“Somewhere along the way we reduced salvation to an afterlife destination instead of an ever-deepening participation in the life of the Trinity.” –Matthew Hester

What does the doctrine of the Trinity have to do with salvation? Is it more than Jesus, as one Person of the Godhead, becoming human to pay for our sins on the cross? While certainly not less than that, let’s explore the idea a bit more, considering first how we ourselves define salvation.

I have a dearly loved family member whose social media posts consist almost exclusively of terrifying memes portraying people burning in hell because they didn’t accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior while alive, begging everyone to repent and “get saved” before it’s too late. While extreme, I think it does reflect the majority belief about what salvation essentially is: being saved from our sins so we can go to heaven, not hell, when we die. Does that resonate with you at all? Will you take a few moments right now to search your own thoughts and beliefs about what salvation is? (As always, we’re not concerned with “right” or “wrong” answers, just what the answers are.)

Now, please read, and then hold for a few moments, this definition: Salvation is “participation in the life of God.”

What does that mean to you? Does it reframe or expand the meaning of salvation at all?

We’ve talked here before about Rublev’s Trinity icon and how the Trinity’s mutual indwelling and ever-flowing divine Love is seen in it. Our salvation issues from that Love: the Father sending the Son into humanity by the power of the Spirit to heal us from the inside. In Christ we are adopted into and embraced within the love-life of God that has always existed within “the happy land of the Trinity” (Fred Sanders). This means that salvation isn’t just a pardon from a distance for some future reward, but is being drawn into living communion with God right here, right now.

When we begin to understand that salvation isn’t some future state after death but is living, now, into and from the eternal flow of Love that dances within the Trinity, it changes our lives. As our friend Barton Breen says, “Salvation isn’t only something done for us, though it certainly is that. It is also being brought into communion with the Father through the Son in the Spirit, and learning to live out of that communion in the world.” Living from the same flow of love that Jesus does, our lives begin to look like they would if Jesus were living them, and that, friends, changes the world. Let’s walk in Trinitarian love, together.

-Lori Duncan