Unpacking #7 : The Salvation You Were Sold Isn’t the Salvation Jeremiah Promised

If your “gospel” is mainly a hell-avoidance transaction, you didn’t get the biblical root—you got a scalable product.

Feb 05, 2026

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I’ve met far too many sincere believers who were handed salvation as a single moment: a prayer, a raised hand, a card, an aisle. Then later—when you ask the honest questions—Is my life actually being re-formed? Do I love God? Do I return to Him when I fail?—you can get treated like you’re threatening grace instead of pursuing truth (2 Corinthians 13:5; 1 John 2:3–6).

And before we go any further, let’s clean up a word we throw around like a weapon.

When I say sin, I’m not trying to spook you. At the root, sin is falling short—missing the mark, veering off the path (Romans 3:23). If you want a picture that’s closer to Scripture than courtroom drama, imagine a Father watching His child choose what destroys them. Sin isn’t just “rule-breaking.” It’s relational damage. It’s grief. It’s God saying, I made you for life—and you’re choosing death (Isaiah 59:2). That’s why repentance isn’t “paying a penalty.” Repentance is coming home.

Now here’s the problem.

Jeremiah doesn’t speak like modern religious packaging. Jeremiah speaks like covenant—exile, return, restoration, and God remaking the human heart so faithfulness becomes possible (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Jeremiah 32:38–41).

So I’m not going to do the cheap version. If we’re going to talk about salvation, I’m going to talk about it the way Scripture does—text-first, covenant-first, and beyond reproach.

The anchor: Jeremiah 31 — covenant renewal, not religious paperwork

Jeremiah 31 doesn’t describe salvation as a legal trick. God promises covenant renewal with His instruction written within, on the heart. It’s relational knowing, not mere affiliation. Forgiveness is there, yes—but forgiveness as restoration, not forgiveness as a product (Jeremiah 31:31–34).

Here’s the plain meaning: salvation isn’t merely that God overlooks sin. Salvation is that God reconstitutes a people so they can actually live with Him.

And Jeremiah doesn’t leave this promise floating in the clouds. He places it inside collapse, exile, and judgment—and still insists God is committed to restore. That’s why the next chapter matters, even if I’m not making it a separate section: when everything visible screams it’s over, God speaks in covenant terms—He will be their God, He will make an everlasting covenant, He will not turn away from doing them good, and He will put the fear of Him in their hearts so they will not turn away (Jeremiah 32:38–41).

So when you hear “salvation,” don’t picture a feel-good moment with eternal benefits. Picture covenant renewal—God writing His ways into you, forming faithfulness inside you, and causing the covenant to actually hold.

Now do something simple and brutally honest: think back through the last year of Sundays you’ve sat in church. When was the last time you heard Jeremiah 31 taught clearly—not quoted as a tagline, but opened up as the backbone of what salvation is: Torah written on the heart, covenant renewal, knowing God, forgiveness as restoration? If you can’t remember, that’s not a random gap. That’s diagnostic. It means you’ve been formed on a salvation story that can survive without the prophets—and if your gospel doesn’t need Jeremiah, it has probably been thinned down into something easier to sell, easier to count, and easier to consume.

You were sold a moment. Jeremiah promised adoption.

I’m willing to bet you were taught a feel-good moment with eternal benefits—not authentic, blood-sealed covenant adoption.

There was a covenant made with a people—Israel—that God used as a living example to show the world what success, failure, salvation, obedience, and righteousness actually look like.

That’s not a side note. That’s the framework.

“Chosen” doesn’t mean “chosen for bragging rights.” It means chosen for witness—chosen to carry God’s name, God’s instruction, and God’s testimony in full public view (Deuteronomy 4:5–8; Isaiah 49:6). God didn’t pick Israel to hide salvation. He picked Israel so salvation would be visible.

So when you hear “salvation,” don’t imagine a floating, detached religious product. Imagine adoption into a real covenant story, rooted in real history, with real consequences and real mercy.

And this is where people get tripped up: once Torah is distorted into a caricature—either “legalism” or “irrelevance”—you lose the covenant frame that makes emunah intelligible. I’ve written about that distortion and how Acts 15 is routinely misused as a wedge to detach Gentile believers from the covenant story instead of grafting them into it.[7]

Salvation is not a New Testament invention

“Salvation” is native Bible language, long before the New Testament. The Tanakh repeatedly describes God as the One who rescues, delivers, liberates, and restores (Exodus 15:2; Psalm 3:8; Isaiah 12:2; Jonah 2:9).

And let me make one thing painfully clear: biblically, salvation is not primarily a courtroom theory where everything gets reduced to penal substitution math.

Yes, atonement is real. Blood matters. Forgiveness is real.

But the Bible’s center of gravity is covenant rescue: God bringing you out and bringing you in—out of slavery, out of exile, out of death-paths—and into covenant belonging with Him and His people. Salvation is covenant membership that produces a changed life (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Ezekiel 36:26–27; Titus 2:11–14).

The pattern is consistent:

God rescues a people.
God claims a people.
God binds Himself to a people.
God forms that people into covenant faithfulness (Deuteronomy 6:4–6; Leviticus 26:12).

Salvation is not merely escape from consequence. It is a transfer of allegiance: from slavery to freedom; from idols to the living God (Exodus 20:2–3; Joshua 24:14–15; Romans 6:16–18).

Covenant: why salvation can’t be reduced to an afterlife policy

Once you take covenant seriously, salvation stops looking like a spiritual receipt.

Covenant is belonging and loyalty—relationship, identity, lived faithfulness before God. That’s why Scripture never treats obedience as optional ornamentation. Not because obedience earns salvation, but because salvation produces the kind of person who can actually live in covenant reality (Deuteronomy 10:12–13; Titus 2:11–14).

A gospel that only says “you’re covered” but never forms covenant life inevitably produces consumers—people trained to equate assurance with a past moment rather than present allegiance to the King (Luke 6:46; Matthew 7:21–23).

Free will: modern autonomy vs the Bible’s categories of the heart

Modern speech treats “free will” as autonomous self-determination: a neutral chooser above influence.

Scripture speaks differently. Scripture speaks about the heart—the seat of desire, loyalty, intention, and direction (Proverbs 4:23). Scripture warns the heart can be distorted and self-justifying (Jeremiah 17:9). Scripture commands choice and return (Deuteronomy 30:19–20). And Scripture also promises heart-work that makes faithful return possible (Deuteronomy 30:6; Ezekiel 36:26–27; Jeremiah 32:38–41).

Now question any denomination that tells you you don’t have a conscience and you can’t make real decisions—because Scripture commands choosing, returning, and obeying, and God doesn’t command what humans are incapable of responding to. (Deuteronomy 30:19–20; Romans 2:14–15)

Here’s the sober synthesis:

Biblical salvation does not erase your choosing. It heals the chooser (Ezekiel 36:26–27; 2 Corinthians 5:17).

Emunah: faith that stays faithful

This is the definition that demolishes receipt-Christianity.

Emunah is not merely agreeing that something is true. Emunah is faith expressed as steadiness, trustworthiness, fidelity—covenant loyalty embodied over time (Habakkuk 2:4; James 2:14–26).[6]

So if an altar moment is real, biblically, it isn’t a checkout line. It’s:

teshuvah: turning and returning (Mark 1:14–15)
confession and renunciation of idols (Acts 19:18–20)
transfer of allegiance under Messiah’s kingship (Romans 10:9–13)
entry into covenant life and discipleship (Matthew 28:18–20; Acts 2:37–42)

In plain terms:

You are not purchasing safety. You are submitting to the King (Luke 9:23–24).

The baptism problem I’ve watched too many times

I’ve seen this play out over and over: someone has a powerful moment, gets baptized, gets celebrated, and then weeks later—it’s like nothing changed. No real hunger. No deep growth. No reordering of desires. The language stays Christian, but the life stays untouched.

And what’s even more sobering? Many don’t leave church. They still attend Sundays. They still sing. They still sit in the same seat. But inside, the fire never catches.

That’s what a cheap gospel produces: people who confuse a moment for conversion and a ritual for transformation (Matthew 13:20–21; Hebrews 3:12–14). If that lands hard, good. It should force the question: were you discipled into covenant life—or processed through a system?

The altar call problem we can’t keep ignoring

Let me say this carefully: God can meet people in messy rooms. I’m not denying that.

But institutionally, the modern altar call has another function—one most people in the seats never get told out loud.

It brings seats to the table.

And seats stabilize the machine.

When “decisions” become proof of momentum, momentum fills rooms. Full rooms strengthen budgets. Budgets protect platforms. Platforms protect reputations. Reputations protect influence.

That’s what I mean when I say it can become self-sustaining and personally advantageous without anyone needing to be cartoonishly evil. The incentives are baked in.

So I’ll ask the question that keeps me honest too:

Am I calling you into covenant discipleship—or am I collecting moments that help a system keep paying for itself?

Messiah did not commission decision-counting. He commissioned disciple-making (Matthew 28:18–20). And shepherds will answer for how they feed the flock, not how efficiently they grow crowds (Ezekiel 34:2–10; Acts 20:28–31; James 3:1).

John 3:16 — not a password to paradise, a covenant proclamation

I’ve written about this earlier because John 3:16 is one of the most commercialized verses in the modern church. We quote it like a password to paradise—like a one-line sales pitch for eternal safety—when in context it’s covenant logic: rebirth from above, light exposing, life invading, and emunah as faithful trust.[1]

When Yeshua says, “For God so loved the world,” the emphasis isn’t sentimental intensity. It’s manner: in this way—love expressed in covenant action through giving.[1]

And “whoever believes” is not “whoever agrees.” In the Hebraic frame, it’s emunah—faithful trust, allegiance that shows up as lived turning. I tied it directly to Numbers 21: the dying were healed not by striving, but by looking in trust.[1]

I reinforced the same point again in The Gospel Manifesto: salvation isn’t a private escape plan; “believe” is covenant loyalty; “perish” is remaining lost and unrepaired; “eternal life” is the life of the coming Age beginning now.[2]

So John 3:16 doesn’t contradict Jeremiah. It harmonizes with it:

Jeremiah: Torah written on the heart; covenant endurance formed within.
John 3: rebirth from above; light revealing; life of the coming age invading now.

Why Yeshua came: Jeremiah fulfilled, not replaced

Yeshua did not arrive to detach salvation from the Tanakh. He arrived as the fulfillment of its covenant rescue arc: liberation, redemption, restoration, new heart, faithful obedience (Luke 4:18–21; Matthew 1:21; Mark 10:45).

When Yeshua said, “I did not come to abolish the Torah, but to fulfill it,” “fulfill” didn’t mean cancel—it meant bring Jeremiah’s covenant promise into reality: Torah written on the heart, obedience from within, and a people finally formed to walk it out. (Matthew 5:17; Jeremiah 31:31–34; Ezekiel 36:26–27)

So salvation in Messiah is not merely “forgiven.”

It is forgiveness and liberation and return and transformation—God writing His ways within, by the Spirit, forming a faithful people (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Ezekiel 36:26–27; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Titus 2:11–14).

A message that emphasizes pardon while neglecting covenant formation isn’t entirely false—but it’s incomplete. And what’s incomplete is easy to sell.

Jew and Gentile: direct covenant and grafted-in family

For Israel, salvation is covenant restoration in history—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob restoring His people, His worship, and His promises (Jeremiah 31:35–37; Ezekiel 37:21–28).

But feel the weight of what that means: Israel’s covenant story isn’t a private religious diary. God used this family as a public demonstration so the nations could watch what covenant success and covenant failure look like; what sin does; what mercy does; what exile does; what repentance looks like; what return looks like. Israel’s story is part of the evidence.

So for you as a Gentile, salvation is not a separate covenant storyline. You’re not receiving a detached “Christian package.” You’re being brought near and incorporated into Israel’s covenant family through Messiah—grafted into the nourishing root (Romans 11:16–24; Ephesians 2:11–22; Isaiah 56:6–8).

And that’s an honor.

Being grafted in isn’t you becoming the new owner of the tree. It’s you being welcomed into a family you didn’t build, into promises you didn’t originate, into a story you didn’t write—and into a covenant people who have suffered under the weight of carrying God’s testimony through history.

There’s humility in that. There’s gratitude in that. And there’s obligation: you don’t get grafted in and then despise the root that holds you up (Romans 11:17–22).

That’s why replacement theology isn’t a harmless doctrinal disagreement. It’s an insult. It takes adoption and turns it into a hostile takeover. The apostolic warning is explicit: don’t boast over the original branches, don’t distort them, and don’t pretend you replaced them (Romans 11:18–20).

When you sever salvation from Israel’s covenant narrative, you end up with a floating “afterlife program.” Floating things are easy to market. Covenantal things require formation. Covenantal things require discipleship.

What you’ve been sold: three institutional substitutes

Transaction without discipleship

Atonement is real (Romans 3:24–26). But when salvation is reduced to a receipt, discipleship becomes negotiable—yet Messiah commands discipleship (Matthew 28:18–20).

Emotion as assurance

Feelings are not a stable measure of covenant standing (2 Corinthians 5:7; 1 John 3:19–20).

Badge Christianity

Affiliation without obedience is repeatedly condemned (James 1:22–27; Matthew 3:7–10; Romans 2:28–29).

These substitutes persist because they’re efficient: they preserve crowds, stabilize institutions, and generate metrics. They do not necessarily produce disciples.

When salvation got packaged as a “get out of hell” card

Judgment is real (Matthew 25:31–46; Romans 2:5–11). My point isn’t to deny judgment. My point is to expose how fear became the center of the sales pitch, eclipsing covenant rescue and transformation.

Historically, Western imagination was shaped by vivid afterlife mapping; The Divine Comedy is widely credited with shaping how many people pictured the afterlife.[3]

And in the medieval Western penitential world, indulgences functioned inside a system that connected salvation-imagery to “remission” language—and, historically, to money dynamics and abuse—training people to think in post-mortem risk-management categories.[4]

Later, revivalist streams leaned hard into urgent conversion and vivid warnings; “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” is a famous example of that legacy.[5]

You can respect historical context and still tell the truth about the modern outcome:

A “gospel” can now be preached convincingly without Jeremiah, without covenant, without emunah, and without any serious account of why obedience matters (Acts 20:27).

Can you lose it? Two errors, one sober path

Two ways to mishandle this:

terrorize tender believers who repent and return
grant false assurance to people who persist in rebellion

The warnings about drifting, hardening, denying, and departing are real (Hebrews 2:1–3; Hebrews 3:12–14; 1 Timothy 4:1; 2 Peter 2:20–22; 1 John 2:19).

But those warnings aren’t aimed at the repentant struggler. They’re aimed at covenant betrayal—deliberate hardening, sustained refusal, apostasy.

And Jeremiah holds the other side with equal force—God’s covenant work doesn’t just pardon; it forms perseverance. God’s salvation includes heart-work that produces persevering return—Torah within, fear of God within, God’s fidelity producing human fidelity (Jeremiah 31:33–34; Jeremiah 32:38–41).

So I’ll keep it simple:

When you sin, do you return—or do you harden? (Psalm 95:7–11; 1 John 1:5–10)

Assurance is not a receipt. Assurance is covenant-shaped perseverance—returning, repenting, remaining (John 15:1–10; Philippians 1:6).

The matrix: why a cheap gospel keeps winning

A system built on growth, metrics, and comfort naturally prefers a message that’s fast, repeatable, and emotionally compelling.

A covenant gospel is slower. It requires formation. It produces fewer instant wins and more long obedience.

But it is the biblical gospel. And it is what Jeremiah is describing.

A clear rebuke to pastors teaching a cheap gospel

This needs to be said cleanly, not theatrically.

Shepherds will answer for what they feed the flock (James 3:1; Ezekiel 34:2–10; Acts 20:28–31).

If you preach forgiveness while avoiding repentance, you aren’t protecting your people.

If you preach grace while refusing lordship, you aren’t clarifying salvation—you’re obscuring it.

If you offer assurance without emunah, you’re giving people confidence without covenant reality.

If you avoid the Tanakh root system because it doesn’t fit your model, you’re thinning the gospel down to what sells.

A cheap gospel can keep people in the room.

A true gospel brings people to the King (Luke 6:46; Matthew 7:21–23).

This is what the gospel is

Not a product. Not a slogan. Not a panic button. Not a receipt.

The gospel is the announcement that the God of Israel has acted in Messiah to end exile, forgive sin, liberate captives, and form a faithful covenant people—Jew and Gentile—by writing His ways on the heart and giving His Spirit so you can walk with Him (Jeremiah 31:31–34; Jeremiah 32:38–41; Ezekiel 36:26–27; Romans 11:16–24; Ephesians 2:11–22; Titus 2:11–14).

And if you want a clear response—heart-level, not performative—this is what it looks like:

A) Return with your heart—turn from sin, idols, and self-rule; come home to God (Mark 1:14–15; Deuteronomy 30:1–6).

B) Entrust yourself to Messiah with emunah—not mere agreement, but loyal trust that remains faithful (Habakkuk 2:4; Romans 10:9–13; James 2:17).

C) Enter covenant life as a disciple—not a consumer; learn His ways; obey from the heart by the Spirit (Matthew 28:18–20; Ezekiel 36:27; John 14:15).

D) Endure in humble faithfulness—keep returning, keep repenting, keep abiding, keep walking in the light (John 15:1–10; 1 John 1:7; Philippians 1:6).

That is not legalism. That is salvation as Jeremiah promised it.

The Challenge

You need to ask yourself a deep question, because all that really matters is whether or not you know Him—and He knows you (Matthew 7:21–23; John 17:3).

So I’m making this pledge, and I’m inviting you to make it with me: present the gospel appropriately—in truth and love, clearly and without manipulation. Call for repentance and emunah. Warn where Scripture warns. Assure where Scripture assures. Honor Israel’s covenant storyline. Proclaim Messiah without selling fear or receipts.

And say it like you mean it. Because accepting the Lord as your Savior is not a shortcut to an afterlife. It leads to a righteous existence on this planet and a future in union with Him (Titus 2:11–14; John 15:1–10; Revelation 21:1–4).

Don’t shortcut your relationship with God. It’s time to make this a very real part of your existence. Or don’t—it’s up to you.

May the shalom of our Abba guard you —

shalom v’shalvah.

Your brother in the Way,

Sergio.

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