YouTube: The Meaning of Salvation

One of the key issues in our inherited religious tradition revolves around the topic of salvation. When a Christian apologist asks if you have been saved, he or she is usually asking whether, when you die, you will be going to heaven or hell. The answer is often measured by the quality of your Christian life, as if eternity were decided by how well you performed in this one.

A significant takeaway from my studies of near-death experiences is that, upon the death of the body, there is no judgment, no possibility of eternal damnation, and no special reward for being the best Christian on the block. All are met with the same absolute freedom from the confines of this physical garment. What we do with that freedom is a deeply fascinating question, but it is one we will consider at another time.

If we accept this point of view as truth, are we saying that salvation is not an issue? No. But the question we need to address is this: If there truly is a need for salvation, what is it that we need to be saved from? The answer is closer than we might suspect. We need to be saved from the difficulties associated with an eternal soul attempting to live a successful life in a physical body while navigating a material world.

I have come to believe that one of the greatest misunderstandings of New Thought philosophy is the notion that we are tasked with advancing the soul, making ourselves so God-like that we will no longer have to enroll in this earthly school. At that imagined moment of enlightenment, we graduate from the need to return after our summer break.

If you are making a thousand-mile car trip, your objective is to make the drive as comfortable and successful as possible. You want enough food, enough money for gas, enough alertness to stay safe, and enough wisdom to take advantage of the amenities of the rest stop. You want to be “saved” from fatigue, hunger, confusion, and an empty gas tank. The rewards you seek are not in the destination, but in the journey itself. Your plan of salvation is in your preparation for the journey, not the destination. What happens when you arrive is an entirely different matter.

And so it is with this earthly journey. We want to understand how a spiritual being can have a human experience in the most creative, stimulating, and comfortable way possible. This is undoubtedly why Jesus invited the weary and heavy-laden, those burdened with earthly cares, to listen to what he taught. His teachings function like a rest stop. Refuel, have a snack, stretch your legs, wake up, and resume your journey. You will enjoy it a lot more.