Experiencing both the ‘already’ and the ‘not yet’ in the Christian life
When I was considering becoming a Christian as a teenager thousands of years ago, I had a question to which I never got a satisfactory answer.
It was this. The gospel invites me to be forgiven my sins, to be saved from God’s just condemnation and to enter eternal life. But part of being saved is that I would be changed, through new birth and the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit. (I’m not sure I would have framed things in those theological terms then.) Here’s the question: If I am changed, I would no longer be me. I would be a different person. So in that case is it really me who is saved? Isn’t it actually some other person? Is, therefore, Christian salvation a real salvation? Paul’s assertion in Galatians 2.20 was a worry: ‘I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live.’
