righteousness:

Holy living based on God’s standard of holiness. See also holiness.

Sabbath: A day of rest; typically, Christians consider Sunday as the Sabbath Day.

“salt and light”: Jesus tells his followers in Matthew 5 that they’re the salt of the earth and the light of the world. Salt seasons food – bet you knew that already! In the same way, Christians are to season, or influence, the world they live in. Light refers to pointing the way to the Truth of Jesus Christ himself.

salvation: To experience salvation is to be freed from eternal punishment and hell. See also saved.

sanctification: To become progressively more holy and Christlike. Christians won’t be perfect in this earthly life, but through the process of sanctification, they come closer to that goal.

saved: To be saved is to have faith in Jesus Christ and the work he did on the cross (see also Blood of Christ). A saved person is in a secure position, being freed from the punishment of sin and promised to be with God in heaven after death.

scripture: Another name for the Bible.

Second Coming of Jesus Christ: Term that Christians use to describe Christ’s eventual return to the earth. Christ’s first coming was some 2,000 years ago, when he was born as a human child. When he comes for the second time, he’ll descend from the clouds (see Matthew 24:30).

secular: Worldly. Anything that isn’t spiritual in nature.

seeker-sensitive churches: A trend within some churches to attract new people by focusing on their needs and making worship services more specifically relevant to everyday life. Seeker-sensitive churches often use marketing techniques to attract people to church and integrate multimedia and entertainment as part of the worship service experience. Supporters of this movement see it as a way to effectively present Christianity to the 21^st-century person, but critics of the seeker-sensitive movement feel that this thrust to attract people waters down the Christian message.

“set free in Christ”: See freedom from bondage.

sin: Any deliberate action, attitude, or thought that goes against God. People often think of sin as an obvious act, such as murder, adultery, or theft. However, sin is also wrongdoing that’s far more subtle and even unnoticeable at times, such as pride, envy, or even worry. Sin can either be something you shouldn’t have done, but did (sins of commission), or something you should’ve done, but didn’t (sins of omission).

sinful nature: A tendency to sin that has been passed down to each human by Adam and Eve. See also flesh, the and Fall of man.

“sitting at the foot of the cross”: Focusing on the reality of Christ’s agony and sacrificial death on the cross as well as the eternal love that God has for humans, which led Christ to make this sacrifice.

“slave to sin”: See freedom from bondage.

speaking in tongues: The phenomenon of an emotionally intense spiritual experience that prompts a person to start talking in a nonhuman speech. The tongues speaker believes that the words are an angelic language that the Holy Spirit gives so that he or she can pray spontaneously as directed by God. To a bystander, the words don’t resemble any humanlike languages and seem like gibberish or babble when listened to from a purely human standpoint. See also charismatics.

Spirit-filled Christian: A buzzword that has different meanings to different parts of the Church. Charismatics use the term to mean a Christian who speaks in tongues, but non-charismatics generally use the term to describe an earnest, obedient disciple of Christ. See also filled with the Spirit.

spiritual gifts: Special gifts that the Holy Spirit gives to Christians for the purpose of doing God’s work and building up the Church. Spiritual gifts include wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miraculous powers, prophecy, spiritual discernment, speaking in tongues, and interpretation of tongues, to name a few (see 2 Corinthians 12:8-10).

“surrender all”: See dying to self.

“take up my cross”: Refers to giving up one’s personal wants and desires to Jesus and living only for him. Jesus said, “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me” (Mark 8:34). See also dying to self.

testament: Refers to either a witness or a covenant. The Bible is made up of the Old Testament and New Testament.

“that still, small voice”: Refers to God speaking silently, not in an audible manner. See also God laid it on my heart.

“Thy will be done”: Praying thy will be done means that you’re asking God’s will be done in the world, not your own. Jesus taught his followers to pray this phrase in the Lord’s Prayer (see Matthew 6). When you pray thy will be done, you’re transformed, exchanging your will for his, forgetting about yourself, and turning over your needs and wants to God.

“turn the other cheek”: Expression means to not stick up for your rights, but rather to submit to others, even when they’ve wronged you. Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you, don’t resist him who is evil; but whoever strikes you on your right cheek, turn to him the other also” (Matthew 5:38-39).

“walk with Christ”: See Christian walk.

“walking through the valley of the shadow of death”: Trusting God in the midst of difficult circumstances. Refers to Psalm 23:4: “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.”

“walking with the Lord”: See Christian walk.

“washed in the Blood of Christ”: Refers to the cleansing power of the Blood of Christ. If a person has been washed in the Blood of Christ, he or she has been cleansed of his or her sins. See also Blood of Christ.

Western Church: The Christian Church that formed in the western part of the ancient world and became headquartered in Rome. The Western Church became the Catholic Church. The Protestant Church came out of the Western Church during the Reformation.

“What would Jesus do?”: A phrase that Charles Sheldon’s 1896 novel In His Steps focuses on and that became a popular craze among Christian youths in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The idea behind the phrase is to ask yourself what Jesus would do in your situation and then do it, regardless of the consequences. The Apostle Paul urges Christians to live their lives like Jesus did, because he’s the perfect, sinless model on which to base your life. See also Christlike.

Word, the: Term that refers to Jesus (see John 1) as well as the Bible.

works: Good behaviour or actions. Jesus Christ made it clear that humans aren’t saved by good works, but only by the grace of God.

“wrath of God”: God’s judgment on sinners.

WWJD: See What would Jesus do?