Salvation through Christ Alone

By Gary F. Zeolla

A consequence of this viewpoint is the common assumption that most everyone will be going to heaven, or whatever "salvation" means in one's own religion. And again, to claim that your religion is the only one that can save someone is considered intolerant. It can even be considered "insensitive" to tell someone they need to be saved. We are told we should be "affirming" people, not telling them they are sinners who need a Savior. And it especially said to be insensitive to tell people that they cannot save themselves.

However, the Bible is clear: we are all sinners, and the one and only means of salvation is through faith in Jesus Christ and His death on the cross for our sins. Moreover, Jesus is the only means of salvation for all peoples. There is not a separate means of salvation for those of differing races or regions.

It is this belief that Jesus is the one and only way that Christians have been proclaiming throughout the world ever since Jesus rose from the dead. It was this proclamation that led to the early Christians being persecuted, and it is this proclamation that is leading many to disparage Christians today.

But despite the difficulties, Christians proclaim this "narrow" view of sin and salvation because it is clearly what the Scriptures teach. This point became clear to me as I was working on Third Edition of the Analytical-Literal Translation (ALT3), from which the following verses are taken.

Matthew 1:21:

Matthew 7:13-14:

Matthew 18:11:

Matthew 20:28:

Matthew 26:26-28:

²³Now someone said to Him, "Lord, are the ones being saved few?" And He said to them, ²⁴Be striving to go in through the narrow gate, because many, I say to you*, will seek to enter and will not be able.

Luke 22:19-20:

¹⁹And having taken bread, having given thanks, He broke [it] and gave [it] to them, saying, "This is My body, the [one] being given on your* behalf; be doing this in remembrance of Me." ²⁰And in the same manner [He took] the cup after [they] ate, saying, "This cup [is] the New Covenant in My blood, the [blood] being poured out on your* behalf.

Luke 24:46-47:

⁴⁶And He said to them, "Thus it has been written, and thus it was necessary [for] the Christ to suffer and to rise from [the] dead the third day, ⁴⁷and [for] repentance and forgiveness of sins to be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem.

John 1:29:

John 3:13-18,35-36:

John 6:28-29:

John 11:25-27:

John 14:6:

John 20:30-31:

Acts 4:12:

¹²"And [there] is no salvation in any other, for neither [is there] a different name, the One having [or, which has] been given among people by which it is necessary [for] us to be saved!"

Acts 10:39-43:

³⁹"And we are witnesses of all [things] which He did, both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem; whom they also executed, having hanged [Him] on a tree [or, a cross]. ⁴⁰This One God raised up on the third day and gave Him to become visible, 41not to all the people, but to witnesses, the ones having been chosen beforehand by God, to us who ate together and drank together with Him after He rose from [the] dead. ⁴²And He gave strict orders to us to preach to the people and to solemnly testify that He is the One having been designated by God [to be] Judge of living [people] and of dead [people]. ⁴³To this One all the prophets bear witness [that] through His name every[one] that is believing [or, trusting] in Him receives forgiveness of sins."

Acts 15:7-11:

⁷Now much debate having taken place, having risen up, Peter said to them, "Men, brothers, you* know that from former days God chose among us [for] the Gentiles to hear the word of the Gospel through my mouth and to believe. ⁸And the heart-knowing God testified to them by having given the Holy Spirit to them, just as also to us, [see Acts 10:44] ⁹and also distinguished nothing between us and them, having purified [or, purged] their hearts by faith. ¹⁰Now therefore, why are you* testing God [by trying] to put a yoke on the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? ¹¹But we believe [we are] saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, according to which manner they also [are]."

Acts 16:30-31:

³⁰And having brought them out, he said, "Sirs, what is it necessary [for] me to be doing so that I shall be saved?" ³¹So they said, "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your house!

Acts 17:29-31:

²⁹"Therefore, being offspring of God, we ought not to be thinking the Divine Nature to be similar to gold or silver or stone, an image [shaped by] humanity's skill and imagination [or, [the] craftsmanship and consideration of a person]. ³⁰Therefore indeed, the times of such ignorance having overlooked, God is now giving strict orders to all people everywhere to be repenting, ³¹because He set a day in which He is about to be judging the inhabited earth in righteousness by a Man whom He designated, having given assurance to all by having raised Him from [the] dead!"

Romans 3:29:

Romans 10:8-13:

1John 2:1-2:

¹My little children [or, My dear children], I am writing these things to you* so that you* do not sin. And if anyone should sin, we have a Counselor [or, an Advocate; cp. John 14:16] with the Father, Jesus Christ, [the] righteous. ²And He is [the] propitiation [or, appeasing sacrifice] concerning our sins, but not concerning ours only, but also concerning [those] of the whole world!

1John 4:14-15:

1John 5:1,9-13:

Revelation 5:9-10:

⁹And they sing a new song, saying: "You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because You were slain, and You redeemed us to God by Your blood, out of every tribe and tongue [fig., language group, and throughout book] and people and nation, ¹⁰and made them kings and priests to our God, and they will reign as kings on the earth!"

Revelation 7:9-10:

⁹After these [things] I saw, and look!, a large crowd, which no one was being able to number, out of every nation and from tribes and people and tongues, having stood before the throne and before the Lamb having been clothed in long, white robes and palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰And they cry out with a loud voice, saying, "The salvation [belongs] to our God, the One sitting on the throne, and to the Lamb!"

Revelation 20:14,15:

¹⁴And death and the realm of the dead were thrown into the lake of fire. This is the second death, the lake of fire. ¹⁵And if anyone was not found having been written in the Scroll of Life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.

Revelation 21:1-4,27:

¹And I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth went away [fig., had disappeared]. [cp. Isaiah 65:17; 2Peter 3:13] And the sea is not [any]more [fig., the sea no longer exists]. ²And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having been prepared like a bride having been adorned [for] her husband.

³And I heard a loud voice out of heaven, saying, "Look! The tabernacle of God [is] with the people, and He will tabernacle [or, dwell] with them! And they will be His people, and God Himself will be with them. ⁴And He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not be [any]more [fig., death will no longer exist], nor sorrow, nor crying, nor will pain be [any]more [fig., pain will no longer exist], because the first [things] passed away." …

²⁷And by no means shall any defiling [thing] and [anyone] doing an abomination and a lie enter into it, but only the ones having been written in the Scroll of Life of the Lamb…

Conclusion

The Gospel message of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ is for all peoples, and this includes you, the reader. If you have not trusted in Christ for your forgiveness and salvation, now is the time to do so.

Listen! Now [is the] acceptable time. Listen! Now [is the] day of salvation (2Corinthians 6:2).

Scripture taken from the Analytical-Literal Translation of the New Testament: Third Edition. Copyright © 2007 by Gary F. Zeolla of Darkness to Light ministry (www.zeolla.org/christian). Previously copyrighted © 1999, 2001, 2005 By Gary F. Zeolla.

NWT: ⁸By this undeserved kindness, indeed, YOU have been saved through faith; and this not owing to YOU, it is God's gift. ⁹No, it is not owing to works, in order that no man should have ground for boasting.

KIT: ⁸To the for undeserved kindness YOU are having been saved through faith; and this not out of YOU, of God the gift; ⁹not out of works, in order that not someone should boast.

NKJV: ⁸For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, ⁹not of works, lest anyone should boast.

ALT3: ⁸For by grace you* have been saved, through faith, and this [is] not from you*; [it is] the gift of God, ⁹not by works, so that no one shall boast.

The NKJV and ALT3 begin with the word "For" while the KIT has "for" as the third word. The Greek word here is gar. It is "a postpositive conjunction" (Dana, p. 242). This means that it usually is the second word in a sentence in Greek but is generally rendered as the first word in an English translation. The KIT's "To the" is a rendering of the first word (the Greek definitive article in the dative case). So the KIT has followed the exact word order while the NKJV and ALT3 follow the basic Greek rule of rendering the postpositive first.

But what about the NWT? It does not appear to have translated this word as there is no translation of this word in either of these positions. However, the NWT does have "indeed" as the fifth word in the sentence. This apparently is its translation of gar. It is true that "indeed" is a possible translation of the Greek word (Friberg). However, it is a very uncommon rendering to say the least. I never rendered it as such in the ALT, and I don't remember seeing it rendered as such in the main versions I compared as I worked on the ALT. Moreover, there is a different Greek word that specifically means "indeed" (men, e.g. Phil 1:15). Meanwhile, "for" is the most common rendering of gar. This translation is used more often all other possible renderings combined.

So the NWT has used an unusual translation of gar and placed it in an unusual place. This not technically wrong, but it does have the effect of losing the connection between this verse and the previous verses. By using "For" and placing it first, which is the more basic rendering and placement, the NKJV and ALT3 preserves this connection.

Otherwise, the first clause is basically the same in each version, but the clause after this has significant differences between the versions. The KIT has the very literal "this not out of YOU." However, the word "out of" (ek) can also be rendered as "of" or "from" (Friberg). And these translations are the most common type of renderings for ek. The NWT has "owing to." Its justification for doing so is probably that ek can indicate the "reason" for something. But this is a rare rendering for this word. In fact, some lexicons do not give it at all, while the ones that do usually use "because of" or "since." None I checked have "owing to." Hence, I did not use "owing to" in my list of possible meanings for ek in my Companion Volume, while indicating that "because of" is a "rare" usage (p. 88). So again, the NWT is using an unusual rendering of a word.

Next the NWT has "God's gift" rather than "the gift of God." Now it has been mentioned previously that it is legitimate to use a possessive to or render a Greek genitive. But by doing so, the article is omitted. And in this case, there is a point to the article. It is not just any gift that is being referred to but a very specific gift. And the article indicates this specificity.

Now, the translators of the NWT might justify their rendering by saying that putting God first emphasizes that God is the Giver. But in English, which word comes first is not necessarily the word that is emphasized. Moreover, both points are important—that God is the Giver and that it is a specific gift. The best way to emphasize both points would be to follow the Greek word order as seen in the KIT and have "of God the gift." But this is very awkward. However, "the gift of God" retains the specificity of the gift while still giving emphasis to the Giver.

Verse nine is a phrase, but the NWT has turned it into a complete sentence. To do so required the NWT to add the words "it is," which again, are not bracketed. Also not bracketed is the added interjection "No." And once again, the NWT has the unusual "owing to" rendering.

Now, the translators of the NWT can argue that "No it is" are required to express the meaning of the original. However, most other versions do not feel this is necessary. But more fundamentally, the NWT claims to be a literal translation, and the purpose of a literal translation is to render the WORDS of the original not the MEANING of the original. The latter is the practice of dynamic equivalence and paraphrase type versions.

The NWT ends this passage with "should have ground for boasting" instead of the simple "should boast" of the other three versions. The word here is a verb in the aorist tense and subjunctive mood. All four versions use "should" to show the "conditional" sense of the subjunctive. However, the NWT has "have" in its translation, along with the participle "boasting." This would be fine if the verb were in the perfect tense. Using "have" with the participle indicates the ongoing nature of the action, which is what the perfect indicates. However, the verb here is in the aoristic tense, which indicates the singular nature of the action.

The difference here is, the NWT makes it sound like the text is saying we should only not be boasting in regards to our salvation as an ongoing practice, while the more accurate translations show that we should not boast even once in this regard. So by mistranslating the tense, the NWT has altered the sense of the statement. We can never ever, not even once, boast about being saved. It is the gift of God.