Saved?
Thursday we reviewed a couple of the books we’ve read and discussed some upcoming assignments with a website called http://del.icio.us/. Is anyone else new to this? Apparently it’s on online way to bookmark websites by certain categories…haven’t attempted to use it yet so we’ll see how it goes.
BUT…somehow (and i can’t really remember how), we got into a discussion of salvation and what it really means to be “saved.” Apparently the term didn’t actually come about until the 18th century (don’t quote me on that; i didn’t look it up), and until then was known more as a process than an actual quantifiable moment in time. One student offered a particularly interesting analogy: becoming “saved” is more like becoming an “adult.” The day you turn 18 you may no longer be considered a minor, and you may legally be an “adult,” but there is an un-identifiable period of development where you actually grow into an adult. it’s hard to pinpoint when that actually happens, but you definitely feel more like an adult at 50 than you did at 18.
So what does it mean to be “saved?” could it possibly be something we receive but then grow into as we learn how to act like we’re “saved?” I suppose this is more of a question for Systematic Theology rather than Transforming Contemporary Culture, but I’d say the analogy of process has more to offer a Church in need of believers who actually live out their faith, rather than just attending a church on Sundays because they once “accepted Christ.”
“So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” – Philippians 2:12-13
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