I’ve started and stopped this entry about a dozen times so far. Bear with me as I continue to navigate some murky and troublesome waters. And forgive the somewhat simplistic nature of this post. I wanted to get something out even if it isn’t entirely fleshed out or nuanced.

My goal in this series is to think through some fairly esoteric issues for me and reword them in ways that my mind can wrap around them. I’m not plowing any ground that far loftier minds than mine have not paved the way for. When time permits I will create a bibliography page that will point you to more salient and dense works.

I hope next week to begin to get into the sayings of Christ that have been attributed to the existence of an eternal punishment in hell. But as we progress it’s important to talk briefly about the concept of salvation and what it means for us. As more time has elapsed since the creation and the subsequent “fall” I believe that we have developed a much more self-absorbed focus to salvation than originally intended.

God created us to be in relationship with Him. But for the majority of my life I’ve held an unshakable opinion that He wasn’t really committed to that relationship initially. It took one transgression, in my understanding, to screw the whole thing up. It seems that that one transgression moved us from waking hand in hand with God to that Holy Hand picking us up by the collar and dangling us over the fires of hell.

As a result of this view I have lived my life viewing salvation as this personal crusade on my part to win back God’s good graces. Even being “grace-oriented” I still lived out a somewhat myopic self-obsessed view of God’s Salvation. Salvation was my “get out of hell” card, because although hell is not mentioned as part of the punishment in Genesis 3 we all knew that was the end game.

However, as I have progressed in my understanding of the character and nature of God the less I see salvation as been “saved from” but “save to.” It’s not simply God moving that hand away from the fiery pit and placing me back down on some solid ground.
Instead it is about God making things right, acting in good faith toward that humanity that He created to be in relationship with.

It is about us finding meaning and purpose in this world through being the imagio dei. Salvation is not just a forgiveness of sins, though I believe that is a part of God reconciling us to Himself.
Salvation is also God setting this world to rights, so that we might live in relationship with Him and our fellow man. It is God claiming the relationship with us that He intended us to have and that He expects us to have with others.
Salvation is not about escaping from hell but following after Christ, to learn how to live and love and act like He did. It’s about relationship.
Relationship in the here and now, not just in some world to come. Salvation is lived out through our love, care and concern for others.
Salvation is not about hell and what we are saved from. It’s all about Jesus and us being brought into complete relationship with Him. The only way to true salvation is following in the steps of the Risen Lord. To experience and embrace the person of Christ.
It’s about the redemption and reconciliation of all things. About coming into a full fellowship with God. Walking hand in hand with Him as He has always intended us to do.

And as a result, we must view salvation as not simply being saved from punishment, although that is a part of it. Instead we must view salvation on a much grander scale of the God of all creation bringing that creation into harmony, redeeming and reconciling that which is His so that His creation might have the relationship to which it was intended to have.
Hence, why I am a redemptive reconciliationist.