Editorial September 23, 1967 Issue

Salvation—A Modern Concept?

William Milford Correll

What does it mean to the modernist when one speaks of being saved? To many people this concept seems to have a very dated connotation. It may seem trite, passé, or perhaps strictly theological in its context. At any rate, many may question whether or not it applies to present-day life and experience.

The usual religious interpretation of salvation links this term with rescue from sin; but because of modern, changing concepts of morality the meaning and value of salvation has become obscured in public thought. This does not change the basic need nor obviate the necessity of redemption from evil. The problems of today do not differ essentially from the problems of ancient time. The experiences related in the Scriptures have remarkable parallels in this generation. What remains to be done is simply to update the meaning or the interpretation of these Biblical concepts.

It is frequently related in the testimony section of this periodical that an individual, after having exhausted material means of healing, has been redeemed from suffering and death by the understanding of Truth gained in Christian Science. When someone has been saved from such deep ills and restored to wholeness and harmony, salvation takes on a very significant and modern meaning. When one has been rescued from the degradation of sin in any of its various forms and restored to self-respect and effective living, such a saving action has very definite relevance to the modern age! Being saved in this sense does not indicate an act of faith or simply of commitment to Christ in the ordinary usage of that phrase, but it includes a fundamental change involved in an understanding of life. Such an advance is irreversible. It involves an understanding of the reality and substance of Spirit, God and a consequent grasp of the unreality of matter, sin, disease, and death

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