What is Soteriology?

A second requirement of a philosophy of history is a proper unifying principle. In covenant theology the principle is the covenant of grace. This is the alleged covenant that the Lord made with man after the sin of Adam, in which He offered salvation through Jesus Christ. In short, the covenant of grace is God's plan of salvation, and therefore the unifying principle of covenant theology is soteriological.

The truth of the gospel is the doctrine of salvation, as declared by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven in the name and as the witness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Its peculiarity is this: that it disallows all natural claims, or pleas, or hopes; and contradicts authoritatively that which was once enjoined by divine command upon the only nation that God had ever called distinctively His own. The law called on men to justify themselves. The gospel approves the law as the just and holy witness and discoverer of human sin, but supersedes it in its former office of the teacher of God's children, by the revelation of that higher and living truth of which it spake — the specific purpose and intent of the law in its relation to the gospel is declared with much fulness by the apostle in the following chapter. What we have here to insist on is, that the gospel of our salvation is in its tone and character exactly contrary to law. "To him that worketh not," and to no other, it assigns both forgiveness of sins and the gift of divine righteousness on the sole condition of his faith. We may not work upon the Sabbath of God's saving grace. Christ is that Sabbath; rest for God and man alike. For God, as the full realization of His own good pleasure in the obedience of His Son; for man, by the finishing of all transgression and the bringing in of everlasting righteousness through the dying and reviving of the Lamb.

The New Testament Scriptures contain a doctrine of salvation for sinners who are lost and a doctrine of rewards for the faithful services of those who are saved. And it is of great importance to the right understanding of the Word that the student should clearly make the distinction between these. What that distinction is may be seen by carefully noting the following contrasts.

Let us look, then, first, at the character of the deliverance, or salvation, which this wondrous intervention of God in grace brings. This cannot be learnt by going over the points of systematic divinity [i.e. the creeds of religious systems], but by a reference to the character of man's condition through sin, as unfolded in the word of God, and manifested by the suffering and death of Christ. Whatever there is of moral distance from God, through sin, this salvation, which "the grace of God" brings, meets, and sets aside. "For Christ hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." Sin in its very nature separates from God; for light cannot have fellowship with darkness; but then it is said, "Ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ." Sin, and death, and Satan's power, and the judgment of God - all marked man's condition of ruin, and all must be met before salvation, full and adequate, can be proclaimed. It is not enough to raise man from his degradation and moral pollution, if such a thing could be, and set him on his pathway to happiness. The conscience must be set at rest on the ground of every claim of God in His righteous holiness having been met, and every possible consequence of sin set aside. And this is the salvation which the grace of God brings. It brings eternal life into this region of death; for "God hath given to us eternal life: and this life is in his Son." It brings in divine righteousness into the midst of condemnation. For "he who knew no sin was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." It brings deliverance from Satan's power; for "through death [Christ] destroyed him who had the power of death, that is, the devil." Nay more, the salvation which the grace of God brings puts us in the very place, and position, and acceptance before God, and makes us partakers of the very life and glory of Him by whom the salvation has been wrought. It has no other measure, and has no lower character. Was ever love like this!

Here then, most assuredly, we have final perseverance, and that moreover, not merely the perseverance of the saints, but of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Yes, dear friend, this is the way we would have you view the matter. It is the final perseverance of the Holy Trinity. It is the perseverance of the Holy Ghost in opening the ears of the sheep. It is the perseverance of the Son in receiving all whose ears are thus opened. And, finally, it is the perseverance of the Father in keeping through His own name, the blood-bought flock in the hollow of His everlasting hand. This is plain enough. We must either admit the truth — the consolatory and sustaining, truth of final perseverance, or succumb to the blasphemous proposition that the enemy of God and man can carry his point against the holy and eternal Trinity. We see no middle ground. "Salvation is of the Lord," from first to last. It is free, unconditional, everlasting salvation. It reaches down to where the sinner is in all his guilt, ruin, and degradation, and bears him up to where God is, in all His holiness, truth, and righteousness. and it endures for ever. God the Father is its source, God the Son is its channel, and God the Holy Ghost is the power of application and enjoyment. It is all of God, from beginning to end, from foundation to top-stone, from everlasting to everlasting. If it were not so, it would be presumptuous folly to speak of final perseverance; but, seeing it is so, it would be presumptuous unbelief to think of aught else.

Justification is presented in three ways in the Epistle to the Romans. In the third chapter we get the complete ruin of man detailed, and then the statement, "All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" (ver. 23). That is our condition by nature. Then we are told that we are "justified freely by his grace (God's grace) through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus" (ver. 24). In the first verse of the fifth chapter of Romans we read — "Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." In the ninth verse of the same chapter we have — "Much more then being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him." So you see justification spoken of in these three ways. Are there then three ways of justification? No. There are three parties to justification. Do you know who they are? God, Christ, and yourself. And what is God's part in it? Listen: "Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Grace is the spring of it all. It all comes from God. And what is the next thing? Being now justified by his blood" — the blood of Jesus — "we shall be saved from wrath through him." That is Christ's side — "his blood" — His death. And what is your side and mine? It is faith. Righteousness shall be imputed to us "if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ" (Rom. 4:24-25, Rom. 5:1). What is your side and mine? Faith! God's side is Grace. That is the spring. It all flows from Him. And Jesus' side? Blood. His death is the instrumental means and basis — the groundwork of our justification. Your side and mine is Faith! And what is that? It is the hand put out to take the blessing which God's grace offers, and Jesus' blood secures. Justification, therefore, is by grace, through blood, and on the principle of faith — not works.

Then we have brought before us that which sets forth the death of Christ the supper (v. 2); for nothing less than the death and blood-shedding of the Son of God could meet our need, or satisfy the claims of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens. Nothing less than the unsparing condemnation of our sins could satisfy divine justice, and nothing less than our having everlasting life and salvation could satisfy divine love. The death of Christ, then, was absolutely necessary, and is the alone ground of peace and everlasting security. "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; birth if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." (John 12:24.) Precious love, that could thus manifest itself in cleansing and saving us, and bringing eternal glory to God! By the death of Christ, the question of our sins is for ever settled, according to the strictest claims of justice and truth, as well as love. We are told that He "bare our sins in His own body on the tree," that He "suffered for sins," "died for our sins," shed His blood "for many for the remission of sins;" that "He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities, … and with His stripes we are healed." We have thus in the death of Christ an immoveable ground of peace, and that which purges the conscience, because of remission of sins, on the ground of sins having been judged by God unsparingly in the Person of His beloved Son, who was "made sin" and "made a curse" for us on the tree. If the love of God is the source of all our blessings, the death of Christ is the foundation of our everlasting peace and security; for "other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ." Here we see the demands of holiness vindicated, the claims of righteousness met, justice satisfied, love manifested, sins judged, the sinner that believes saved, and God glorified. God, who condemned sin, now justifies the sinner on the principle of faith. "Jesus knowing that His hour was come that He should depart out of this world unto the Father," and the Supper, tell us of His death. It is the death of Christ, then, that has justly answered for us every charge of sin, and which sets our conscience at rest before God; for if the question be asked, Who is he that condemneth? The answer is, It is Christ that died, and it is God which justifieth. Thus we sing: "The Lord of life in death hath lain, To clear me from all charge of sin, And, Lord, from guilt of crimson stain, Thy precious blood hath made me clean."

God's salvation, and the full deliverance which it brings from all the power of Satan, which, being won by the death of Christ, should be the present enjoyed portion of every Christian, is only known to him who has accepted by faith two distinct statements of the word of God concerning it; namely, that as God's salvation surely deals with, and settles the question of my sins, so surely does it also deal with, and settle the question of, myself. "Who was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification," indicates the way of the settlement of the one (Rom. 4), that is, our sins; for the Holy Ghost now present (Acts 2) is now testifying to us (as He will testify to Israel, founded on the work of Christ, in the day of the new covenant), "Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more." But while this is true, it is His voice also saying we "are dead to sin," "buried with Him by baptism unto death" (Rom. 6) (and therefore are we exhorted to reckon ourselves to be "dead indeed unto sin"); these and similar passages give us the other part of this "great" salvation; i.e. the end too of ourselves in that death of Christ in God's sight. Both are to be accepted and enjoyed only by faith.

Regeneration is not a change of the old nature, but the introduction of a new; it is the implantation of the nature or life of the Second Adam, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, founded upon the accomplished redemption of Christ, and in full keeping with the sovereign will or counsel of God. The moment a sinner believes in his heart, and confesses with his mouth, the Lord Jesus, he becomes the possessor of a new life, and that life is Christ. He is born of God, is a child of God, is a son of the free-woman. (See Rom. 10:9; Col. 3:4; 1 John 3:1-2; Gal. 3:26; Gal. 4:31)

This is true practical sanctification. It is not any attempt at the improvement of our old nature. It is not a vain effort to reconstruct an irretrievable ruin. No; it is simply the Holy Ghost, by the powerful application of "the truth," enabling the new man to live, and move, and have his being in that sphere to which he belongs. Here there will, undoubtedly, be progress. There will be growth in the moral power of this precious truth — growth in spiritual ability to subdue and keep under all that pertains to nature — a growing power of separation from the evil around us — a growing meetness for that heaven to which we belong, and toward which we are journeying — a growing capacity for the enjoyment of its holy exercises. All this there will be, through the gracious ministry of the Holy Ghost, who uses the word of God to unfold to our souls the truth as to our standing in Christ, and as to the walk which comports with that standing. But let it be clearly understood that the work of the Holy Ghost in practical sanctification, day by day, is founded upon the fact that believers "are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once." (Heb. 10:10) The object of the Holy Ghost is to lead us into the knowledge, the experience, and the practical exhibition of that which was true of us in Christ the very moment we believed. As regards this, there is progress; but our standing in Christ is eternally complete.