Salvation: The Big Picture

I now wish to begin a series of posts on salvation theology. Before I delve into any of the specifics; I first want to give a broad overview of what salvation is. In brief, one could sum up salvation by saying that it begins and ends with the Trinity.

The Beginning of Salvation: The Trinity

Before anything was created there existed the Triune God from all eternity. For all eternity the persons of the Trinity gave and received love in a differentiated but united community. One God in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God did not need to create humanity or anything else, so that He might have something to do or someone to love. He was completely fulfilled in His eternal communion of love.

However, that communion of love did overflow into creation, including human creation. Unfortunately human creation fell. It is clear enough form everyday experience that we all have fallen short of the moral law. Most essentially, we have fallen short in love: we have not loved God or others as we should have. As a result of this Sin, we are not in right relationship with the Trinity.

Salvation is God bringing us back into the life of the Trinity.

Let me repeat that. Salvation is GOD bringing us back into the life of the Trinity. God is salvation’s initiator, and it is to the Triune God that salvation aims as its end. Salvation is not our prerogative and it is not our achievement. The entirety of the Scriptural narrative can be read as God seeking to bring humanity back into the life of the Trinity (and humanity resisting nearly every step of the way). In fact, there was only one distinct point where humanity did not resist salvation at all: Jesus Christ. It is through Christ that we have a way to God.

What does it mean to come back into the life of the Trinity?

The special status of Christ makes Him the key to salvation. He is quite literally the only way we can be brought back into the life of the Trinity. In subsequent posts I will strive to lay out the specifics of how we can enter into the life of the Trinity through the mediation of the Son by the power of the Holy Spirit. These specifics will include the nature of faith (both explicit and implicit), justification and sanctification among other things. For now this pithy summary will set forth the parameters of the discussion:

Salvation is entering into the life of the Trinity. This means coming back into right relationship with the Father, by being united to the body of Christ, through the power of the Holy Spirit.

Next week: the nature of saving faith. Until then . . . peace.