Dear Christians: What is Salvation? 🤔

[@ssshadowwolf6762]

What a loaded question bc it varies widely ( seems they can’t manage to agree ). I was taught to “ persevereth unto the end “ in a good way . Others think you can have some sort of experience which = “ saved “. Good advice Ack !

[@ntertanedangel]

Here goes nothing.... I'm Protestant, btw Imagine you stole something and you get caught red-handed, and the punishment for stealing in your country is death. So you're sitting on death row with no hope, knowing you're guilty and you're going to die. While in prison you find out that the person you stole from was the greatest, kindest, most generous person who's ever lived, so now you're feeling extra guilty. But one day, the warden comes to your cell and says "you're free to go, someone has volunteered to take your place." Curious about who would do such a thing, you decide to attend the execution, and it turns out it's the guy you stole from. The execution is protracted, and bloody, and torturous, and the whole time you're witnessing it you're thinking "He doesn't deserve this, but I do." A few days later, you get a letter from that man, mailed before he died, and it says, "I wanted to let you know why I chose to take your place: I'm actually your father. You may not remember, but when you were young, you ran away from home, and I've been trying to find you and bring you home ever since, but you just keep running. So I'm actually so grateful for the chance to do this for you so that you have another opportunity to turn your life around. I just hope that one day you might choose to call me 'Father' again. I love you." After all of that, what is your response? Are you going to say "all right, well I got off scott free, so I'm going to start planning my next heist"? I certainly hope not. Technically, yes, you did get off scott free, but it required the suffering and death of the greatest man to ever live, who did it out of love for you, because he wanted to be reconciled to you and give you a loving family. If you've really processed that, it's going to affect the way you live, the way you see the world, and everything else. Can you sin? Yes, but you wouldn't want to, out of love and respect for the man's sacrifice. So, yes, Jesus dying for my sins is a free gift, and I don't have to be a good person to receive it. But receiving it requires accepting it, and accepting it requires some level of understanding it. And if I understand it, I won't want to sin. Not out of a fear of punishment, but out of gratitude to God. All Christians sin, because we're all imperfect, but all Christians should also be taking part in the process of sanctification, or becoming more holy and getting closer to God. If there's a Christian who continues to brazenly sin without remorse or repentance, I'm not going to say if they're saved or not because I don't know their hearts. But I would suspect that they haven't genuinely "gotten it," which may mean they haven't genuinely accepted the gift of salvation. The thing is, we ALL are on death row. We've all sinned. We all deserve death. And praying and fasting and giving to the poor is great, but it doesn't exonerate you. The only thing that does exonerate you is Jesus taking your place, which is offered to everyone, but not accepted by everyone. I don't think you can say this is an unloving God just because you're choosing not to accept his gift.

[@thinkingbiblically1708]

Thank you @ntertanedangel for explaining the Gospel clearly. I really like the example you have used. The Gospel says, you are saved not because of what you do for God, but you are saved because of what God has done for you. The salvation is a gift from God. You don't earn a gift. When you receive a gift that you don't deserve, you want to be grateful to the person you have received the gift from. When a person becomes a Christian in a true sense, he/she wants to please the Lord through every area of his/her life.

[@sportyfifi7192]

This is the best thing i have ever read

[@tilenvipotnik4018]

The people you described are not Christians. They are lukewarm - Revelation 3:15-16 where Jesus says, "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm-neither hot nor cold-I am about to spit you out of my mouth."