n.t. wright on salvation

I have been reading N.T. Wright’s Surprised by Hope. It has a been a very good read, though it was kind of hard to initially get into. It probably early to be giving out Easter reading recommendations, but this book would be a great book to read for Lent in preparation for Easter.

Here is a excerpt, his summary of salvation:

The point is this. When God saves people in this life, by working through his Spirit to bring them to faith and by leading them to follow Jesus in discipleship, prayer, holiness, hope, and love, such people are designed—it isn’t too strong a word—to be a sign and foretaste of what God wants to do for the entire cosmos. What’s more, such people are not just to be a sign and foretaste of that ultimate salvation; they are to be part of the means by which God makes this happen in both the present and the future. That is what Paul insists on when he says that the whole creation is waiting with eager longing not just for its own redemption, its liberation from corruption decay, but for God’s children to be revealed: in other words, for the unveiling of those redeemed humans through whose stewardship creation will at least be brought back into that wise order for which it was made. And since Paul makes it quite clear that those who believe in Jesus Christ, who are incorporated into him through baptism, are already God’s children, are already themselves saved, this stewardship cannot be something to be postponed for the ultimate future. It must begin here and now.

In other words—to sum up where we’ve got so far—the work of salvation, in its full sense, is (1) about whole human beings, not merely souls; (2) about the present, not simply the future; and (3) about what God does through us, not merely what God does in and for us. If we can get this straight, we will rediscover the historic basis for the full-orbed mission of the church. To pursue this further, we need to look at the larger picture within which all this makes sense: the kingdom of God.

There is a lot I could say about this. It is surprising to read and think about a salvation; there is such a fullness of spirit, a richness of life which this conception draws out. It is definitely something to get behind, definitely a gospel worthy of the label of good news.

This spelling out of salvation is well into the book. He spends a lot of time dispelling all the wrong conceptions of salvation and resurrection which have run rampant in our culture. I have been blow away at his thoroughness in dispelling wrong beliefs through this exegesis of the scriptures.

He definitely hasn’t pulled any punches. I know I found myself being hit by a punch or two.