A few years back, pre-pandemic, we had an intergenerational Sunday School class called Big Questions. One Sunday we asked What does it mean to be saved? and then How do we know we are saved? Saved from what? Saved for what? How does saving work?

The other day a friend told me about a hospital that has a safety record to be proud of; in fact, there is a big sign at the hospital bragging about the safety record. It wasn’t always this way. In years past, they had high rates of people that fell when they got out of bed. Not safe. Falling in hospitals? Insurance companies hate it. Something had to be done. So now this hospital doesn’t let their patients get out of bed. And they have a great safety record. But just laying in bed, doesn’t necessarily help the patients get well; they get weaker as they lose muscle tone. The hospital looks good on paper though, at least in terms of fall rates. Who or what has been saved? is safe?

Standing outside the Supreme Court the other week as people gathered to speak in support of birthright citizenship, things got theological for me. Someone started chanting “Up, up with liberation, down down with deportation.” Soon hundreds of people were shouting, “Up, up with liberation, down down with deportation.” I started to think about how in the streets we talk about liberation but in church, well, in many churches, we talk about salvation.

In the passage from John today the person that sits by the pool, the mikvah, at Bethesda does not fall – because they never get up. Are they safe? They don’t seem liberated. Every day is the same, laying there near the pool, but not quite near enough. It’s been 38 years (almost two generations) and they have not been able to get into the pool for healing. Then Jesus comes along and asks the person if they want to be healed. Why would Jesus even ask that question of someone who has been sitting there for a lifetime? Of course they want to be healed.

But the person don’t answer Jesus’ question. Instead their reply is more of an explanation – or maybe even an excuse. “I don’t have anyone to help me into the pool once the water has been stirred up. By the time I get there, someone else has gone in ahead of me.” After all these years, this person is alone. Have they forgotten to even want healing? Does this person need to be healed? Or saved? Or liberated?

When we had our Big Questions class we asked What does it mean to be saved? How does it sound to ask these same questions using liberation? What does it mean to be liberated? How do we know we are liberated? Liberated from what? for what? How does liberation work? Can liberation and salvation be used interchangeably? Would we answer the questions in the same way for both salvation and liberation?

Salvation is a big deal for the church. We even have a word for salvation theology: soteriology. A dictionary definition of Salvation is deliverance from harm. In religious contexts it usually means deliverance from sin.

Liberation is similar in some ways. It means setting free from imprisonment, bondage, or oppression. The Exodus story is the big biblical example, as the people are freed from slavery. Both of these words, “salvation” and “liberation” (or more often “freedom”) appear in scripture. I wonder why we most often use “liberation” in the streets and “salvation” in church. Is it all just a matter of translation?

Language and translation are of course concerned with theological meaning. And if we ever had any doubt, we are learning these days that language, and translation, are political – think of all the banned words and books these days. For instance, the King James Version of the bible, translated in 1611 as England’s colonization was beginning in earnest, that translation uses the word “salvation” 158 times. (In the NewKJV “salvation” appears even more often, 166 times.) In the Complete Jewish Bible (which includes the New Testament) we find the word “salvation” only 88 times (so says the online search function of Bible Gateway.com) I wonder why this is. It is presumably the same biblical text but translated differently. In contrast, the word “freedom” appears 20 times in the Complete Jewish Bible – and in the KJV, the word “freedom” appears twice. I am not a linguist or a translator so I don’t know what all of this means but it is curious. It does make me wonder.

 In practice, salvation and liberation operate differently. Salvation, in many church contexts, is an individual experience. We are told that we are saved by our “personal relationship with Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.” And the way that happens is that we make that choice in our hearts, a personal and individual choice, at a very memorable time that we can mark on a calendar. Often that choice comes out of fear – of the threat of hell, or the fear of being separated for eternity from those we love.

In contrast, liberation is not a solitary endeavor. Liberation is something we work at together with other people. Freedom is not a one time event but an ongoing process that unites us in strong, courageous action. We work toward liberation together. Sometimes it is a far off dream but freedom is a vision we hold onto, even as we find ways to live into freedom in the present.

Personal salvation is life changing for one person but it doesn’t necessarily change the life or conditions of a community. Which is why personal salvation is not a threat to political or religious institutions. The salvation experience changes life for that one person, but it doesn’t do much to disturb the status quo. Those who hold religious or political power can remain comfortable in their roles. The idea of personal salvation seems advantageous to those who want to maintain their power.

Liberation functions differently. Liberation is not for one individual but is for a group of people that are working together toward freedom, even working together to change the system that keeps them oppressed. This can happen in religious and political institutions, in for profit and non-profit situations. Liberation, people working together to disrupt oppression, can be threatening to those who hold power.

Liberation theology started in Latin America in the 1960s amongst theologians and pastors who worked alongside lay people. These religious people, were blurring the barriers between clergy and laity in a time of political and economic oppression. They went a step further, blurring the lines between the middle class and those who lived in poverty. As the folks in this movement lived into this “new” kind of theology together, they began to understand the biblical text and Christian tradition in new and expansive ways. These new ways of understanding the text and faithfulness spread to other groups, around the world, who also experience oppression in their own contexts. Now we have liberation theologies, not just one version but African American and womanist, feminist, and mujerista (feminist theology from Latin American women – since that early liberation theology was almost exclusively men), Minjung (in Korea), Queer theology and more.

Do these new theologies save us? free us? create disruption?

We might think of Pink Menno, the group led by queer people and allies working creatively together to be a visible presence in Mennonite Church USA. Pink Menno called the church to change, to openness. Many Pink Mennos were part of churches, even had a personal relationship with Jesus. At the same time, they had been sitting alone, by the pool, waiting for the spirit to move the waters. They didn’t need to be healed from being queer. But being their full, true and authentic selves seemed impossible in church. Who would help them move to the waters, to find freedom?

Pink Menno, as a liberation movement, helped Queer people and their families work together to see each other in their fullness even if the larger church could not yet see their fabulous, fierce, sacred, Queer selves. Pink Menno challenged the church, challenged the way we had always understood what it means to be a Mennonite church, challenged who is saved and what it means to be saved. This was not new work, these were not new questions. Pink Menno built on the work of black and brown people before them who also challenged what it means to be Mennonite.“Nobody’s free until everybody’s free” Fannie Lou Hamer said. Liberation movements bring a new freedom of expression to the whole church. In a liberating church all of us get to live our full, true selves: black and brown and Asian and indigenous and white, Queer and straight, differently abled people… the ways we classify each other go on and on. And why stop with humans? Isn’t liberation for creation, for the earth?

When the person by the pool is given encouragement, even ordered by Jesus, to stand up, take up their bedroll and walk, the person… does it. The person takes the risk to stand on their own rather than wait for the traditional way of being healed. As they walk with their mat into new life, they are seen and once again included in the larger community.

But the story doesn’t end there. Like the story we heard last week about the person who was born blind, and then healed by Jesus on the Sabbath, there is push back. The people in power, the religious leaders, see this person walking with their bedroll, their mat, and they say it isn’t right. Carrying a mat on the Sabbath is work and there can be no work on the Sabbath. “But the one who made me healthy,” the person answered, “he told me, ‘Pick up your mat and walk.’”  “Who,” they asked, “is the person who told you to pick it up and walk?” But the person who was restored to health didn’t know who he was. Jesus had left unnoticed since the place was crowded.

Oh, how these stories play out over and over again. When Queer people began to come out of hiding, to live into their full selves in Mennonite Church USA, some people objected. Some people challenged the idea that everyone can be included. “Who is the person who told you to pick up your bed and walk?” These very religious people couldn’t make sense of a way that Jesus would invite Queer people into the church, that Queer people could be saved and included. They couldn’t make sense of how Queer people were already in the church. And so the religious people left, to live out their faith separately, (or so they think) from Queer people.

We are in a time when personal salvation, genuine commitments and experiences with God, are important. And working together for liberation is essential. We need salvation and liberation in. the. church. If we are concerned only for our own souls, we are missing out on the possibilities of the Reign of God here and now. If we seek healing and liberation only for bodies and not our spirits, we are missing out on that part of ourselves that connects us to what is beyond our knowing and understanding, to God.

What a gift it is to have a community where we can ask these questions and wonder together as we seek salvation and liberation. May our search be guided by God our creator, Jesus our teacher, liberator and savior, and the mysterious Spirit that enlivens and expands our life together.