Soteriology, or the explanation of salvation, includes the distinctive Christian approach to salvation developed by the apostle Paul. We shall see that Paul’s gospel of salvation does not fit with many influential modern interpretations, but that it is nonetheless resilient and powerful, in keeping with the severity of God. According to this chapter, Paul’s case for salvation by divine “grace” requires an active, if severe, role for humans in their salvation. In identifying this active role, we shall elucidate our own accountability in the realization of human salvation. The chapter clarifies this active role via an important distinction between (a) action that either constitutes or earns salvation and (b) action that receives already constituted salvation. The chapter illuminates the nature of divinely reckoned righteousness in terms of human faith that is rigorously active concerning (b) but not (a) in the salvation that involves the human reception of divine resurrection power.

Grace and works

Paul’s account of salvation is theocentric in that it revolves around a distinctive perspective on God. He announces: “the gospel … is the power (dunamis) of God for salvation (sōtērian) to everyone who has faith … for in it the righteousness (dikaiosunē) of God is revealed” (Rom. 1:16–17). The Christological emphasis of Paul’s soteriology stems from its theocentric character, and not vice versa; that is, Paul’s Christology owes its importance to God’s redemptive plan in Christ. His soteriology highlights God’s righteousness, which concerns God’s powerful life-giving moral character and redemptive purposes and figures directly in Paul’s understanding of human salvation via God’s grace in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.