The Confusing and Contradictory Doctrines of Christian Salvation

Anytime someone is presented salvation in Jesus Christ, it is assumed they know and understand the Hebrew sacrificial system that has been modified to (again) accept human sacrifice. (1) Other than that, the idea of a person giving their life for you is nothing short of an universal emotional “sob story”.
Here are some major problems with any doctrine of Christian Salvation:

A. One MUST believe in Jesus Christ and his atoning resurrection to get to Heaven, yet belief in Hell is not required for (according to the Bible (Jesus himself)) most people to go there!

B. In religion, belief gives existence in things not seen or provable. By contrast, the Periodical Table of Elements does not require belief for it to exist. One need not believe that CO2 extinguishes fires for it to work.

C. For Evangelicals, Jesus gives no Plan of Salvation in the Synoptic Gospels and almost nothing in the late Gospel of John. (Need proof? Simply pick up and read some Gospel Tracts you fine at the ATM.) One good reason is that Jesus hated gentiles.

D. By contrast, the Apostle Paul - who NEVER saw nor heard the earthly Jesus - can be made to present a Plan of Salvation via the cut and paste method from his letters where the Jewish sacrificial system is an assumed fact to be forced on the gentile world so they maybe “grafted in” (Romans 11: 17 – 24).

E. Paul’s idea of salvation is created (invented) and modified over his life time form a simple paruosia in 1 Thessalonians to a fuller doctrine in his last book of Romans that Evangelicals can piece together get a complete dogma of salvation: The Roman’s Road of Salvation

F. Since a Doctrine of Salvation can only be created from the Bible through a cut and paste method, the Bible Only sects can’t agree among themselves on just what is needed to be believed to get to Heaven. For example: Southern Baptist vs. Jehovah Witnesses vs. Christadelphians vs. Seventh Day Adventists and so on.

G. To avoid the problems of a Bible Only Doctrine of Salvation (soteriology), high order churches either accept the Creeds or have a Confession of Faith. The reality of both the early creeds (Nicene, Apostle’s and son on) or a Confession of Faith (the Catechisms, Westminster Confession of Faith and so on) is that all of these Christian statements of belief were NOT objectively written with just the idea of salvation in mind, but each section of these statements was written to defend orthodoxy against heresy and against heterodoxy. All three of these terms are subjectively defined based on which sect you are a member of. Thus, Catholics define all other sects (denominations) as heretical while all other sects define Catholics as heretical; inculding each other. So who is a Christian heretic? Anyone who doesn’t believe like me!.

H. Among Christian groups, more confusion exist as to salvation in that there is no “assurance of salvation”. Even long time believers are left “whistling in the graveyard” of life as they repeatedly go to Mass, get revived at Revivals, take Communion, confess sins, speak in tongues, make pilgrimages, try to be more Biblical, try to be more Confessional, try to do more good works, try to have more faith alone, try to be more Christ like, try to argue the correct hermeneutical approach to Salvation as doctrinally expressed in Calvinism or Arminianism.

I. As Christians go from door to do evangelizing (most notably Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons) and Fundamentalist go as missionaries to the Philippines and Mexico to convert Catholics and to the former Soviet Union to convert Orthodox; we find that likely over 90% of Christian evangelizing amounts to nothing more that Christians converting Christians to Christianity!

Conclusion
There IS NO so-called “Plan of Salvation” in the Bible! Reality proves that Jesus of the Gospels doesn’t agree with Peter in the Books of Acts which doesn’t agree with Paul who doesn’t agree with James who fails to agree with a highly Jewish book like Revelation. What we are simply left with is man’s attempt to formulate something major from the Bible to make it useful. Thus,the irony is that while Christian humanity has labeled itself totally corrupt and sinful (Original Sin), it must make sense of the hundreds of Doctrines of Salvation it as imposed on itself starting with the very Canon of books created then required itself to believe in.

Sadly for any sincere Christian believer, to have chosen the wrong doctrinal path to Heaven can put him or her on a toboggan race straight to Hell along with all the atheists they had condemned.
Note
1. King Manasseh and Child Sacrifice: Biblical Distortions of Historical Realities, by Francesca Stavrakopoulou (Walter De Gruyter, 2004).
Harry McCall

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