Musings on the Daily Lectionary - Saved

What is it about me that most needs saving? That may seem an odd question to ask, but Christianity is, after all, a faith that speaks a lot about salvation and being saved. In his book, A New Kind of Christianity, Brian McLaren says of the younger generations that are drifting away from the Church, "they just can't figure out what they're being saved from, or for, enough to stay." (p. 162)

In today's gospel reading, Jesus first forgives and then heals a paralyzed man. The forgiveness bespeaks a deep compassion, "Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven." The healing is done - or so it seems - mostly to verify Jesus' authority to forgive sin. Would Jesus have healed the man had such proof not been needed? Did he need forgiveness more than healing? Was Jesus already going to heal him as well?

I don't know that the biblical text gives easy answers to such questions. Certainly Jesus is more often portrayed simply healing people, so the story may be more interested in talking about Jesus than about the paralyzed man. Perhaps the commonly held view that such maladies were the result of sin prompts Jesus to assure the man his relationship with God is restored. But in the end, while I try to determine how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, the paralyzed man is both healed and forgiven. His life is made whole and full.

Which takes me back to my original question, What about me most needs saving? Too often in the Church, we want to reduce salvation and saving to a status question meaning, "Has your ticket to heaven been punched." But there is nothing in this story, or any of the other saving stories in Matthew, about going to heaven. They are stories about healing, forgiving, restoring, and wholeness, not stories about what happens to you after you die.

Perhaps McLaren is correct. The biggest problem facing many denominations and congregations is the fact that salvation has become so disconnected from life. When salvation is about some far off heaven, what does it have to do with following Jesus or a kingdom that has "come near?"

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