What Do You Mean… SALVATION? (Part I)

by Leonard V Johnson

Do you know just what salvation is? Do you know how to get salvation? When do you receive salvation?

A great many worldly churches proclaim that they properly teach “salvation by WORKS!” But are they correct? I pray that this article will help reveal the LORD God’s (the Elohim, the family of God, which at this present time consists of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ) TRUTH ON THIS VITAL SUBJECT!

If one of those millions of door-to-door “salesmen” came to your door peddling their religion, would you know the right answer to these questions? If someone asked you to open your Bible and show him exactly where God’s living word says that salvation means “going to heaven when you die” ── could you?

Is salvation a destination, a condition, a reward, or is it a place? Where in your Bible would you look to find God’s TRUTH?

How about──at proper conversion, are you an inheritor, a co-heir, or something else ── and what is it you inherit or become co-inheritor of?

How about──what connection is there between salvation and a whole third of God’s word in prophecy? Can you explain that? Do you even know what I mean? Another third of God’s word is history. And, as I just wrote in our latest World News in Relation to Biblical Prophecy ── May 25, 2026, “we should keep our history in perspective” when it comes to biblical prophecy. In fact, can you believe that MOST of God’s living word is unconcerned with the matter of salvation?

God’s Word Laid Bare──Hebrews 4:12-13

Uber religious people like to talk about “getting saved!” Yet, sadly, most religious people actually don’t know what God’s word truly says about salvation, or even the real meaning of the word “salvation” ── certainly no more than a young man that came knocking at my door.

Once, while I was driving over the road, I had been parked at a truck stop in Albany, Oregon when across the way I saw a whole group of Jehovah’s Witnesses. These young people were walking about the truck stop during the day, each carrying their New Word Translation – Jehovah Witness Bible, accosting the truck drivers sitting in their trucks. “Can I climb up into your cab and show you the word of God?” the young man asked. “Well,” I said, “Sure, get on up here and tell me what you’ve got to say.” After climbing up into the cab, the young man began by saying, “What I have here is the accurate and easy-to-read word of God.” Opening it up he read, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god.”

“What!?” I cried. Having an Authorized Version in my truck, I grabbed it and turned quickly to that passage of Scripture, and read, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Glancing back up at the young man I said, “That book that you have there is not the word of God!”

“Well, uh ── uh ──” he stammered, confused, “uh ──what do you mean, of course it is!”

“No young man. You need to throw that away and get yourself at least the King James Version.”

“Well, uh ── uh ──” he stammered some more, then opened up the door and got out.

That’s the way it is with a lot of people who say, “I have the word of God.” Well, no ── no ── they don’t! And it’s the same with what they mean by “getting saved.”

Do you know what God’s living word truly says concerning salvation? Millions of sincere people believe that they do ── yet have been dupped and deceived into accepting a FALSE SALVATION.

WHAT Salvation Is

The truth must come from God’s living word──the Holy Bible──yet the Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary can certainly provide us with the definition of “salvation” ──

“1 a. deliverance from the power and effects of sin; 2. liberation from ignorance or illusion. 3 a. preservation from destruction or failure.”

What is the LORD God’s definition of sin? And let us see and hear what the Spirit has to say concerning what are the CONSEQUENCES of sin. So, whatever the consequences are, Webster says that salvation brings you liberation and preserves you from it.

Now, just why would you need to be “preserved” from the spiritual consequences of sin? WHY── as nearly every single worldly church teaches ── if you are an “immortal soul,” do you need preservation from perishment? What in the world does any of this have to do with you?

Suppose you say, as my wife does to me, “Look, ── I believe in a God, but I don’t believe in your religion. Why should I be concerned with all your religious words, like ‘sin,’ ‘salvation,’ and ‘spiritual consequences’? Because, you really don’t know what’s gonna happen. The Bible was written by men and then translated over and over and over again.”

WHY You Should Be Concerned

The Creator God, the One who designed, created, and sustains all life ── including yours, says this ──

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” – Romans 3:23.

Now, it’s possible that right now you have no conception of what is meant, “the glory of God” ── of what you have come short of. You will be astonished when you learn just what this means.

So, whatever sin is ── the LORD God says that you’ve done it. EVERY SINGLE HUMAN BEING! Our Lord and Savior alone being the exception. And since salvation is saving man from the consequences of sin (and God’s living word does affirm this), let us see what the consequences of sin are.

“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 6:23.

Death, meaning here an eternal death. A death that you are not resurrected from. But──why have you heard ── and very possibly believe ── just the opposite, THE WAGES OF SIN IS ETERNAL LIFE?

The wages that you are going to be paid for having sinned is ETERNAL DEATH! Yet so many religious people teach and believe that the wages of sin is eternal life──eternal life in hell.

~ be sure to watch our sermons “What Is Hell?” and “Is There a Hell?” ~

Read that again in your Bible── “The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.” So, on one hand is the penalty of eternal death, and on the other hand, the gift of God is eternal life. It’s like what our LORD God says in the Book of Deuteronomy ──

“’ I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you LIFE AND DEATH, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, …’” – Deuteronomy 30:19.

It’s one or the other ── ETERNAL LIFE, or ETERNAL DEATH.

Now, right here I would like to make something plain. We’ve been accused of teaching that “salvation is by WORKS.” No, ── we’ve never taught this! Here is what we teach concerning this subject of “works” ── it’s been consistent.

“Faith without works is dead” recorded Saint James. But what exactly did he mean?

Turn with me if you will to Ephesians 2:8-9 – “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9) not of works, lest anyone should boast.” Yet, we need works. Saint James was inspired to write: “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15) If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16) and one of you says to them, ‘Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,’ but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17) Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” – James 2:14-17. And, he repeats it yet again, “But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?” – verse 20. And yet again, “For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also” – verse 26.

Every single morning between 3AM and 11AM I “work” on our ministries’ website. Yet is this what saves us? No. “For by grace you have been saved THROUGH FAITH, and that not of yourselves; it [faith itself] is the gift of God, NOT OF WORKS, …” So, our “works” ── our works being “the work of God, obedience to God, the keeping of His holy and righteous commandments, the helping of orphans and widows in their need and keeping oneself unspotted from the world” ── does earn a reward ── but it is not salvation. In the same respect, the “works” ── of our sin ── do earn something ── but it is not eternal salvation ── what they earn ── the WAGES they earn ── is ETERNAL DEATH!

Also, and I highly stress this ── ETERNAL LIFE is not something you can work for or earn, it is the LORD God’s gift through Christ Jesus, our Lord! That is God’s living truth. O’ indeed you earn rewards (Hebrews 11:6), but the rewards you earn is not ETERNAL LIFE. Again, eternal life is a GIFT from God.

So, Romans 6:23 (and in fact, all other passages within God’s word bearing on this subject all agree) that what you receive by God’s grace ── as His loving GIFT, is ETERNAL LIFE. Therefore, SALVATION is actually ETERNAL LIFE! Yet, sadly, those that accuse us, and try and discredit us ── this very work of the Eternal our God ── DENY THAT! They deny that eternal life comes only as a gift of God’s grace and through Christ Jesus, our Lord. They, in fact, proclaim and believe THAT YOU ALREADY HAVE ETERNAL LIFE! They claim that you either have eternal life in heaven, or eternal life in hell. They claim, you are an “immortal soul.”

~ be sure to watch our sermon, “What Happens After Death?” ~

They are deceiving and being deceived ── causing people to believe they don’t need to obtain “eternal salvation” ── because they already have an immortal soul that cannot spiritually die ── as they twist and misapply God’s living word, “We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord.” – 2 Corinthians 5:8. “Present with the Lord,” they claim, means entrance into heaven after physical death, experiencing joy, glory, and eternal life with the Lord. “Why,” they say ── and this is simplified here ── “we don’t need saving from death at all! One need just accept the Lord, and you shall be saved!” As they once again twist and misunderstand that passage.

They continue to teach, propagate, and believe exactly what Satan the Devil told Eve, “’ You will not surely die’” ── you are ── an immortal soul!

IT’S TIME TO STOP BELIEVING MEN AND BELIEVE GOD!

WHY They Teach This──You Have An “Immortal Soul”?

Why do most religious people speak continually, doctrinally, incessantly, about “your immortal soul” and about “going to heaven” ── about loved ones who have died now being “with the Lord” ── and many other such things that supposedly are basic Christian doctrines? They teach of these things as if they are the living word of God. They propagate, promote, and teach these things supposing that they come from God’s word. Yet, they do not.

What does God’s living word teach us concerning the soul?

Turn with me in your Bible to Ezekiel chapter 18 ──

“’ Behold, all SOULS are Mine; The SOUL of the father As well as the SOUL of the son is Mine; The SOUL who sins shall die.’” – Ezekiel 18:4; see also verse 20.

Again, the wages of sin is ETERNAL DEATH!

God’s living truth concerning the soul is so important that God repeated it ── twice.

So, a soul is not immortal. God’s word says that souls that sin shall die.

Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself has told us, “’ And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul [your life]. But rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul [your life] and body in hell [in gehenna]’” – Matthew 10:28.

This Greek word gehenna is a translation of the Hebrew word Gai Hinnom, which means valley of Hinnom. During the time of Jesus Christ and His apostles, the valley of Hinnom had become a city dump where garbage, dead bodies and dead animals were thrown and burned. The fires there constantly smoldered. Yet, this garbage and dead bodies which were burned there did not continually burn. Jesus Christ used this valley of Hinnom as an example of the coming gehenna – the ‘lake of fire’ – into which Jesus Christ will throw the incorrigibly wicked into.

So, let’s believe our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, when He says that souls can be DESTROYED!

Not only is it true that no such expression exists within God’s living word as “immortal soul,” but the very word “immortal” occurs only once ── in 1 Timothy 6:16 (NIV), where it explains to us that God alone is inherently immortal.

Also, furthermore, the word “immortality” is found five times within God’s word ──

Romans 2:7 – “eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and IMMORTALITY.”

So, we don’t already have immortality. We don’t need to seek after something we already have. It is the gift of God.

1 Corinthians 15:53 – “For this corruption must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on IMMORTALITY.”

1 Corinthians 15:54 – “So when this corruption has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on IMMORTALITY, …”

So, immortality is something the “saved” must put on at the time of the resurrection.

1 Timothy 6:16 – “who alone has IMMORTALITY, …”

Again, God alone is inherently immortal.

2 Timothy 1:10 – “but has now been revealed by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ, who abolished death and brought life and IMMORTALITY to light through the gospel.”

So, our Lord Jesus Christ brought to light ── immortality.

God’s living word teaches us that the soul ── which is the Hebrew word nepeš, which means, “breath; by extension: life, life force” (Strong’s #5315) is something that God can destroy ── as the penalty of sin! Again, note Matthew 10:28. The soul is not immortal.

Again, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” This includes you. And the penalty is ETERNAL DEATH! We do not possess eternal life from birth. Our Lord Jesus has told us, “’ That which is born of the flesh IS FLESH.’” – John 3:6. So, we are but mortal ── and death is a predicted outcome of the laws of thermodynamics and cosmology. As I’ve said many times ── even if Adam had taken of the tree of life he was going to die anyway – no matter if they were to choose the tree of life or the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Had they chosen the tree of life, they would still have lived out their days and physically died. But, like what the Apostle Paul wrote, “at the twinkling of an eye” they would have been resurrected wholly spiritual beings. Have you ever thought of this before?

The life we were born with is merely temporary. We live by breathing oxygen in and out of our lungs ── the breath of life. We are only one breath away from our physical death ── death here is the cessation of consciousness ── the end of all awareness, sensation, and thought. And God’s living word confirms this; Ecclesiastes 9:5.

We do not have an immortal soul that will keep us alive and conscious.

WE ARE A SOUL – cf. Genesis 2:7.

There Is a Spirit in Man

“But there is a spirit in man, And the breath of the Almighty gives him understanding.” – Job 32:8.

Animals do not have a spirit. Man needed this spirit to empower his brain with mind power - see 1 Corinthians 2:11. This human spirit enters the human embryo at conception. The spirit is like the “hard drive on a computer” – it stores information. The spirit essence is NOT an immortal soul or an eternal spirit. The spirit in man is NOT the man. It is something in the man. It has no life of itself. At death, it has no consciousness of itself, for it sleeps (1 Corinthians 11:30; 1 Corinthians 15:51; 1 Thessalonians 4:14). Like a tape recorder, it forms a permanent record of the qualities of mind and character built by a man during his lifetime. And much like a used tape is stored lifelessly on a shelf till activated in a recorder, so also does the spirit of man “return to GOD who gave it” after death, until the resurrection when life is again given to a person (Ecclesiastes 12:7). This was the way that our Lord Jesus Christ – through His servant – explained it to me and I hold fast to this that is good. Furthermore, the spirit in man was transmitted from Adam. Spirit comes from the father from a sperm cell, from Adam, all down through all humanity.

HOW──To Receive the Gift of God──Seek God

So, how does one receive this glorious gift of eternal life ── something which we do not inherently have? YOU GO TO THE LORD GOD!

The LORD God’s great prophet, Isaiah ── inspired by the very Spirit of God ── wrote, “Seek the LORD while He may be found, Call upon Him while He is near. 7) Let the wicked forsake his way, And the unrighteous man his thoughts; Let him return to the LORD, And He will have mercy on him; And to our God, FOR HE WILL ABUNDANTLY PARDON.” – Isaiah 55:6-8.

So let us SEEK the LORD God, so that we may obtain eternal life from them. WE MUST REPENT! And repenting truly means to forsake our own way of life, turn to God’s Way. But there is still a barrier in front of you──the ‘narrow way’ is still cut off. Why?

SIN.

Sadly, there are a great many people who talk about “sin,” “getting saved,” “under law or under grace, “justification,” sanctified,” “heaven,” “hell,” “predestination,” and a whole plethora of other terms. Well, ── do you know that a good portion of those religious people haven’t the foggiest what all those religious words actually mean?

SIN──Not a Relative Term

At the beginning of this article, I began by quoting Romans 3:23, “for all have sinned …” And this, again, includes you.

But what is sin?

I’m sure you’ve heard the proverb, “One Man’s Trash Is Another Man’s Treasure.” Well, ── sadly, there are those throughout this world that are insisting, teaching, and preaching that sin is relative. As they proclaim, “There are things that are sinful for one person that are not sinful for another person.” Of course this flies in the face of God’s living immutable word! Then they reason amongst themselves, “Relative to what?”

Now, ── I looked up the Protestant’s definition of what sin is on their very popular website, Got Questions. And I’m fairly certain that the majority of Protestants all agree with this roundabout answer they give, “A central idea in Scripture is that sin is a human condition of separation or estrangement from God stemming from an inner attitude of rebellion against God.” That said article begins with, “The Bible expresses the complex concept of sin …” 1

Well, ── God’s living word is not “complex” for those of us who do have the glorious gift of the Holy Spirit (cf. John 16:13).

The LORD God’s direct and easy-to-understand definition of what sin is ──

“Whoever commits sin also commits LAWLESSNESS, and SIN IS LAWLESSNESS.” – 1 John 3:4.

But whose law? And what law?

The answers can be found in the Book of Romans chapter 7 ──

“What shall we say then? Is the law [speaking concerning the Ten Commandments] sin? CERTAINLY NOT! On the contrary, I would not have known sin except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness unless the law had said, ‘You shall not covet.’” – Romans 7:7. In other words, the Law of God DEFINES SIN.

Sin is the breaking of the Law of God ── summed up with the Ten Commandments and grouped together into two great commandments by our Lord Jesus Christ (Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:30-31).

Here the LORD God tells us plainly and straightforward, without any ambiguity, what law it is SIN transgresses. It is the same Law that says, “’ You shall not covet …’” (Exodus 20:1-17).

Sin is the breaking of the Ten Commandments.

Down in verses 12 and 14 of the Book of Romans chapter 7, we read that the law is holy, just and good, and that the law is spiritual. It’s a spiritual Law ── a Law of spiritual principles of living!

And again, as our Lord Jesus Christ taught, the whole spiritual Law can be summed up in one word ── LOVE. Love toward our LORD God and love toward our neighbors. The first four of God’s commandments tell us how to love the LORD our God; the last six show us how to love our neighbors.

Also, and we stress this ── “by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for BY THE LAW is knowledge of sin.” – Romans 3:20.

If one just tries to keep the LORD God’s spiritual Law, it will not justify anyone. WE ALL HAVE SINNED. We cannot justify our guilt that we have incurred ── we cannot avoid the wages that we have earned ── ETERNAL DEATH ── by just simply obeying the Ten Commandments, or by just being good, or by just doing works ── or anything else we might do.

God’s Law As a MIRROR

Let me give you an example of what I mean ── throughout God’s living word, the LORD God’s Law is often compared to a mirror ── not to flatter, but to REVEAL. Just as a mirror will show any dirt on your face, the Law is that mirror, exposing.

“For if ANYONE is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; 24) for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. 25) But he who looks into the perfect LAW OF LIBERTY and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer BUT A DOER of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.” – James 1:23-25.

To hear God’s living word──which is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction and instruction in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16) ──and then DO NOTHING about the spiritual dirt that His living word reveals is like a person beholding their face in a mirror, seeing dirt ── receiving the understanding that there is dirt ── and doing nothing about it.

So, ── yes, the wages of sin is ETERNAL DEATH! But we do have HOPE! The glorious gift of the LORD God is ETERNAL LIFE!

So, ── forsake YOUR WAY ── forsake SIN, the breaking of the LORD God’s Law. You forsake breaking it by keeping and obeying it. At least you try with the help of God’s Spirit. □

to be continued

1. Got Questions, What is sin? Retrieved 29 May 2026