Lesson for January 5, 2022
The Doctrine of Soteriology
Lesson 1
Soteriology is the doctrine of salvation. The Greek word for salvation is “soteria,” which comes from the root word “soter” meaning savior or deliverer. Salvation is defined as the work of God in regenerating (giving new life) to a spiritually dead person when by an act of faith in Jesus Christ that person believes in Christ for eternal life, totally apart from any form of human good works.
Salvation is by means of God’s grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Faith is the only system of perception which is totally devoid of any human merit. Only the object has merit, and in salvation the object of faith is the Lord Jesus Christ. How much faith does it take to be saved? Just a little bit more than no faith at all. (Luke 17:6) The salvation work of Christ on the Cross excludes anything being added to faith.
Grace is all that God is free to do for mankind on the basis of the work of Christ on the Cross. Grace is extended to mankind as unbelievers, living under spiritual death, controlled by their sin nature and totally helpless regarding salvation. Therefore, as a matter of grace, salvation is entirely the work of God. It is the work of the Father in judging our sins, of the Son in being judged for our sins, and of the Holy Spirit in making the Gospel clear. This is why the way of salvation is by faith alone in Jesus Christ with no human works added to it. Human works are human efforts to please or gain the approval of God for salvation or spirituality including, but not limited to, such things as church membership, water baptism, religious rituals, performing good deeds, obeying the Ten Commandments, good behavior, being sincere, and keeping certain rules.
Saving grace is called “efficacious grace,” meaning effective grace. When a spiritually dead person responds to the invitation from God (all are invited) to have eternal salvation, a person can simply respond by believing in Jesus Christ as Savior. This is classified as “faith alone” or “faith plus nothing.” It is the ministry of God the Holy Spirit to “invite” unbelievers to believe in Christ. So, the Holy Spirit makes the Gospel clear to an unbeliever who in spiritual death is unable to understand spiritual things. Upon faith alone in Christ alone, the Holy Spirit makes an unbeliever’s faith effective for salvation, eternal life and the other 39 spiritual assets that we receive as a result.
The faith of an unbeliever who is spiritually dead means that they have positive volition at the point of Gospel-hearing and exercise their faith which is a non-meritorious function and is compatible with God’s grace. The Holy Spirit makes faith and only faith alone effective for salvation. Human good works (such as being water baptized, giving money, doing good deeds, or observing certain rituals) when added to faith in Christ are useless (dead) works, and the Holy Spirit does not make dead works effective for salvation. So, if you add works when you believe in Jesus Christ, there is no efficacious grace and you’re not saved at that point. (Romans 11:6)
The pre-salvation grace ministry of the Trinity is as follows: In common grace (available to all), the Holy Spirit makes the Gospel message understandable. God the Father invites the spiritually dead person to believe in Christ, which is called “the divine call.” The spiritually dead person, with the Holy Spirit acting as a human spirit, believes in Christ, and the Holy Spirit causes faith to be effective for salvation, which is called efficacious grace. Any human effort added to faith in Christ is a rejection of grace and is not effective for salvation. Therefore, human works added to faith in Christ as a requirement for salvation cancels faith. Salvation cannot be from ourselves since it is a matter of common grace, the divine call, and efficacious grace. That’s why it is a gift from God. (Ephesians 2:8-9)
A spiritually dead person is incapable of doing anything to obtain salvation. Spiritual death at birth means separation from God, the absence of a human spirit and total helplessness to attain a relationship with God by our own efforts. Without a human spirit, a person is unable to understand the simplest concepts of the Gospel. The very nature of common grace, the divine call, and efficacious grace eliminates any system of salvation by works. (I Corinthians 2:14)
Salvation is not by human effort and not by “repenting of sin.” True repentance does not mean to feel sorry for sin or to turn from sin. The Greek word for repentance is “metanoeo,” which means to change your mind. When an unbeliever changes their mind about Christ and believes in Him for salvation, they have eternal life. True repentance is a result of the convincing ministry of the Holy Spirit. (II Peter 3:9)
Salvation by “human invitation” is false. “Inviting Christ into your heart” is an erroneous statement. The invitation is made by Jesus Christ to believe – He invites us to salvation. The invitation to salvation is the principle of coming to Christ, not inviting Christ to come to you. By believing in Christ, we come to Christ at His invitation. Matthew 11:28, “Come unto Me, all you that labor and are heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.”
These words were spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ. John 6:35, “Jesus said to them, `I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me will never hunger. He who believes in Me will never thirst.’” John 6:37, “The one that comes unto Me I will certainly not cast out.” John 6:47, “He who believes in Me has eternal life.” So, Jesus Christ invites us to salvation; we do not invite Him. We are spiritually dead at the moment of our birth. We cannot invite Jesus Christ anywhere. He can invite us, which He does through common grace. This becomes efficacious (effective) grace when we believe in Jesus Christ. Spiritually dead people do not issue invitations!
Public acknowledgement of Christ as Savior is not the means of salvation. Acknowledging Jesus Christ as Savior is a result of salvation; it is not the means. Confusion of the means and the results of making a public confession of faith has given the wrong impression to many unbelievers as to the condition for salvation. The Holy Spirit, in His ministry of efficacious grace, causes faith and faith only in Jesus Christ to be effective for eternal salvation.
Committing your life to Christ for salvation is not the means of salvation. It is putting “the cart before the horse.” Commitment of one’s life to Christ for salvation confuses the unbeliever and ignores the salvation work of Jesus Christ on the Cross. Therefore, telling a person they must commit their life to Christ for salvation attempts to make passages like Romans 12:1 and similar commitment passages a condition for salvation, which they are not. Commitment is something that a believer may or may not choose to do after salvation. So, distinction must be made between the condition for salvation, which is faith alone in Jesus Christ, and commitment, which is a number of decisions after salvation.
“Lordship salvation” is not salvation at all. This false system of pseudo-salvation says, “If Christ is not Lord of all, He is not Lord at all.” This is a relatively stupid statement and shows a total lack of understanding of God’s grace. This statement ignores completely the fact that Christ is Lord of all whether a person believes in Him or not. Furthermore, no one can make Christ the Lord (Master) of his or her life without the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit to do so. So-called “Lordship salvation” is salvation by human works, and therefore is not salvation. The spiritually dead person does not have the ability to make Christ Lord of anything. All he can do is believe in Christ, and then the Holy Spirit makes his faith effective for salvation. After salvation, a person with positive volition toward God and His Word will make Christ the Lord (Master) of their life. Furthermore, if a person believes in Christ and fails to make Christ the Master of their life, they are still saved and still have eternal life.
Ritual works for salvation is false and includes rituals such as water baptism, the observation of communion and many other religious rituals as conditions for salvation. Most common in this category is called “baptismal regeneration” or salvation through faith plus water baptism, which is a common teaching of several religions and denominations. When water baptism is added to faith as a requirement for salvation, there is no salvation because the Holy Spirit does not and cannot make faith plus water baptism, communion, or any other religious ritual effective for salvation.
Salvation by morality is false. Morality is something the spiritually dead person can accomplish on his own through human effort and therefore salvation is obviously not by morality. Being moral is certainly a command to believers and was instituted by God for the entire human race, believers, and unbelievers alike, but has never been a requirement for salvation or spirituality. (Romans 3:20-28, 4:4-14, 5:1; Galatians 2:16)
Salvation by emotion is false and alleges salvation comes through some emotional activity. This is the blasphemy of adding emotion to faith for the validity and assurance of faith. The validity and assurance of faith in Christ comes from the Holy Spirit, never from emotion. (Romans 8:16) Even after salvation, the filling of the Spirit is not associated with emotion. No one is ever saved because he “feels saved.” Neither emotion nor “feeling saved,” nor a “rosy glow experience,” nor “weeping tears of repentance at the altar,” nor so-called “speaking in tongues” is a condition or a part of salvation.
The emotion in our souls is designed to be a responder to things we enjoy, appreciate, or feel, but you must never assume that emotion has a spiritual connotation. You may get emotional over understanding spiritual things, such as grace. However, that emotion does not make you spiritual; it is merely a response to the spiritual function of your life and does not indicate the filling of the Spirit. It does indicate appreciation for God and His Word. How you feel is inconsequential in salvation. The Gospel does not emphasize how you feel; it emphasizes Who and what Christ is. In spiritual death, there is nothing we could do to impress God. When we believed in Christ, how we felt was not important; it’s what God does for us that is important.
Church activities are not a requirement for salvation, such as joining a church, tithing, being water baptized, or taking Communion, raising your hand during prayer, coming forward, walking an aisle, weeping tears of repentance at an altar, making a public declaration of faith, or “jumping through some psychological hoop.” If any of these is added to personal faith in Jesus Christ for salvation, they cancel faith. Titus 3:5 says, “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit.”
Many religions and denominations add certain requirements or obligations to faith in Christ, which is no salvation at all. Many who belong to these organizations claim that they believe that Christ died on the Cross for their sins. They allege to believe in Christ but at the same time, their church has a system of human works which they must follow for salvation. If a person follows a system of human works for salvation, they are not saved. They have canceled any benefit of their faith by adding the works. If they are depending on the work of Christ on the Cross alone, they are saved. But if they add a system of penance and/or works, they are not saved. What people who believe this are saying is that the work of Christ on the Cross was not good enough to pay the penalty for their sin and they need to help Him out by some form of human effort. (I Corinthians 5:6)
A person does not have to practice a system of works to ensure or retain their salvation, as alleged by many churches. Some people in these churches are saved because at some moment they believed in Christ alone for salvation, totally apart from anything imposed by their church. At the moment they believe in Christ, totally apart from their works, they receive eternal life. Later, after hearing the false explanation of the Gospel from some minister in their church, they may have changed their minds about the requirement for salvation, but they are still saved because of that one decision to trust Christ alone for eternal life.
John 19:30 indicates that the work of salvation was completed on the Cross by Christ. When something is completed, you can’t add anything to it – it’s finished. So, the only condition for eternal life is personal faith in Jesus Christ, whose substitutionary spiritual death on the Cross provided all the work for salvation. That is why Jesus said after He had been judged for our sins, “It is finished!” Salvation was completed on the Cross and there is nothing we can add to it now or ever. Eternal salvation is a free gift which is compatible with God’s policy of grace. Therefore, it is attained by faith alone in Jesus Christ. By adding anything to faith for salvation, mankind is in competition with God, and that alone is blasphemous. (Ephesians 2:8-9; John 3:15-18, 11:25-26, 16:8-9; Romans 1:16, 3:20-24, 4:4-5, 5:1-2, 8, 15-17; Galatians 2:16, 3:13; I Peter 3:18)