Prayers, Prophecies and Miracles Are Not a Sign of Salvation
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’” (Matt. 7:21-23)
“And He said: ‘Take heed that you not be deceived. For many will come in My name, saying, “I am He,” and, “The time has drawn near.” Therefore do not go after them’” (Luke. 21:8) (Matt. 24:5) (Mark. 13:6)
For Salvation It Is Necessary to Be a Member of the Body of Christ (the Church)
The Church is the Body of Christ:
“His body, which is the church” (Col. 1:24)
Christ is the Savior of the Body, that is, of the Church:
“Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body” (Eph. 5:23)
The door to salvation is Christ:
“I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly” (John. 10:9-10)
The Lord added those who were being saved to the Church:
“And the Lord added to the church daily those who were being saved” (Act. 2:47)
Whoever is outside the body cannot bear fruit, will be cast out and thrown into the fire:
“Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned” (John. 15:4-6)
“This is the ‘stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief cornerstone.’ Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Act. 4:11-12)
Whoever is not with Christ is against Him:
“He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters” (Luke. 11:23)
Joining the Body of Christ (the Church)
Baptism
“For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body — whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free — and have all been made to drink into one Spirit” (1 Cor. 12:13)
Communion
“The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? For we, though many, are one bread and one body; for we all partake of that one bread” (1 Cor. 10:16-17)
The Ark Is the Old Testament Prefiguration of Salvation
“So the LORD said, ‘I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.’ <...> The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. So God looked upon the earth, and indeed it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, ‘The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. <...> And behold, I Myself am bringing floodwaters on the earth, to destroy from under heaven all flesh in which is the breath of life; everything that is on the earth shall die. But I will establish My covenant with you; and you shall go into the ark — you, your sons, your wife, and your sons’ wives with you. And of every living thing of all flesh you shall bring two of every sort into the ark, to keep them alive with you; they shall be male and female. Of the birds after their kind, of animals after their kind, and of every creeping thing of the earth after its kind, two of every kind will come to you to keep them alive. And you shall take for yourself of all food that is eaten, and you shall gather it to yourself; and it shall be food for you and for them.’ Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did” (Gen. 6:7,11-14,17-22)
“And all flesh died that moved on the earth: birds and cattle and beasts and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth, and every man. All in whose nostrils was the breath of the spirit of life, all that was on the dry land, died. So He destroyed all living things which were on the face of the ground: both man and cattle, creeping thing and bird of the air. They were destroyed from the earth. Only Noah and those who were with him in the ark remained alive” (Gen. 7:21-23)
“in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared, in which a few, that is, eight souls, were saved through water” (1 Pet. 3:20)
The Old Testament Images Were Written for Our Instruction
“Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come” (1 Cor. 10:11)
Criticism
“You Say This out of Pride: ‘Only We Are Saved, and the Rest Are Not’”
Once, through the prophet Moses, God created the Old Testament church and established in it the order pleasing to Him. Later, next to it, there arose the Samaritan people, made up of many resettled peoples, who, on the basis of the five scrolls of the prophet Moses (the Torah), not accepting the scrolls of the later writers (the prophets), themselves created their own separate religious society with its own order, which believed in God in its own way and awaited the Christ. Christ answers the Samaritan woman:
“You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews” (John. 4:22)
Did Christ say this out of pride, or because in self-willed societies with a faith self-willedly invented from a book one really cannot be saved?
When the apostle says that those who do the works of the flesh, among which are heresies and schisms, cannot inherit the Kingdom of God, does he say this out of pride, or because with such sins one really cannot inherit the Kingdom of God?
“Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions*, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God” (Gal. 5:19-21)
*dissensions (διχοστασίαι) — division, splitting apart.
Protestants see pride here because of their invented teaching about a salvation supposedly already received merely by acknowledging Christ as one’s personal Savior, that is, salvation right now and by faith alone. The Orthodox do not hold this teaching, and accordingly have a completely different way of thinking about salvation (more).
On coming into the Orthodox Church, we are not yet saved, but are being saved. Not all who have come into the Church will be saved, but only those who, making use of the means of salvation, labor diligently on themselves, uprooting sinful passions and acquiring the virtues of the Gospel. Being in the Orthodox Church is only one of the conditions of salvation. Anyone who seeks salvation needs the means of salvation: a sick man needs medicine, and a man drowning in the middle of the ocean needs a ship. So too every person sick with sinful passions, in order to cross the sea of earthly life without drowning in the sinful abyss and to reach life with God, needs the means of salvation: the right faith and the grace-filled sacraments. These means of salvation have been placed by God in His ark of salvation — the Orthodox Church — which God Jesus Christ Himself personally came and created 2000 years ago.
Communities recently and self-willedly created by ordinary people, directly contrary to God’s will for the unity of believers, not only do not have the means of salvation, but on the contrary, by their very separate existence lead people into grave sinful states — the mortal sins of heresies and schisms (Gal. 5:19-21).
The creation of one’s own “churches”, the division of believers, directly contrary to the will of Christ and the apostles for the unity of believers — all this is precisely a manifestation of pride:
“I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me” (John. 17:20-21)
“Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment” (1 Cor. 1:10)
Of course, being at enmity with Christ, creating one’s own “churches”, one cannot be saved. And the apostle says that by doing the works of the flesh, in heresies and schisms, one cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven:
“Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions*, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God” (Gal. 5:19-21)
*dissensions (διχοστασίαι) — division, splitting apart.
The apostle says directly that those who create divisions do not serve the Lord Jesus Christ:
“Now I urge you, brethren, note those who cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which you learned, and avoid them. For those who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly, and by smooth words and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the simple” (Rom. 16:17-18)
How can one be saved by following the road behind one who acts against Christ?
Besides, heresy and schism are not the only sins; there are many other mortal sins. Is it an act of pride to warn a drunkard that, remaining in the mortal sin of drunkenness, one cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven, as it says in Scripture (1 Cor. 6:9)? Or to say the same to a murderer, a thief, a sorcerer, a fornicator, a deceiver? If this is not pride and we must warn of these mortal sins (Eph. 5:11), then, to be completely honest, one should also warn heretics and schismatics, because heresy and schisms are in the same list of mortal sins as drunkenness, murders and the like, remaining in which a person cannot inherit the Kingdom of Heaven.
How then can a person come out of this sinful state? By refusing to remain in a society recently created by an ordinary person, and refusing the faith of that society, recently invented by the same person. Then one should enter the Orthodox Church, created by the Lord Jesus Christ, and take in the Orthodox faith, which the apostles were taught by Christ, which was placed by them in the Orthodox Church, and which is unchangeably preserved in the Church of Christ by the Holy Spirit, sent to it forever:
“And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever” (John. 14:16)
“I am with you always, even to the end of the age. Amen” (Matt. 28:20)