: Would someone please explain to me what is meant by "being saved", "accepting Jesus as your savior", "witnessing Jesus as the one and only path to spiritual salvation", etc.: These seemed to be the primary tenets of christianity. They are dished out in excessively generous portions with little or no clarification on what they mean or how one goes about fullfilling them. This has always struck me as being very peculiar since it is the fullfillment of these tenets that allegedly keep us from being eternally damned in a pit of flames.
: You'd think that a game with stakes this high would come with crystal clear instructions that could not possibly be missinterpretted, but alas, all explanations I have receive to date either contradict each other, contradict themselves, or pile on more ambiguity.
: Am I the only person that has this Alice In Wonderland kind of experience with christians?
It is commonly believed that God judges us according to what we do by assessing the tally of our good deeds vs. our tally of evil ones. If the scales tip toward the good then we get into heaven. This is quite a fanciful notion and nowehere near the actual biblical account of God and His relationship and dealings with man. I won't argue the truth of this issue to you because you seemed to make a reasonable inquiry into the nature of the biblical Christ. I'll try to make a reasonable response. Please understand that the following is biblical doctrine to which a vast percentage of the factions within Christendom subscibe. I can certainly provide unambiguous scriptural references for every major assetion here.
If we are to examine the relationship that we would have with God if the above misconception were true we would find that we are in a position to manipulate God. If we were to do enough good deeds, according to this notion, God, the God of the universe, would owe us something. It seems to me to be somewhat untenable that God should ever be in a position to owe anyone anything. That seems to challenge His diety by definition. But these are deep things and worthy of more thought.
The biblical God is holy, meaning He cannot abide sin in His presence. He is also the author of love and wishes to be loved as well. I cannot love Him if I have no free will to reject Him so God created me with that free will. My choice to sin permanently removes me from His presence. His holiness and His love would seem in conflict here. His perfect holiness requires eternal removal from His presence. His love cannot abide that divide. Having no ability to bridge that gap myself, God visits us in the form of Jesus Christ. He proceeds to offer Himself (spotless) as THE sacraficial lamb (required by God for the atonement of sin). In this way God fulfills His own justice requirement for sin and allows man into His holy presence.
I believe the truth of Christianity that has the most impact is the acknowledgement that we have no power to aspire to God. He comes to us. In my heart I struggle to do right. In my heart I know I cannot. I know that all who truly seek to know God come to this conclusion also and trust Him to do what we cannot.
Salvation is trusting God to arrange to have us live forever in His presence and not working to force God to give it to us. Christ is His provision for us in this matter. If we pursue works to aquire heaven, we attempt to subjugate God to our motive.
"For by grace you have been saved, through faith (in Jesus), and that is not of yourselves, it is a gift of God, not as a result of works, lest any man should boast" Ephesians 2:9
Stuart Gort
