HOW ARE WE SAVED? [1]
Article by Pastor O’femi Ogunyemi
Previously, we had seen the meaning and nature of salvation. We had also seen how man brought the misery of sin upon himself, through rebellion against God. And, then we had seen God’s motivation for saving man, despite our miseries being self-inflicted. Now, we want to probe how a person is saved. This is an important issue. How is a person saved? The Bible’s teaching on this is very clear.
EPHESIANS 2:8-9:
“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of your- selves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”
In this text is the complete revelation of how sinful people get saved—by grace alone, through faith alone. This is the New Testament formula for the salvation that God does. Anything different from this, even by a small degree, is not the gospel of Christ. Let’s break it down.
BY GRACE
Grace is God’s favor given to the undeserving. Grace projects the idea of a gift given, but which the receiver is unworthy of, doesn’t contribute to, or pay for, coming solely by the giver’s magnanimity. This is how the Bible describes salvation—a free gift to unworthy people, who never contributed in anyway to their salvation, and are in no position to pay for it. All of God’s dealings and givings in the entire salvation experience is grace based —free, undeserving, not worked for or paid for.
ROMANS 3:24:
“Being justified FREELY BY HIS GRACE through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” [Emphasis added]
ROMANS 5:15-16 [NLT]:
15 But there is a great difference between Adam’s sin and God’s GRACIOUS GIFT. For the sin of this one man, Adam, brought death to many. But even greater is God’s wonderful GRACE and HIS GIFT OF FORGIVENESS to many through this other man, Jesus Christ.
16 And the result of GOD’S GRACIOUS GIFT is very different from the result of that one man’s sin. For Adam’s sin led to condemnation, but GOD’S FREE GIFT leads to our being made right with God, even though we are guilty of many sins. [Emphasis added]
ROMANS 6:23:
“For the wages of sin is death, but THE GIFT OF GOD IS ETERNAL LIFE in Christ Jesus our Lord.” [Emphasis added]
EPHESIANS 1:7:
“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, ACCORDING TO THE RICHES OF HIS GRACE.” [Emphasis added]
Man can only obtain salvation by grace. One, we are undeserving of it. The miseries of sin are self-inflicted. God showed man great love. But in Adam, we rebelled against God, bringing on us fierce consequences. And as individuals, we have kept compounding the problem by continuous sinning and rejection of God. What we deserved is God’s wrath (Ephesians 2:3).
Two, man is totally bankrupt, so broke we can’t afford salvation. We have no goodness (Genesis 6:5; Romans 3:9-12). And where, by the exertion of great efforts, people have any good deeds to show, the good deeds still fall short of God’s righteousness demand. The perfectly righteous God, in Isaiah 64:6, described or summed up all of our righteousnesses (good deeds, morality) as filthy rags.
“But we are all like an unclean thing, And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags; We all fade as a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, Have taken us away.”
The Hebrew terms translated into “filthy rags” literally denotes menstrual rag. This is how God described the best of man’s good deeds—filthy and nauseating. God’s standard of righteousness is so high. It is one hundred percent perfection (James 2:10-11), which is bad news for us, because fallen man can never attain that perfection. This inability is the dividing gulf between us and God.
Therefore, if we will ever be able to come into relationship with God, then righteousness must be gifted to us! And that is exactly what salvation is—a gift to undeserving people! God doesn’t save based on our goodness or morality. Morality, described variously in the Bible as “works”, “deeds of the law”, “works of the law”, “works of righteousness”, is not a basis for salvation. If it is, no man will ever be saved. So, God had to make salvation a gift, given to men despite falling short of His righteous demand.
TITUS 3:4-7:
4 But— When God our Savior revealed his kindness and love, 5 he saved us, not because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He washed away our sins, giving us a new birth and new life through the Holy Spirit. 6 He generously poured out the Spirit upon us through Jesus Christ our Savior. 7 Because of his grace he made us right in his sight and gave us confidence that we will inherit eternal life.
Salvation happens solely on the merit of God’s grace—freely, undeservedly, not man’s morality. Grace is God saving man in spite of all his despite.
(To be continued in the next part.)
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3 Responses
Our best is like filthy rags before the Holy God. I thank God for his gift of righteousness.
Gifting salvation to us is the only way we could ever be saved. Left to ourselves, we will perish eternally.