Salvation -God’s Axiom

The German theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, rightly observed that God’s relationship with humanity as recorded in Old Testament Scripture had nothing whatsoever to do with saving the human soul. Righteousness and the Kingdom of God on earth was the focus. It is not with the beyond that we should be concerned but rather with this created world to be preserved, subjected to laws, reconciled and restored.¹ Salvation in the OT had a very worldly kind of rescue or liberation in mind (see Ex. 15:2).²
Moreover, God’s salvation of the Israelites was axiomatic. Salvation as the forgiveness of sin was inseparable from the behavior of the community as a whole embracing God’s broader purpose of righteousness and justice in God’s earthly kingdom. When the people followed God’s law, worshiping God exclusively, all went well with them in this world. God would vanquish their enemies before them and deliver the land God had promised. God was with the people in this world and by extension in the realm occupied by their ancestors.

So, what happens when the community becomes distant from God under corrupt kings, against whom God had warned? (1 Sam.8: 4-18) God spoke through the Psalmists and the Prophets, disdaining perfunctory sacrifices as disingenuous exercise (Ps 40:6; Isa 1:11-15), and instead calling for behavior consistent with God’s will for God’s earthly kingdom (Mic. 6:6-8). But the religious structure continued with its priestly traditions, jealously guarding its powerful role in the community. What hope was there for the average citizen to seek salvation, seeing God’s absence all around him? All he could do was wait for God’s return. The writer of Hebrews put it best. “Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.” (Heb. 10:11)

And what of us today? Have our Christian traditions become either mindless rote or diluted doctrine such that God’s axiom of salvation seems less real because we know in our hearts that we are not living as close to God’s will as we might? Do we not see the absence of God all around us?

I think Paul’s admonition to his Roman audience was good advice. “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God” (Rom. 12:2). I am comforted by the knowledge that the will of God is well documented in Scripture, is unchanging, and easy to grasp. Love God for all God is and has created. Love our neighbor. Do justice. Be kind. And walk with humility before God and our fellow citizen.
God’s salvation in the resurrection of the spirit is, after all, axiomatic. (Mk. 12:27)

1. Letters and Papers From Prison, New York, Touchstone, 1953, p. 286
2. Plantinga, Thompson, Lundberg, Christian Theology, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010, p. 316