salvation

How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard [him]; [Heb. 2:3]

It has been on my mind for days on end just what it means to walk in an “accomplished salvation”. Hebrews describes this salvation as pertaining to a company of people birthed into a new creation who shall have dominion over the world that is to come. That is to say, they do not have dominion over the world as it now stands, but they will have dominion over that which is coming after.

Many believe they should have dominion over the world that presently is — or that they soon will have it as they exercise faith and spiritual authority. Some believe that the lack of dominion comes from not exercising faith. They must take back the world for God through various means — prayer, miraculous words, subversion of wicked public policies and flooding key systems of the world with Christians who will gain the power to enforce righteousness.

Next to all this are the trials that believers go through privately. How does one take back the world for Christ while fighting tremendous private battles? Still, many go through — and even overcome — great evil, believing that God is training them for something bigger. It’s always around the corner. Eventually, they will have that ministry or will step into some role. And then they die anyway before seeing that accomplished. I have witnessed this too much with my own eyes. Their deaths resolve little about what God’s goal was in their lives.

It would seem that the trials we go through are mostly no different than what the world goes through. Many of us believe these are “special” trials in our case. Numbers of us testify in public gatherings of what we have escaped, creating ministries based on our personal trials. Those outside of Christ maybe don’t laugh, but they say, “What’s the big deal? We go through these same things and live to tell about it, too!” Paul even said:

There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it. (1 Cor. 10:13)

The difference between one inside of Christ and one outside of Christ is that the former is inclined to conquer some rebellious part of himself and come into a place of peace. The nonbeliever goes from trial to trial and comes out no better for it. Nothing is accomplished for all that.

And yet, what is accomplished practically for the believer if he only enters into a place of peace? I have just said that many go from trial to trial expecting to be trained for something but never seem to grasp exactly what that “something” is.

We have had unmistakable encounters with evil and seen the power of prayer. We have heard distinctly the inner voice of the Lord and avoided obstacles or even overcome them by obeying the speaking. Yet for all that, we pick up the everyday thread of life the same as our nonbelieving friends and endure similar day-to-day trials. So let me pose one alternative of what it means to walk in an “accomplished salvation”.

As believers living in the world that occupies time and space now, many of the trials we encounter (particularly the spiritual kinds) are the result of a clash between two worlds — the Kingdom of God within us and the present world without. The meeting of these two worlds automatically creates conflict. I believe this conflict is back of many trials that we experience both in the fully spiritual realm and in the war we have between our spirit and flesh.

Our salvation has already been accomplished. The conflict arises because of that accomplished salvation greeting the world on God’s behalf through our mortal bodies. We are not at home in this world. We are, in fact, alien creatures not callibrated to the rhythms of the times and seasons of this world.

Rather than looking on all trials as a neverending “training”, I am starting to see that they are the normal combustion of an accomplished salvation encountering the darkness in the world. Darkness must react to us until the day we die (unless we desire to join it once more). We have the choice to meet all things in the spirit or in our flesh. This is the normal Christian life. Once we understand that, there is no whining that we may have missed God’s direction in our lives.

This is not about winning a few souls to Christ so He’ll give us a mission field or getting more faith to accomplish healing so he’ll give us a healing ministry. No, this is every day life lived out as it will be until the day we all die. When we consider every trial a tool by which God accomplishes a fuller salvation in us and in the lives of those we touch, we will feel confident that we belong in the place He has us at any time. Every day and every way we are choosing Him and overcoming within so that we may participate in the world that is to come as fully qualified sons of God. If there’s a training, that’s what it’s for.

Been a while here since my previous three posts were lost. This had the effect of derailing my plans entirely. Now how to begin? How about a little update?

I was driving to work in my car yesterday, thinking about a member of my family who has no use for God. The closer you are to a family member, the more disconcerting this can be. In fact, I’m often surprised at how many Christians are not the least bit concerned about the salvation of their own family members. Perhaps they subscribe to the notion that either it’s not that important or that all the world will be saved in the end anyway (universal reconciliation).

To be sure, I have investigated the claims of universal reconciliation and been less than fully convinced. However, God’s unlimited mercy continues to amaze me anyway. It was while I was driving that I suddenly remembered this scripture:

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end. (Ecc. 3:11, NIV)

We all feel the pull of something grander than ourselves, which we cannot grasp any more than we can reach the moon though it may seem near. Even the most hardened atheist seems often compelled to look to the universe in search of…something — an answer perhaps. We look and do not find, we yearn and are never satisfied. Perhaps this is eternity expressing itself in our hearts.

For the Christian believer, the thought of someone we care for missing God represents the loss of all eternity. I have often wondered how can there be a point to enjoying God forever when eternity has been lost? Who can get their mind around such a thing?

“When they crucified Jesus, they crucified eternity.”

Now where did that thought come from, I wondered? I never considered it before. God is eternal. Could there even be an “eternity” without Him? No, there could not be. In an instant I realized that all of eternity was wrapped in Christ while the Roman soldiers nailed His humanity to the Cross. I often feel that eternity when I think about those who seem to be lost and do not even consider finding the way out — all of that eternity in my heart was crucified on the Cross during the Great Shakedown between Life and Death.

Suddenly, I knew the answer was in there. I’ve known a few people who died without seeing their prayers answered for lost family members, yet those prayers were answered after their departure. I wondered just how far can God really come from behind. What we see is a far cry from what He sees. There is a judgment, though what it entails has not yet been revealed. I am beginning to think that whatever comes, it will not diminish what God has bought through the Cross of Christ. It was an eternity-for-eternity trade. Eternity crucified, eternity resurrected — fully beyond our imagination of both the good we hope will come and the evil we fear.

Who has seen eternity? Who can describe it? Yet we all feel it in our greatest hopes and losses.