Salvation

It’s rather early right now (6:15AM) and I’ve already been up for close to two hours. So I was sitting here just doing nothing, wasting time that someday I’ll probably wish I hadn’t wasted, when something just popped into my head (as many things do).

Anyone who has ever been to a church and heard a “salvation message” or who has been “witnessed to” by someone should know what I’m talking about here. It has to do with the “plan of salvation.”

If you go and ask any good Christian how to be saved or how to go to heaven, they will most likely say something to the effect of the following; First, you have to realize that you are a sinner. Second, you have to realize that God loves you and made “a way out” for you(I wonder who made the way in?). Third, you pray a prayer and “ask Jesus into your heart.”

Now although I could argue the Biblical validity of this little plan for hours, that’s not what I’m writing about. I’m writing about the whole plan itself.

You see, according to Christians, all you have to do is follow the steps, connect the dots and you’re saved. Christians have reduced salvation to a “simple” formula that, if you do it, guarantees you entrance to the pearly gates. If you admit that you’re a sinner and pray a prayer asking forgiveness, then you’re pretty much set.

I have to wonder, if God is really as infinite as the Bible says, can either he or his “plan of salvation” be reduced to such a trivial little recipe? Hmmmm….

As I was writing this little part above, something else came to my mind. It has to do with the part about salvation being a free gift.

Now churches and Christians will quote the book of Romans all over the place to try to convince people that salvation is God’s free gift to us and that all we have to do is take it. They beat into people’s heads that it is FREE and that there is nothing we can do to earn it. And this is where I think they’re wrong.

There is a verse in Romans that talks about salvation being the free gift of God, and not by works. Basically people interpret that to mean that there is nothing you can do to earn your salvation, that it is totally dependent on God and what Jesus did when he died on the cross.

Here’s the problem with that; no matter how you try and word it, you cannot be saved (according to the Bible and Christianity) without action on your part. YOU are the one who has to believe, YOU are the one who has to ask forgiveness, YOU are the one who has to have faith, etc. All this stuff that people try to make the masses believe about salvation not being by “works” is crap. Anything you do, even something as internal as believing, is a “work” that you do. It is something that no one can do for you, and yet without it you can’t be saved.

Without the “works” of faith, belief, asking forgiveness, and some other things, you can’t be saved (can you? If you CAN be saved without those things, I’d love to learn how), and thus salvation (as put forth in the Bible) IS gained by participation on our part.

If salvation was truly God’s free gift and wasn’t gained by “works” then he would have to save everyone no matter what they did or didn’t do. He would have to save both those who accept his gift and those who don’t, because if he only saved those who accepted his gift it wouldn’t be free-it would be conditional upon the “work” of accepting that gift.

To possibly make myself clearer, lets look at something else that God supposedly gives us no matter what, not depending on our “works.” According to the Bible and Christians, God loves us all unconditionally. He loves us no matter what we do, or don’t do. In other words, his love isn’t dependent on our “works.”

So if salvation is a free gift, as his love supposedly is, and isn’t gained by “works” (which means anything that we would have to do in order to gain it), as his love supposedly isn’t, how can anyone NOT be saved? If his love and salvation are both free, how can you have one without the other?

Personally I think the whole thing about “free salvation” is just a way to keep seats full.

But whatever, I gotta hit the shower. Hopefully I’ve had my bit of “revelation” for the day and I can just go about my business.

*

“Spineless from the start, sucked into the part

Circus comes to town, you play the lead clown

Please, please

Spreading his disease, living by his story

Knees, knees

Falling to your knees, suffer for His glory

You will

*

Time for lust, time for lies

Time to kiss your life goodbye

Send me money, send me green

Heaven you will meet

Make a contribution

And you’ll get a better seat

Bow to the Leper Messiah

*

Marvel at His tricks, need your Sunday fix

Blind devotion came, rotting your brain

Chain, chain

Join the endless chain, taken by his glamour

Fame, fame

Infection is the game, stinking drunk with power

We see

*

Time for lust, time for lies

Time to kiss your life goodbye

Send me money, send me green

Heaven you will meet

Make a contribution

And you’ll get a better seat

Bow to the Leper Messiah

*

Witchery, weakening

Sees the sheep are gathering

Set the trap, hypnotize

Now you follow

*

Time for lust, time for lies

Time to kiss your life goodbye

Send me money, send me green

Heaven you will meet

Make a contribution

And you’ll get a better seat

Bow to the Leper Messiah

*

Lie”

*

Metallica