Salvation Is More Than Being Saved

In Salvation Is More Than Being Saved, Dr. Jack Hyles takes the reader through the inner workings of salvation to help him realize that there is so much more to salvation than just being rescued from the depths of Hell. If that is all salvation was, it would be wonderful; however, God has taken the gift of salvation and packaged it with many other doctrines and has presented it freely to all mankind.

“If there were a Guinness Book of World Records entry for ‘amount of times having prayed the sinner’s prayer,’ I’m pretty sure I’d be a top contender,” says pastor and author J. D. Greear. He struggled for many years to gain an assurance of salvation and eventually learned he was not alone. “Lack of assurance” is epidemic among evangelical Christians. In Stop Asking Jesus Into Your Heart, J. D. shows that faulty ways of present- ing the gospel are a leading source of the confusion. Our presentations may not be heretical, but they are sometimes misleading. The idea of “asking Jesus into your heart” or “giving your life to Jesus” often gives false assurance to those who are not saved—and keeps those who genuinely are saved from fully embracing that reality. Greear unpacks the doctrine of assurance, showing that salvation is a posture we take to the promise of God in Christ, a posture that begins at a certain point and is maintained for the rest of our lives. He also answers the tough questions about assurance: What exactly is faith? What is repentance? Why are there so many warnings that seem to imply we can lose our salvation? Such issues are handled with respect to the theological rigors they require, but Greear never loses his pastoral sensitivity or a communication technique that makes this message teachable to a wide audience from teens to adults.

Are There Two Wills in God? Divine Election and God's Desire for All to Be Saved In this short, theological essay, John Piper builds a scriptural case that God's unconditional election unto salvation is compatible with God's genuine desire and offer for all to be saved. Helping us to make sense of this seemingly paradoxical relationship, Piper wisely holds both truths in tension as he explores the Bible's teaching on this challenging topic, graciously responds to those who disagree, and motivates us to passionately proclaim the free offer of the gospel to all people.

A stunning reexamination of one of the essential tenets of Christian belief from one of the most provocative and admired writers on religion today “A scathing, vigorous, eloquent attack on those who hold that that there is such a thing as eternal damnation.”—Karen Kilby, Commonweal The great fourth-century church father Basil of Caesarea once observed that, in his time, most Christians believed that hell was not everlasting, and that all would eventually attain salvation. But today, this view is no longer prevalent within Christian communities. In this momentous book, David Bentley Hart makes the case that nearly two millennia of dogmatic tradition have misled readers on the crucial matter of universal salvation. On the basis of the earliest Christian writings, theological tradition, scripture, and logic, Hart argues that if God is the good creator of all, he is the savior of all, without fail. And if he is not the savior of all, the Kingdom is only a dream, and creation something considerably worse than a nightmare. But it is not so. There is no such thing as eternal damnation; all will be saved. With great rhetorical power, wit, and emotional range, Hart offers a new perspective on one of Christianity’s most important themes.

The majority Evangelical view is that once someone has accepted Christ as Saviour they are guaranteed salvation. But is it safe to assume that once we are saved, we are saved for always? David Pawson investigates this through biblical evidence, historical figures such as Augustine, Luther and Wesley, and evangelical assumptions about grace and justification, divine sovereignty and human responsibility. He asks whether something more than being born again is required so that our inheritance is not lost. This book helps us decide whether ‘once saved, always saved’ is real assurance or a misleading assumption. The answer will have profound effects on the way we live and disciple others.

Looking at the complex but important, topic of what it takes to truly be saved, Alan Stanley asserts there is more to salvation than believed.

"This short book encourages doubt-filled Christians with the truths of Scripture--shifting their perspective to see themselves as God sees them, comforting their hearts with the abundant love initiated by God, and teaching them to receive this love through the gifts Christ has given them"--

The purpose of this book is to make the way of salvation as plain as day to men, women, and children, with the expectation that many of those who read the book will see the way, will take it, will be saved at once, and will obtain eternal life. The book goes out into the world for the same purpose that Jesus Christ came into it: to seek and to save that which was lost (Luke 19:10 AKJV). Jesus Christ came to save sinners. Do you want Jesus to take an interest in you and save you? Then you must take your place before Him as a sinner – a commonplace, unadorned, unvarnished, inexcusable, self-confessed sinner. Not a respectable sinner; no, not a sophisticated sinner or a cultivated sinner; no, not an attractive sinner or an amiable sinner; no, just a plain, unadorned sinner – a poor, miserable, vile, guilty, worthless, hell-deserving sinner. Did you know that more people are shut out of Jesus Christ’s saving grace, pardon, heaven, and eternal life because they won’t come to Jesus Christ as sinners – plain, ugly, wretched sinners? Far more people are shut out of heaven by the pride that keeps them from crying, God be merciful to me a sinner, than are shut out by the enormity of their sins or by the stubbornness of their infidelity. It is as true today as it was when Jesus Christ first said it to the moralists of His own day: The publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom of God before you (Matthew 21:31). Christ Jesus came not merely to save the sinner from the guilt of his sins and from the penalty of his sins, but to save him also from the power of sin. Jesus Christ does save from sin’s guilt and from sin’s punishment; He does save from a guilty conscience and from hell, but thank God, that is not all; He saves from sin’s power. Our Lord’s own words bring this out with great clearness and force. He says in John 8:34 (ASV), Every one that committeth sin is the bondservant [slave] of sin. We all know this is true. How many of us know from bitterest experience the slavery of sin, the slavery of drunkenness, the slavery of lust, the slavery of the greed for gold, the slavery of a bad temper, the slavery of an unruly tongue, the slavery of a mean disposition, or the slavery of unclean thoughts. Yes, we have all known something about the bondage of sin, but listen to what Jesus Christ: If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed (John 8:36 ASV). Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Savior who died on Calvary’s cross to make pardon possible, rose from the dead and is a living Savior today. He has all power . . . in heaven and in earth (Matthew 28:18 AKJV), and is therefore able to save to the uttermost, not merely from the uttermost but also to the uttermost, all those who come to God through Him (Hebrews 7:25); He saves us from all the slavery of sin. He saves us from sin’s power as well as from sin’s guilt. That is what He came to do; that is what He does do. – Reuben A. Torrey