What is Christian Salvation?

introducing the orthodox churchI’m reading an Eastern Orthodox book for new believers when I came across an explanation of salvation that was amazing! They truly have a robust view of salvation that puts the typical Protestant to shame.

Seeing how wonderful their explanation is, I have posted their explanation below for you read (with some emphasis added at certain points). I hope it will speaks to you as it spoke to me.

Blessings


What is Salvation?

What does it mean to be saved? What is salvation in Christ?

Salvation is freedom – freedom from the tyranny of self centeredness, freedom from bondage of fear and death.

Salvation in Christ is being freed from myself so that I can become they person God created me to be and intends me to become.

Salvation is God lifting us up in Christ Jesus. It is God giving us hope. It is God working an unrelenting work in our personalities, in our characters, in our lives.  It is God not giving up on us.

Salvation according to Orthodox theology is not the state of “I have arrived. I have made it. I am saved.” Rather, it is the sate of “I am on the way. I am moving. I am growing in God, for God, with God, and through the power of God.”

Salvation is Christ overcoming for us our greatest enemy which is at the root of all our insecurity, the fear of death. God does not remain aloof in the heavens while men suffer and die. He takes on a body and by death destroys our death so that now death becomes a doorway through which we must all pass to enter the splendor of His glorious presence.

Salvation is:

Liberation from evil,
The defeat of the devil,
The transfiguration of man,
Living authentically,
Putting on Christ,
The restoration of the image of God in man,
Participating in the life of God,
Restoration of communion with God,
Incorruption,
Receiving the Holy Spirit,
Becoming temples of the Holy Spirit,
Forgiveness of sins,
Ascending to the throne of God,
Participating in the kingdom of God,
Being by grace what God is by nature,
The destruction of death,
Seeing the light,
Being in a process of growth that never ends,
Living life the way God meant it to be.

This is the salvation the Lord Jesus offers us.

2 thoughts on “What is Christian Salvation?”

  1. That’s good for the Orthodox. However, almost all of the references to “salvation” in the Synoptic Gospels are to physical healing. Why no mention of this *biblical* concept of “salvation”?

    1. Thank you for your comment. While I would agree there’s an aspects of physical healing in salvation as seen in the usage of sozo in the Gospels, I would push back against the “almost all” portion of your comment. I just ran some quick word searches (English and Greek) and found sōtēria (salvation) used more in a deliverance from enemy fashion, which fits within the context of the primary message of Jesus more than purely physical healing (à la the coming of the Kingdom of God via Inaugurated Eschatology).

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