MYSTERIES OF GOD'S KINGDOM. Kenneth B. Alexander

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СКАЧАТЬ His Son from the dead and it His power that delivered us from the Kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of His beloved Son (Colossians 1:13). We will always remember that. We will not be like Satan who, although created by God, wanted to take His place. We will inherit the Kingdom, not by our own righteousness, but by His. He will always receive the glory. We will give it to Him. We will throw any crowns we receive at His feet (Revelation 4:10). We will worship Him forever.

      WHAT IS SALVATION?

      Salvation is an experience that all Christians must have in order to walk on with God. It is a gift of God bought for mankind by the blood of Jesus Christ on the cross. The oft quoted scripture of John 3:16 says: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life”. Salvation is eternal life and, as the experience is expanded, a lot more.

      In this article we will refer to initial salvation, which is the first experience an individual can have in Christ. We will also go further to explain a greater degree of salvation that is available, that is salvation “to the uttermost”. Salvation to the uttermost is the obtaining of the state of perfection that is available from the Lord and leads to a resurrection from the dead, as Christ attained as the first-fruits Son of God. Salvation to the uttermost is the obtaining of that same resurrection obtained by Christ so that Christ becomes the first of many brethren that become like Him in every respect.

      In principle, initial salvation is very easy to receive. The only requirement to receive salvation is: “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; (Romans 10:9).

      Thus there are only two requirements: BELIEVE in your heart and CONFESS with your mouth. Simply mouthing the phrase won’t help. You must really believe in your heart. Then by the confessing of that belief you immediately receive God’s eternal gift. It doesn’t completely manifest itself at that time but you do receive the entire gift of grace at that time.

      The word salvation is used in both the New and Old Testament. In the New Testament, the Greek word is “Soteria”, which means deliverance, preservation and salvation. In the New Testament the word is used in many contexts but always denotes the personal and eternal deliverance granted by God, through His Son, to those who accept His conditions of salvation (Acts 4:12; Vine’s Expository Dictionary).

      Surprisingly, the term is used more frequently in the Old Testament than the New. This proves that salvation was not suddenly initiated by Jesus physical appearance on the earth, but was available throughout Biblical history. The Hebrew words for salvation are “yasha” meaning “to deliver” and “yesha” denoting deliverance, rescue, salvation, safety, welfare. These words are used in the Old Testament well over 150 times—it may mean save, saved, saves, savior, deliver, avenger, safety and victorious. Jesus’ name came from Yasha and Yesha. His name Yehoshua or Yehoshua literally means “the Lord is salvation” or “Messiah” (New American Standard Hebrew-Aramaic and Greek Dictionaries: Updated Edition).

      Salvation is the basic tenant of Christian faith. Receiving salvation is the beginning of a believers walk with God. But basic salvation is only that: a beginning. Salvation is an ever expanding experience, for those who want to go on with God. Hebrews 7:25 says, “Wherefore also he is able to save to the uttermost them that draw near to God through Him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them”

      Therefore there is basic salvation and there is being saved to the uttermost. Basic salvation means that by your faith and confession you will be saved from the condemnation that comes upon the evildoers or those who do not believe. Salvation to the uttermost means you will manifest the entire gift from God which includes resurrection life and being conformed to His very image.

      Thus God’s entire plan of salvation goes far beyond the initial acceptance of Jesus Christ as your personal savior. When we are first saved we are, in essence, newborn babies in Christ. Following salvation, we must learn how to walk and function as mature Sons in Christ. Maturity of His Sons is Christ’s ultimate goal.

      Ephesians Chapter 4 explains this process to maturity: “And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ; until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the true knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ. As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; but speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love” (Ephesians 4:11-16).

      The goal of Christ is that our salvation experience expands to that of a mature man, to the point of becoming the fullness of Christ. This is not accomplished in a vacuum but within a body which itself grows into a collective unit of mature Sons that function together in the unity of the Spirit of God. Since this does not happen automatically upon initially receiving Christ, Christ has given His “Sons to be” gift ministries who will help guide us into all of His fullness, identified in Ephesians 4 as apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors (shepherds) and teachers.

      Much of Christianity today does not understand the level of salvation that is available to them. They feel that it is sufficient to bring someone to the altar and have him/her confess Christ as Lord. Most churches conduct what are called “altar calls” where congregants confess their sin and accept Christ as their Savior. Christianity calls this forgiveness “saving” the soul for Christ.

      Many churches measure their success by how many people they have “saved” in this matter. So called evangelistic efforts seek souls they can save and feel comfortable that once the soul is saved he then has all the essential elements to be able to die and go to heaven, avoiding the fires of hell. However, in most churches, there is little or no follow up to this initial experience, There is little effort to bring the saved individual into deeper and deeper levels of knowing Christ. As a result many “saved souls” believe they have something they don’t really have as they leave the altar and continue to live their lives as they were but, believing that since they are saved that they have acquired some kind of security in the afterlife.

      Actually a real walk with God is a continuing and expanding salvation experience. A Christian who is just saved still deals with sin in his walk on a continual basis. A saved Christian often finds that he has to continually return to Christ to seek forgiveness for each sin as it rears its ugly head in his/her life. And there are some sins the saved Christian just cannot seem to overcome no matter how many times he repents. So saved Christians go through life crippled in a sense as the sin never seems to completely abate. This situation is not so much the weakness of the flesh as it is not realizing the entirety of what Christ did for us on the cross.

      There are two distinct aspects of what Christ did for us by His death on the cross. First, He forgave mankind of their sin and no longer held their sins against them. A Christian is forgiven no matter how much he stumbles and falls short. God is always there to uphold, revive and forgive. However this state of being tossed to and fro by the effects of sin was not His entire purpose for mankind. He not only wants to forgive sin but to remove it entirely so it is no longer and ongoing problem.

      Salvation is actually a 2-step process leading to complete perfection. The first part is the part of salvation that forgives sin. 1 John 2:1-2 says: “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate [intercessor] with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and He Himself is the propitiation [satisfaction] for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for СКАЧАТЬ