Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

SALVATION, SAVE, SAVIOR

God’s deliverance of a people or an individual from a threatening situation from which that group or person is unable to rescue itself. The threatening situation may range from political oppression, unjust accusations, military disaster, difficult labor or physical illness to a spiritual consequence of sinful behavior or the experience of God’s wrath. The agent of salvation may be a human liberator, king, or judge; nevertheless, clearly it is God who provides the agent, and it is God alone who ultimately saves.

Salvation is the theme of much of the Bible. In the life of the Hebrew people, God is the one who delivers from oppression, trouble, or destruction. This conviction is expressed through a variety of terms other than the word “salvation” (Heb. hôšîaʿ or related terms from the verb yāšaʿ): hiṣṣîl (“remove someone from trouble”), ʿāzar (“help”), gāʾal (“buy back,” “vindicate,” or “redeem”), pādâ (“ransom”), pālaṭ (“bring to safety, cause to escape, rescue”). Such deliverance is the gracious working out of God’s own salvific purpose for Israel and does not depend upon the merits of the people.

Heb. yāšaʿ can also describe the help that human beings offer one another (2 Sam. 10:11). Even in the areas of human activity, however, the working of God is evident (1 Sam. 23:2-5; Josh. 10:6-11). Thus Israel’s faith expressed its experiences in warfare as God’s salvation (e.g., Judg. 6–7) and through human agency in the juridical process (Deut. 22:25-27). Even the king is to be the “savior” (môšîaʿ) of the helpless (e.g., 2 Sam. 14). God provides human agents whose responsibilities include the working out of justice or righteousness to bring about the salvation of someone in need.

The faith claim of the OT is that Israel has both already experienced and still anticipates the promised salvation of God within the arena of history. The paradigmatic experience of Israel’s salvation is the Exodus event, God’s deliverance of his people from slavery in Egypt. Each new generation recites these events in a confession of faith that not merely recalls the historical facts, but enables each generation to participate anew in the event (Deut. 6:21b-23).

In its worship Israel characteristically recited in detail its experiences of God’s salvation within historical events (e.g., Ps. 105). Other Psalms make it clear that Israel envisioned other historical events as revealing God’s saving purpose for Israel. Ps. 72:12 recites creation as a historic, salvific act of God. Ps. 136 extends the range of these events from creation through the wilderness wandering to Israel’s possession of the Promised Land. Ps. 107 speaks of God’s redeeming work in general terms so that God’s saving acts for the desert wanderer, the prisoner, the sick, and the shipwrecked are also available in the present to those who dwell in Israel.

God’s salvation is the reception of his steadfast love (ḥeseḏ) and peace (šalōm) in the life of the nation and of the individual (Ps. 29:11; 55:18[MT 19]), even in the midst of trouble. Salvation is expressed not only in the release from captivity, but also the forgiveness of sin (Ps. 85), characterized not only by the manifestation of God’s loving-kindness and peace but also God’s righteousness (ṣeḏeq) and truth (ʾemem).

The experience of salvation has a communal as well as an individual nature. This bipolar understanding of salvation and the resulting tension is maintained throughout the Bible. Nevertheless, the OT gives evidence of a shift in emphasis from the collective nature of salvation to the salvation of the individual which is then maintained in the NT. This shift seems to have been accelerated by the experience of exile. Both Jeremiah and Ezekiel emphasize the individual nature of sin and judgment and the individual nature of repentance and forgiveness (Jer. 31:29; Ezek. 18:2b). This is not to deny the communal nature of faith but to insure that individuals recognize their personal responsibility rather than blaming others. Nevertheless, such an emphasis opened the way to a focusing upon the personal experience of salvation as often expressed in the Psalter (e.g., Ps. 88:1-3[2-4]).

In both the prophetic literature and the emerging apocalyptic literature, God’s salvation was increasingly projected into the future. Even from the giving of the promises to the patriarchs in Genesis there had always been a future element in the nature of salvation, but the promises were never completely fulfilled. The restoration had raised the hopes of an age of salvation to begin with a new temple and all nations bringing tribute to Israel (Isa. 49; Zech. 2). Yet Haggai and Malachi indicate that the restoration of the people to Israel and the rebuilding of the temple led to disappointment and disillusionment. Therefore, the final saving acts of God were placed in the future with even more radical metaphors of salvation: a new heaven and a new earth (Isa. 65). While previous prophets had seen God’s salvation as a future event within history (Hos. 2), the biblical writings after the Restoration move toward apocalyptic imagery until finally salvation will be fully expressed in the arena of eternity after the resurrection of the dead (Dan. 12; Isa. 26:19). These concepts continued to be developed in the intertestamental literature (e.g., Enoch, 2 Esdras, the Apocalypse of Baruch, and the Assumption of Moses), and their influence is felt in the NT.

The NT’s contribution to the understanding of salvation lies in its witness to Jesus, the Christ (Messiah), the Savior (Gk. sōtḗr) of the world (John 4:42; Luke 2:11). Jesus (from Heb. yāšaʿ, “to save”) was born to save his people from their sin (Matt. 1:21). It is Jesus, and Jesus alone, who is the agent of God’s salvation (Acts 4:12).

The NT speaks of salvation as deliverance from physical danger such as sickness, deformity, demon possession, death, or the “evil one,” as well as deliverance from sin. Salvation does include a concern for the earthly needs of people, as evidenced by the miracles of Jesus as well as the teachings of James and 1 John, but its major focus is more spiritual in nature. Salvation means entry into the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of heaven. Jesus was interested in giving abundant life to the whole person (John 10:10). This life in the kingdom is life within the reign of God, which is actually present and yet remains future in its complete realization (cf. Rom. 8:1, 9). This present reality of salvation is the proleptic experience of the believer of eternal life in the presence of God by means of faith in Jesus Christ, the crucified and resurrected Lord.

The NT also knows of the communal nature of salvation. The Church, not just individuals, was the object of Christ’s saving love as demonstrated on the cross (cf. Eph. 5:25-27).

The NT, like the OT, bears witness to the ultimately eschatological nature of salvation. Salvation has yet to be realized completely in the life of believers. Jesus speaks of an end to history and the coming of the Son of Man, the final saving act of God (Mark 13:27). But even Jesus does not claim to know when this “day of the Lord” will come. It is the book of Revelation that gives greatest expression to the concept that the final salvation of God will be revealed on a stage beyond history, beyond time, and beyond this earth (Rev. 21–22). That day will be one in which God’s salvation will be available to all the world (Matt. 28:19-20; Eph. 1:9-10; Phil. 2:9-11; Col. 1:20). This universal scope of God’s love was not unknown in the OT (cf. Gen. 12:3; Isa. 19:24-25; Ezek. 29:9). Nevertheless, it is the NT which gives salvation its widest scope, its greatest motivation, and its unique means (John 3:16).

Gary W. Light

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

SALVATION, SAVE, SAVIOR

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)