So, Darian asked me (on the post requests page) to write a post.
‘could you post about sin and salvation and works and all that?’
First of all… I don’t think that you really know what you’re asking Darian. That is such a huge question… entire lives have been devoted to answering those questions, and still there is a raging debate amongst the church.
Sin I think is an easy topic. Essentially, a Christian shouldn’t (and for most accounts and purposes can’t) have it. I think that that’s obvious. I hate it when people emphasize how we’re sinful and we’ll never be perfect etc. etc, because that is TOTALLY the wrong emphasis. We as Christians should strive to be perfect, and we should never think about our sinful nature, because that only gives it a chance to get the better of us. Now I’m not saying that a Christian can’t sin or never sins… because we do. But I don’t think you really want to think or talk about that aspect at all, because you’re then dwelling on imperfection, which you should never do (obviously I’m generalizing). A metaphor off the top of my head:
Say you watch a movie. It’s the best movie you’ve ever seen in your life. By far and away. Say you start talking to a friend about it, and you don’t tell him anything good. Instead, you say, "Oh, there was this one part where the main character slurred the word ‘hill’ and ‘bill’ and it sounded like he said ‘hill-billy’ when he meant something totally different." or… "And then this one part I didn’t like because the antagonist used a slang word that was technically incorrect," or… "Oh, and one of the characters had this trait that I didn’t like… he was always scratching his head… he did it way too much."
You’re emphasizing the wrong parts. You don’t talk about those sorts of things, you look at the whole story and how it goes together, and you don’t take things out of context. When you dwell on imperfection, you’re doing just that. It is a very sad and very true fact that we sin, but who cares when we do it so little?
Works is a little harder. Everyone has a different theory about what works exactly do. But they all say this: "You have to have them or you ain’t a Christian." I think that that is pretty much what we should emphasize. It’s not really all that important about what they do so long as you actually do them.
Can we earn our way to heaven? Are we justified by faith alone? Do works change God’s opinion of us? Can we pay in any part for our salvation through works? All legitimate questions. At this point, I would probably lean towards (note the ‘probably’ and ‘lean’) saying that works do something. That they actually do amount to something, however small, in God’s eyes. But this is such a huge topic and I haven’t studied it in depth-that I would have to say I really have no clue.
Salvation. Oh dear.
I know I should be able to pop off a definition of salvation, or I should be able to walk someone through the steps, but to tell the truth, at this point I really couldn’t. I’ve said this in previous posts and I’ll say it again: "I have no clue… I’m working on it." But I can give you a list of at least a couple of things that I think are absolutely essential to the Christian life and salvation.
Love, Faith, Baptism, Realizing how big God really is, Confession, Enlightenment (pretty much the same thing as love), Persecution, Overcoming, Joy, Holiness.
God be with you all, Amen.