The Essence of Salvation

Evangelicals need to rediscover the core meaning of salvation: God Himself

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Evangelicalism has long given shorthand terms for understanding salvation. Whether that’s “Accept Jesus into your heart,” “Make Jesus your personal Lord and Savior,” “Pray this prayer,” “Jesus died for you,” or “Have your sins forgiven,” we evangelicals have no shortage of sayings attempting to describe what happens in Christian salvation.

Though some of these sayings lack the substance to even qualify as a shorthand for salvation (e.g. “pray this prayer”), the larger problem is none of them really get to the core of salvation, the essence of our redemption. They all miss the broader picture of what actually happens in salvation.

In salvation, we speak of many things. We talk about Jesus living a righteous life pleasing to God the Father; dying a gruesome, horrible death on behalf of those who believe; resurrecting three days later in victory; ascending to the right hand of the Father; interceding as high priest for Christians. All of these things are marvelously true. May we never shy away from proclaiming the sinless life of Jesus Christ, His substitutionary death, or His vindicating resurrection.

But you place all these together and they still don’t quite get to the absolute heart, per se, of what salvation is. Salvation, at its core, is God giving Himself to us.

This is the same line of logic behind what Sinclair Ferguson wrote about grace.

There is no such ‘thing’ as grace! Grace is not some appendage to His being. Nor is it some substance that flows from us: ‘Let me give you grace.’ All there is is the Lord Jesus Himself.

The same is true with salvation itself. God does not simply bestow upon us blessings of salvation by giving us things external from Himself. If you break it down, what we receive in salvation is God Himself. Salvation is far more beautiful than we think; it is infinitely more glorious than we could ever imagine. This is why it’s important to ask the question, Do I desire God?

We ask that question because God Himself is at the center of the gospel. When the Lord saves us, we will go to Heaven one day—that will be magnificent! But at the end of the day, the gospel is good news and Heaven is amazing because of God. So, do you want God? Do you desire God, or do you just want perceived benefits?

John Piper, in his book God is the Gospel, wrote:

The critical question for our generation—and for every generation— is this: If you could have heaven, with no sickness, and with all the friends you ever had on earth, and all the food you ever liked, and all the leisure activities you ever enjoyed, and all the natural beauties you ever saw, all the physical pleasures you ever tasted, and no human conflict or any natural disasters, could you be satisfied with heaven, if Christ were not there?

There are many professing Christians who claim they are excited for Heaven but don’t make any well-meaning attempt to follow God in this life. Their praise and worship is mere lip-service, just like the Pharisees. We need to understand that if we are apathetic to the Lord in this life, what makes us think we will love Him in Heaven? These are perhaps the people that would be satisfied in Heaven with Christ absent. Those are also the same people crying out “Lord, Lord!” in Matthew 7:21. It’s simple self-deception.

I don’t mean to harp too much, but this is a major problem in the evangelical church. Heaven is not beautiful because there are streets of gold, endless bliss, and no sin. Heaven is beautiful—Heaven is Heaven—because of God. Everything revolves around Him. He is the source of everything good, everything pure, everything holy. We want to go to Heaven because God is there.

Have you pondered this, friend? Have you given thought to the fact that your salvation is none other than God giving Himself to you? When God saves us, He gives us Himself and invites us into the eternal, communal love of the Godhead. There is literally nothing better than that.