God’s wonderful plan for your life might not be what you think – Helmet of Salvation, Part 2

We need to talk about the other direction of salvation.  Jesus does not only save us from terrible consequences, he also saves for something. 

We are saved for the abundant, flourishing life, filled by the Spirit, so the good things of the Spirit flow out of our lives.  We are saved to live according to the teaching and mission of Jesus throughout all the days of our lives. 

To put it simply, Jesus saves us for a new life in the here and now. 

That new life I believe is so important to understanding salvation.  Once we are saved, we do not live in the Saved From.  When we are saved, we are living in the Saved For.  What do I mean by that?  “We do not live in the Saved From, but we are living in the Saved For.”  Let me try to explain it. 

We are saved from our sinful past.  It does not have the same hold on us.  We now have access to God’s strength for victory. We are also saved from a godless eternity.  That is our past and future.  But we live in the present.  We are saved for the now.  We are saved to live the new life of Jesus, following him on his mission, now.  Further, we also have the hope of eternal life with him in the future.  But we do not live in the future.   We also do not live in the past.  We live now.

Think about the illustration of the person who was saved from the burning building in the previous post.  Should that person for the rest of their just constantly talk about how they were rescued from the burning building?  Or should they live gratefully with a new purpose? 

Do you see the two very different visions of salvation?  The Saved From, which is the past and the future, so often focuses on being saved from negative, horrible consequences.  But the Saved For, the present, focuses on being saved for the beauty, goodness and truth of the Mission of Jesus.  We are saved for living that life now. 

There are times that you might hear the phrase, “God has a wonderful plan for your life now.”  The people who say that phrase mean that God has one very specific plan for you now.  What college you will go to.  What career field you will have.  Whether you’ll be single or marry.  Where you will live.  For some reason this idea of God having a wonderful plan for our lives now focuses on the big decisions.  Usually not what socks we should wear, or what we should make for dinner. 

What I’m trying to say is that God does have a wonderful plan for our lives now, but not about those big or small decisions.  He gives us biblical principles and wisdom and the wise counsel of godly people to help us make decisions.  We are free to make those decisions.  What God does have a plan for is that we are saved for his mission and his way of life now in the here and now, for the flourishing of ourselves, others and the whole world.

What is so amazing is that when we are saved, the Spirit of God indwells our lives so that we can have his power to serve him. The Saved-For life is a life flowing with the Spirit of God. 

God does have a salvation plan for your life. He wants to save you for new life now, and he gives his Spirit to fill you so that your life is overflowing with love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self-control as you follow him on his mission, inviting others to experience that same salvation plan that God has for their lives too.  

Photo by Glenn Carstens-Peters on Unsplash