Getting Saved

One of the things that I have had a personal loathing for throughout my life is the way the word “saved” is used in modern American conversation.  Specifically, I mean the way Christians use it.  I can’t remember how many times I have heard that our job is to preach the gospel so people can “be saved.”  I have no problem with the notion that Christ saves people through the preaching of the gospel, my problem has always been the air of superiority that accompanies it.  I think there is that danger in my previous article as well.

It is easy to look at salvation, or discussions about it, as between one person who thinks they “get” it and one person they want to “give it to.”  It is perceived then as a self-righteous power play.  One person has everything so well figured out that the other person should not only listen to them, but should do what they say.  In my article yesterday I spoke of baptism and salvation, and I realized this morning that salvation is so often used in this false way, that talking about baptism that way may have been a bit flippant and sounding self-righteous.  I’d like to take a step back and think through this out loud with you.

To be a saved person is to be a person in union with God.  Union with God occurs when the Spirit of God dwells in a person, and that person dwells in the Spirit of God.  Saint Paul speaks of it thus in 2 Corinthians 5:17, “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation: the old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” David says it another way, ““You are gods, sons of the Most High, all of you.” Both of these authors speak of the same thing, describing only slightly differently.  To be saved is to be truly what we were made to be.  To be saved is to be a new creation.  To be saved is to be truly a person in the fullness of the word.  To be saved is to be a “god” and a “son of the most high.”

So when an Orthodox Christian speaks of salvation, he speaks in these terms.  “Going to heaven when you die,” is not what salvation is, though going to dwell eternally with God is certainly “salvation.”  Perhaps a western way to put it (and i know no other way being a westerner) would be, if I go to heaven when I die, I will be saved then, but that says nothing about whether I am saved now.  A saved person is not a person who will go to heaven when they die.  A saved person is a person who has heaven in him now.

Thus, when the Church speaks of there being no salvation outside the Church, She means simply that there is no way to have heaven in you in the present without being submerged in it, eating it, drinking it, being sprinkled with it, and communing in it through prayer and fellowship (with the saints before and present) .  No salvation outside the Church does not mean other people will go to heaven when they die, truly St. Justin Martyr celebrated Socrates as a non-Jewish person living in the Old Testament who knew God.  No Salvation outside the Church means that the Church is where Jesus enters and abides in us.  We may be saved on the last day, but why wait?

Getting more specific, children receive Baptism, Chrismation (Confirmation) and Holy Communion, why?  Because they need to be in union with God.  Baptism and Chrismation (Confirmation) submerge and anoint the child with heaven itself.  It is not that the child is broken and needs fixed, its that we want for them in their first days to have what we all long for all our days, union with the divine life.   Children, in truth, are more fit for heaven and more able to seek God than adults, for this reason we are confident in their salvation.

A baptized person like myself has no right to hang my “salvation” over another however.  Yes, I was saved (united with God) at baptism, but am I uniting my body, soul, spirit, and will to his now?  As we grow and mature we gain more abilities, and those abilities have to be incorporated into our relationships.  When we are young, our family is by birth, our friends are by birth (friends of family), etc. As we grow we choose our friends and even choose what kind of relationship we will have with our family.  This is not different with God.  Salvation is to be united to God.  The sacraments, the services of the Church, the icons, are all intended to facilitate growth in the relationship (salvation).  But, it is up to us.

Thus, the question “do you know where you would go if you died now?” is not a question of whether a person is saved. It is a question of whether they think they WILL be one day.  “Are you saved?” is a question about the nature and maturity of someone’s relationship with God.  This is why I think it is so offensive to us.  The answer to that question when it comes from a stranger is “none of your business.”  When it comes from a friend, perhaps there is some discussion, but the answer is probably not “yes,” without some caveats.

The easiest and most assured way to receive the life of God is the sacraments.  The easiest and most secure way to maintain it is to learn from the saints and what they have done to cultivate the love of God in themselves.  Salvation without the Church would simply be feeling around in the dark that haply we might find Him.

To summarize what I am trying to get at, salvation is not about going to heaven when you die, but about union of body, soul and spirit with the divine (Christ).  Baptism and the other sacraments are objective ways to imbibe heaven (Christ).  The way we live and die is a matter of working out that energy put into us by imbibing heaven (Christ).  Whether I go to heaven when I die is a valid concern, but it is of just as much concern to me whether I am saved (in union with God).

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