From the Vault

A couple days ago I went through some of my old notes looking for more insight into a question. It's stuff that I wrote back in 2002 during the beginning of my studies of the bible. I read it to know what salvation was, and if there was confidence to be had for application to me and others.

I can see how hard my mind was working back then, trying to integrate all of what I read into a single concept. I enjoyed looking through my drafts, at the things that I crossed out, and the rewrites I made for months and months trying to put human language to the salvation message, devoid of error and compact in communication.

In the eyes of today, I judge a lot of my language atrocious with evangelical fear of evil. But, at the finish of those eighteen months of intense study I penned a page of thoughts on a topic that I since have not followed up on... something that intrigues my mind now just as it did when I left it.

I was trying to use scriptural truths to minimize the distance between hearing about Jesus, and being forgiven of everything. I used substitution for equal truths.

"Previous argument: that belief = receiving God's love (1 john 2:3, 2:5)
Furthering the argument: God's love = Jesus being given to us

'I want you to be merciful; I don't want your sacrifices.' Sacrifices are not needed where sins have been forgiven (heb 10:18), and loving God with all your heart is more important than all sacrifices (Mark 12:33). God did not want sacrifices, nor was He pleased with them (heb 10:8). But sacrifice is what we are doing when we obey God's law, it is an act of worship (rom 12:1).

Now you say 'I know that I fail to love God and men, so I fail to obey the law.' But when Jesus obeyed the law He credited it to our account. He did love God with all his heart and love men. The law's requirements have been met by Jesus.

What is love? This is how we know what love is: Jesus laid down his life for us (1 john 3:16). This is how we know that we love one another: that we would lay down our life for someone else's (john 15:13).

"If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us." (1 john 4:15-16) Belief engages God's love for us.

So, if we know about the standard of love, and the standard of love is Christ (and we believe that it happened), then we have known God's love. If we know God's love, the bible says we have been saved in a reliable sense. Moreover, knowing:

the standard of love,
that the standard was Christ,
that the law commanded love,
that the sacrifice for the law was paid,
that he credited it to our account,
that there was a need for sacrifice for our disobedience,
that the sacrifice requires spilling of blood,
that Jesus spilled his blood when he laid down his life,

then knowing about God's love = the blood of Jesus (personally applied).

God's restoration to, in us, is a restoration of love."

I was trying to prove the righteousness transaction taking place by means of simply knowing and believing that God loved us by sending his son; John 3:16 -- the most common gospel phrase.

Some people like to read their bibles for the reason to distance people away from good standing with God. As I look back, I am thankful that my aim has always been to shorten that distance -- and that the scriptures allowed me to do so.