“One Size Does Not Fit All.” Some thoughts on the construal of sin and salvation.

A fair number of evangelical theologians claim to set forth “the” understanding of sin in the Bible. They claim it is a single concept. I will show you that this claim is clearly false.

When preparing a holiday meal, do you use just one cooking utensil?

When building a room in a house, do you use only one tool?

No, we don’t. So why do we think there is a singular understanding of sin and a single concept of salvation?

Here are 34 different ways of understanding sin and salvation in the New Testament.* [The NT writers use more images than these.]

Note that many of these metaphors understand salvation as transformed relationships rather than as a business transaction. I believe the ones about an ongoing journey or relationships offer profound implications for how we are to live.

Consider the various ways English speakers understand love. Love is considered:

1. A Nutrient (He was starved for affection. Her love sustains him).
2. Fire (They are burning with love).
3. Magnetism (He is strongly attracted to her).
4. Powerful Natural Forces (She was swept off her feet).
5. As Stumbling (He fell for her).
6. Insanity (He’s madly in love).
7. Unity (She is my better half. They are a perfect fit).
8. A Game (She’s playing hard to get).
9. A Journey (We’ve come a long way together. We hit some bumps in the road. Our relationship broke down).

Which is the correct way of understanding love? Clearly, there is not a single correct way! The experience of love is so rich and deep it requires multiple ways of understanding. No single metaphor captures everything we want to say about love. The same is true for sin and salvation. The experience of sin and salvation is so deep and wide that we need many metaphors to understand these phenomena. Instead of selecting only one metaphor as “the” correct way of construing sin and salvation, we, like the New Testament writers, should consider which particular ways of conceiving of sin and salvation may be helpful to a particular person or group. What is it that will help them experience God’s love and grace?

Also, note that each metaphor has distinct inferences. For instance, if love is insanity, then you are not responsible for your actions whereas if love is a journey together, then you are responsible for your actions. The same is true for metaphors for sin and salvation. If sin is walking the wrong path, then you need to change course. If sin is being an orphan, then it is not your fault. If sin is being lost, you need someone to find you. The different inferences in each metaphor are an important part for deciding which metaphor or metaphors will be helpful to people.

Finally, we are not limited to the ways the biblical writers construed sin—we can develop new metaphors. For instance, Cornelius Plantinga’s Not the Way It’s Supposed to Be discusses a wide array of understandings of sin used in the Bible and Christian tradition. He provides some interesting ways to understand sin:

• Addiction
• Disintegration from the wholeness of life God desired for us,
• A parasite preying upon God’s good creation,
• A masquerade—pretending to be one thing (goodness) when it is not.
• Vandalism of God’s shalom—the defacing of God’s gifts intended to enable creatures to flourish.

One size does not fit all when it comes to understanding the experience of sin and salvation.

* The chart is indebted to Brenda Colijn’s Images of Salvation in the New Testament (2010) and Richard Beck’s Unclean (2011), pages 34-35. This chart is available as a stand-alone file on this website.

For further reading:

Brenda Colijn, Images of salvation in the NT (2010).

John Sanders, Theology in the Flesh (2016).