Ridgell's Originals

I often hear conversations about Scripture that refer to salvation issues.  I certainly want to be right about salvation.  I do not want to tell someone something is crucial to their salvation if God did not say it was.  Nor do I want to tell someone they are lost over something God did not say they were lost over.

There are those who seem to believe that every belief, decision, and conviction about spiritual things is a matter of salvation.  In other words, there is a right answer for every issue and every issue, doctrine, or practice is of equal importance to God.  You will be lost if you get anything wrong.  Jesus saves but only if you get everything about Jesus right.

Others seem to feel that nothing is really a salvation issue.  It is as if the Bible is simply of book of suggestions.  Most things are open to interpretation and all interpretations carry equal weight -- even with God.  As if you cannot really be lost over anything.  Jesus saves so you don't have to worry about anything else.

So I have been thinking about what things really do matter.  When I read Scripture, are there things that are more important than others?  Are there things I must get right or I endanger my soul?  Are there things I can be wrong on and still go to heaven.

So here are a few of the ways I am deciding what really matters in Scripture.

When a passage includes words like "saved", "salvation", "condemned", "lost", etc. then I conclude that God might intend for it to be a salvation issue.  Words like important, greatest, first seem to indicate that the subject being talked about is ... well, more important than others.

I believe that talking about how you make followers of Jesus is a salvation issue.  Lost people become saved.  I do not want to be wrong about that.  So things that have to do with becoming a Christian would seem to be salvation issues.

But truth about becoming a Christian does not seem to have the same eternal consequences as how you worship as a Christian.  How to become a member of the family of God would seem to me more a salvation issue than how the family of God operates.

Even when talking about how Christians live, I listen for definitive words.  And there are passages that say "do", or "do not".. That seems clear.

So I think baptism is on a different level than how we worship.  One is a salvation issue.  One is not.

But that is what I think.  You may disagree. That's OK.

But that is where I draw my lines of fellowship.  

And if I misread Scripture and am drawing lines too tightly, the good news is that I am not the final judge.  God is.

And if I draw them too loosely, I beg forgiveness and pray God will have mercy on me and on the ones I misled.

So let's all be very careful about what is and is not a salvation issue.

After all, none of us want to be silent where God spoke.  And none of us want to speak where God was silent.  Especially about salvation.  

Well, that's what I am thinking about today.  Salvation issues.  It matters to the lost I talk to and it matters as I decide how to live -- or not live -- in fellowship with my brothers and sisters here.