What Is Salvation? Why Did Jesus Christ Have to Die to Save Us? From What Are We Saved? Everything You Need to Know About Salvation in a Nutshell

Published on 04/28/24 by Dr-Shirley-Cheng.

What is salvation? Why did Jesus Christ have to die in order to save us? And from what are we actually saved? Answers to these questions are the foundations of the Christian faith, and our eternal destiny entirely lies in knowing the answers.

First off, it is necessary to read the Old Testament, particularly the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, in order to understand why Jesus had to die for us, why the sacrifice was needed, why Jesus' death and resurrection is the foundation of Christianity, and why it is the most important thing we need to know in order to receive salvation. It is actually necessary to read the entire Bible to know about the main teachings of the Holy Scriptures and how everything fits together.

Here, I will outline the basic facts of the Gospel to help you better understand the teachings of Christianity, and why it is important to know these truths in order to embrace an everlasting life of sheer bliss and fellowship with our Heavenly Father, Yahweh God Almighty.

First Man, First Rule, First Sin, First Penalty

• God, whose personal name is "YHWH" in the Hebrew manuscripts (from which scholars get "Yahweh"), created two people--Adam and Eve--who were perfect and sinless. Back then, God established that death will be the penalty of sin.

a) Sin is an offense we commit against God, just as a crime is an offense we commit against one another. Many crimes are actually sins, too, because God doesn't want us to treat one another badly. When we treat one another in a bad way, we are actually sinning against God.

b) Death is a state of non-existence. It is like the state before you were born. So when you die, you don't know anything.

• Yahweh gave Adam and Eve--and all humans after them--a precious gift called "free will." That means we have the absolute freedom to make moral decisions for ourselves on our own. If God hadn't given us free will, we would be robots, doing the will of God, not our will.

Along with free will, Yahweh established one simple rule for Adam and Eve. That command was to not eat from only one tree, out of the numerous fruit trees in the Garden of Eden where they lived. Again, this was the only law the people had. If they kept it, they would live forever; if they didn't keep it, Yahweh told them that they would certainly die.

• Unfortunately, Adam and Eve sinned by eating from the tree, so God punished them with death. Everyone else after them all sinned, so everyone dies. So "through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin; and so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned." (Romans 5:12, American Standard Version)

• How could eating a fruit earn such a heavy punishment? Some feel that Adam and Eve received a punishment that was way out of proportion to their sin. Was their punishment really too harsh?

No, what they got was justified. God punished them because they deliberately did not follow His simple command. No matter what the rule was, it was a rule, and a rule should be adhered to, most especially when it comes from God.

God had made a perfect Earth that needed care from perfect people. When Adam and Eve disobeyed an order that should have been easy to follow, they proved that the planet could not be entrusted to their care. If they could not be trusted over a small thing, how could they be trusted with big things?

Also, we need to keep in mind that God specifically told Adam and Eve that they would certainly die if they disobeyed Him. To not punish them the way He warned would make Him a liar. God promises both blessings and curses; He always keeps His word according to what He promises. Enforcing promised disciplines is how He can get His messages and orders taken seriously.

Solution for a Sinning World

• Yahweh is a holy God; He cannot live among a sinful world, so sins separate us from Him. We cannot have fellowship with Him as long as we are sinning.

• Yahweh doesn't like everyone to die. His purpose for the Earth was to fill it with happy people who could have fellowship with Him for eternity. Therefore, He has a solution...

• That solution is Jesus Christ, who died in order to wash away our sins, so we can be saved into eternal life with God.

• As soon as Adam and Eve sinned, Yahweh mentioned His plan for salvation through Jesus; the mysterious plan wouldn't be revealed till many years later.

After the devil used the serpent to deceive Eve, Yahweh said to the snake, "I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: he shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." (Genesis 3:15) Who will be the seed of the woman? What does bruising the head mean? And how would this plan stop the fall of the human race, undo the effects of sin and death, and fulfill God's purpose?

Two millennia ago, this designated seed was born into our world. He was bruised on the heel, died, and on the third day, was raised up. Through his death, he has redeemed the hope for an everlasting life for all of us. Now, it is merely a matter of time before he will return to bruise the seed of the serpent on the head, a wound from which he will never survive. Along with his eternal destruction, any poisonous works Satan has ever planted will be consumed once and for all, and no more evil fruits will bloom again.

The seed of the woman is Yahweh's own beloved Son, Jesus Christ. Faith in the Christ is the only path to Yahweh and the only way to salvation; having faith in him will save us from our sins and bring us to our new home.

Why Did Jesus Have to Die for Us?

• It is necessary for Jesus to die and shed blood in order to save us. But why? And why particularly Jesus, and not anyone else?

How could Jesus' blood wash away our sins? To understand this, we need to know how God's system of the sacrifice works. The books of Exodus and Leviticus in the Bible extensively talk about sacrificing livestock, such as cattle and sheep, to cleanse the people of their sins so God could forgive them. Animals used in the sacrifice must be without any defects, and priests must perform specific steps during the sacrifice, including pouring out their blood upon the altar for atonement.

Why is the pouring out of blood necessary? What is important about blood? Yahweh answered this question in the Bible: "For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh atonement by reason of the life." (Leviticus 17:11)

Blood represents the life of a living creature. To shed blood is to take away a creature's life. When a bull or male goat was killed as a sin offering (a kind of sacrifice that atoned for certain sins), the death of the animal took the place of the sinner, so the sinner would not have to die themselves. Remember, God requires that the penalty for sin is death. But by His mercy, He let certain animals die in the place of the sinner as a substitute. And the animal substitute had to be physically perfect, without any blemish.

Hence, in order to make atonement for all the sins of a great multitude, God chose His Son, who is absolutely flawless spiritually; no other man who has ever lived could be perfectly sinless enough for the job. Ultimately, the life--Jesus' blood--was poured out as a ransom to redeem our own blood--our life.

Simply put, Jesus died for us, in our place as our substitute, so we will not have to die forever. His death paid the penalty for our sins.

The sacrifice for salvation had to be perfect for another reason. In Yahweh's perfect justice system, the restitution had to be of equal value as the original: "He that smiteth a beast mortally shall make it good, life for life. And if a man cause a blemish in his neighbor; as he hath done, so shall it be done to him: breach for breach, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; as he hath caused a blemish in a man, so shall it be rendered unto him." (Leviticus 24:18-20) So when Adam was a perfect human being, another perfect human being had to be sacrificed to set things right.

Salvation, What It's All About

• Jesus' sacrifice doesn't automatically ensure us salvation from eternal death. Each person has to personally respond to it. We are saved the moment we 1) repent of anything bad we've ever done and 2) accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. Accepting Jesus as Savior and Lord means that we have accepted his teachings and will diligently apply them to our lives. Simply believing in Jesus does not give us salvation. If belief is all that's needed without obedience, then Satan can be saved, too!

• Each individual has to remain faithful to Jesus and Yahweh their entire lifetime. Otherwise, they may lose the gift of salvation. If you renounce Jesus later in life and completely reject salvation through him, then Yahweh God will not force His gift on you.

• Salvation is only through Jesus, not through anyone else, nor through doing good works only, nor through any church or denomination. Denominations are manmade. We should never focus on the manmade, but God-made.

• Remember, "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." (II Peter 3:9, KJV)

• Jesus' sacrifice for us is the most important thing he has done for us. This is the only way we can receive an eternal life with Yahweh, just as He had planned long ago. Nothing else, no miracles, no healing, can provide this salvation gift for us. This is why believing that Jesus died for us and trusting in him for our salvation is the most important element of Christianity. We cannot be saved by any other way.

• However, everyone still dies as usual. But the difference is that all Christians (those who make Jesus their Lord and Savior) will be resurrected on Yahweh's appointed day. Those who have made Jesus Savior and Master of their lives will live forever; those who do not will enter the second death, which is eternal death, known by many as "hell." Simply put, hell is the state of eternal non-existence.

• The saved will live in the Kingdom of God. What is the Kingdom of God? It is a Kingdom that will be fully established upon Earth, governed by Yahweh and Jesus from Heaven. It is a Kingdom that will rule for eternity, putting an end to all human governments. Inhabitants of this Kingdom will never grow old, get sick, or die. It is a Kingdom of perfect holiness, love, peace, and joy.

• Yahweh God is the King of His Kingdom, which will be entrusted to Jesus as King for one thousand years. Jesus said that he is the way, the life, the truth, and that no one can go to God without going through him. If we cannot connect with God, we surely cannot enter His Kingdom. So when we can have connection with God only through His Son, it means we can enter the Kingdom only through Jesus. No one can enter the Kingdom without accepting Jesus as Savior. He is the "way" to salvation. He is our eternal "life." He is the "truth" that will lead us to God and God's Kingdom. "Jesus" means "Yahweh Is Salvation." "Christ" means "the Anointed One." So Jesus is the one appointed by God to provide us salvation, while salvation ultimately comes from Yahweh.

How will you personally respond to the death of Jesus Christ? Will you embrace him as your Lord and Savior to enjoy eternal fellowship with him and Yahweh God? Decide wisely, for your eternal destiny entirely lies in your decision!

"I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse: therefore choose life, that you may live... to love Yahweh your God, to obey his voice, and to cling to him; for he is your life, and the length of your days." (Deuteronomy 30:19, 20, WEB)