Joel Belz recently suggested the world would be a better place if people would live their lives in the same way that good airplane pilots approach their jobs. Good airplane pilots make a habit of correcting the little mistakes they make in flying before those mistakes become tragedies. Just imagine what the world would be like if each of us did the same in our personal lives. Belz gives three reasons why most people do not have this habit—we no longer believe in error, we justify our errors by saying everyone is doing it, and we have become cleaver at inventing instant solutions to our errors. [1]
We Christians have a great deal of responsibility for the third reason. We teach that all we need to do is to believe in Jesus and his death for our sins and automatically all our sins are forgive and we get to go to heaven. This view of salvation impacts how we live our lives and is aptly summarized by David Wells:
For a one-time admission of weakness and failure they got eternal peace with God. That was the deal. They took it and went on with their lives as before. The result is that there is no significant difference between the way born-againers live at an ethical level as compared to those who are nonreligious. [2]
In this blog and in my book we maintain that salvation is the change of our soul so it becomes more like God. It is not just a belief system. Salvation takes more than saying a few words at one moment in our lives. Salvation is not an event, it is a process (2 Corinthians 2:15, Philippians 2:12, Hebrews 10:14). It involves our entire being and our entire lives.
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[1] Joel Belz, “The little adjustments”, World, Vol. 30, No. 24, November 26, 2015, p. 3
[2] Chris Stamper, “Authors by the Dozen”, World, Vol. 17. No. 23, July 7/13, 2002, p. 33.
