"Salvation: A Progressive View"
Stephen Van Kuiken
Rincon Congregational Church
Tucson, Arizona
January 22, 2012
Let us boldly proclaim an inclusive salvation,
the salvation of the world. - John Cobb
Scripture reading: John 3: 11-17
Today I want to talk about the word, “salvation,” and already I can see your eyes start to glaze over. And so this part of the problem, I think. Many of us don’t know how to speak of salvation. Many of us are uncomfortable with the question, “Are you saved?” Some of us don’t quite like how the term is used by others, yet we are not quite sure how to use the term ourselves. John Cobb wrote a book, Reclaiming the Church: Where the Mainline Church Went Wrong and What to Do About It. In it he said that we suffer from being unclear and uncertain about our message. He writes:
Perhaps our most serious weakness at present is that we share no clear idea of “salvation”…we do not know what we are saved from or to.
Many of us recoil from the term because we don’t like the restricted way it is used. Most often, to be “saved” is used in a personal, exclusive, even arrogant sense.
Marcus Borg says that Christianity has a crisis with its language now and that for may people, words like “salvation” have become an obstacle “sometimes so large that taking Christianity seriously becomes very difficult.” The language has become distorted. “Salvation,” for example “now refers to life after death; it is about going to heaven. But in the Bible it is seldom about afterlife; rather, it is about transformation this side of death.” (Speaking Christian, p.15)
And so he says that the language of Christianity needs to be redeemed, set free, and reclaimed from its captivity
January 29 Scripture Reading: Isaiah 6: 1-10
January 29 Sermon: "Evangelism: A Progressive View"