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Four Different Views on Salvation

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Abstract
This paper looks at four different views experts have concluded of salvation. It talks about who will receive salvation and how we receive salvation. There are four different views of salvation and each view is represented in this paper. Douglas Giivett and Gary Phillips take on the hard restrictivist view, in that only those who have given their lives fully to Jesus will be saved. John Hick argues a pluralist view, in that all people will be saved if they believe in God. Clark Pinnok explains an inclusivist point of view that says that humans are saved through Christ alone accept through some exceptions. Finally the soft restrictivist view explains that Christ is the only way to Heaven and that the Lord can reach those who have …show more content…

A pluralist, like John Hick (1995), would tend to disagree. His basic philosophy is that good people receive salvation. He thinks that Jesus Christ, although an extraordinary human being, is the son of God as we too are children of the Lord. He does not think that God could possibly be completely human while fully God. Hick says, “The simplest possible model would be a divine mind in a human body. But this was not acceptable, because a being without a human mind would not count as a genuinely human being” (Hick, 1995, p.56). A pluralist does not believe that Jesus is the ticket to Heaven, but that His Father is. This is where I must disagree with John Hick and his pluralist view point. Jesus is the way; God sent His son to die for our sins so that we could live eternally. We, as sinners, needed Jesus, to die for us. On this point I agree with the hard restrictivists, such as Geivett and Phillips who said, “God the Father ordained the death of his Son on the cross in order that life might come to those who fulfill a specific condition: belief in him” (Geivett & Phillips, 1995, p.234). The point is also reiterated in the Bible, for example John 3:16 says, “This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life” (The Message). Another example is in Romans 6:23, “But God’s gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus

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