A Continuing Look at Hebrews

A Bit About the Creator

In this post, I am continuing on from a previous one where I began discussing the prologue of the book of Hebrews. 

In Acts 4, Peter and John were presenting their case. They were speaking about this “Jesus” and what they had “seen and heard.” In 4.24 “they lifted their voices to God with one accord and said, ‘O Lord, it is You who made the Heaven and the earth and the sea, and all that is in them.”
The creation of the world was unquestioningly accredited to Israel’s ancestral deity, Yahweh, as their Scriptures attested: Exod 20, Deut 4.32; Psalm 146; 148.1–6; Isa 42.5; 44.24; 45.11–12; Neh 9, Job 38.1–41; Matt 19.4. In this story, they quote “David” (who they call their father) from Psalm 2, who they credit as being the servant of Yahweh (the context of Psalm 2 shows Yahweh and the anointed, messiah): “Who by the Holy Spirit, through the mouth of our father David Your [the same God, Yahweh they attribute with the creation of the world] servant [someone different, who did not create the world], said, 'why did the gentiles rage, and the peoples devise futile things? 'The kings of the earth took their stand, and the rulers were gathered together against the LORD [Yahweh, the creator] and against his [Yahweh, creator] Christ [not Yahweh or creator]’” Acts 4.25-26.

They continue praying to God, the Father (Jesus himself taught them to pray in this manner, Matt 6.9) as verse 24 presents and the contexts of Exodus, Nehemiah, and Psalms bear out, “For truly in this city there were gathered together against Your [God, Yahweh, the creator] holy servant Jesus [someone different, not God, Yahweh the creator], whom You [Yahweh] anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel” Acts 4.27.

Jesus is clearly portrayed (Matt 27.46; Mark 15.34 from Psalm 22; John 20.17; Rev 3.12;) as having called Yahweh his Father and God. If I am processing this correctly, the disciples pray to God, called the Father (who is Yahweh in the Hebrew Bible– Deut 32.6; Jer 31.9, Isa 63.16, 64.8, Mal 2.10) and to whom they credit the creation of the world. They call David his servant, and then Jesus, as the one anointed by Yahweh.

A similar episode is found in Acts 17 where Paul spoke to the Stoic Philosophers in Athens. Paul declared to them that “the God who made the world [kosmos] and all things in it” (vs. 24) desires all to repent, because this God “has fixed a day in which he [the God] will judge the world in righteousness through a man [someone other than the God] whom he [the God] has appointed” and provided “proof to all men by raising him [someone other than the God] from the dead” (vs. 31). 

Paul did not say that the one raised was the creator of all (as John 1 and Hebrews 1 are often interpreted to say), or that Jesus was this “God.” Quite the opposite, he said that this man has been appointed to judge in righteousness and was raised from the dead by this “God,” as a testimony of that choice.

If Jesus was being communicated as the second member of the Trinity, then why wasn’t he given proper credit for the creation of the world (according to traditional John 1; Col 1; Heb 1 interpretation) in this text? It was the God, called Father who was instead credited with the material creative role. They were not praying to Jesus and certainly not to the spirit as a separate entity. What should a proper Trinitarian response be to these apparently confused disciples?

 Back to Hebrews 1, here is another thought that grabbed my attention. As a member of the human race, I am prone to reflect upon my own mortality. When reaching the phrase regarding those “who are about to inherit salvation” (v. 14), it reminded me of the larger NT theme of God’s restorative eschatology. It drew my attention back to how the writer began the chapter, “in these last days.” In the use of the word eschaton, the writer refers to the time but emphasizes the means by which God is communicating. Perhaps the author believes that these “last days” may continue for any length of time. The point is that God has now spoken through a son, in a way similar to what had been done through the prophets.

The whole point I saw being communicated was that as Christians, we have hope. This chapter seems set to that tune. The old saying goes, “hope is hearing the music of the future, and faith is dancing to it today.” The world is a mess and things are bad, but through this son, God has revealed more of the cosmic plan of remediation and justice than had been revealed before. 

The author of Hebrews continues to develop these themes throughout the book, and as we immerse ourselves in the message, it places our hope on the one for whom we wait. While today and tomorrow may not signify the end, that is not ultimately what matters. What matters is that he has been seated at the right hand of God and at the proper moment, the tide will turn and justice will be the order of the day. I like N. T. Wright’s exclamation in his book Surprised by Scripture, “Jesus is coming – plant a tree.”

Acts' Story: Sent from Jerusalem

Acts 8.4-9.43.
The time came and the witnesses to all that had happened in Jerusalem made their way into other regions of the ancient world. New challenges arose, but also many joys unfolded. In this story, we find a mirror to our own world: who are the unsung heroes behind the scenes of our lives? Are we proclaimers of our Lord or rather of ourselves?

Here is the podcast, and on iTunes.

Here is the PowerPoint

Acts' Story: Strife in Jerusalem

In Jerusalem, God’s power through Jesus’ spirit, and the actions of the apostles has taken center stage. In the next part of the story, other characters are faced with obstacles and challenges as the Church grows and continues to spread the word about what God has done for his people through Jesus.

Here is the podcast and here on iTunes.

Here is the video.

Acts' Story: Power in Jerusalem

The story of emergent Christianity continues with the early followers still frequenting the Temple. In this next chapter of the story, Peter and John go up to the temple for the time of prayer. Here, miraculous power is observed through the connection to the name of Jesus. How is it that this power drove the message onward?

Here is the link to the podcast, for those who would prefer it. Also in iTunes.

Here is the video:

Here is the PowerPoint:

Acts' Story: Anointed in Jerusalem

Much of Luke’s purpose is recognized through the story he tells. He demonstrates how Israel’s earlier history was being realized in new ways. He told his story with Israel’s legacy as a backdrop, and stuck to a pattern of using Hebrew Bible themes for the sake of showing the continuity of salvation history.

The people for whom he wrote would have readily understood the themes from which he formed his story, as these were quite familiar.

In the same way that story can powerfully motivate us today, so it did for them. But it was not just any story; it was the legacy of an entire people. By retelling, howbeit in new forms and different ways, the truths of the past were carried into their present to bring to light how God was at work. Without the spirit there would be no story to tell, there would be no assembly and no way to follow.

Here is the PowerPoint:

Acts' Story: Beginning From Jerusalem

I will continue posting my series on the "Gospel as Peace" in the next few weeks. This post, however, is to share something a bit different with you. I have been afforded the privilege to fill-in at a local congregation for a few months. Throughout my time there, we will be examining the book of Acts.

The Acts of the Apostles is without question the most exciting and dramatic book in the New Testament, and possibly in the entire Bible. The story of the beginnings, of what became known as Christianity, is narrated with great vigor and vividness, leaving its reader wide-eyed in amazement. Even today, this book has the ability to ignite passion and stir emotion from those within the faith community.

We will begin this adventure examining what we can know about who, where, when, why, and how, and then, as best as we can, listen with their ears, read through their eyes to see what God is saying to us in our time. It all began in Jerusalem…
Note: The last few minutes of my final text, comments, conclusions, application were cut-off due to a technical glitche.

Here is the PowerPoint:

Let’s Be On Our Way – John 14:25-31

“For it is not right that a worshipper of God should be injured by another worshipper of God.”

–Lactantius[1]

            Historically, it is no secret that diverse Christianities have had difficulties dwelling together peacefully. Strife among God’s people can be traced almost anywhere, anytime to anything imaginable under heaven.

C. S. Lewis famously remarked that the quickest way to a desired destination – if a wrong turn has been taken – is to get back to the right road. The individual making an about-turn first, though seemingly counter-productive, is the most progressive.[2]

Doctrinal dissension has arguably proven to be divisive and destructive throughout the history of the Church.[3] This text is a prime example of such a battleground. It is a theological lithosphere of christological, pneumatological and ultimately Trinitarian layers which shifted[4] early and shook Christianity to its core for centuries.[5] Not only is there what some see as a proto-Trinitarian formation,[6] there is also an unavoidable subordinationist Christology present.[7]

As it happened, to argue that Jesus was equal in divine majesty to God the Father required “considerable literary ingenuity”[8] to explain these texts. The result was a widened rift between the subordinationists and those in favor of the Nicene Creed. Gregory of Nyssa described, 

“If in this city you ask anyone for change, he will discuss with you whether the Son is begotten or unbegotten. If you ask about the quality of bread, you will receive the answer that, ‘the Father is greater, the Son is less.’ If you suggest that a bath is desirable, you will be told that ‘there was nothing before the Son was created.’”[9]

Having personally been involved in unavoidable, chaotic feuds merely for being open-minded theologically, I am more convinced than ever that relating to our brothers and sisters in Christ with peaceful and humane dialogue is the only way forward. One’s conviction on any given text is never grounds to degrade or deride a perceived theological opponent or, in consideration of Church history, use violence. “Loving one another,”[10] as so frequently and plainly taught within the Johannine corpus, should never be annexed for that which is speculative, and the subject of constant debate.

Regardless of one’s Christology, Jesus – as God’s executive agent and revealer[11] – has given a supreme example of perfect peace.[12]  Though conflict came to him, 

“Christ did not become what men were; he became what they were meant to be, and what they too, through accepting him, actually became.”[13]

Before actually leaving, Jesus prayed: “[that] they may be one, as we are one” (John 17:22 NRS). Believers in Jesus have the hope that he will indeed return, 

“He is the promise, but the Father is the fulfillment. What Jesus says here about his own death applies also to the death of individual Christians.”[14] 

Until that time, we have the responsibility of emulating his example to love each other, even if our theological, doctrinal or political views don’t always mesh. By grasping onto the theme of the Prince of Peace we can bring the shalom[15] of the age to come into our present, one selfless action at a time. Let’s make an about-turn and get-on. “Let us go from here.” Let’s keep conversing, but be of the same mind and in the same love through humility while we do.[16]

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[1] A Treatise on the Anger of God, 13.99 (ANF 7.271).

[2] C. S. Lewis, “Mere Christianity,” The Complete C. S. Lewis Signature Classics (New York, NY.: Harper One, 1952, 2002) 33.

[3] Swartley seems to imply that some are not as prone toward provocations of this nature: “Even among Mennonites, historically considered sectarian, one finds both high christology adhered to be some and a considerably lower christology adhered to by others.” Willard M. Swartley, Covenant of Peace: The Missing Peace in New Testament Theology and Ethics (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2006), 296 (fn. 48).

[4] Hans Küng, Christianity : Essence, History, and Future (New York, NY.: Continuum Publishing Co, 1996), 170-71.

[5] See Professor of Conflict Resolution Richard Rubenstein’s excellent book, When Jesus Became God: The Epic Fight over Christ’s Divinity in the Last Days of Rome (Orlando, FL.: Harcourt Brace and Company, 1999), 7-8.

[6] George R. Beasley-Murray, Word Biblical Commentary: John, vol. 36 (Dallas, TX.: Word, Incorporated, 2002), 261; Craig S. Keener, The Gospel of John: A Commentary, vol. 2 (Grand Rapids, MI.: Baker Academic, 2003), 2:976.

[7] C. K. Barrett, “The Father is Great Than I,” Essays on John (London, SPCK, 1982), 19-36; Karl-Josef Kuschel, Born Before All Time? : The Dispute Over Christ’s Origin, trans. John Bowden (New York, NY.: The Crossroad Publishing Company, 1992), 388.

[8] Charles Freeman, A.D. 381: Heretics, Pagans, of the Monotheistic State (New York, NY.: Overlook Press, 2009), 60.

[9] Joseph H. Lynch, Early Christianity: A Brief History (New York, NY.: Oxford University Press, 2010), 166.

[10] John 13:34-35; 15:12, 17; 17:26; 21:15-17. Even the Johannine Epistles carry this theme: cf. 1 Joh 3:10-11, 14, 16, 18, 23; 4:7-8, 11-12, 16-21; 5:2; 2 Jo 1:5.

[11] Barrett 1982, 23.

[12] F. F. Bruce points out, “the world can only wish peace; Jesus gives it.” F. F. Bruce, The Gospel of John: Introduction, Exposition and Notes (Grand Rapids, MI.: Wm. B. Eerdman’s Publishing Co., 1983), 307 (Fn. 14).

[13] John A.T. Robinson, The Priority of John, ed. J. F. Coakley (Oak Park, IL.: Meyer-Stone Books, 1985), 378.

[14] Ernst  Haenchen, Robert W. Funk, and Ulrich Busse, John 2: A Commentary on the Gospel of John, Chapters 7-21 (Philadelphia, PA.: Fortress Press, 1984), 128. See (Keener 2003, 982).

[15]  “Peace was believed to be a feature of righteous royal rule and of the messianic age.” Marianne Meye Thompson, John: A Commentary (Louisville, KY.: Westminster John Knox Press, 2015), 316

[16] Phil 2:1-3.

Storied Salvation: Assurance

Salvation According to Paul: Assurance

“Paul would certainly see 'salvation' as secured through 'belief in the Lord Jesus', however much such belief would have to be spelled out in any particular case.”[1]

The book of Jude with its unique content and non-canonical citations contains a noteworthy warning to its readership:

“Now I desire to remind you, though you know all things once for all, that the Lord, after saving a people out of the land of Egypt, subsequently destroyed those who did not believe” Jud 1:5.

The idea that belief and obedience are mutually exclusive or autonomous is not found in the OT or apostolic tradition. God does indeed secure his people, but not without their consent or cooperation. Security and safety are found in continual obedience to God; it’s his word not ours. Once the later idea that grace and obedience are separate from each other is removed – one being accomplished by God’s fiat alone and the other optional by us – Jude’s warning is perfectly appropriate. “Those who did not believe” are not those who wandered into heresy,[2] but rather those who after participating in God’s renewing and restoration power refused to participate and act in the obedience required to be part of that kingdom. This is not a matter of maintaining proper theology, but rather a failure to put into action God’s commands. There are numerous examples of faith as obedience, where those who were once obedient but did not continue on that path were subsequently judged by God.

The psalmist wrote:

“The salvation of the righteous is from the LORD; He is their strength in time of trouble. The LORD helps them and delivers them; He delivers them from the wicked and saves them, Because they take refuge in Him” Ps 37:39-40.

There is no question that Yahweh is the source, character, nature, substance, and reality of salvation. It depends on his faithfulness, consistency and reliability, not our wavering attempts. Does this then describe our eternal security; are we eternally secure? I believe that is the wrong question to ask. A better question is, “Who are the righteous,” which the passage describes? This passage (and others like it) is about the righteous, a topic about which the OT (especially the Psalms) has a lot to say. Jesus came teaching Israel what the actions of a righteous (kingdom citizen) look like. God himself is our guarantee, as Paul said, “by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption” Eph 4:30.[3]

Within the idiomatic way biblical language works, salvation can be spoken of as an accomplished action, although in modern ways of reckoning it causes substantial confusion regarding that from which we are being “saved.”

The proof of spiritual transformation in the Gospels is the confirmation of the people and the spirit of God. There is a sense in which the principle, first taught in the OT, and taught also by Jesus with the witness of at least two, is appropriate. It’s not a matter of self-confirming statements, but rather community affirmation. Obedience is obvious.

“The sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death” 2 Cor 7:10.

The declaration by many dedicated men of God should ring in our ear; hineni, “here I am,” your servant waits for your instruction. Obedience is the best gauge in the present regarding one’s salvation being a reality in the future.

“The righteous dead still await the promised resurrection, 'God' has singled out Jesus, bestowing on him, uniquely, resurrected existence and making him thereby the exemplar of what believers can hope for and the assurance that their hope in 'God's' readiness and power to raise the dead is not in vain (esp. 1 Cor 15:20-58; Heb 2:5-18; 1 John 3:1-3). Resurrection, thus, is presented as the essential means by which ‘God’ will demonstrate faithfulness to believers, and their hoped-for salvation/vindication is directly patterned after what 'God' did in/for Jesus. . . . So, 'God' in the NT is emphatically known as the deity who raised Jesus from the dead and exalted him to glory, which justifies and even demands now that Jesus be proclaimed as 'Lord' (e.g., Phil 2:9-11). But God's resurrection of Jesus also serves to signal incomparably this God's great power and purpose, which are to eventuate in a personal/bodily glorification of believers that is patterned after that given to Jesus.”^[4]

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[1] J. D. G. Dunn, Beginning from Jerusalem, Christianity in the Making, vol. 2 (Erdmans, 2008), 674.

[2] 1 Tim 4:16.

[3] Eze 9:4; Eph 1:13-4; 4:30; 2 Cor 1:21-2; 5:5; 2 Tim 2:19; Rev 7:3; 9:4.

[4] L. W. Hurtado, God in New Testament Theology (Abingdon Press, 2010), 42.

Storied Salvation: Part XVIII

Salvation According to Paul: Present

“The word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” 1 Co 1:18.

The NT sometimes indicates that salvation, justification, redemption, adoption, glorification, and resurrection are both past and present realities.[1] However, the larger scope of salvation is indeed God's rescue operation for all humanity from sin and death through messiah, which culminates in resurrection where death is destroyed for those who sleep in the dust. It cannot be ignored that this is also an eschatological final deliverance of Israel and the saints from their physical enemies.

“Jesus believed that there was one God who had made the world, and who had called Israel to be his people; that this one God had promised to be with his people, and guide them to their destiny, their new exodus; that his presence, guidance and ultimately salvation were symbolized, brought into reality, in and through Temple, Torah, Wisdom, Word and Spirit. He was a first-century Jewish monotheist.”[2]

Along with the role of God as savior and deliverer, Scripture also places an emphasis on the role his people play in the present, as it is the present that determines the future. Endurance, persistence, determination, tenacity, patience, and ultimately obedience are all intimately connected as actions of the faithful. Faith is an action-oriented dynamic based on God’s covenant-keeping character, not something I retain as a medallion.

Participation is the reality. Faith without action has no validity. Upon consideration of the Shema one will discover that hearing, as a Jew would describe it, is done in ones “feet,” meaning it is action-based, hearing that immediately translates into action, a.k.a. obedience.

“Theologically, salvation depends to some extent on the individual's faith in Yahweh. Ps. 37:40 affirms that Yahweh saves ‘because they take refuge in him’ (cf. 13:5[6]; 25:5; 42:5[6]; 65:5[6]; 78:22; 86:2; 119:94; Lam 3:26; et al.). Ps 119:146 appeals your personal deliverance to achieve a purpose – ‘I will keep your statutes.’”[3]

When Paul wrote in Romans 10:17 that “faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ,” he no doubt had the Shema in mind. While the “word of Messiah” is without question the Good News about the Kingdom of God which he proclaimed, in Paul’s mind faith, i.e. action/obedience, results in salvation. We have been conditioned far too long to think that salvation is an object of our possession that can exist independent of our behavior. Yahweh, the covenant-keeping God, is secure; it is us, when un-faith-ful, who have no salvation. If we choose to act as though we possess a free pass and nothing more is required, we have chosen to abandon the relationship and the means by which we are made righteous.

It is in this present time – while we wait, train for service and live as citizens of a kingdom to come – that we can say with Paul, that we too are working out our salvation with fear and trembling.[4] Deliverance is the result of our dynamic interaction with him through his promise. Salvation exists by God’s grace towards his people and the obedience on their behalf with his assistance. Our work is God’s work too. In the NT, the work in and through a believer is an expression of God’s renewing, restoring and salvific action. Salvation is not about going to heaven, but rather being raised from death for life on God’s renewed earth. We anticipate in the present what will become full reality in the future.

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[1] Rom. 3:24; Eph. 1:7; Col. 1:14.

[2] Wright, Victory, 652.

[3] William A. VanGemeren, “ישע,” New International Dictionary of Old Testament Theology and Exegesis (Grandrapids, MI.: Zondervan, 1997), 2:560.

[4] Phil 3:20; 2:12, 

Storied Salvation: Part XVII

Salvation According to Paul: Past

Paul occasionally uses the past tense when referring to salvation: 

I. “For in hope we have been saved” (Rom 8:24, cf. Tit 2:11).

Although the verb used is in the aorist tense – denoting something that has been done – for Paul the nature of hope is anticipation,

“We . . . groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of the body” (Rom 8:23).

The adoption for which believers long for is their final salvation. The “inward groaning” experienced by believers and creation (8:22) is as Dunn describes,

“the inward sense of frustration of individual believers (as a whole) at the eschatological tension of living in the overlap of the ages seems the most obvious reference, not least in view of the parallel with v 26 and 2 Cor 5:2, 4.” J. D. G. Dunn, Word Biblical Commentary: Romans 1-8 (Dallas: Word, Incorporated, 2002), 38A:474.

It is the redemption of the body, i.e. resurrection which is to be fully realized. This is evident in what the apostle explains,

“hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees . . . if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it” (Rom 8:24-25, cf. 2 Cor 5:7).

“Hope in the NT is always future oriented, and unseen in the sense that the object of hope is yet to be revealed. Yet hope is not wishful thinking, but what the writer to the Hebrews describes as both ‘sure’ and ‘certain’ (Heb 11:1).” Colin G. Kruse, The Pillar New Testament Commentary: Paul’s Letter to the Romans (Grand Rapids, MI.: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2012), 350. [1] 

II. “For by grace you have been saved through faith” (Eph 2:8).

In the context of this passage there are clues that through Paul’s strong use of metaphor and the use of the past tense, he alludes to a future reality. Paul’s wording “made alive” (v. 5) and “raised us up and seated us with Him in the heavenly places” (v. 6) seems to specify “so that in the ages to come” (v. 7) a reference to glorification that awaits the saints. 

It is also possible that Paul sees believers being represented in heaven, Christ having been seated at the right hand of God (cf. Rom 8:16-24). [2]

III. “He [God our Savior] saved us, not on the basis of deeds” (Tit 3:5).

Here, the mention of “saved” although past, is tied to the hope of future life in the age to come (v. 7).

IV. “He [the Father] rescued us from the domain of darkness” (Col 1:13).

The context in Paul’s greeting is the inheritance that is being shared with the saints. Through the spirit, the guarantee, the first-fruits of what is to come, was given. This is sometimes called “now and not yet.”

Regardless of one’s eschatological orientation, it seems most are agreed that this present age – with its domain of darkness – is not as it should be and as it will be in the age to come. What is ahead, how to fix the problems now, and what God intends are usually where debate centers. Paul, though, envisions the people of God connected with the Messiah and saved in the manner which he described in detail to the Corinthians, “first-fruits.”

“The Messiah has been raised from the dead, as the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep” 1 Cor 15:20 (Wright, KNT).

First-fruits was an offering of the first-ripened grain, harvested and presented to God in celebration and thanks for the whole harvest which would follow.

“‘We were saved,’ says Paul in Romans 8:24, ‘in hope.’ The verb ‘we were saved’ indicates a past action, something that has already taken place, referring obviously to the complex of faith and baptism of which Paul has been speaking in the letter so far. But this remains ‘in hope’ because we still look forward to the ultimate future salvation of which he speaks ‘in (for instance) Romans 5:9, 10. This explains at a stroke the otherwise puzzling fact that the New Testament often refers to salvation and being saved in terms of bodily events within the present world.” Wright, Surprised by Hope, 210-11.

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[1] See also J. D. G. Dunn, Neither Jew nor Greek: A Contested Identity, Christianity in the Making, v. 3 (Erdmans, 2015), 714.

[2] See F.F. Bruce, The New International Commentary on the New Testament, The Epistle to the Colossians, to Philemon, and to the Ephesians (Grand Rapids, MI.:William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1984), 287.

Storied Salvation: Part XVI

Salvation According to Paul

Introduction.

Paul had a resurrection based soteriology. Paul and Luke are both most interested in salvation along with its progression. Paul used the verb sōzō (to save) twenty-nine times, topping anyone else in the NT. He makes up for half of the twenty-four times the noun sōtēr (savior) is used in the NT. Eighteen times he employed sōtēria (salvation) and singularly used sōtērion (salvation) and sōtērios (bringing salvation). He also used the verb rhuomai (deliver, rescue) eleven times.

When speaking of saving some of his fellow Israelites (e.g. Rom. 11:14), Paul did not intend that his own actions would effect salvation, but rather he provided them with the message given him by God, thereby causing them to turn and enter into the deliverance to be provided by God in Christ.

“Knowing the time, that it is already the hour for you to awaken from sleep; for now salvation is nearer to us than when we believed” (Rom 13:11).

“In popular evangelicalism salvation is constantly spoken of as something only in the past: ‘when I got saved . . .’ In the NT the balance of the salvation statements is in favor of a yet future final salvation. The NT says too that we ‘are being saved.’ (1 Cor. 1:18; 2 Cor. 2:15).” [1]

Paul used the word egeiro (to wake), which can have no connection to asking Jesus to be a personal savior. Otherwise Paul could have not said salvation was still before us, and nearer than before, when we first believed. If the “day of salvation” (1 Cor 6:2; Isa 49:8) is the day I “made a decision” for Jesus, then that day is behind me and getting further every day. Paul undoubtedly had something else in mind.

Ergo, it should not come as a surprise that Paul was thinking much larger. The word egeiro is the same word used for the raising of the dead, no doubt making connection with the LXX. Passages such as Daniel 12 could be recalled, 

“those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake, these to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. . . . you will enter into rest and rise again for your allotted portion at the end of the age” v. 2, 13.

“The day of salvation” points toward a time of full restoration of cosmic proportions, the arrival of the long-awaited rule of God and the triumph over his enemies. This includes the enemy of death. This is vital within Paul’s soteriology, e.g. 1 Cor 15, possibly even relating to the exodus and the personal force, the destroyer. The entire order of the cosmos is about to be overturned and Yahweh – through his anointed, established and declared regent-king Jesus – will at last deliver his people from not only their present enemies, but the enemy that has plagued humanity all throughout history.

This is not a matter of a “personal rescue” operation (although that is not excluded). It’s much larger. Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection became the first-fruits of a larger harvest in the garden of God. In the OT God is sometimes a farmer/gardener and Israel is a tree, vine whose purpose is to yield fruit. In Jesus parables, the same metaphor is used. Even after Jesus’ resurrection, he is mistaken for a “gardener.” There can be little question that an allusion to God’s garden (Eden/restoration) and Jesus’ role as caretaker is being communicated. 

The seeds have been planted and life will come shooting out of the ground at God’s timing. The re-establishment of God’s divine order will be underway, and creation will revert to its original intent for which it was designed.   

 “This inaugurated eschatology is the primary driver for Paul’s redefinition of what it means to be God’s people (which is what he is still talking about, rather than any abstract scheme of ‘how people get saved’ which ignores the Israel dimension). If the end has come forward into the present—if the Messiah has arrived in the middle of history—if resurrection itself has happened in one case while death still appears to reign all around—then the verdict of the last day is already known, and the careful eschatological schemes by which various quite different groups of Jews had organized themselves, their lives and their soteriologies must be seen in a different light.”[2]

For Paul, deliverance from sin is important because it affects one’s relationship to the “wrath or judgment of God,” although it is more common for him to simply speak of “salvation” rather than that from which one is saved. However, being “saved from sin” for Paul is tantamount to being released from the implications of God’s active justice which inevitably culminates in death. The Messiah Jesus, the man whom God has raised in declaration of divine appointment as judge, will enact God’s justice and reform. While being “saved from sin” manifests itself in corporeal and temporal benefits, Paul’s larger emphasis is eschatological when surveying the usage alongside his proclamation of the Gospel of the kingdom and parousia language.

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[1] A. Buzzard, “Romans 13:11,” The One God the Father, One Man Messiah Translation (Restoration Fellowship, 2015), 403.

[2] Wright, Justification, 148.

Storied Salvation: Part XV

Salvation From Sin

While salvation from sin is a theme, the priority and later focus of the Church on this aspect – as though it encompassed the greater meaning of Jesus mission – misses the point. Jews in the first-century were not concerned about forgiveness and God’s dealing with their sin because God had already made provision for this.

“There is no sign that first-century Jews were walking around gloomily wondering how their sins were ever going to be forgiven. They had the Temple and the sacrificial system, which took care of all that. If Jesus had only said what a lot of Western Christians seem to think he said, he would have been just a big yawn-maker. What he in fact said was so revolutionary that it woke everybody up.”[1]

Disease in the Gospels is often equated with sin. By forgiving sin and/or delivering one from the stated affliction, salvation had come. This was salvation from the certain death which would have ensued had there not been direct intervention.

“In the healings of both the woman with the hemorrhage (Mark 5.84 par.) and the blind Bartimaeus (Mark 10.52 par.), Jesus proclaims that their faith has ‘saved’ them; most recent translations correctly render the Greek verb sōzō ‘has made you well’; cf. Mark 3.4; 5.23, 28; 6.56; Luke 17.19; Matt. 27.42 par.) Likewise, sōzō is used by the disciples when they thought they were drowning (Matt. 8.25; cf. 14.30) and (in a compound form) of Paul's escape from shipwreck (Acts 27.44; 28.1).”[2]

The works Jesus did correspond to the greater theme of his eschatological motif which pointed to the signs given by the prophets as to what Yahweh would do when he ushered in this “age to come.”

“Mostly, Jesus himself got a hearing from his contemporaries because of what he was doing. They saw him saving people from sickness and death, and they heard him talking about a salvation, the message for which they had longed, that would go beyond the immediate into the ultimate future. But the two were not unrelated, the present one a mere visual aid of the future one or a trick to gain people’s attention. The whole point of what Jesus was up to was that he was doing, close up, in the present, what he was promising long-term, in the future. And what he was promising for that future, and doing in that present, was not saving souls for a disembodied eternity but rescuing people from the corruption and decay of the way the world presently is so they could enjoy, already in the present, that renewal of creation which is God’s ultimate purpose—and so they could thus become colleagues and partners in that larger project.”[3]

The metaphorical use of salvation is often applied to the present:

“The death and resurrection of Jesus are the inauguration of the promised new age; and this ‘age to come’ is the long-awaited time of deliverance. The Jewish metaphorical meaning (resurrection as the rescue and restoration of Israel after exile and oppression) is retained but transformed: the divine rescue operation through Jesus is for all people, and delivers Jew and Gentile alike from the present evil age.”[4]

Jesus actively intervened in the chaos (“destroying the works of the Devil”)[5] of peoples’ lives, making the lame walk, the blind see, the deaf hear, and the mute speak. In this manner, he brought the salvation of the future, when all will be right, into a small geographical region and to a relatively small number of people (cf. Luke 4:23-27) as a taste of what Yahweh would do on a grand scale. The prophets had foretold these things were to happen. 

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[1] N.T. Wright, Who was Jesus (William B Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1992), 98.

[2] Meier and Metzger, Oxford Companion to the Bible, 670.

[3] Wright, Surprised by Hope, 204.

[4] Wright, Resurrection, 220

[5] 1 John 3:8.

Storied Salvation: Part XIV

John

This Gospel is interested not only in OT fulfillment but showing Jesus as the climax which scriptural history has pointed. Within salvation-history, John highlights the respective roles of Abraham, Moses and Isaiah as particularly important. In John, Jesus indicates that these individuals were pointing towards him as the fulfillment in God’s final redemption of Israel (salvation is of the Jews), and the gentiles by way of inclusion.

"In the gospel of John not only is Jesus identified as ‘savior,’ an interpretation of his name . . . but the object of salvation is frequently identified as ‘the world’ (Grk. kosmos) the created order now at enmity with God and therefore in need of salvation through Jesus (John 8.16-17; 12.47; cf. Rev. 12.10-12). A large number of personal names are derived from the Hebrew root yš, including those of Moses' successor Joshua, the prophets Hosea, Isaiah, and probably Elisha, the Moabite king Mesha, and Jesus (a Grk. form of Hebr. yēšûa; see Matt. 1.21 John 4.42; Acts 5.3 1; Phil. 3.20; Eph. 5.28; Titus 1.4; 2 Pet. 1.1); in all of these names God rather than the person with the name is explicitly or implicitly the agent of salvation. The exclamation transliterated ‘Hosanna’ is also from this root.”[1]

Dualism

It is also worth noting that the Platonic view of dualism,[2] where one’s “soul is saved,” does not have its root in OT or NT theology. A passage used to support this theory is Luke 21:19, 

“By your endurance you will gain your souls” (NRS). 

Within this paradigm, the soul is separate from mortal existence; therefore it’s the soul that is saved. The body is left behind upon death and replaced with a new “resurrection” incorporeal body. In this view, a redefinition of “you,” is essential. Here the individual is the combination of the soul (immaterial) and the mortal tent, i.e. the human shell (material), in which they dwell. One of the problems with this is that only part of you is delivered upon death, not all of you. 

Other translations correct this issue by rendering the verse similar to the NASB, “you will gain your lives.” In Hebraic understanding, the Greek concept of “soul” is impossible. The Greek word in question, psyche has historically been translated soul, no doubt from its use in Greek philosophy. In context, “salvation of life” is what is being presented. God is the God of the living (cf. Matt 22:32; Mk 12:27; Lk 20:38) and it is lives not souls that are in need of deliverance.[3] The Platonic and Augustinian idea of soul is in need of correction.

“For the first Christians, the ultimate salvation was all about God’s new world, and the point of what Jesus and the apostles were doing when they were healing people or being rescued from shipwreck or whatever was that this was a proper anticipation of that ultimate salvation, that healing transformation of space, time, and matter. The future rescue that God had planned and promised was starting to come true in the present. We are saved not as souls but as wholes.”[4]

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[1] Meier and Metzger, Oxford Companion to the Bible, 669-70.

[2] This is the popular view that human beings are compartmentalized into body and soul (sometimes with a side of spirit).

[3] For a short treatment of this see in OT John Walton, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible (Baker Academic, 2006), 210-14.

[4] Wright, Surprised by Hope, 211.

Storied Salvation: Part XIII

Mark

When Jesus came on the scene preaching and inaugurating the kingdom of God, a conflict was presented between the forces of good and evil, of God’s kingdom and the anti-kingdom. Jesus’ message, authority, and his substantial role in salvation-history are derived from God. Mark’s emphasis on various elements of the story offered a nuanced telling of the stunning proclamation of Jesus’ authority and lordship for his audience.[1]

“The adherence to Jesus remains a precondition for eschatological salvation during the post resurrection period. . . . In the face of persecution and affliction during Jesus' absence the precondition for participation in the eschatological salvation is faithfulness to Jesus and the Gospel: whoever denies inherence to Jesus or the gospel (Mk 8:38 parentheses) forfeits salvation (Mk 8:34, 38; cf. Mk 4:16-19). . . . For Mark, salvation first of all means participation in God's eschatological reign (Mk 1:14-15; 9:47; 10:24-25), which will be brought about finally when the Son of Man returns (Mk 8:38-9:1; 13:24-27). The coming of the Son of Man is depicted as God’s final judgment and is understood as the destruction of God's enemies. Salvation therefore entails being saved from God's final judgment administered by the Son of Man (Mk 8:34-9:1; 13:24-27; 14:62).” [2]

Luke

It is Luke’s Gospel that has Simeon declaring that the salvation Jesus brings into history will be a “light of revelation for the gentiles” (2:32). This theme is realized in the mission portrayed throughout Acts. 

“Luke’s massive two-volume work can be read as claiming, among many other things, that this status ought now to belong to the Christians. They are the ones who have inherited the Jewish promises of salvation; they are the ones to whom accrues the status proper to a religion of great antiquity.” [3]

 “Luke clearly grasped the equally important Jewish belief that when Israel was redeemed the whole world would be blessed. Israel’s salvation was not to be a private affair only: it was to be for the benefit of all. The good news of the established kingdom would have to impinge on the Gentile world. Since, therefore, he believed that this good news had taken the form of the life, and particularly the death and resurrection, of one human being, and since this was a Jewish message for the Gentile world, Luke blended together two apparently incompatible genres with consummate skill. He told the story of Jesus as a Jewish story, indeed as the Jewish story, much as Josephus told the story of the fall of Jerusalem as the climax of Israel’s long and tragic history. But he told it in such a way as to say to his non-Jewish Greco-Roman audience: here, in the life of this one man, is the Jewish message of salvation that you pagans need.”[4]

“‘Salvation’ is a particularly Lukan theme whose thesis is that ‘the idea of salvation supplies the key to the theology of Luke’ but familiar in (in verb or noun) in all strands of early Christianity.”[5]

At the circumcision of John the Baptist, Zacharias prophesied concerning not only John, but regarding Luke’s greater message of God’s eschatological salvation-history:[6]

“Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, For He has visited us and accomplished redemption for His people, And has raised up a horn of salvation for us In the house of David His servant-- As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from of old-- Salvation FROM OUR ENEMIES, And FROM THE HAND OF ALL WHO HATE US; To show mercy toward our fathers, And to remember His holy covenant, The oath which He swore to Abraham our father, To grant us that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies, Might serve Him without fear, In holiness and righteousness before Him all our days” Luke 1:68-75. 

Notice that the wording of this prophecy is in the past tense, “visited,” “accomplished,” “raised,” but yet Jesus hadn’t even been born at this time. Speaking in the past tense of something that is assured is an idiomatic expression common throughout biblical and Hebraic literature.

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[1] For example see Thomas Schmidt, “Jesus Triumphal March to Crucifixion: The Sacred Way as Roman Procession” Biblical Review (Feb. 1997), 30.

[2] Joel B. Green, “Salvation,” Dictionary of Jesus and the Gospel's, Second Ed. (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2013) 827.

[3] Wright, People of God, 376-7.

[4] Ibid., 381. (cf. Acts 17).

[5] J. D. G. Dunn, Beginning from Jerusalem, Christianity in the Making, v. 2 (Erdmans, 2008), 672.

[6] In Acts 28, verse 28 appears to equate the gentiles listening to the “salvation of God” with Paul’s preaching the Kingdom of God in verse 31.