Pentecost: The Bridge Between the Gospel and Salvation
Photo by Pearl
This is the fourth in a series of articles expounding on the need for re-formation in the church.
Links to other articles in this series: Thesis 1, Thesis 2, Thesis 3.
[See the original overview article here: 9.5 Theses: The Needed Re-Formation of the Church.]
Thesis 4. Because the Church Has Forgotten the Gospel, She No Longer Understands Salvation
In our last article (Thesis 3), we sought to understand what the gospel is by focusing on five elements that define Jesus’ life and ministry: he came, he died, he rose, he reigns, and he will come again. The gospel is the bold proclamation that Jesus is Lord. In this article, we want to examine what happens when men and women respond correctly to that gospel. In other words, this article is about salvation.
Most Christians today, especially in the evangelical church, confuse the gospel with salvation. They think they have shared the gospel with someone when they explain the steps one needs to follow in order to be saved. This muddles both the gospel and the salvation that flows from it. Although these two realities overlap and interlock, they are not equivalents or synonyms. They do, however, work together synergistically.
When you combine the gospel and salvation into one synonymous theological concept (the gospel = our salvation) it takes the focus off King Jesus and makes us the center of attention. This results in a me-centered understanding of both the gospel and salvation: “Jesus is my personal Savior and has forgiven my sins so I can have abundant life. When I die, I will go to heaven.” But when someone puts their trust in the unmuddled gospel that centers on the Lordship of Jesus, the resulting salvation looks very different: “Jesus is Lord. By his resurrection, he has defeated death itself, our ultimate enemy. And by his ascension he possesses all authority and reigns over the earth as Lord and King. It is my privilege to surrender my will to his reign in and through my life.” Yes, when the unmuddled gospel is preached in the power of the Spirit, an unmuddled salvation becomes possible, that is, God’s inbreaking New Creation becomes a reality both in my life and in the world.
Pentecost Is the Bridge
From a soteriological perspective, Pentecost serves as the bridge which connects the King Jesus gospel to our full appropriation of the salvation it brings. The reception of the Holy Spirit is the transformational moment when we experience the salvation that Jesus makes possible. God’s New Creation now becomes operative in our lives as the sanctifying Spirit begins to work both in us and through us to reverse the curse of sin. The ministry of the Spirit involves so much more than empowerment for service.
On a personal level, the salvation that flows from the Jesus-is-Lord gospel is not merely a change in status, from guilty to forgiven. God, through his Spirit, is changing our very nature, making us a new creation. Salvation is so much more than something God has done for us. Preeminently, it is something that the Lord Jesus, through his sanctifying Spirit, is doing in us. Not only is he saving us from sin’s penalty. He is breaking its power. Jesus is restoring us not only to the favor of God, but more importantly, to the image of God.
Unfortunately, the contemporary church tends to see salvation in terms of going through a prescribed formula: raise your hand, say a prayer, sign a card, get baptized. When the recipe is followed, people are assured that they will go to heaven when they die. Yes, a muddled gospel has produced a muddled understanding of salvation. The results of such theological fuzziness are evident in the church today. The church is full of converts but has few disciples. Many believers seem to think that ongoing sin is compatible with the normal Christian life and that victory over sin happens only in heaven. Sadly, the muddled gospel preached in many churches today is producing believers who don’t believe, Jesus followers who don’t follow Jesus, and Christians who are not Christlike. However, when the gospel defines the life of the church, salvation is understood very differently. The Spirit of holiness makes it possible for the image of God to be restored in us. As we pledge our allegiance to King Jesus and follow him, he works in the world today. The power of sin is broken as the curse is reversed! King Jesus is establishing his New Creation and empowering us to be the stewards we were originally called to be. In Christ we are “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for [God’s] own possession, that [we] may proclaim the excellencies of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (I Pet. 2:9).
The Restoration of the Imago Dei
Because the gospel stands at the headwaters of all Christian thought and practice, when it is polluted, it contaminates everything downstream. This is why getting the gospel right is essential to the coming re-formation of the church. Bonhoeffer said it well: “False doctrine corrupts the life of the Church at its source, and that is why doctrinal sin is more serious than moral. Those who rob the church of the gospel deserve the ultimate penalty….” (The Cost of Discipleship).
A muddled gospel creates a series of casualties throughout the entirety of Christian thought and practice. One of the tragic consequences that comes when the gospel is muddled is a dehumanized anthropology.
The muddled gospel preached in most churches today takes Genesis 3 as its starting point. It assumes that to be human is to be a sinner. In every day and in every way, we fall short of God’s intended purposes for us, sinning constantly by thought, word, and deed. The gospel that many hear in church tells us that God loves us just the way we are. Even though we are sinners, he accepts us and covers our wickedness with the righteousness of Christ. When we put our faith in Jesus, he reconciles us to God. When sin manifests itself in the life of someone who has put their trust in this muddled gospel, it tends to be met with the dismissive comment, “Hey, I’m only human.”
An unmuddled gospel, however, takes Genesis 1-2 as its starting point, not Genesis 3! Here we learn that, before sin entered human history, humans bore the image of God and were the divinely appointed caregivers of God’s good creation (see Gen. 1:26-28; 2:15). The true gospel roots us in this original model of personhood and proclaims that the salvation being offered in Jesus’ name enables us to recover the image of God that has been disfigured by sin. Through the blood of Calvary and the Spirit of Pentecost, we can be fully human. In contrast to what the muddled gospel asserts, the purpose of salvation is not to go to heaven when we die. That is the destination, not the purpose. We are saved, rather, so that, here and now, we can be like Jesus. Paul put it this way: “For those whom [God] foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son” (Rom. 8:29).
Understand the gospel.
A muddled gospel obsesses on the how of salvation, focusing on the steps one should follow to complete the deal, as if salvation were a business transaction. The true gospel, however, emphasizes not so much the how, but the why. In his high priestly prayer, Jesus helps us understand the purpose of salvation when he says to his Father: “The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one.” (Jn. 17:22). We are saved in order that we might reflect God’s glory to the world, as seen in the incarnate humanity of the Lord Jesus himself. “Behold, the man!” (Jn. 19:5). Our vocation, both individually and corporately, is to manifest the glory of God through our lives and Christian communities to the world around us. When we do, the world will know the truth of the gospel (see Jn. 17:20-26).
Believe the gospel.
Sadly, many choose to reject the gospel. Committing treason against their true king, they brazenly say, “We do not want this man to reign over us” (Lk. 19:14). On the other hand, those who respond correctly to the gospel proclamation that Jesus is Lord respond very differently. Coming under the conviction of the Holy Spirit, they repent, believe, and submit to the rule of King Jesus, following him wherever he leads. Their lives are characterized by the “obedience of faith” (Rom. 1:5; 16:26).
Share the gospel.
As the gospel shapes the lives of those who put their trust in King Jesus, they naturally want others to hear this good news. Evangelism is not an obligation but a joyful privilege. Everyone, everywhere, needs to know that Jesus is Lord so they too can experience the reversal of the curse that causes such havoc in their lives. They, too, can be transformed into the image of God. Believers must share the gospel not just to help people go to heaven, but to witness to the glory of a victorious and rightly ordered life in this present age.
Be the gospel.
The dialogue between Jesus and Peter in John 21:15-19 helps us to understand Jesus’ mission and how it relates to us today. Three times Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” Three times Peter responds, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Then three times Jesus gives the command, “Feed my sheep.” The point of the conversation is not on the question Jesus repeats, rather the focus centers on the delegation of responsibility. Jesus is giving Peter the care of his sheep. But can he trust his lambs into the hands of someone like Peter? In other words, has Peter truly understood the gospel? Jesus wants to be sure that Peter is ready to lay down his life for others, even as he laid down his life for Peter. In other words, Jesus is calling Peter not only to believe the gospel and to preach the gospelpreeminently, but he is also sending Peter on a mission to be the gospel. This is how salvation comes to the world.
Chris Bounds is Professor of Theology at Asbury Theological Seminary.
Hubert Harriman is Former President of World Gospel Mission (WGM).
Stan Key is Former President of the Francis Asbury Society.
Dave Smith is Professor Emeritus of New Testament at Indiana Wesleyan University.