A common evangelistic appeal asks, “Are you ready to receive Christ as your Savior?” Another asks, “Would you like to receive Christ as your personal Savior?”
Have you ever wondered what people mean when speaking of Jesus as the Savior or my personal Savior?
I once heard Zane Hodges discuss receiving Christ as one’s personal Savior. He said that the Lord Jesus is no one’s personal Savior. He is “the Savior of the world” (John 4:42). He is everyone’s Savior. He is even the Savior of those who will spend eternity in the lake of fire (cf. 2 Pet 2:1; 1 John 2:2).
By His shed blood on the Cross, Jesus made everyone savable. He is the way, the truth, and the life, even for those who reject Him.
Paul said, “For to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe” (1 Tim 4:10).i Thompson comments, “Paul called God ‘the Savior of all men’ in that he genuinely wants all human beings to experience salvation. The fact that more are not saved is not due to the weakness or impotence of the divine intent but to the stubborn opposition of the human will (see Matt 23:37)” (1, 2 Timothy, Titus, p. 136). Litfin adds, “Paul stated that God is the Savior of ‘all men’ (cf. 2:2, 4, 6) since He desires that all be saved, and He provided Christ as the ransom (2:6) to make that salvation possible. Yet God is the Savior of those who believe in a special way since only in them has His desire for their salvation come to fruition” (“1 Timothy” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary, p. 740).
In his first epistle, John repeated what the Samaritans said in John 4:42: “And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world” (1 John 4:14).
I read an interesting article on “Recent Trends in Christology” by Gerald Bray (see here). This line caught my attention:
Very often the most that is said is that Christ is our ‘liberator,’ a term which is usually understood in terms of individual emotional and psychological experience, though, of course, it has also been applied to social and political freedom in the context of the liberation theology which has grown up on the frontiers of Christianity and Marxism.
When people claim the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, they may mean many things. “He liberated me from my guilt and depression.” “He set me free from my alcoholism.” “He delivered me from my addiction to food.” “He has given me a new focus on life.”
Guess how often the word Savior occurs in John’s Gospel, the only evangelistic book in the Bible. Would you believe only once (John 4:42)? Did you know that the Lord Jesus never referred to Himself as the Savior?ii
People are not born again because they believe that Jesus has set them free from their anxiety, depression, guilt, alcoholism, or lack of purpose. To be born again, one must believe in Him for what He promises: everlasting life that cannot be lost (e.g., John 3:16; 6:35, 37; 11:26).
One final point. In Scripture, Savior, our Savior, God and Savior, and Lord and Savior often do not refer to Jesus’ making us savable. Sometimes, those expressions refer to other types of deliverance. Jesus is the Savior of Israel (Matt 1:21; Luke 1:47; 2:11; Acts 13:23). He will save Israel from Gentile oppression. He will save the entire world from injustice, unrighteousness, and iniquity. Paul encouraged believing slaves to “adorn the doctrine of God our Savior in all things” (Titus 2:10, emphasis added). Doctrine is attractive when believers let their lights shine before men (Matt 5:16; Phil 2:15).iii
Let’s keep grace in focus.
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i God the Father is called “our Savior” many times (Luke 1:47; 1 Tim 1:1; 2:3; 4:10; Titus 1:3; 2:10; 3:4; Jude 25). In Titus, Paul used the term Savior to refer to both the Lord Jesus and God the Father interchangeably.
ii I’m not suggesting that Savior is an insignificant concept. It does occur twenty-four times in the NT. What I’m suggesting is that it is not the bullseye in evangelism. The bullseye is everlasting life that the Savior promises. It is sadly possible to believe that Jesus is the Savior–or my personal Savior—and not believe in His promise of everlasting life.
iii Thompson comments, “Especially noteworthy is the fact that the exemplary behavior of those at the lowest level of society (i.e., slaves) has the effect of ‘making attractive’ (kosmosin, “adorning”) the gospel” (1, 2 Timothy, Titus, p. 308).
