What does salvation mean?

The Bible makes clear that everyone needs salvation, and it is wonderful to know that “By grace you have been saved, through faith” as the apostle Paul writes to believers in Ephesians 2.8. The Bible word “salvation” summarises a number of spiritual blessings that every believer receives from the moment he is touched by God’s saving grace. 

Notice three things of importance in that quote from Ephesians. First, you “have been saved”; salvation has happened to you if you have repented and believed in Christ. It is no longer something you have to seek after or try to obtain. The verb is in the past tense: you have been saved, or as Jesus put it, you have “passed from death to life” (John 5.24). Secondly – the reason for that is that God has blessed you “by grace”. That means without you having to deserve it. God is so kind, he grants salvation freely by pure grace to those who could never deserve or merit it. Paul adds in Ephesians 2.9, “it is not because of works, lest anyone should boast”. So, thirdly, salvation is by faith, the faith that receives Christ as Saviour and Lord. Saving faith is not merely believing some facts; it is entrusting your life and your eternity into the hands of the Lord Jesus, beginning a new life in relationship with him. It is called “saving faith” because by that commitment or conversion a sinner is saved from sin and its consequences.

What does salvation mean, then? It means the believer, counting on Jesus’ promise, may know that he has become a child of God, that he has eternal life; he is saved from being eternally lost at the judgment. He is now reconciled to God, in good relationship with God. Salvation sums up all that and more: specifically the forgiveness of our sins is an important part of salvation.

When we are saved we receive the full forgiveness of all our sins. God wipes them all away. Furthermore, the Lord declares the believer in Christ to be acceptable to him in the day of final judgment. We are saved from the eternal negative consequences of our sins – we are free from condemnation. We have been saved from hell. 

The technical word for this is “justification”: “Since we have been justified by faith,” Paul writes in Romans 5.1, “we have peace with God”. We do not have to fear final rejection at the judgment day; we are accepted in Christ. We live our Christian lives therefore not in order to be saved from that judgment, but because, by God’s grace, we are already assured by his word that we are saved, justified, accepted as righteous, and free from ultimate divine condemnation. This is no small blessing!

Justification abolishes our guilt before God. Forgiveness clears our conscience from all that might accuse us. It’s all gone; our salvation is assured, so Paul uses the past tense when he writes to his colleague, “God saved us and called us to a holy calling” (2 Timothy 1.9). And note, he calls us to a holy life.

You might be thinking, “If my final salvation is assured, I could commit any sins I want, because I’m already justified”. Interestingly, Paul saw that response coming: “Shall we continue in sin, so that grace may abound?” His answer is categorical: “By no means!” (Romans 6.1, 2). For as God saves, forgives, and justifies us, he also calls us to holiness, giving us the Holy Spirit to transform us into saints! My next post will explain that more fully.

Clive Every-Clayton