Sharing by: Rain Khoo
From Marcus Borg’s Speaking Christian, Chapter 3
Marcus Borg highlights that today’s Christianity links salvation to the idea of heaven and hell, and that salvation is linked solely to accepting Christ as savior. In the historical context of Christianity, Salvation is seen very differently – there can be political salvation, physical salvation / or rescue from peril, return from exile salvation, or liberation from bondage.
In physical salvation – “sometimes the peril is illness. Often the peril is posed by enemies or the wicked. Sometimes the petition is to be saved from death – but this is not about surviving death and entering in a blessed afterlife. Rather, this is being saved from a potentially mortal illness or from enemies who desire the death of the petitioner.”
“Salvation is depicted as deliverance and transformational – moving from blindness to seeing, from death to life, from infirmity to well-being. The salvation that Jesus brought as a healer, was healing the wounds of existence, as well-being, as wholeness. Salvation is the healing of our wounds and becoming whole.”
This is a moment where the lightbulb went on for me as a transman, that our acceptance of ourselves as trans, and transition is part of our Salvation, experienced through enlightenment of a situation or ourselves. When we accepted ourselves, we went from being blind to ourselves, to seeing ourselves as God sees us (in part). From being the walking dead, to being truly alive. From being crippled by our dysphoria to wellness.
When I just completed my surgery and I was looking at my new chest for the first time, I had an immense sense of relief, and a weight that was lifted off my shoulders. Coupled with that, was a knowledge that God would not condemn me for doing the surgery, and a quietly bubbling happiness. I was puzzled for weeks why my subconscious was so clear in reconciling my faith with the lifting of the dysphoria when I could not recall any bible passages. It was the sense of restorative healing that made God’s hand clear to me. When I read this passage on Salvation as physical deliverance, I realize that it was indeed God.
Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure. (Philippians 2:12-13)
