sin, and “lostness”[15] and, subsequently, their need of salvation.
Many who live in the Latino/a contexts of conflict, oppression, and violence are desperate to find liberation, peace, and hope.[16] African Christians address their world, which is plagued with HIV/AIDS, poverty, and war, by looking for a soteriology of emancipation from such ills and evils.[17] Asian multi-religious, scriptural, linguistic, and racial social realities inevitably cry out for a soteriology that addresses natural disasters, epidemics, child labor, human trafficking, and dissymmetry of wealth. Christians of indigenous groups in the United States, Borneo, and Australia wrestle with a soteriology that will save their land and bring them an identity of nationhood, political freedom, and self-determination. Understanding soteriology in one’s context is nothing new. In Salvation in the New Testament, Jan G. van der Watt is adamant that “the documents of the New Testament [cannot] be classed as abstract theological treatises. They should rather be seen as reflecting [in the ancient world] the integration of the message into particular situations of the people involved in the first and original communication process.”[18]
The hope of the series editors is that you will read this volume in conjunction with other volumes in the same series. For soteriology is the mega-theme of Scripture, “the integrating center of Scripture [and] the coordinating center of theology.”[19] The salvation motif is prevalent in the Bible and Christian theology because of the “many dimensions” of soteriology by which “most key theological issues . . . converge.”[20] Soteriology is symbiotically related to the nature and work of God the Savior (theology; the author of salvation), the person and deeds of Christ (Christology; the agent of salvation), the work of the Spirit (pneumatology; the agency of salvation), the need and being of humanity (anthropology; together with the creation, the recipient of salvation), the identity and function of the church (ecclesiology; the channel of salvation to the world), the process and goal of history (eschatology; salvation consummated).
I believe that soteriology is about God’s pneumatology of universality (God’s working out his plan of salvation in the whole creation) that has a Christological inclusivity (of all who are saved). Therefore, the church lives out that eschatological hope proleptically (Søren Kierkegaard’s “life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards”)[21] and prophetically (mercy and justice) to the ends of the earth. Majority World scholars in this volume come to us from among the nations, and they offer us the courage and the grace to care for the world redemptively without borders.
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The series editors wish to give thanks to many of our friends who partner with us in this project, witnessing to the global church in action regarding soteriology in the global context of Scripture and theology. We are grateful to the authors in this volume for providing numerous drafts of their presentations at the 2015 Atlanta conference of ETS (Evangelical Theological Society) and IBR. We are indebted to ScholarLeaders International (especially Evan Hunter), the Rivendell Steward’s Trust, and the SEED Research Institute (John Shen, Moses Cui) for their generous financial and prayer support. The leadership of ETS, IBR, and the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) has provided hotel space and efficient logistical support for our conferences. Michael Thomson of Eerdmans continues to believe in our work and guide us to navigate smoothly through publishing waters. Chris Wright, Pieter Kwant, and Mark Hunt of Langham Partnership International encourage us and partner with us in publishing our work, but also in caring for the future scholars of the Majority World.
I praise God for the global church living out the mission of God sacramentally (salvation in and through the body of Christ), every time we meet, “breaking bread” at academic conferences or online/iCloud. Oh, “so great a salvation!” (Heb. 2:3). I echo Paul’s words as a prayer: “For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing; to the one a fragrance from death to death, to the other a fragrance from life to life” (2 Cor. 2:15–16).
Chapter 1
The New Covenant and New Creation: Western Soteriologies and the Fullness of the Gospel
Daniel J. Treier
Abstract
The focus of this opening chapter is to provide an overview of Western soteriologies. This overview begins by complicating the term “Western” before sketching eight soteriological traditions: Orthodox, Catholic, Lutheran, Calvinist, Anabaptist, Arminian, Wesleyan/Holiness, and Pentecostal. Next the overview concludes with recent trends affecting Christ’s accomplishment of atonement and justification as well as the Spirit’s application of salvation in believers’ sanctification and glorification. After this overview comes possible critique, both internal and external, regarding Western soteriological tendencies.
From liberationist and Majority World perspectives, the sociopolitical and cosmic dimensions of salvation are the chief lacunae in traditional dogmatic attempts to represent the gospel’s fullness. Such incomplete soteriologies focus too exclusively on the personal blessings of participation in the new covenant. Hence I conclude by suggesting that “new creation,” with which the Old Testament prophets surround the new covenant, might fill up what is lacking in the soteriologies surveyed here—without divorcing sociopolitical and cosmic concerns from the new covenant’s personal elements.
My primary goal is to provide an overview of “Western” soteriologies (assuming the quotation marks around this label “Western” throughout). This overview indicates that sociopolitical and cosmic dimensions are the chief aspects of salvation neglected by traditional dogmatics. Such incomplete soteriologies focus too exclusively on the personal blessings of participation in the new covenant, which the end of this chapter addresses particularly in terms of Jeremiah 31. I conclude by suggesting that “new creation,” a theme of God’s saving action with which the Old Testament prophets surround the new covenant, might fill up what is lacking in the soteriologies surveyed here—without divorcing sociopolitical and cosmic concerns from the new covenant’s personal elements.
“Western” Tendencies
Western soteriological tendencies reflect both major historical traditions and influential recent trends. Of course, such an assignment requires a gargantuan level of generalization, beyond the usual oversimplification that all education requires.
Such generalization begins with the very label “Western”: in one sense it really means Northern, as opposed to Majority World theologies located largely in the Global South. In another sense, soteriologically, “Western” references the Augustinian tradition, which has generated Catholic and Protestant socially embodied arguments over many centuries. Yet the contrast implied in the present context, concerning Majority World theologies, probably includes the Orthodox tradition as well, since its heritage of theosis (deification) overlaps considerably with the Catholic tradition and even some Protestant accounts. Finally, for all the differences between Augustinian and Eastern tendencies, together they present another complexity: Augustine and other classic figures were African or Middle Eastern, not European—however Latin or Greek their language and however Roman their context. Hence “Western” functions quite imprecisely, as an omnibus contrast term.
Likewise, the boundaries of “soteriology” are fuzzy—overlapping with Christology, especially for atonement; pneumatology, especially for sanctification; and eschatology, especially for glorification. Systematic theology as modernity knows it, seeking an ordo salutis (order of salvation) that logically arranges the Spirit’s application of Christ’s saving benefits, is a comparatively recent invention. Its meandering development exacerbates the challenge of accurately characterizing Western soteriologies. Should Orthodox soteriology
