The Great Rescue

The Great Rescue: Understanding the Saving Work of Christ explores the meaning of salvation in Scripture, examining what believers are saved from, how they are saved, and the ultimate purpose for which they are saved.

Dr. R.C. Sproul organizes this book around three foundational questions: Saved from what? Saved by what? Saved for what? In the first section, Sproul addresses the reality of God’s wrath and divine judgment, arguing that salvation cannot be rightly understood apart from the severity of human sin and the holiness of God. He draws on prophetic texts such as Zephaniah 1 to underscore the gravity of the coming judgment from which sinners need rescue.

The second section turns to the means of salvation, explaining the doctrines of propitiation, expiation, and imputation. Sproul shows how Christ’s substitutionary sacrifice satisfies divine justice and secures the justification of sinners through the imputation of His righteousness. The final section considers the purpose of salvation—adoption into God’s family, the promise of glorification, and the hope of the beatific vision, when believers will see God as He is.

An abridgement of Sproul’s earlier work Saved from What?, this book presents the biblical doctrine of salvation in a concise and accessible format suitable for a broad readership.

Key Themes

• The wrath of God as the ultimate reality from which sinners are rescued
• The severity of sin and the impossibility of human self-redemption
• Christ’s substitutionary atonement and the doctrine of imputation
• Adoption as children of God and the hope of future glorification

Featured Quotes

“As long as we discount the severity of our sin, we sense no fear of God.”

“He declares our highest point of glory—the very acme of our salvation.”