What does Tribe teach about gift of salvation?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on the gift of salvation starts with a question most people never think to ask: where does the story of Christmas actually begin? Brian Hunter answers it by going all the way back before Bethlehem, before the prophets, to a garden where God made humanity for relationship and gave the gift of free will. That gift was misused, sin entered the human race, and as Pastor Brian puts it, "this condition of sin that has infected all of us is terminal, resulting in death, separation forever from God's family." No person can escape that on their own.
But God already had the answer before the problem fully landed. In the garden itself he promised that from Adam would come one whose heel would crush the head of evil. Generations passed, prophets caught glimpses, Israel waited, and then at just the right time the promise arrived in Bethlehem. Brian traces the whole line from Isaiah 9's vision of a mighty God and prince of peace straight to the feeding trough and the angels over the shepherd's field, and then to the cross and the empty tomb. Jesus lived without sin, died a criminal's death, shed his blood to pay for sin, and rose again so that God and mankind could be reunited as family.
What strikes Brian most about all of it is the scale of the gift. The savior was promised to Israel, but God always goes further. As Brian says, "God always goes one step further than what you expect." The messiah was given first to Israel and then, going one step further, to the whole world. That gift, though, has to be received. Brian asks plainly whether something handed to you that you set on a shelf and never open is really a present at all. The teaching at Tribe is that salvation is real, it is finished, and it is waiting to be opened.
Taught from Isaiah 9 · Luke 2 · John 3:16
“The story of Christmas begins all the way back in a garden.”
From Tribe Christmas Eve Service - Town Square
The passage taught · Isaiah 9
1 But there shall be no more gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time, he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali; but in the latter time he has made it glorious, by the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.
2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who lived in the land of the shadow of death, on them the light has shined.
3 You have multiplied the nation. You have increased their joy. They rejoice before you according to the joy in harvest, as men rejoice when they divide the plunder.
4 For the yoke of his burden, and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as in the day of Midian.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- December 25, 2025 Tribe Christmas Eve Service - Town Square A Christmas Eve message from Jackson Hole about why the story of Christmas begins not in Bethlehem but in a garden, and what the gift of the Messiah means for everyone.
- December 25, 2022 The Story of Christmas Begins in a Garden A Christmas Eve outdoor service in Jackson Hole where Pastor Brian Hunter traces the story of Christmas from the garden of Eden to a manger in Bethlehem.