What is the Common Salvation?

Believe it or not, there are bogus Bible teachers who twist even blatantly obvious verses into pretzels of error. The lay minister at a cultic house church I once attended was one of those scripture twisters.

Perhaps the worst of his mangling's of God's holy Word was Jude verse three which reads, "My loved ones, while my thoughts were full of a letter which I was going to send you about our common salvation, it was necessary for me to send you one requesting you with all my heart to go on fighting strongly for the faith which has been given to the saints once and for ever."

A plain reading of this verse indicates that Jude referred to the salvation which we, who have surrendered control of our lives to Christ, have in common. Almost the entire text of this epistle warns against false brethren who twist the precious truth which was passed down from the saints.

So how could anybody warp the obvious concept of the "common salvation" to mean something else? The man running the house church claimed it indicated that everybody would be saved eventually. He figured that since hell was meant for the Devil and the fallen angels, God wouldn't incarcerate any soul in it eternally. Additionally, he said that God was too merciful to condemn anybody to eternal agony forever.

So what does "common salvation" actually mean? John 3:16 is the most well-known verse from scripture. The Bible in Basic English renders it this way. "For God had such love for the world that he gave his only Son, so that whoever has faith in him may not come to destruction but have eternal life." The word "whoever" shows that some wouldn't accept Christ's magnanimous offer. Read the next few  verses and you'll realize this fact.

Instead of reading the Bible to find out what God has said to his created beings, people, like the one I knew, twist the meaning of scriptures to suit what they want to believe. Only by comparing the mysterious verses with plain ones can we understand the Bible fully.

Thanks to proper Bible scholars who understand the nuances of the ancient languages in which the verses were written, I now know what the Lord said and who he really is. This is why I want to write my book called You Think You're Going to Heaven? Satan has filled this world with so much disinformation that I feel compelled to counter it with biblical truth.