Lordship Salvation Controversy

The "lordship salvation" controversy (also "Lordship Controversy") is a theological dispute regarding key soteriological questions within Evangelical Protestantism, involving some non-denominational and Evangelical churches in North America since at least the 1980s. The dispute spawned several books, pamphlets and conferences.

While many Protestants affirm salvation by grace alone received by faith alone, some Protestants use 'accepting Christ as...' language, sometimes 'accepting Christ as Savior,' or 'accepting Christ as Lord', to describe a condition of initial conversion, taking a cue from Colossians 2:6 in the Good News Bible for the "accept" and in the New International Version, for "receive" as synonym.

Given the accepting-as phraselogy of the popular GNB of Colossians 2:6, and the receiving-as phraseology in the widely popular NIV of Colossians 2:6, an exegesis based on the NIV, for example, offered an explanation of what manner of receiving this was. John F MacArthur Jr, in turn, taught that such a receiving was both non-passive toward Christ and actively submissive to Christ, offering this as a way of understanding the English idiom, of what receiving a person "as" Lord, really means.

Yet the "as Lord" language was not the only metaphor of the controversy. In 1959 Eternity Magazine featured a twin set of articles which ignited the debate and the use of the idiom from the titles: what Christ must "be." This asked what Christ must "be" to the one accepting Christ... must he "be Lord" in order to "be Savior," both, etc. Ten years later (1969), Charles Ryrie used this idiom in a chapter title, verbatim!, quoting exactly the title of the articles in Eternity Magazine, Sept 1959. This idiom, what Christ must "be", was used to derive and discuss the implications for salvation associated with what Christ is. One author, Arthur W. Pink (1886–1952), had already associated Christ's Lordship with surrendering to it as a sine qua non at the initial point. Therefore the controversy dates back to before 1959, to at least before 1953 in the case of Pink, and shows the subject's connection to evangelism.

In 1988 John F MacArthur Jr published the first edition "The Gospel According to Jesus". By defining salvation by what it produces and what salvation will not fail to produce—namely, not only glorification, but good works, repentance, faith, sanctification, yieldedness, and obedience, the book in its sales not only heavily spread the extent of the debate, but the debate expanded in scope, from questions about conversion issues, to questions about what is also necessary, and who it is who does what, throughout the Christian life. Using surrender language in the gospel became not the only issue.

Free Grace theology became an umbrella term for a variety of opposing or contrasting positions, sometimes arguing that Lordship salvation was legalistic, sometimes more opposed to it than that, for example, faulting it about not being specific about what degree, quality, and current visibility there must be to the obedience necessary. The controversy continues to be debated in discussions about not only all the gospels, but in discussions about almost any of the Pauline epistles, and the rest of the New Testament, as well as much material about salvation in topical studies, and in systematic theology.