3D
Salvation in 3-Dimensions
I just met the world’s worst worrier and she did not have a care in the
world. I asked: 'What happened? How did you get rid of all your worries?'
She said: 'I hired a man to worry for me.'
I replied: 'Wow - what does he charge?'
She answered: '£500 a day.'
I said: 'But where are you going to find that kind of money?'
She replied: 'Well, that’s his worry, isn’t it!'
Wouldn’t it be great if we had someone who could take all our worries and
for free?! That’s exactly what God offers us (1Peter 5:7).
We get into anxiety when we take our eyes off the Lord and try to carry the
burden ourselves. One of the things we can worry about is our salvation.
Has it happened?, is it happening?, or will it happen? There is
a paradox here. In the Bible, salvation is sometimes past, sometimes
present, sometimes future - which is it? Do our weaknesses and failures
mean God won’t be able to finish what He started. Will He finally be
able to perfect us? What's God doing in us now?
1Thessalonians 5:23,24: 'Now may the God of peace Himself SANCTIFY
(save) you COMPLETELY and may your whole SPIRIT, SOUL, and BODY be
preserved blameless at the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you
is faithful, Who also will do it.'
* He is the God of peace: He wants you to have the assurance of your salvation,
that He will see it through to the end. He does not start something
and then abandon it.
* Your salvation is so important He Himself is doing it. He is leaving nothing to chance but taking personal responsibility.
* He is working on you until He has saved you completely. He is not going to settle for anything less than perfection.
* Our complete being that is being saved (restored to glory) is defined
to be: spirit, soul, and body.
* The process of salvation will be complete: at the coming of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Until then we are still under construction.
* Our guarantee that God will complete His work in us is that: He is faithful.
He began by calling us into salvation through the promise of the Gospel.
He is faithful to keep His promise to do (complete it). We can rejoice
and rest in this assurance: “Confident of this very thing, that He Who
has begun a good work in you will perform it (carry it on to completion) until
the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6).
SPIRIT-SOUL-BODY. One of the most enlightening revelations
concerning the nature of man and how God is working our salvation is that
man by creation is a TRINITY or TRI-UNITY. This is not surprising
as threeness is the very nature of our One God. 'In the beginning God
(Elohim- a plural noun) created (singular) the heavens and the
earth' (Genesis 1:1).
He created a Triune Uni-verse: (1) ‘In the beginning’ = TIME,
(2) ‘the heavens’ = SPACE, (3) the earth = MATTER-ENERGY
Science confirms that one can’t exist without the other two.
Likewise when God created man in His image and likeness He made man a Trinity.
'The LORD God (1) formed man of the dust of the ground (BODY) and (2)
breathed into his nostrils the breath of life (SPIRIT) and (3) man became
a living being (SOUL)' (Genesis 2:7).
Before the Fall, these 3-dimensions of man were in harmony.
His spirit (made of the breath of God) was in constant contact and
fellowship with God’s Spirit giving him direct intuitive knowledge of God
and things.
By his body he contacted and exercised authority over the physical
world.
His soul or personality (his mind, will and emotions) was formed
from the fusion of spirit and body, forming the bridge between them.
He lived under God’s authority by the life flowing from his spirit.
So, man is a spirit, he has a soul and lives in a body.
God’s purpose is for every part of triune man to respond to the Triune
God with love: 'Hear, O Israel: The LORD (FATHER), our GOD (SON), the LORD (SPIRIT)
is ONE (echad - meaning a corporate unity) You shall love the LORD
your God with all your heart (SPIRIT), with all your SOUL, and with all your
strength (BODY)' (Deuteronomy 6:4,5).
The Three are One so we should love the One God with all three parts
of our being.
But after the Fall our spirit, soul, and body got messed up. Man’s
spirit died to God immediately, so that we were cut off from the life of
God. It became the ‘Old Man’. The sin-nature (sin) came
into the flesh resulting in certain physical death. All this was predicted
in Genesis 2:17. So instead of the soul coming under the control
of the spirit, it came under the power of ‘sin in the flesh’.
This means we need salvation on all 3-DIMENSIONS: Spirit-Soul-Body.
This explains whyin the Bible we discover:
(1). We have been saved,
(2). We are being saved and
(3). We will be saved. Which
is right? - they all are!
There are 3-STAGES OF OUR SALVATION:
1. We have been saved - this is the salvation of our SPIRIT.
2. We are being saved - this is the salvation of our SOUL.
3. We will be saved - this is the salvation of our BODY.
Notice the order: SPIRIT - SOUL - BODY. God works from
the inside out.
1. We have been saved (the Past Tense Salvation of our SPIRIT by the
New Birth).
* 'Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of
the Holy Spirit' (Titus 3:5).
* We are a NEW CREATION in the spirit, we are the righteousness of God (2Cor
5:17,21).
* 'God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He
loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with
Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made
us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages
to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward
us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith,
and that (salvation) not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works,
lest anyone should boast. For we (the New Man) are His workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God has prepared beforehand
that we should walk in them' (Eph 2:4-10).
'The new (spirit) man which
was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness' (Eph 4:24).
See Romans 6:1-11, Col 2:9-15.
2. We are being saved (the Present Tense Salvation of our SOUL by the
Word of God).
'The message of the cross ... to us who are being saved it is the power
of God' (1Cor 1:18).
'Receive with meekness the implanted Word, which is able to save your
souls' (James 1:21).
'Receiving the end (result) of your faith - the salvation of your souls'
(1Peter 1:9).
Now our reborn spirit is perfect and indwelt by the Holy-Spirit, but our
soul is not perfect. There is an ongoing process called ‘the salvation
of our souls, which works through us (1) receiving and (2) doing the Word
of God (including repentance, prayer, worship, serving). Our soul (mind)
now is the main issue (the decider) in determining what progress we make.
The spirit pulls the soul one way and the flesh pulls the opposite way. Whichever
way the soul votes will dominate (Gal 5:16,17, Rom 8:5).
It all depends on what we set your mind on and give attention to. If
we become spiritually minded by allowing the Word to renew our mind to who
we are in Christ in our spirit, then the fruit of the Spirit will flow out
of our spirit.
The result is the transformation of our life: 'Do not be
(externally) conformed to this world (by its pressures), but be transformed
(by ‘metamorphisis’) by the renewing of your mind (soul), that you
may prove (in your life) what is that good, acceptable and perfect
will of God' (Romans 12:2). In metamorphisis, the inner beauty
of our reborn spirit (butterfly) is no longer hidden inside the soulish outer
shell (caterpillar), but comes forth into manifestation. It is change
from the inside out. Likewise God’s will is for the life and love of Christ
in our spirits to be expressed outwardly, showing forth the will of God.
This requires the renewing of our mind - letting the Word of God bring our
thinking (souls) into agreement with our new-creation spirit (removing blockages
of unbelief, unforgiveness etc) by continually (1) hearing and (2) doing
it. Faith in our salvation comes by (1) hearing the Word, but only
by (2) acting it out by faith is the process completed. As a butterfly
must exert its strength so you must: 'work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling. For it is God which works in you both to will
(giving you the desire) and to do (giving you the ability and power)
His good pleasure' (Phil 1:12,13).
3. We will be saved (the Future Tense salvation of our BODY by resurrection
and glorification)
Our eternal glory depends on how well we have received the saving of your
soul: 'salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1Peter 1:5).
'For those who eagerly await Him, He (Jesus) will appear a second time,
apart from sin, for salvation' (Hebrews 9:28).
'Let us who are of
the day be sober, putting on as a helmet the hope of salvation. For God did
not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ'
(1Thess 5:8,9).
'now our salvation is nearer than when we first
believed' (Romans 13:11). See also 1 Corinthians 15:50-58.