Salvation is a Group Project
Isaiah has a problem. In a vision, he finds himself in the presence of God. He recognizes his own sins and cries out his confession, feeling unworthy to stand in the presence of the Lord (Isaiah 6:5). Fortunately, angels put a hot coal in his mouth to purify him so that he may be a prophet. Being imperfect isn’t really his problem. His problem isn’t what would prevent him from carrying God’s message. His problem is the message itself.
“Make the mind of this people dull, and stop their ears, and shut their eyes, so that they may not look with their eyes, and listen with their ears, and comprehend with their minds, and turn and be healed.” (6:10)
What are we supposed to do with this? It sounds like the point of this message is so that it won’t be understood, or at least, it won’t be understood by most people. But why would God willingly send a message that cannot be understood by most people? And perhaps more importantly, how do we know we are the ones for whom the message is intended?
Of course, I can’t speak for God. If I’m being honest, this passage is a mystery to me. I don’t know how to make sense of a loving God doing this. I can’t speak for God. I don’t see all of God’s plan laid out before me. I struggle with this passage. Some braver theologians have interpreted passages like this to indicate that God has chosen some people for salvation, while others can never attain it. They won’t understand the Good News when it is given to them. They will reject God no matter what. They are outside the boundaries of salvation.
Naturally, I have problems with this. On the one hand, even if the limits of salvation seem to be indicated in the Bible itself, I don’t trust human rationality to limit the power of God. If God really is as powerful as we believe God is, then God can certainly save the unsavable. If God is really as loving as we believe, then God can surely love the lost, even those too far lost for us.
Beyond limiting God’s power, this perspective also hurts me personally. I have a lot of friends who were Christians and then lost their faith or who were never particularly religious at all. I suspect that many of them will not become devout church-going Christians in this lifetime. This is true of so many people in my generation, that I suspect that even if you personally have never doubted your faith, you know and care about some atheists. Personally, I can’t imagine that their current lack of belief means that they are unsavable, that preaching the Gospel is a wasted effort for them and that death is the last we’ll see of them. I refuse to believe that atheists are abandoned by God. As frustrating as my friends can be, no more frustrating than I can be, I can't believe that God is so fed up with them that even God doesn’t want them to understand the way of salvation.
I may be naively turning my eyes from a hard truth, especially in light of this passage, but I think there is another interpretation that is a little less bleak than the story of a petty God and some people whose lack of understanding makes them too bad to save.
The people of ancient Israel had a different view of salvation than most of us do today. Some Bible scholars will say that there isn’t even clear evidence that most Old Testament writers believed in any sort of positive afterlife experience. While you may find some exceptions, this is mostly true. For ancient Israel, salvation was not about an individual going to heaven when they died. Salvation was a matter of the people being saved from their enemies. People lived on through their children, so leaving behind many children living in peace and prosperity was about the best they could hope for. People didn’t live on; families did. This may sound bleak. I don’t want to live on through my family. I want to live on myself. But this worldview shares something valuable with us that we often miss.
In ancient Israel, salvation was a team effort, a group project. We all attain salvation together. And maybe that is the good news that lies behind this difficult passage. Sure, many people in Israel did not understand and would continue not understanding, but some would. Some people would understand for the good of the rest. Even if individuals died, even if families vanished from the earth, the people would live on. Israel endured.
Perhaps it is the individualistic nature of our culture that makes passages like this seem particularly distressing. Believing that everyone needs to accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior makes us fear that each person needs to be saved alone. We look at our atheist friends and neighbors, consider them lost, and cling to the raft for dear life, hoping not to be swept away in the torrent of unbelief in our time. There is nothing we can do for them. We have to worry about ourselves. But it doesn’t need to be that way.
I had an interesting experience in my CPE class recently. We were required to write a short paper about one event that we celebrated in our life and one we lamented. Then we shared these papers by reading them aloud in class. This was very personal for everyone, but it was particularly emotional when one of my classmates talked about her cousin who died of cancer in her twenties. They had been very close and had big plans for working together in the future. During her reading, my classmate started crying. Eventually, she began to cry so much that she could no longer read. At that point, one of my other classmates asked if she wanted her to read for her. She agreed.
It was interesting to hear the rest of the paper in a different person’s voice. The voice I was hearing was not the person who had written the paper and not the person who had experienced the tragedy. But there wasn’t really a disconnect either. It felt like the group was speaking through her. When one person was unable to continue, another took her place to tell her story, to finish the emotional journey, and to speak her faith.
When we recite the creed in church, we engage in something similar. Even if I don’t have the faith I need to fully believe, other people do. If the words seem fake to me, I can listen to others share it as certain truth. We don’t need to be alone in our faith, nor do we have to keep our salvation to ourselves. Our journey can be a team effort. The prayers of the faithful can cover the unbelief of the faithless. A small remnant can preserve a people.
I still don’t know why God would choose to keep some people away from the knowledge of salvation, but I also don’t think it matters. Not everyone needs to comprehend for the people to be saved. If my faith wanes or falters as difficulties arise, the faith of others can hold me in the community. Our friends and loved ones are not beyond salvation. They do not have to be saved alone. We are saved together.
