a strong salvation

When Jesus brought me to Himself during the "Jesus Revolution" Revival of the 1970s, I knew the strong Power of The One Who called, forgave, and saved me.  Though I was dedicated to loving Him with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength (and still am!), I knew that the Strength of this eternal relationship lay in Him.

Not so my family.  They were very worried that I was committing my life to something as tenuous as faith in God.  They believed in the strength of the mind or of the substantial "stuff" of life and had difficulty understanding how I could sustain a commitment to something that seemed so ethereal.  In this, perhaps they were like the family of Jesus who, when they heard that He and His disciples were so busy that they couldn't even eat, went to take charge of Him, for they said, "he is out of his mind" (Mark 3:20-21).

I wonder if we have adopted the same attitude about our faith as that of our non-believing family, friends, and culture.  Have we come to see our faith as tenuous, fragile, and losable, especially in the light of many believers who seem to be "deconstructing" or abandoning their faith in Jesus altogether?

Psalm 95:1 invites us to come, sing for joy to The Lord, shout aloud to the Strength of our Salvation.  It sees our salvation as something strong precisely because it originates, sustains, and endures because of The One Who is our Strength, also translated as our Rock.  Though there have been many theological debates about the role of human will in one's being saved and the possibility of losing one's salvation by a failure of will (with lots of anxiety accompanying), I prefer to see my salvation as strong in The One Who willed to saved me and will keep me until the end and the new beginning.  

In a preface to his hymn, "Rock of Ages," Augustus Toplady wrote: "Yes, if you fall, be humbled, but do not despair.  Pray afresh to God, Who is able to raise you up and set you on your feet again.  Look to the Blood of the Covenant and say to The Lord from the depths of your heart...Rock of Ages, cleft for me, let me hide myself in Thee; let the Water and the Blood, from Thy wounded side which flowed, be of sin the double cure, save from wrath and make me pure."