Road to Where?

Romans 10:8b-13
10:8b "The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart" (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim);
10:9 because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
10:10 For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved.
10:11 The scripture says, "No one who believes in him will be put to shame."
10:12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him.
10:13 For, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved."

The above passage has been (more than) occasionally referred to as the fourth stop on the "Romans Road To Salvation". By "more than occasionally" I mean it is the darling of the evangelical tradition. Frankly other then being a trifle reductionist in it's logic I can't really disagree with the overall concept. Except where the reductionist metaphor falls apart... So, since we live in a world full of folks who understand salvation in this context, lets dive in and see if we can make sense of it all.

By "reductionist" I mean that I am generally opposed to anything that reduces the Christian lifestyle to a bullet point list that is oversimplified to the point that it distorts the Gospel.
That said, here are the bullet points of the Romans Road:

Stop One:  We Are Sinners:  Romans 3:23, "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." We have all sinned. We have all done things that are displeasing to God. There is no one who is innocent.
Stop Two: The Logical Consequences: Romans 6:23, teaches us about the consequences of sin - "For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." 
Stop Three: The Gracious Solution:  "but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." Romans 5:8 
Stop Four....well, the text for today...



OK, here is where you put on your seat belt and get ready for the bumpy ride.

At stop four you, "Confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved".  The questions are  "to whom are you confessing?" "To what are you being saved to/from?"  And "how does all of this work salvation in the first place?"

First of all, is my confession and faith saving me?  Well, no.  Paul is pretty explicit that it is Jesus' sacrifice on the cross that provides us with salvation apart from any human act.  We don't save ourselves.  Jesus did that. At best we can be said to be accepting that gift from our God who is too gracious and loving to force his will on us, even in the form of salvation.  

Big Concept Alert: Receiving salvation is called Justification.  We receive this as a free gift of grace through faith in Jesus Christ. Sanctification is what happens to us after we receive the gift as the Holy Spirit changes us into the image of God. 

So how do I get saved?  You don't. You already are saved, Jesus did it 2,000 years ago on the cross.  The grace of Jesus Christ extends to every single living person on the planet into perpetuity. Could you reject the gift and never believe? Sure.  You could also choose not to breathe anymore and duct tape your face shut...but why on earth would anyone do that?!  You are saved by the Grace of Jesus Christ that was already accomplished for you, with you in mind, before you were born.  Our confession is merely acceptance of the gift.

So, wait, I am confused....my confession doesn't mean anything? Hold on there, let's not forget that the text actually says, "confess with your lips" so it must be important.  The act of confessing clarifies what it is that we are believing...what it is that we are accepting.  We are to confess that "Jesus Christ is Lord" this clarifies how we are to understand salvation.  We are not confessing that "Jesus Christ is giving me free stuff."  We are not confessing that "Jesus Christ and I are buddies." We are shaped by the confession that Jesus is not just our savior but our rightful Lord and Sovereign. Anything less is a rejection of the gift. 

Does it matter if you accept the gift in the privacy of your room or a full-to-the-brim church building on Sunday? No (and maybe yes....sort of...I told you it is complicated....) We can come to accept the grace of God wherever and whenever we let the Holy Spirit give us the strength to do just that.  But a lot hinges on the question "to what am I being saved?"  If you view salvation as merely an assurance against going to hell it hardly matters if you ever even meet another Christian let alone come to faith in a building full of them....But...



That isn't the sort of salvation Jesus talked about...it's just an attempt at buying a realllllllly big fire insurance policy. This turns salvation into a manipulative relationship where we look to use God's grace for our own purposes without consideration for God's sovereignty. 

If you see salvation as only being about squaring yourself up with God (what we call "Jesus and Me Theology")  then it hardly matters if you ever set foot in a church building.  After all, you are just getting "right with Jesus".  Now that God isn't mad anymore life is cool. 



But that isn't the sort of salvation Jesus talked about either. Jesus never said anything about his believers standing apart from one another.  In fact Jesus preached almost always about the essential nature of loving your neighbor, enemy, brothers, foreigner, children, and most of all God the Father all in community.  Paul said that we who are in Christ are actually so deeply knitted together that we are "one body".  

The way Jesus preached it we were not just saved FROM death and damnation, we were saved TO a restored relationship with God the Father and all of the Father's creation...and that includes all those pesky people.  

Saying you practice the Christian faith by yourself is like saying you like to play football...by yourself, or sing in the choir...by yourself. It makes no sense.  

The Romans Road does a fine job getting us to stop four but then becomes less of a highway and more like the Shibuya Crosswalk in Tokyo.



Christianity isn't simple.  But it does contain some simple truths to make the journey a little easier.  I will even give them bullet points. 

• God loves you.  More than anything. 
• Jesus died for your salvation.  You in particular. 
• God wants to gather us into a loving relationship with himself and each other. 
• Jesus made it hard not to receive his grace, not the other way around. 
• You already live under the grace of God (before you were worthy, before you "had it all together", before you were "good enough) all you have to be is willing to receive it. 
• Christ is our Savior and Lord and will bring us all grace and mercy if we believe. 
• We never stop living anew into this grace. We are born again, and again, and again into new life through the grace of God every day.
• We are never beyond the grace of God.

So, road or highway, path or bullet point list. The point is we are called to receive the greatest gift God has ever given.  And it is all for us.  Given freely, received freely, at the incalculable cost of the life of Christ. Because God so loved the world....