What is Salvation?
By salvation, we mean, more than the promise of eternal life, but a present deliverance from sin, a restoration of the soul to its original purity; a recovery of the divine nature; in righteousness and true holiness, in justice, mercy and truth.
Catechism for the Global Methodist Church, question 54
10For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, having been reconciled, we will be saved by his life.
17So if anyone is in Christ, a new creation: the ancient things have passed by; look, new things have come to be.
22The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness. 23Gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.
2:11For the grace of God has appeared, saving for all people. 2:12It trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly desires and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age. 3:5not by works that we did in righteousness, but according to his own mercy he saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit,
24Who himself carried up our sins in his body upon the wood, that, having died to sins, we might live to righteousness; by whose wound you were healed.
1:9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 2:2And he himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
Question 54 pauses the sequence of graces to define the thing they accomplish. The answer's language is Wesley's own. Wesley described salvation as a present deliverance from sin, a restoration of the soul to its original purity, and a recovery of the divine nature, and the catechism adopts that description nearly verbatim. Article IX of the Confession of Faith states the same doctrine in the church's own words: regeneration is "the renewal of man in righteousness through Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, whereby we are made partakers of the divine nature and experience newness of life."
The answer describes salvation as present as well as future. Paul writes that "having been reconciled, we will be saved by his life" (Romans 5:10), and that "if anyone is in Christ, a new creation: the ancient things have passed by; look, new things have come to be" (2 Corinthians 5:17). The "deliverance from sin" is both pardon and cleansing: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9). The ground of both is the cross. Christ "himself carried up our sins in his body upon the wood, that, having died to sins, we might live to righteousness" (1 Peter 2:24), and he "is the propitiation for our sins" (1 John 2:2).
"Restoration of the soul to its original purity" and "recovery of the divine nature" describe what the Spirit produces in a saved person. Paul lists it: "The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control" (Galatians 5:22-23). Grace "trains us to renounce ungodliness and worldly desires and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age" (Titus 2:12). The renewal is God's work: (Titus 3:5). And the closing phrase of the answer, "in justice, mercy and truth," shows that the holiness in view is practical and moral, worked out toward one's neighbor.
A Methodist who learns this definition stops thinking of salvation as a ticket held for later. It is a life being changed now: sins forgiven, the heart cleansed, and the character of Christ growing where the old passions used to rule. Paul's instruction follows from the definition: "If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit" (Galatians 5:25).