If we as believers in Jesus are so certain to be saved (John 3:16; Acts 16:31; Rom. 10:9; 1 Thess. 1:10; 5:9) then why warn us about the dangers of falling away and forfeiting salvation (1 Cor. 10:1-12; Heb. 6:4-6; 10:24-31)? Could we not also rightly ask: If we as believers in Jesus can fall away and lose our salvation then why assure us that we will be saved and we will be kept safe from falling away (Rom. 8:29-30; Eph. 1:13-14; Jude 1:24-25)? Are the warnings real? Who are the warnings for? Could the warning passages serve a divine purpose--even a sanctifying purpose? But can warning passages serve a sanctifying purpose if the believer knows for certain, from the scriptures themselves, that he cannot fall away and forfeit his salvation? Are the passages of future certainty conditional? How can future certainty be conditional? Are we taught in Scripture that our future certainty of being saved from God's wrath depends upon our frail humanity at perfect faithfulness and perfect obedience?
I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU NOR FORSAKE YOU
The nature and the character of God toward one of His own is repeated often in Scripture: God first utters this oft-repeated message to Jacob: "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you" (Gen. 28:15 NKJV); To Moses God says: "Be strong and of a good courage. Fear not, nor be afraid ..., for the LORD your God, it is He who goes with you. He will not fail you nor forsake you" (Deut. 31:6 MEV); Moses speaks the same message to Israel: "The LORD, He goes before you. He will be with you. He will not fail you nor forsake you. Do not fear nor be dismayed" (Deut. 31:8 MEV); "I will be with you," God says to Joshua. "As I was with Moses, I will be with you. I will not abandon you. I will not leave you" (Josh. 1:5 MEV); King David said to his son Solomon: "Be strong, and of good courage, and do it; do not fear, nor be dismayed, for the LORD God--my God--will be with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you" (1 Chron. 28:20 NKJV). God is a Covenantal God of eternal promises and He always keeps His promises--without fail.
God says to Israel a couple thousand years later: "Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand" (Isa. 41:10 NKJV); and, yet, this very same concept belongs also to New Testament believers who belong to God--He will never, ever leave us, or abandon us: Let your manner of life be without ἀφιλάργυρος, a negative particle with reference to not being greedy, not being fond of wealth, not "dominated" or "over-influenced by the desire for financial gain," not loving, philéō, materialism; but "be content with such things as ye have: for He hath said, 'I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.' So that we may boldly say, 'The LORD is my helper and I will not fear what man shall do unto me'" (Heb. 13:5-6 KJV). This promise of our Covenantal God should inform us on this subject. If you suggest that, He may not forsake us but we may forsake Him, I have to ask you two interconnected questions: 1) Who saves who? and 2) Who sustains who? He saves; He sustains; His faithfulness wins the Day for our final salvation and future justification.
Incidentally, the writer to the Hebrews freely quotes, or freely translates / paraphrases (Moffatt), this message scattered throughout the Old Testament, using language that leads the believer to trust fully in a God who refuses, of His own character and nature, to leave, to abandon, to desert the one who belongs to Him by the Eternal Covenant that our triune God established from all eternity past (Heb. 13:20; cf. Isa. 24:5)--the late Dr. A.T. Robertson alerting us to note "the five negatives strengthening each other"1: οὐ μή (never not), οὐδ’ οὐ μή (nor never not). These five negatives strengthening each other in the text could be rendered in English as: "For He Himself [emphatic] has said: 'I will never, never leave [desert, abandon] you, nor never never forsake you." This salvation granted to you depends entirely on this faithful God who gave you this gift.
OUR FAITHFULNESS AND OBEDIENCE
There is a loosely-perceived notion today that obedience to the Lord in our daily walk is not that important. Some proponents of this idea are labelled hyper-grace advocates, somewhat akin to the practice of ancient Gnostic heretics, who held that what is done in the body does not matter because what is material is expendable and that which is spiritual, our inner spirit, is untouched by sins committed in the flesh. Yet, Paul writes, "Flee sexual immorality. Every other sin that a person commits is outside the body but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body" (1 Cor. 6:18 NASB 2020). But we know that sexual sins against the body also negatively impact the spirit: "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?" (1 Cor. 6:19). "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the desire of the flesh is against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another in order to keep you from doing whatever you want" (Gal. 5:16-17). Our obedience matters to the Lord.
Jesus is the One who said: "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments" (John 14:15 NASB '95); "He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him" (John 14:21); "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him" (John 14:23); and, yet, our feeble obedience and faithfulness is not what brings us salvation; and not what keeps us saved; and not what grants us assurance of future salvation. If salvation, and assurance of future justification, depends upon faithfulness then you and I are in deep trouble! Jesus is granting us the true identity of the one who belongs to Him and the one who will be saved: such a person obeys Him--not perfectly, not sinlessly, but in intent; because he has a new heart, a new nature, which inspires a new way of thinking and living (Rom. 6:1-3; 2 Cor. 5:17). Sinclair Ferguson is right to conclude, "My security as a Christian does not reside in the strength of my faith but in the indestructibility of my Savior."
"It is because of [or due to, NABre] Him [God] that," or "But by His doing" (LSB), or "But from Him" (LEB), "you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God--that is, our righteousness, [and our] holiness and [our] redemption. Therefore, as it is written: 'Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord'" (1 Cor. 1:30-31 NIV). We only have righteousness, holiness, and redemption in Jesus Christ; and Paul argues that Jesus has become for us our righteousness, our holiness, and our redemption. God sees us solely in and through the lens of His sinless Son Jesus Christ: He imputed the righteousness and holiness belonging to Jesus Christ to our spiritual account--He reckoned us in and through Christ to be as holy and as righteous and Jesus (Rom. 3:21-26 ESV). "This righteousness is given, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all who believe" (Rom. 3:22 NIV: I added the commas in order to frame the structure that righteousness is given to the believer; cf. the same truth at 2 Cor. 5:21).
Jesus' blood redeemed us (Eph. 1:7; 1 Pet. 1:18, 19); His resurrection justified us (Rom. 1:4; 4:25; 10:9, 10; 1 Cor. 15:17); and His active and passive obedience to the Will and to the Law of God the Father is given to the believer as a gift (Rom. 3:22). To stand before God, you must stand in the righteousness of Jesus Christ (Phil. 3:9), or you will not stand at all (Rom. 5:15-19; Ps. 24:3-4). This should inform how we think about salvation, assurance, and our future justification. If God is looking at us in and through His sinless Son, deeming us to be as holy and righteous as is He, then He is not looking for my feeble attempts at perfect obedience and faithfulness. Spiritual obedience and faithfulness are rooted in Christ, not in me, and I will not be saved from the wrath of God by my own efforts. God will not accept my own obedience and faithfulness--even though He calls me to them in the here and now. I am to strive after holiness (Heb. 2:14). But I am a fool if I believe I have attained perfect holiness, or perfect obedience, or perfect faithfulness (Phil. 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14); otherwise I have a fool for a savior--myself.
THEN CAN WE DO WHAT WE WANT?
The short answer is no. But the better answer is this: the born-again believer does not want to live in sin because he has been changed (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3; 2 Cor. 5:17). Does this mean that he will never sin again? Hardly! "If we claim to have fellowship with Him, and yet walk in the darkness [as a normal way of life the way we formerly did, Eph. 2:1, 2, 3], we lie and do not live out the truth" (1 John 1:7 NIV). This person, no matter his profession, is not a born-again believer. Yet the same writer also pens: "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8 NIV). The truth is that the regenerate believer hates his sin and longs to be without sin. While sin does not have dominion over him (Rom. 6:14), the effects of sin still live within him (Rom. 7:14-25), and one day all effects of sin will be eradicated forever (1 Cor. 15:50-57).
Let me ask you a troubling question. If sin still dwells within us, and we still sin even though we despise it, are we not habitual sinners? Is there even a 24-hour period in which you avoided every known sin possible? If you answer yes: Could you not have sinned against the Lord, or against another person, without realizing it? If so then are you telling me that you sin every single day of life? Is that what we call the changed and renewed life in Christ? The day you say that you had no sin was the day you were found to be a liar (1 John 1:8)! Yet, you are supposed to be chasing down holiness, with the threat that, without it, you will not see the Lord (Heb. 12:14). I mean, warning passages aside, how on earth can we even call ourselves Christians if we haven't attained to holiness of life and heart (Matt. 5:48; Heb. 12:14; 1 Pet. 1:15, 16)? The truth of the matter is that we are both (redeemed) sinners (1 Tim. 1:15) and saints (1 Cor. 1:2 NASB) at the same time. Dr. Douglas Sean O'Donnell writes:
ARE THE WARNINGS REAL?
The short answer is yes. Every single one of the warning passages are real. God means what He says. Why, hypothetically, warn a professing believer that he can, by neglect or spiritual apathy or whatever instrumental cause one can imagine, forfeit his salvation if the regenerate believer cannot, at least from God's eternal perspective (Rom. 8:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5), forfeit his salvation because God will preserve him to the end? Because each and every single professing believer does not know with absolute certainty that he is not self-deceived, deceived by Satan, or merely possesses a "faith" that is not rooted and grounded in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ; and every pastor and every person in the church also cannot know with absolute certainty the same about others. Perhaps a professing believer retains a life-motto of Faith, Family, and Freedom--or God, Family, and Country--and thinks that he is thereby saved: a born-again Christian. Or perhaps she thinks that she is saved and a born-again Christian because she believes in justice for the oppressed and marginalized, much akin to what we read in Luke regarding Jesus' ministry among such oppressed and marginalized people, and thereby she has taken up His cause--not His Cross but His perceived cause.
Or perhaps an individual "believes" in God in some abstract and / or subjective sense, meaning the person "believes" God created all things and Jesus is in some sense His Son, but he or she has not been regenerated and does not maintain a daily and personal relationship with the LORD through prayer, Bible-study, devotional reading and regular / recurrent / habitual worship with other believers (unless otherwise hindered). We call these people nominal Christians because they are Christians "in name only." They are professing believers without possessing saving faith.
Like regenerate believers, nominal believers are also warned against falling away, and encouraged to advance in their professed belief. If this seems an awkward concept--that nominal believers who are not truly regenerate are encouraged to advance in their professed belief in God or in Christ--then consider this: nominal believers, like tares among the wheat (Matt. 13:24-30), often look like or seem like truly saved believers. They may appear or even behave morally, bow their heads in prayer during worship, sing hymns, tithe, volunteer for outreach, or any host of other activities with true believers. No one but God can truly see the condition of the heart of a human being (1 Cor. 2:11) and, so, nominal believers who appear as true believers are warned against falling away through neglect just like everyone else who sits in the congregation.
All who profess to believe in Christ are warned against falling away--and we really do see those who at one time professed to believe fall away. Their falling away revealed the true nature of their heart (1 John 2:19). If they return to us, and remain, then they were true believers who experienced a spiritual set-back, or of backsliding into sin for a season, and they should be welcomed back into the fold because they belong to the Fold of Jesus. Yet, no doubt, there will be nominal believers who remain in the church all of their lives and who still do not know Christ Jesus personally--savingly. Even upon His return He will encounter people who thought they were saved. They will point out to Jesus all their good works (Matt. 7:21, 22) and, yet, He says to them: "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!" (Matt. 7:23 NKJV).
Paul writes to the believers in Colossae: "And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds," so this is prior to being regenerated (Eph. 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5), "yet He has now reconciled you [a past-tense action of God with on-going result: 2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19] in His fleshly body through death [for the following eternal and divine purpose], in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach--if indeed you continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven and of which I, Paul, was made a minister" (Col. 1:21-23 NASB '95). Is this true? Yes. The persons who have been reconciled (past tense) to God (2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19, 20, 21), and who continue to believe / trust / exercise faith in Christ (that faith being a gift: Eph. 2:5, 8, 9; 2 Pet. 1:1), will be presented before God holy and blameless: for God Himself is the One who elected "the ones believing" (1 Cor. 1:21), before the foundation of the world, to be in Christ so that they will be "holy and blameless before Him in love" (Eph. 1:4, 5). Is there any doubt that God the Father will succeed in accomplishing entirely His eternal purposes (Eph. 1:4, 5, 11), to "sum up all things in [or bring everything together in, CSB; or place everything under the Headship of, CJB; or be joined together with, ERV; or unite all things in, ESV; or restore all things by, JUB; or gather us all together ... to be with Him in, TLB] Christ" (Eph. 1:10 NASB, ESV; cf. Eph. 1:20; 2:6), in saving and justifying the ones believing in Christ (1 Cor. 1:21, 30; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2; 2 Pet. 1:1) by the effectual work (Titus 3:4, 5) of the Holy Spirit? No.
Here is where I think some people make their theological error. The one who has been elected unto salvation from before the foundation of the world will continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Gospel that he has heard. God cannot fail to bring to full and final salvation the one whom He unconditionally elected to that end. God failing to save any one of His elect is an infinite impossibility. God could no more lie (Titus 1:2 NASB) than He could fail to save even one of His elect (Isa. 59:1). When God saves and regenerates a person, He raises him up with Christ, and seats him with Christ (Eph. 2:6), just as he raised Christ from the dead and seated Him at His right hand (Eph. 1:20). Can you imagine someone being seated with Christ in Heaven, and then the person loses his salvation, and then he is also unseated with Christ Heaven. Seated, unseated, seated, unseated, so forth and so on for thousands of years. The notion is just ridiculous.
When God regenerates a person, raises him from spiritual death, he cannot possibly die again spiritually any more than Christ could die again (Eph. 1:20; 2:6). The born-again believer whom God spiritually raised from the dead is being kept by His own power (Jude 1:24, 25) for Himself (Eph. 1:5 CSB)! To say that the regenerate person can fall away and lose salvation is to say that God cannot do what He said He would do: keep him by His own power (Jude 1:24). God seals the regenerate person by the down payment, the foretaste, the first installment of our inheritance in Christ by the indwelling Holy Spirit of promise (Eph. 1:13, 14). To what end? For the "anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring complete possession of it--to the praise of His glory" (Eph. 1:14 AMPC). Our inheritance and our salvation is guaranteed by God Himself!
But have we not seen professing believers fall away from the faith? Yes (2 Thess. 2:3; 2 Tim. 4:1-10; 2 Pet. 2:1)! What are we to think about those people who were once among us but who later left us? Did they lose their salvation? No. They had a profession of salvation but not the possession of salvation. "They did not really belong with us. If they were really part of our group then they would have stayed with us. But they left. This shows that none of them really belonged with us" (1 John 2:19 ERV). The mere fact that they fell away shows for all the world to see that what they professed they did not possess--saving faith. Believers stay because believers are kept from falling away (Jude 1:24, 25).
WHO ARE THE WARNINGS FOR?
Scripture is written to and for the ultimate benefit of the believer--whether the Old Testament person who professes to be a believer in YHWH and the future-promised Messiah; or the New Testament person who professes to be a believer in the Blood-Stained Cross and Resurrection of the Jewish Messiah Jesus. Although, equally true, each individual ever to exist will be held accountable to God regarding His Word, His Truth, His Standards and His Righteousness (Isa. 59:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15; Matt. 12:34, 35, 36; John 16:7, 8, 9, 10, 11; Rom. 1:18, 19, 30; 3:19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 6:23). Old Testament people who profess to be believers in YHWH were warned about falling away (Deut. 4:1, 6; 9:1, 2, 3; Jer. 7:23); and New Testament people who profess to be believers in Christ are warned about falling away (Matt. 24:13; Rom. 11:19-22; 1 Cor. 10:12; 2 Cor. 11:3; Gal. 1:6; 2 Thess. 2:3; 1 Tim. 4:1, 16; Heb. 3:12-19; 6:4-6; 10:26-31; James 5:19-20; 2 Pet. 2:20-22). Why do I call them "people who profess to be believers"? For this one biblical reason: not everyone who professes to believe is a regenerate believer. The warnings are for those who profess to believe: if you fall away from faith in Christ, thus falling away from Christ Himself, there is no hope for you, no promise of future redemption / justification / salvation or glorification (Rom. 8:30); God's promises are found solely in Christ (2 Cor. 1:20).
Those who fall away from Christ: did they not lose or forfeit their salvation? No. They revealed that they retained a profession of saving faith without the possession of saving faith. "Now I make known to you, brethren, the Gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved," but here is the caveat, "if you hold fast the Word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain" (1 Cor. 15:1, 2); cf. "unless you believed at first without effect and all for nothing" (AMPC--Amplified Bible Classic, ©1964, ©1987); "unless you believed in vain [just superficially and without complete commitment]" (AMP--Amplified Bible 2015 update); "unless somehow you believed it for nothing" (CEB, CEV, EEB, ERV, LSB, NCV, NIRV); "For if you don't, your trust will have been in vain" (CJB); "unless you believed for nothing [in vain; or superficially; or in something of no value]" (EXB); "unless you believed it without thinking it over" (GW, TLV); "unless, of course, your faith was worthless [1 Pet. 1:7]" (ISV, NLV); "unless, of course, your faith had no meaning behind it at all" (PHILLIPS); "unless you believed to no purpose" (LEB); "unless of course you never really believed it in the first place" (LB, NLT). True and saving faith continues to the end.
You argue: But you say that no one can believe / exercise faith / trust in Jesus without first being regenerated; so, if they were regenerated, and thus saved, and they believed in Christ, then they spiritually died and forfeited / lost their salvation when they ceased to trust in Christ. Not at all. I am saying that, yes, a person must first be regenerated in order to trust in Christ (1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:14; Eph. 1:20; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6; Titus 3:4, 5; 1 Pet. 1:1); and such a person, regenerated and saved by the grace of God, is also kept by that same grace and power of God from stumbling and falling away from Christ, causing us efficaciously to stand in the presence of the glory of God, blameless with great joy (Jude 1:24); such a one was sealed in Christ with the promised Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:13); such a one, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, is promised by God Himself to inherit the riches of Christ Jesus his Lord, Savior, Shepherd and King (Eph. 1:14); such a one was raised from the dead in Christ (Eph. 1:20) and is seated with Christ even now (Eph. 2:6). This spiritual state is a gift of God's grace, to the praise of the glory of His grace (Eph. 1:6), a state of grace that he did not effect (Rom. 8:7; 1 Cor. 1:30, 31; James 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:3), that he cannot keep by his own strength or power (Phil. 2:12, 13; 3:8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14), and that depends entirely upon the power of God for its fulfillment (1 Pet. 5:10); such a one will, by the power of God, obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in Heaven for him, who is protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (1 Pet. 1:4, 5). There is not even the slightest chance that such a one could fall away from faith and fall away from Christ--that is, unless God loses His power to keep such a one, or unless He arbitrarily changes His mind.
Consider Jesus' words about the different types of soil that produces different results. The same seed is sown: the Word and Gospel of God (Matt. 13:1, 2, 3, 4, 19). The varying types of soil include ground on the side of the road (Matt. 13:4), rocky places (Matt. 13:5, 6), thorny places (Matt. 13:7) and good soil that yields a good crop (Matt. 13:8). Incidentally, Jesus also reveals here of God's particular and efficacious grace, granted to the disciples of Jesus but not to everyone (Matt. 13:10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17). He then explains the parable. The Word and Gospel of God falls upon the ears of those who do not understand it; so the Devil snatches that Word away from them (Matt. 13:19) because he is the god of this godless world (2 Cor. 4:4, 5, 6). The Gospel of the Kingdom falls upon the ears of some, and they seem to receive or welcome it with joy, but that joy does not last: when hardship comes, as it comes to test us all (Ps. 66:10; Isa. 48:10; 2 Cor. 13:5; James 1:2, 3, 4; 1 Pet. 1:6, 7), their "faith" is revealed as a fraud (Matt. 13:20, 21). The Word of God falls upon the ears of others who are consumed with worry, easily deceived by the insatiable desire to gain wealth, and the Word is quickly forgotten (Matt. 13:22). But there is a category of people who effectually hear the Word of the Kingdom, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and they understand it (Matt. 13:23a). These are the ones who receive a saving faith (Matt. 13:23b; 2 Pet. 1:1). Just because a person claims to believe, even if for years, does not mean that he believes savingly. The ones who fall away demonstrate that they professed a faith that they did not possess. If they had truly been among the saved then they would have remained among the saved.
Moreover, being precise, "people who profess to be believers" are referred to in Greek by Paul as τῇ (tē) πιστεύοντας (pisteuontas), the article τῇ being plural and the verb πιστεύοντας being present active passive, "the ones believing" (1 Cor. 1:21). God was well-pleased by His mercy and grace to save "the ones [who are] believing": the believing ones are those whom God has already saved (saving faith is the result of having been saved). They did not believe in Jesus so that God would then save and regenerate them. Regeneration precedes true and saving faith: Paul teaches that, even when we were spiritually dead in our sins--while being (Eph. 2:1) spiritually dead in our sins--God regenerated us, "made us alive together with Christ" (Eph. 2:4, 5); God "saved us in accordance with His mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5)--which indicates that salvation and regeneration are inseparably interconnected like the soul and the spirit (Heb. 4:12). Even belief itself, faith, is a gift effected by the saving act of regeneration (Eph. 2:5, 8, 9), and is a gift of grace we passively receive, to which even Peter himself explicitly refers (2 Pet. 1:1). The gifts of faith and of salvation are but some of the results of being unconditionally elected by God the Father from all eternity past, by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit [see 2 Thess. 2:13, 14; Titus 3:5], unto or for obedience to Jesus Christ and to being spiritually sprinkled with His precious blood (Heb. 9:13, 14, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 10:22, 23, 24; 12:18-24; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2).
Furthermore, though we did not earn or merit this grace of God, and we were given the gifts of redemption, salvation, regeneration, faith, justification, sanctification and the promised future glorification (noted by Paul in the past tense, Rom. 8:29, 30, because in the mind of God, our redemption and salvation and justification and sanctification and future glorification is already purchased, and guaranteed, and is a present reality in Heaven for us with and in Christ: cf. Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 19b, 20, 21; 2:4, 5, 6); for God has called us to these promises through the Gospel so that we may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Thess. 2:14); and yet still we are commanded to "stand firm and hold on to the traditions which [we] were taught, whether by word of mouth, or by letter from us" (2 Thess. 2:15 NASB). The blessings bestowed upon us are not to be taken for granted, not to be abused or neglected, but are to be treasured and carefully guarded (2 Tim. 1:13, 14).
Though we who trust in Christ are inheritors of all Christ's riches in glory (Rom. 8:17; Gal. 4:7; 1 Pet. 1:4); and though even now we are "a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us out of spiritual darkness into His marvelous Kingdom of Light" (1 Pet. 2:9); even still we are instructed, and commanded, for our own good:
THE PURPOSE FOR THE WARNINGS
Think about the context of the warning passages to the congregations of professing believers. People would join with them in worship of Jesus, seeming so sincere, and later abandon them. Dr. Greg Morse writes: We see these thorns grow even in the hearts of those who seemed
Still, the believer knows that the heart is deceitful (Jer. 17:9), and he knows this to be true about himself. As devout as he believes himself to be, feeling conviction of sin, feeling the terror of falling away, wanting nothing more than to be a truly regenerate and saved child of God, he knows how deceptive his heart can be; so he presses in even more to the Lord because he does not want to be found out to have been a false believer: someone who professed saving faith but who did not possess saving faith. The warning passages concern me greatly. Why? Because I love the Lord, I want to be with Him forever, and the idea of discovering at some point in the future that I was actually a false believer is so utterly terrifying to me. You will never convince me that the warning passages have no sanctifying effect when I feel the effect within me. I truly believe that the warning passages throughout all of Scripture are endued with power toward sanctification (1 Thess. 4:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8).
Consider Judas. No one thought that he would be the one to betray Jesus. What does that tell you about the outward character of Judas (though no one could see his inner heart)? On the very night when Jesus Himself announced that He was about to be betrayed, many of the disciples wondered if he himself would be the one (Matt. 26:22), but no one turned and pointed the finger at Judas--yet Judas was the one (Matt. 26:23, 24, 25)! What does that tell you about the nature of deception? The purity of deception is that the one deceived does not know that he is deceived. This is why we are urged and warned about looking at ourselves honestly (1 Cor. 11:31; 2 Cor. 13:5; Gal. 1:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 6:7; 1 John 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 2 :1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24; 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; 4:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 5:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21)--taking heed lest we, too, fall (1 Cor. 10:11, 12). Paul urges us not to receive the grace of God in vain (2 Cor. 6:1). We have promises from God that we will be saved by His grace through a saving and living faith in Jesus Christ: "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Cor. 7:1).
Notice he instructs us to be perfecting (present active) holiness--perfecting and perfecting and perfecting. Perfecting something takes a very long time. We will, all of our lives in Christ, be continually perfecting holiness in the reverence and awe of God: trying, failing, recovering ourselves; and progressing, failing, recovering ourselves; then progressing, failing, and recovering ourselves; on and on and on until we finally see Jesus. You fear: "But I'm weak; I'm often frail; and I fail; and there are times I feel overwhelmed; and there are times I don't want to pursue holiness; and I go through seasons of doubt, or depression, or both!" Welcome to life in Christ Jesus! You fit right in with the rest of us! Keep reminding yourself that you didn't save yourself, and you couldn't possibly have saved yourself, and you can't keep yourself saved either! This is why God is working within you and preserving you by His grace and power (Phil. 2:12, 13; 1 Pet. 1:4, 5; Jude 1:24, 25). You ask, "So, He will keep me saved, even though I often fail?" Now you're thinking like a biblical Christian. Yes, God will keep all of us sinner-saints, even though we fail. God isn't saving heroes and saints who attain perfection. There are none! All God has to work with is us sinner-saints: sinners in reality (Rom. 3:23) but saints in Christ (Rom. 3:21, 22, 24, 25, 26; 1 Cor. 1:1, 2)--saints by calling (Rom. 1:7). That means that God called us to be saints, not because we actually became sinless, but in and through the righteousness of Jesus Christ (Rom. 3:24-26 ESV; 1 Cor. 1:30 NIV; 2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19, 20, 21).
Paul himself confesses that God had set him apart even from his mother's womb, and called him through His grace [Acts 9:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19; see Jer. 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10], God was pleased to reveal His Son in him so that he might preach Christ among the Gentiles (Gal. 1:15); and, yet, he also confesses that he disciplines his body, making it his slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified (1 Cor. 9:27). I must interject here: Paul would not be disqualified from salvation but from ministry (1 Tim. 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-9, 16), since God is the One who has qualified Paul and us who by grace through faith are in Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:6 NKJV; 2 Cor. 3:5, Col. 1:12). This is the same Paul who knows that God has unconditionally elected to save and to justify certain from among mankind (Rom. 9:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5, 13, 14); and, yet, he still strives to keep his mind on Christ and heavenly realities (Col. 3:1, 2, 3, 4); and he considers the parts
So now you fear that you have to persevere unto the end in order to prove that you are truly saved and in order to have assurance that you will be saved. Good! In one sense I am comforted that you feel the weight of that fear just like the rest of us do at times. Let the godly fear serve you--let it motivate you to press in to Christ and to cling tightly to Him. But know this: 1) that fear is a good sign that saving faith resides within you because those who are not regenerated and saved don't care about spiritual matters (1 Cor. 2:14); and 2) God is the one preserving you (1 Pet. 1:5; Jude 1:24), not you, not your frail attempts. God is the one who will see that you persevere to the end because He knows our weaknesses and our frailties. He remembers that we are but dust (Ps. 103:14). We are fragile, and fickle, and wrestling with inner sin that refuses to die (Rom. 7:14-25), a world that wants nothing but for us to join them (1 Pet. 4:4; 1 John 3:13), and a devil that wants to see us destroyed (John 10:10; 1 Pet. 5:8); and this is the same problem for all of mankind since the Garden of Eden: Eve was tempted with the lust of the flesh (Gen. 3:6a), the lust of the eyes (Gen. 3:6b), and the boastful pride of life (Gen. 3:6c), against which we are sternly warned not to be seduced (1 John 2:15, 16, 17).
IS SALVATION CONDITIONAL?
The answer seems to be yes: "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ," which is the condition leading to the result, "and you shall be saved" (Acts 16:31). Salvation seems to be conditional and, if entirely so, then remaining saved seems inevitably to be conditional. That means that your eternity is in your feeble hands and I think that should greatly trouble you. I will demonstrate below, under "Is Salvation Unconditional?," how salvation is unconditional in its eternal nature rooted in an eternal God--God has unconditionally elected to save some people. The doctrine of Conditional Security holds that perseverance in the faith and, thus, in Christ, as well as final salvation and future justification, depends--with emphasis on the word depends--upon God's work and man's work: the believer "may lapse into a state or period of backsliding and, unless there is return to the Lord, the believer could fall into apostasy and be eternally lost."4 Advocates of this view highlight such passages as the following:
The passage referenced above in Ezekiel (Ezek. 33:11-16) has a context that does not relate to New Testament life in Christ for the born-again believer. Our first clue is the commission of Ezekiel to be God's Watchman on the Wall of Jerusalem (Ezek. 33:1-2). God is addressing faithless Israel, those pretending to be righteous but who are not, but holding Ezekiel accountable to warn God's covenantal people to remain faithful to Him; with a reference to discipline by God regarding other nations coming against them. Ezekiel had waited for the fall of Jerusalem for 70 years because of Israel's unfaithfulness to YHWH--the time had finally arrived. This passage has nothing to do with New Testament salvation, justification, or preservation in the faith of Jesus Christ. Context is King when we are interpreting God's Word. We must pay close attention.
I understand the concern of he Conditionalist regarding salvation and the threats of forfeiting salvation, because in some of the passages quoted, the person being warned is said to have been in Christ--a term reserved for the regenerate believer who is in union with Christ by grace through faith in Him. "Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away" (John 15:2). You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt becomes tasteless, it is good for nothing (Matt. 5:13). Conditionalists say that there were Ten Virgins in Jesus' parable, Virgins referring to being clean, proper, and considered holy, but only Five Virgins prepared themselves for Christ's return (Matt. 25:1-13). Conditionalists argue that some believers begin well but end badly, becoming progressively estranged from God, and later forfeiting their salvation. But the branches that do not bear fruit "in Jesus" are wild branches connected to Him but do not belong to Him;5 much in the same way that there are wheat and tares in the field of God, the Church of Jesus, and, even though some of the tares look like wheat, and even though they grow together with the real and true wheat, they will never be wheat, and their presence among the wheat--like the presence of wild branches that produce no spiritual fruit (because they are not connected to the Vine) among true branches of the Vine--does not validate their status as being salvifically in Christ.
Moreover, the salt in Christ that loses his saltiness does not refer to salvation but to productivity and usefulness. Salt, in the ancient world, was used as a preservative so that meat would not decay quickly. "Similarly," writes Dr. Daniel M. Doriani, "the presence of a morally strong disciple can retard moral decay in society."6 Recall how God blessed wicked Egypt for the sake of Joseph (Gen. 39:2-6, 21-23; 40:38-44). We are not saved by being salt and light: salt and light are results and evidences of being saved. "If any man's work" for Christ "is burned up," having been tested by the purifying flames of Christ's righteousness, he will suffer loss but he himself will be saved" (1 Cor. 3:15; cf. 1 Cor. 3:10-15). Paul says that believers plant the Seed of the Word in the world, and we water that Seed, but God is the One who makes it grow (1 Cor. 3:5, 6, 7, 8). Paul calls us God's fellow-workers, God's field, and God's building (1 Cor. 3:9). Regarding our personal building, in which God resides (John 14:17; 1 Cor. 3:16), Paul encourages us to be careful how we build onto our personal house--that we should be very careful with the resources we use: Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones (good resources), or perhaps with wood, hay, or straw (bad resources), each person's work will become evident on the Day of Judgment when Christ Jesus rewards the spiritual work of God's children (see 1 Cor. 3:10-15).
Furthermore, some of the references above appear to refer to people who have a saving relationship with Jesus--and such only occurs by grace through faith in Him--but some people may not. "I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ for a different Gospel" (Gal. 1:6). These professing believers were being deceived by false teaching. Hence the warning. But God uses Paul to shake His people from such deception. So the warning retained an efficacious work: God is protecting His people (John 17:15, 16, 17), He is keeping His people in the true faith (John 6:37, 39; 15:26; 17:11, 12), and He is enlightening His people to truth (John 14:26; 16:13; cf. the difference between believers and non-believers at 2 Thess. 2:8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14). "You have been severed from Christ--you who are seeking to be justified by Law; you have fallen from grace" (Gal. 5:4). Essentially Paul's message is this: If you want to return to failed attempts at perfectly keeping God's Law, the Law of Moses, then that will sever you from Jesus because Jesus fulfilled the Law of God sinlessly on our behalf (Rom. 3:21-26; 11:1-36; 1 Cor. 1:30 NIV). You can have grace, or you can have Law, but you can't have them both: yet only one saves. "For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17 NASB). So God shakes His people, through Paul's message, from the yoke of attempting to perfectly keep the Law, which they cannot do, in order to grant them the grace He intended them to enjoy solely in Christ Jesus.
"We must pay much closer attention to what we have heard so that we do not drift away from it" (Heb. 2:3). Can the true believer drift away? Rational thinking would answer that, if we cannot drift away from the Gospel we heard, then we need not be warned against it. The Jewish believers to whom the author of To the Hebrews writes were under pressure by Jewish leaders who still embraced the Law of Moses in order to attain the salvation and justification of YHWH but who also rejected Messiah Jesus. The theme of "drifting away" from faith and from Christ is repeated throughout. Richard D. Phillips writes: "One of the key ideas here is that drifting away is something that happens largely unnoticed. While it is happening the changes are imperceptible; only later do its consequences become clear. This is a grave danger against which we must respond with careful attention."7 This reminds me of the time that I went swimming with a couple of buddies in the Pacific Ocean in San Diego. We had no idea that the current was gradually taking us further and further from the shore. We were playing games and joking around, laughing, and not paying attention. Suddenly, I looked toward the beach and said to the guys, "Wow. Look how far away the beach is." We didn't know that we had drifted so far from shore. I panicked, because there were no lifeguards, I am not a strong swimmer and I'm also asthmatic. One friend said: "Don't panic. We will begin to swim southward and gradually reach the shore. But don't panic." So that's what we did. We swam for about half an hour, little by little, but eventually reached the shore. I was shocked that we had unnoticeably drifted so far away.
That panic inside of me was intense. Within a couple seconds I imagined that there was no way I would reach shore, that I would drown, and that my parents would be so heartbroken to have lost me in such a needless way. Phillips continues: "There is a current to this present evil age, pulling strongly out from the safe harbor of salvation in Christ. We do not have to actively betray Jesus or renounce our faith. Simply by not paying attention, by becoming preoccupied with the sights and sounds of this world, we can be easily drawn out until we are swept away forever."8 Because some professing believers neglected "keeping faith a good conscience," they eventually "suffered shipwreck with regard to the faith" (1 Tim. 1:19-20 NIV). Phillips adds: "Do you realize that? Do you realize that if you do not pay attention to your spiritual condition it will deteriorate on its own? Do you realize, given the corrupt nature of this world and of your heart, that you naturally become dull and then deadened spiritually, steadily believing the lies of this evil age? Without giving heed to the spiritual resources God provides, your heart will revert to greed, pride, avarice, sensuality, and malice--all those characteristics that define our natural state in sin and lead to destruction."9
Some Conditionalist may snidely remark: "But you say truly regenerate people cannot fall away so how can you believe this to be true?" That is not helpful (or fair) at all. We are not to so arrogantly presume upon God's sovereignty and unconditional election that we neglect to obey His Word: "continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling" (Phil. 2:12 NIV). That is a biblical command of God to the believer. But, should the believer panic because he knows his own frailty and inefficiency, we are comforted: "for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose" (Phil. 2:13). The two are not mutually exclusive. God ordains the means as well as the end. Phillips adds:
Even if you disagree on the issue of faith being effectually given to, or birthed within, only certain people--the unconditionally elect--you can at least agree, I should hope, with these remarks: "But when it comes to the present tense of our salvation--that which is worked out progressively, namely, our sanctification--this is extremely active [Heb. 12:14]. Martyn Lloyd-Jones explains it well: 'In the matter of our righteousness and justification we can never say too often that we do nothing, we can do nothing, it is entirely the work of Christ. But once we are saved and given this new life, then the progressive work of sanctification does not call for passivity, and we are exhorted to activity.'"12 We have even been sanctified, made holy, or rendered holy and redeemed for the sake of Christ (1 John 2:12) by grace through faith (Acts 26:18) in a past-tense sense (1 Cor. 6:11; Heb. 10:10, 14). But we are also being progressively made more and more holy (2 Cor. 3:18), being progressively conformed more and more to the image and likeness of Christ Jesus our Savior, LORD and King (Rom. 8:29); but we are also commanded to continually keep perfecting holiness in the fear (or awe and reverence) of God our Savior (2 Cor. 7:1; 1 Pet. 1:13, 14, 15, 16). This is a life-long process.
Language can be a trickster. We often make statements that seem to indicate one manner of thinking but intend nearly the opposite. "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:26 NASB; cf. ASV, CEB, CJB, CSB, EHV, ESV, GNV, HCSB, ISV, JUB, KJV, LEB, LSB, MEV, NABre, NET, NIV, NIRV, NKJV, NRSV, RGT, RSV, TLV, VOICE, WEB, WYC, YLT). That is quite the literal translation but not at all what Jesus means to convey. The GNT, Good News Translation (which is, from what I can tell, the second edition of the Today's English Version), translates the verse properly: "Those who come to Me cannot be My disciples unless they love Me more than they love father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters and themselves as well" (Today's English Version, Second Edition, ®1992). The same proves true for 2 Peter 2:1 regarding false teachers who deny "the Master who bought them," the question being if such people were truly "bought," or "purchased," by the blood of Christ Jesus (Acts 20:28; 1 Cor. 6:19, 20; 7:23); for Peter also writes: "Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot" (1 Pet. 1:18-19 ESV). So we read:
False teachers creep secretly into the church, posing as true believers, but bringing in with them their heresies. In what sense, then, can false teachers who are not regenerate believers be "bought" or "purchased" or "ransomed" by Jesus? The simple answer is that they were not bought / purchased / ransomed by Jesus or they would not embrace heresy and deny Jesus Christ. These false teachers "refused to submit to Christ's authority yet claimed to be part of His household. They claimed Christ as their Redeemer, but they refused His lordship, thus revealing their true character as unregenerate enemies of biblical truth."13 The notion of being bought extends to the purchasing of a slave and then assigning "that slave responsibilities over various tasks. They now owed their complete allegiance to him," the master who bought them, "because they were his personal property."14 False teachers wanted people to think they had been bought by the Master, Jesus, in order to draw away from His own church those who would listen to their heresies. Their refusal to submit to Christ proves they did not belong to Him; they were not truly purchased by the blood of Christ. They didn't lose their redemption because they had never been redeemed in the first place. They didn't lose their salvation because they had never been saved in the first place. Redeemed and saved people forever remain redeemed and saved people.
The nature and the character of false teachers and false believers is further detailed by Peter in the rest of the chapter (2 Pet. 2:10b, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22). The context does not support the idea that these people were once regenerate believers who later rejected Christ and thusly forfeited salvation: regenerate believers do not "forsake the right way" (2 Pet. 2:15). Nor can this passage be a proper reference for the truly regenerate: "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them" (2 Pet. 2:20-21). These people here were given knowledge of how to escape this world of sin and be saved; but they lasted only for a bit and then they went back to the world, became entangled in sin, and were overcome. These people reflect those who hear the Gospel as it is sown among the thorns, but the worry or concerns of the world, and the deceitfulness of wealth or greed or lust choke the Word, and it becomes unfruitful (Matt. 13:22). There is a stark distinction between the true and false believer--at least there is to Jesus: the Lord knows those who belong to Him (2 Tim. 2:19). They went out from us, thus displaying that they never truly belonged to us, or else they would have stayed with us who are in Christ (1 John 2:19).
The Lord also knows how to protect His own from this world of sin and He knows how to keep His own from embracing this world of sin and from falling away from Him. If we could fall away from Him then we would fall away from Him; for we are weak, we are tempted by inner sin (Rom. 7:14-25; James 1:13-18), the world (1 Pet. 4:4; 1 John 2:15-17) and the devil (Eph. 4:27; James 4:7; 1 Pet. 5:8). "No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation He will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it" (1 Cor. 10:13 ESV). The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from overwhelming trials (2 Pet. 2:9 ESV). But He does not rescue the ungodly; He does not purchase / ransom / redeem the ungodly; He does not claim or save the ungodly. We know the Lord Jesus had not "bought" the false teachers, and false believers, because His blood will only atone those whom God His Father intends to save, to rescue, to ransom, to justify, to sanctify and to glorify (Rom. 3:21-26; 8:29, 30; 1 Pet. 1:1-2 ESV). "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen" (Jude 1:24-25 ESV).
The passages in Hebrews are not all exactly the same. Regardless, the writer grants these warnings and we are to take them seriously, yet he concludes the section in this manner: "But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul" (Heb. 10:39)! Why do Conditional Security advocates miss this conclusion? All of these warnings, all of them true, and yet the author is convinced that the true believer possesses a faith that preserves his soul to the very end! This person will not lose his saltiness (Matt. 5:13); he does not rely on his works or his ministry for his salvation (Matt. 7:21-23); he does not fall away and betray others and hate others (Matt. 24:10-13); he is prepared with oil in his lamp (Matt. 25:1-13); he does not look back with favor upon his old life in sin (Luke 9:62); he continues in the Word of Christ (John 8:31; 1 Cor. 15:1-2), bears fruit in Christ (John 15:1-6), remains humble in his love for the Lord and for Israel (Rom. 11:20-22) and disciplines himself so as not to be disqualified (1 Cor. 9:27; 10:11-12); and he loves the Gospel and he loves Christ Jesus (Gal. 1:6).
He does not seek to be approved by the Law (Gal. 5:4) but by grace and the righteousness of Christ imputed to him (Rom. 3:21-26; 5:1; Eph. 2:8, 9); he continues in the faith, firmly established and steadfast (Col. 1:22-23), refusing to run away from Jesus (2 Thess. 2:3); he fights the good fight, keeping faith and a good conscience (1 Tim. 2:18-19), hating this present world (2 Tim. 4:10; 1 John 2:15, 16, 17); he pays close attention to the Gospel and rejoices in so great a salvation (Heb. 2:3); he has no intention of hardening his heart by the deceitfulness of sin (Heb. 3:6-19) because he has united what he has heard with faith in Christ (Heb. 4:1-11); he has been enlightened, and he has tasted of the heavenly gift, and he has been made a partaker of the Holy Spirit by having tasted the good Word of God and the powers of the age to come--and, so, the thought of falling away from it is treacherous to him (Heb. 6:4-6); he holds fast the confession of his hope in Christ, and has by grace forsaken a life of sin, for he loves the Lord his God and knows that it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of a righteous God (Heb. 10:23-36); he has by grace and the power of God escaped the defilements of the world (1 Pet. 1:3, 4, 5) and, so, he will not get entangled and overcome by sin, for he is not a dog returning to its vomit, and he is not a pig returning to wallow in the muck and mire of sin once he has been cleansed (2 Pet. 2:20-22); he, by the grace and power of Christ within him, is an overcomer (1 John 5:4) who cannot have his name blotted out of the Book of Life (Rev. 3:5).
IS SALVATION UNCONDITIONAL?
The question of the conditionality of salvation seems also to be unconditional. God chose to be the God and Savior of certain people from among Israel (Gen. 17:7; Ex. 6:7; Lev. 26:12; Isa. 46:4; Jer. 31:33; 32:38; Ezek. 37:27; Amos 3:2; Rom. 2:28, 29; 11:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29; 2 Cor. 6:16; Heb. 8:10); and He chose to be God and Savior of certain people from among Gentiles (Rom. 11:11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32). They did not choose Him. He unconditionally chose them to be His special people: Jew, Gentile, one in the Messiah (Eph. 2:11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; cf. Rom. 1:16; 2:9, 10). God never said, "I'll be your God if you want Me to," or "I'll be your God if you choose Me," but, from all eternity past, He decided to have a people for Himself (Deut. 14:2; 28:9; Isa. 62:12; Eph. 1:5 ESV; 1 Pet. 2:9) and graciously chose each individual who would make up His people (Deut. 7:6, 7, 8, 9; Rom. 8:29, 30; 9:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33; 1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16; Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; James 1:18). Why? Because our fall into sin rendered us entirely helpless to choose our own God (Rom. 3:10-18; 1 Cor. 2:14).
God was predetermined to have a people for Himself (Deut. 7:1-8; Eph. 1:5). Satan and other fallen angels, perceived as gods governing various territories of earth (cf. Deut. 32:8, 9; see Deut 7:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18; 2 Cor. 4:3, 4; 10:3, 4; Eph. 6:12; Rev. 2:13), took control over the fallen mass of people estranged from God because of sin (Isa. 59:2; 2 Cor. 4:3, 4 Eph. 2:1, 2, 3). God reclaims people, one person at a time, from the mass of fallen sinners taken captive by devils (Col. 1:13) and He intends to keep His spoil (John 10:10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 27, 28, 29, 30). Since God has determined to take for Himself a people, to unconditionally be their God, then our assurance of final salvation and future justification is utterly irrevocable because our salvation is rooted in the eternal nature, work, and character of God our Redeemer (Rom. 11:29).
THE CONDITION OF THE REGENERATE BELIEVER
The born-again believer can rest in his final salvation and future justification not only in Christ's accomplished work for him; as well as God the Father's preserving power and grace to keep His elect; but also by his being baptized in the Holy Spirit. There is an explicit imperative to the believer to always be in a state of being passively influenced by ("filled with") the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18). We are called to the practice of being led and influenced by the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18)--to always keep in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:25 NIV; cf. Gal. 5:16)--so that Jesus can effectively live His holy life in and through us (Gal. 2:20) while God the Father conforms us to the image of Jesus (Rom. 8:29). We infer that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is an initiation in the Spirit by the act of Christ, and an initiation into the body of Christ, by the universals we read in Paul: For ἑν, in, one Spirit we were all baptized εἷς, into, one body [the body of Christ] ... and we were all made to drink ἑν, in, one Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13).
The baptism in the Holy Spirit identifies every believer with / in / to Jesus Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. Every believer is "in" Christ (Eph. 1:20; 2:6) and Christ is "in" every believer (John 14:20). We are in Him, one in Him, united with and in Him forever. There cannot exist today a regenerate believer who is not at the same time immediately identified with Jesus, baptized in the Holy Spirit, and immersed into His Church. Paul insists that all believers were made to drink in one, or the same, Holy Spirit. If we believers have all been baptized into Christ Jesus, and we believers have all been baptized into one Body--the Body of Christ Jesus--then we believers have all been baptized into the Holy Spirit by the act of Christ because there cannot be some believers who have been baptized into Christ, and also into His Body, but not into the Holy Spirit. That negates Paul's use of the word all (1 Cor. 12:13). To someone who informs me that I am saved by grace through faith in Christ, and that the Holy Spirit dwells within me, but that I still need to step into "the next spiritual level," to be baptized in / of / with / or by the Holy Spirit--some suggesting the caveat of the evidence of speaking in tongues as a result of this baptism in the Spirit; others suggesting the caveat of any manifestation mentioned at 1 Corinthians 12:7, 8, 9, 10 as a result of this baptism in the Spirit--I kindly respond accordingly.
When I was saved and regenerated by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5), given spiritual birth by God the Father (John 1:12, 13), the life-giving and Christ-resurrecting Holy Spirit who created me (Job 33:4; Ps. 104:30) took up residence within me (Rom. 8:11), and He changed my wicked heart, so that now I desire what I once had no desire to do: to worship God the Father and Creator through God the Son, Jesus Christ, in the power of God the Holy Spirit (Ezek. 36:26, 27; John 4:23, 34). The indwelling Holy Spirit speaks to me through the unerring and Spirit-breathed Word of God (1 Tim. 4:1; 2 Tim. 3:16 ESV; Rev. 2:7, 11, 17, 29); He opens my understanding to spiritual issues (1 Cor. 2:12); He teaches me and guides me into all truth (John 16:13; Rom. 8:14; 1 John 2:27); He gives me inner strength (Eph. 3:16); He moves me to pray and intercedes to the Father on my behalf (Rom. 8:26, 27, 28); and He enables me to avoid temptations of my old way of life (Rom. 8:13). He is proactively preserving me.
He produces Christlike character in me, progressively (2 Cor. 3:18), as evidence of His indwelling (Gal. 5:22, 23); He calls me into the service of God in Christ Jesus (Acts 13:2, 3, 4) by granting me spiritual gifts (all gifts listed in the New Testament include the following: Rom. 12:6, 7, 8; 1 Cor. 12:7, 8, 9, 10, 11; Eph. 4:11, 12, 13; 1 Pet. 4:10, 11); and He gives me power to tell others the Gospel (Acts 1:8). I have been given all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in and seated with Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:3; 2:6); I have been elected unto salvation by the grace of God (Eph. 1:4) through faith in Jesus (Eph. 2:5, 8), considered absolutely holy and blameless before God in Christ (Eph. 1:4) even though I, most clearly, am not; and I am predestined from all eternity to be God's adopted son through Jesus Christ by God the Father and for God Himself (Eph. 1:5).
I have been lavished with His love and grace (Eph. 1:6, 8), redeemed by the blood of Jesus and forgiven of all my offenses--past, present, and future (Eph. 1:7)--having been sealed by the Holy Spirit for the Day of Redemption (Eph. 1:11, 12, 13, 14) so that my salvation is already a "done deal" from God's perspective (Rom. 8:29, 30); and the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ has been irrevocably imputed to me by grace through faith (Rom. 3:21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 4:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16). In Christ by the Holy Spirit I have been raised up with Christ and seated with Him in the heavenly places, so that "in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:6, 7). I am His workmanship, created (re-created) in Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand for me to walk in (Eph. 2:10). I am not a stranger to His Covenants, nor a stranger to His Kingdom, but am a full citizen of God's Eternal City with full rights of the firstborn son because of the work and grace of God's one and only unique and eternal Son Jesus (Gal. 3:26, 29; 4:4, 5, 6, 7, 28; Eph. 2:19).
I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives His life in and through me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me (Gal. 2:20). I have received the promise of the Holy Spirit through faith (Gal. 3:14). I have been "filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God" (Phil. 1:11); for life, to me, is Christ (Phil. 1:21); God is at work within me, giving me the will to work for His good pleasure (Phil. 2:13). The Gospel of God, the Gospel of Christ, came to me in power and in the Holy Spirit with full conviction (1 Thess. 1:5); God graciously graced me from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth (2 Thess. 2:13); He saved me, not on the basis of deeds which I had done in righteousness (Isa. 64:6), but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon me richly through Jesus Christ my Lord; so that, being justified by His grace, I would be made an heir according to the hope of eternal life (Titus 3:5, 6, 7), which I have as an anchor, an absolute future certainty (Eph. 1:13-14 NLT), for my soul (Heb. 6:18).
All three Members of the Godhead Trinity, the limitless power of the Triune Creator of the Universe and of Heaven and Earth, lives within me--God the Father (John 14:23), God the Son, Jesus (John 14:20), and God the Holy Spirit (John 14:16); including the reality of all the biblical truths above that God caused to work for me and in me, and yet you think I can lose all that I have already been graciously given? By the eternal foreordination of God the Father I was elected to salvation by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit to obey Jesus Christ who, according to His great mercy, has caused me to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Pet. 1:1, 2, 3).
I have graciously received a faith of the same kind as that of the apostle Paul and the other disciples of Jesus Christ by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ Himself, as well as granted the multiplying of the grace and the peace and the knowledge of God the Father and also of Jesus my Lord, for His divine power has granted to me everything I need pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called me by His own glory and excellence (2 Pet. 1:1, 2, 3). Through these graces, God has also granted me His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them I may become a partaker of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4). I lack nothing of God in Christ. In Jesus Christ, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell in Him (Col. 1:19), and He dwells within me--God in Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit--God the Sustainer dwells within me. I lack nothing. I need no other imagined blessing. I can rest in His finished work and eternal promise to save me.
CAN THE BELIEVER HAVE ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY OF FUTURE SALVATION?
The only biblical answer possible is yes. Not only can the believer have absolute certainty of future salvation but he is called of God to embrace this certainty! Having explicitly informed us that saving faith is a gift we receive by the grace of God (2 Pet. 1:1; cf. Eph. 2:5, 8, 9; Phil. 1:29), Peter then instructs us: "make every effort to confirm your calling and election" (2 Pet. 1:10 CSB). The "call" is the effectual invitation of the Gospel to God's family by His grace through faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:6, 7; 8:28, 29, 30; 9:24; 11:29; 1 Cor. 1:2, 9, 24, 26; Eph. 1:18; 4:4; 2 Tim. 1:9; Heb. 3:1). This effectual call is heard by the elect alone. First, Peter wants the believer to know, "His [God's] divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us to [or by] His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that, through them, you may become partakers of the divine nature--having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire" (2 Pet. 1:3-4 ESV). We escaped this corruption solely by the proactive and effectual grace of God (Col. 1:13). Second, because we are granted these privileges, he then writes: "For this very reason, make every effort," the same phrase found at 2 Peter 1:10, "to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love" (2 Pet. 1:5-6 ESV).
The reason for this strong encouragement is to give the believer the "how to" when he commands us to make every effort to confirm our calling and election. "For if these qualities are yours, and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind--having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins" (2 Pet. 1:8-9 ESV). Notice that the believer who has neglected to develop his faith thusly did not lose his salvation but, rather, has been rendered blind, with a sort of temporary amnesia, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. We make our calling and election sure by being active in our faith--a faith that was give to us as a gift of God (2 Pet. 1:1; Eph. 2:8, 9)--supplementing our faith with ever-increasing virtue, spiritual or biblical knowledge, self-control, steadfastness (when you continue regardless of negative circumstances), godliness, brotherly affection for our brothers and sisters in Christ, and, ultimately love: love for God (with all our heart, soul, and mind: Matt. 22:37), love for neighbor (which includes every single person we meet: cf. Luke 10:25-37), and a proper and biblical love for ourselves (Matt. 22:39).
Dr. Thomas Schreiner writes: "Those who live ungodly lives show no evidence that they truly belong to God, that they have genuinely received forgiveness,"15 that they have not been born again by the Grace and Work of God. The Book of 1 John repeats this theme in nearly every chapter (1 John 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 2 :1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24; 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; 4:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 5:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21). The person who has been regenerated by God cannot live an entire life of sin because God's seed, σπέρμα (sperma), dwells within him (1 John 3:9). We might say that God's life-giving residue abides within the believer to such a degree that, no matter the challenges or pitfalls or difficulties that confront him throughout his lifetime, he belongs to God as one of His offspring. In essence, then, the born-again believer will not live his life entirely in and consumed by sin (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3). He is no longer under the sovereign dominion of sin (Rom. 6:14) even if he daily feels the deadly effects of sin (Rom. 7:14-25). The indwelling Holy Spirit "bears witness with our spirit" that we belong to God, that we are adopted children of God and confirmed in His family, children whom He has promised to save (Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 13, 14; 2 Pet. 1:4), children who share in His divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4), as well as co-heirs with Jesus Christ (Rom. 8:12-17).
CONCLUSION: WHO SAVES WHO?
The only biblical answer possible is that God and God alone saves us. We did absolutely nothing to be saved by God. We cannot give the Lord our hearts, as we often hear the Gospel framed, but only give God our sin. The unregenerate "person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor. 2:14 NASB 2020). If God did not save us then we would not and we could not be saved. Prior to His effectual grace, we did not know about our need for salvation, and we did not care about our need for salvation. Salvation belongs to the LORD (Ps. 3:8; Jonah 2:9; Rev. 7:10). Our fallen and dead state in sin renders us entirely helpless with regard to salvation (Rom. 8:5, 6, 7, 8; Eph. 2:1, 2, 3). God is the only Savior and He cannot fail to save those whom He saves.
You may argue that we had to believe / trust / exercise faith in Jesus in order for God to save us. After all, Scripture reports, "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved" (Acts 16:31). Do you think God responds to your faith by saving you? That is unbiblical. We are saved by grace through faith (Acts 2:8)--"and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God" (Eph. 2:8b EHV); "and this ... is not of yourselves [not through your own effort] but it is the [undeserved, gracious] gift of God" (Eph. 2:8b AMP). Grace saves you, not faith, as faith is merely an instrument through which the song of God's salvation is played--to His tune and not to one of our own making. Peter writes to "those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ" (2 Pet. 1:1 NASB 1995). Paul teaches us: "But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life" (Titus 3:4-7 NASB '95). God saved us by regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit: the words are right there in the text (see also Eph. 1:20; 2:6; James 1:18).
Note carefully: the Holy Spirit preserves the believer in Jesus. The apostate--the one who at one time claimed to have believed in Jesus and was saved by God's grace but who later rejects Christ and remains in that condition--is entirely without hope (Heb. 6:4-8; 10:26-31). What apostates prove is that they were never really a born-again believer who belonged to Jesus or else they would have remained with us (1 John 2:19). They did not lose their salvation. Born-again believers cannot lose their salvation because their salvation was predetermined by God from eternity past (Rom. 8:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5; Rev. 13:8; 17:8), they are presently being kept for salvation (Eph. 1:13, 14; 2 Cor. 3:18; 4:6, 7; Jude 1:24, 25), and God has determined beyond all shadow of doubt that they will be saved (1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 15, 16; Eph. 1:11; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; Phil. 1:6; 3:20, 21; Col. 3:1, 2, 3, 4; 1 Thess. 1:2, 3, 4, 5). The late John MacArthur was right: "Salvation is meaningless if it isn't eternal."
To suggest that a truly regenerate person can fall away from faith, fall away from Christ Jesus, spiritually dying yet again, therefore losing his salvation, is to infer that God is powerless to keep His own promises to save the ones believing in Christ (1 Cor. 1:21, 30; 1 Pet. 1:3, 4, 5), and to keep by His own power those who are His children (Eph. 1:13, 14; Jude 1:24). The warning passages serve as a great sanctifying effect because the regenerate person does not want to be found outside of Jesus Christ--to be found as a fraud and one whose faith was not genuine. There are wheat stalks in the fields of God and there are also weeds (Matt. 13:24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30). Sometimes they both look alike and are nearly indistinguishable. But God knows the distinction (Matt. 13:29, 30). The believer should neither be worried every day of his life about not being a true believer nor so confident and arrogant that the issue of his eternal salvation never crosses his mind. The Christian should live a balanced life: humbly relying on Christ for his salvation while seeking to be obedient to the Word. We he falls, and fall he will, he is to get back up, confess his sin and ask for forgiveness (1 John 2:1, 2), and carry onward. A sinner-saint is one who, as the song says, falls down and gets back up.
__________
1 Archibald Thomas Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, Vol. V, the Fourth Gospel and the Epistle to the Hebrews (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1932), 445.
2 Douglas Sean O'Donnell, Reformed Expository Commentary: 1-3 John (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2015), 96.
3 Ibid.
4 Kevin J. Conner, The Foundations of Christian Doctrine: A Practical Guide to Christian Belief (Portland: City Christian Publishing, 1980), 261.
5 Richard D. Phillips, Reformed Expository Commentary: John, Volume 2: Chapters 11-21, 284.
6 Daniel M. Doriani, Reformed Expository Commentary: Matthew, Volume 1: Chapters 1-13, 135.
7 Richard D. Phillips, Reformed Expository Commentary: Hebrews, 47.
8 Ibid., 47-48.
9 Ibid., 48.
10 Ibid., 49.
11 Ibid.
12 Ibid.
13 Jim Shaddix and Daniel L. Akin, Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in 2 Peter and Jude (Brentwood: B&H Publishing Group, 2018), 52.
14 Ibid.
15 Thomas R. Schreiner, Christian Standard Commentary: 1 & 2 Peter and Jude, eds. E. Ray Clendenen and Brandon D. Smith (Brentwood, TN: B&H Publishing, 2020), 360.
I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU NOR FORSAKE YOU
The nature and the character of God toward one of His own is repeated often in Scripture: God first utters this oft-repeated message to Jacob: "Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you" (Gen. 28:15 NKJV); To Moses God says: "Be strong and of a good courage. Fear not, nor be afraid ..., for the LORD your God, it is He who goes with you. He will not fail you nor forsake you" (Deut. 31:6 MEV); Moses speaks the same message to Israel: "The LORD, He goes before you. He will be with you. He will not fail you nor forsake you. Do not fear nor be dismayed" (Deut. 31:8 MEV); "I will be with you," God says to Joshua. "As I was with Moses, I will be with you. I will not abandon you. I will not leave you" (Josh. 1:5 MEV); King David said to his son Solomon: "Be strong, and of good courage, and do it; do not fear, nor be dismayed, for the LORD God--my God--will be with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you" (1 Chron. 28:20 NKJV). God is a Covenantal God of eternal promises and He always keeps His promises--without fail.
God says to Israel a couple thousand years later: "Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand" (Isa. 41:10 NKJV); and, yet, this very same concept belongs also to New Testament believers who belong to God--He will never, ever leave us, or abandon us: Let your manner of life be without ἀφιλάργυρος, a negative particle with reference to not being greedy, not being fond of wealth, not "dominated" or "over-influenced by the desire for financial gain," not loving, philéō, materialism; but "be content with such things as ye have: for He hath said, 'I will never leave thee nor forsake thee.' So that we may boldly say, 'The LORD is my helper and I will not fear what man shall do unto me'" (Heb. 13:5-6 KJV). This promise of our Covenantal God should inform us on this subject. If you suggest that, He may not forsake us but we may forsake Him, I have to ask you two interconnected questions: 1) Who saves who? and 2) Who sustains who? He saves; He sustains; His faithfulness wins the Day for our final salvation and future justification.
Incidentally, the writer to the Hebrews freely quotes, or freely translates / paraphrases (Moffatt), this message scattered throughout the Old Testament, using language that leads the believer to trust fully in a God who refuses, of His own character and nature, to leave, to abandon, to desert the one who belongs to Him by the Eternal Covenant that our triune God established from all eternity past (Heb. 13:20; cf. Isa. 24:5)--the late Dr. A.T. Robertson alerting us to note "the five negatives strengthening each other"1: οὐ μή (never not), οὐδ’ οὐ μή (nor never not). These five negatives strengthening each other in the text could be rendered in English as: "For He Himself [emphatic] has said: 'I will never, never leave [desert, abandon] you, nor never never forsake you." This salvation granted to you depends entirely on this faithful God who gave you this gift.
OUR FAITHFULNESS AND OBEDIENCE
There is a loosely-perceived notion today that obedience to the Lord in our daily walk is not that important. Some proponents of this idea are labelled hyper-grace advocates, somewhat akin to the practice of ancient Gnostic heretics, who held that what is done in the body does not matter because what is material is expendable and that which is spiritual, our inner spirit, is untouched by sins committed in the flesh. Yet, Paul writes, "Flee sexual immorality. Every other sin that a person commits is outside the body but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body" (1 Cor. 6:18 NASB 2020). But we know that sexual sins against the body also negatively impact the spirit: "Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God, and that you are not your own?" (1 Cor. 6:19). "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh. For the desire of the flesh is against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another in order to keep you from doing whatever you want" (Gal. 5:16-17). Our obedience matters to the Lord.
Jesus is the One who said: "If you love Me, you will keep My commandments" (John 14:15 NASB '95); "He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him" (John 14:21); "If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him" (John 14:23); and, yet, our feeble obedience and faithfulness is not what brings us salvation; and not what keeps us saved; and not what grants us assurance of future salvation. If salvation, and assurance of future justification, depends upon faithfulness then you and I are in deep trouble! Jesus is granting us the true identity of the one who belongs to Him and the one who will be saved: such a person obeys Him--not perfectly, not sinlessly, but in intent; because he has a new heart, a new nature, which inspires a new way of thinking and living (Rom. 6:1-3; 2 Cor. 5:17). Sinclair Ferguson is right to conclude, "My security as a Christian does not reside in the strength of my faith but in the indestructibility of my Savior."
"It is because of [or due to, NABre] Him [God] that," or "But by His doing" (LSB), or "But from Him" (LEB), "you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God--that is, our righteousness, [and our] holiness and [our] redemption. Therefore, as it is written: 'Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord'" (1 Cor. 1:30-31 NIV). We only have righteousness, holiness, and redemption in Jesus Christ; and Paul argues that Jesus has become for us our righteousness, our holiness, and our redemption. God sees us solely in and through the lens of His sinless Son Jesus Christ: He imputed the righteousness and holiness belonging to Jesus Christ to our spiritual account--He reckoned us in and through Christ to be as holy and as righteous and Jesus (Rom. 3:21-26 ESV). "This righteousness is given, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all who believe" (Rom. 3:22 NIV: I added the commas in order to frame the structure that righteousness is given to the believer; cf. the same truth at 2 Cor. 5:21).
Jesus' blood redeemed us (Eph. 1:7; 1 Pet. 1:18, 19); His resurrection justified us (Rom. 1:4; 4:25; 10:9, 10; 1 Cor. 15:17); and His active and passive obedience to the Will and to the Law of God the Father is given to the believer as a gift (Rom. 3:22). To stand before God, you must stand in the righteousness of Jesus Christ (Phil. 3:9), or you will not stand at all (Rom. 5:15-19; Ps. 24:3-4). This should inform how we think about salvation, assurance, and our future justification. If God is looking at us in and through His sinless Son, deeming us to be as holy and righteous as is He, then He is not looking for my feeble attempts at perfect obedience and faithfulness. Spiritual obedience and faithfulness are rooted in Christ, not in me, and I will not be saved from the wrath of God by my own efforts. God will not accept my own obedience and faithfulness--even though He calls me to them in the here and now. I am to strive after holiness (Heb. 2:14). But I am a fool if I believe I have attained perfect holiness, or perfect obedience, or perfect faithfulness (Phil. 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14); otherwise I have a fool for a savior--myself.
THEN CAN WE DO WHAT WE WANT?
The short answer is no. But the better answer is this: the born-again believer does not want to live in sin because he has been changed (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3; 2 Cor. 5:17). Does this mean that he will never sin again? Hardly! "If we claim to have fellowship with Him, and yet walk in the darkness [as a normal way of life the way we formerly did, Eph. 2:1, 2, 3], we lie and do not live out the truth" (1 John 1:7 NIV). This person, no matter his profession, is not a born-again believer. Yet the same writer also pens: "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8 NIV). The truth is that the regenerate believer hates his sin and longs to be without sin. While sin does not have dominion over him (Rom. 6:14), the effects of sin still live within him (Rom. 7:14-25), and one day all effects of sin will be eradicated forever (1 Cor. 15:50-57).
Let me ask you a troubling question. If sin still dwells within us, and we still sin even though we despise it, are we not habitual sinners? Is there even a 24-hour period in which you avoided every known sin possible? If you answer yes: Could you not have sinned against the Lord, or against another person, without realizing it? If so then are you telling me that you sin every single day of life? Is that what we call the changed and renewed life in Christ? The day you say that you had no sin was the day you were found to be a liar (1 John 1:8)! Yet, you are supposed to be chasing down holiness, with the threat that, without it, you will not see the Lord (Heb. 12:14). I mean, warning passages aside, how on earth can we even call ourselves Christians if we haven't attained to holiness of life and heart (Matt. 5:48; Heb. 12:14; 1 Pet. 1:15, 16)? The truth of the matter is that we are both (redeemed) sinners (1 Tim. 1:15) and saints (1 Cor. 1:2 NASB) at the same time. Dr. Douglas Sean O'Donnell writes:
We are saints, yet sinners. Those who think they have obtained angelic purity now are deluded [Phil. 3:12]. While we are freed from the dominion of sin, we are not freed from the corruption of sin. Though we have confidence ... of our salvation on the day of His coming [1 John 2:28] because we have "a personal, obedient, abiding relationship" with Jesus [John 15:4-11], we are not Christ but only Christlike. We might have halos on our heads but they are often dull and broken. We might not walk in sin [Rom. 6:1-3] but we do fall into it.2Pastor Douglas admits: "I think we all understand that, if someone professes to be a child of Heaven but lives like the offspring of Hell, his Christianity is a charade. What we struggle with, however, is grasping how holy we need to be to receive the assurance of our salvation."3 That is it right there! How holy is holy? How faithful is faithul? How obedient is obedient? To God, the degree is one hundred percent, and yet He knows that to be an impossiblity for us while we still live in the flesh. This is why God must reckon to the adopted child the actual righteousness of Jesus Christ His Son (Rom. 3:21-26). This is why Jesus had to become for us righteousness, holiness, and redemption (1 Cor. 1:30). Jesus is our righteousness, holiness, and redemption! When God, who loves His regenerate sinner-saint child to the degree that He loves Jesus Himself (John 17:23), looks at us, He sees the righteousness and holiness and redeeming blood of Jesus, not as we are in our sinful context. Rome calls this biblical truth a "legal fiction." But I'll tell what the true legal fiction is: Believing that God will justify a person who actually becomes as righteous and as holy as is Jesus! If God can only justify the person who becomes as righteous and as holy as Jesus then He cannot justify anybody! I am less concerned that true believers (like me and you) fall into sin. What I want to know is if we despise sin and want to be freed from it one day. Why? Because the unregenerate person does not care about sin or his eternal state (1 Cor. 2:6-14). Only the redeemed hate sin and love Christ.
ARE THE WARNINGS REAL?
The short answer is yes. Every single one of the warning passages are real. God means what He says. Why, hypothetically, warn a professing believer that he can, by neglect or spiritual apathy or whatever instrumental cause one can imagine, forfeit his salvation if the regenerate believer cannot, at least from God's eternal perspective (Rom. 8:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5), forfeit his salvation because God will preserve him to the end? Because each and every single professing believer does not know with absolute certainty that he is not self-deceived, deceived by Satan, or merely possesses a "faith" that is not rooted and grounded in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ; and every pastor and every person in the church also cannot know with absolute certainty the same about others. Perhaps a professing believer retains a life-motto of Faith, Family, and Freedom--or God, Family, and Country--and thinks that he is thereby saved: a born-again Christian. Or perhaps she thinks that she is saved and a born-again Christian because she believes in justice for the oppressed and marginalized, much akin to what we read in Luke regarding Jesus' ministry among such oppressed and marginalized people, and thereby she has taken up His cause--not His Cross but His perceived cause.
Or perhaps an individual "believes" in God in some abstract and / or subjective sense, meaning the person "believes" God created all things and Jesus is in some sense His Son, but he or she has not been regenerated and does not maintain a daily and personal relationship with the LORD through prayer, Bible-study, devotional reading and regular / recurrent / habitual worship with other believers (unless otherwise hindered). We call these people nominal Christians because they are Christians "in name only." They are professing believers without possessing saving faith.
Like regenerate believers, nominal believers are also warned against falling away, and encouraged to advance in their professed belief. If this seems an awkward concept--that nominal believers who are not truly regenerate are encouraged to advance in their professed belief in God or in Christ--then consider this: nominal believers, like tares among the wheat (Matt. 13:24-30), often look like or seem like truly saved believers. They may appear or even behave morally, bow their heads in prayer during worship, sing hymns, tithe, volunteer for outreach, or any host of other activities with true believers. No one but God can truly see the condition of the heart of a human being (1 Cor. 2:11) and, so, nominal believers who appear as true believers are warned against falling away through neglect just like everyone else who sits in the congregation.
All who profess to believe in Christ are warned against falling away--and we really do see those who at one time professed to believe fall away. Their falling away revealed the true nature of their heart (1 John 2:19). If they return to us, and remain, then they were true believers who experienced a spiritual set-back, or of backsliding into sin for a season, and they should be welcomed back into the fold because they belong to the Fold of Jesus. Yet, no doubt, there will be nominal believers who remain in the church all of their lives and who still do not know Christ Jesus personally--savingly. Even upon His return He will encounter people who thought they were saved. They will point out to Jesus all their good works (Matt. 7:21, 22) and, yet, He says to them: "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!" (Matt. 7:23 NKJV).
Paul writes to the believers in Colossae: "And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds," so this is prior to being regenerated (Eph. 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5), "yet He has now reconciled you [a past-tense action of God with on-going result: 2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19] in His fleshly body through death [for the following eternal and divine purpose], in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach--if indeed you continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Gospel that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven and of which I, Paul, was made a minister" (Col. 1:21-23 NASB '95). Is this true? Yes. The persons who have been reconciled (past tense) to God (2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19, 20, 21), and who continue to believe / trust / exercise faith in Christ (that faith being a gift: Eph. 2:5, 8, 9; 2 Pet. 1:1), will be presented before God holy and blameless: for God Himself is the One who elected "the ones believing" (1 Cor. 1:21), before the foundation of the world, to be in Christ so that they will be "holy and blameless before Him in love" (Eph. 1:4, 5). Is there any doubt that God the Father will succeed in accomplishing entirely His eternal purposes (Eph. 1:4, 5, 11), to "sum up all things in [or bring everything together in, CSB; or place everything under the Headship of, CJB; or be joined together with, ERV; or unite all things in, ESV; or restore all things by, JUB; or gather us all together ... to be with Him in, TLB] Christ" (Eph. 1:10 NASB, ESV; cf. Eph. 1:20; 2:6), in saving and justifying the ones believing in Christ (1 Cor. 1:21, 30; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2; 2 Pet. 1:1) by the effectual work (Titus 3:4, 5) of the Holy Spirit? No.
Here is where I think some people make their theological error. The one who has been elected unto salvation from before the foundation of the world will continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Gospel that he has heard. God cannot fail to bring to full and final salvation the one whom He unconditionally elected to that end. God failing to save any one of His elect is an infinite impossibility. God could no more lie (Titus 1:2 NASB) than He could fail to save even one of His elect (Isa. 59:1). When God saves and regenerates a person, He raises him up with Christ, and seats him with Christ (Eph. 2:6), just as he raised Christ from the dead and seated Him at His right hand (Eph. 1:20). Can you imagine someone being seated with Christ in Heaven, and then the person loses his salvation, and then he is also unseated with Christ Heaven. Seated, unseated, seated, unseated, so forth and so on for thousands of years. The notion is just ridiculous.
When God regenerates a person, raises him from spiritual death, he cannot possibly die again spiritually any more than Christ could die again (Eph. 1:20; 2:6). The born-again believer whom God spiritually raised from the dead is being kept by His own power (Jude 1:24, 25) for Himself (Eph. 1:5 CSB)! To say that the regenerate person can fall away and lose salvation is to say that God cannot do what He said He would do: keep him by His own power (Jude 1:24). God seals the regenerate person by the down payment, the foretaste, the first installment of our inheritance in Christ by the indwelling Holy Spirit of promise (Eph. 1:13, 14). To what end? For the "anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring complete possession of it--to the praise of His glory" (Eph. 1:14 AMPC). Our inheritance and our salvation is guaranteed by God Himself!
But have we not seen professing believers fall away from the faith? Yes (2 Thess. 2:3; 2 Tim. 4:1-10; 2 Pet. 2:1)! What are we to think about those people who were once among us but who later left us? Did they lose their salvation? No. They had a profession of salvation but not the possession of salvation. "They did not really belong with us. If they were really part of our group then they would have stayed with us. But they left. This shows that none of them really belonged with us" (1 John 2:19 ERV). The mere fact that they fell away shows for all the world to see that what they professed they did not possess--saving faith. Believers stay because believers are kept from falling away (Jude 1:24, 25).
WHO ARE THE WARNINGS FOR?
Scripture is written to and for the ultimate benefit of the believer--whether the Old Testament person who professes to be a believer in YHWH and the future-promised Messiah; or the New Testament person who professes to be a believer in the Blood-Stained Cross and Resurrection of the Jewish Messiah Jesus. Although, equally true, each individual ever to exist will be held accountable to God regarding His Word, His Truth, His Standards and His Righteousness (Isa. 59:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15; Matt. 12:34, 35, 36; John 16:7, 8, 9, 10, 11; Rom. 1:18, 19, 30; 3:19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 6:23). Old Testament people who profess to be believers in YHWH were warned about falling away (Deut. 4:1, 6; 9:1, 2, 3; Jer. 7:23); and New Testament people who profess to be believers in Christ are warned about falling away (Matt. 24:13; Rom. 11:19-22; 1 Cor. 10:12; 2 Cor. 11:3; Gal. 1:6; 2 Thess. 2:3; 1 Tim. 4:1, 16; Heb. 3:12-19; 6:4-6; 10:26-31; James 5:19-20; 2 Pet. 2:20-22). Why do I call them "people who profess to be believers"? For this one biblical reason: not everyone who professes to believe is a regenerate believer. The warnings are for those who profess to believe: if you fall away from faith in Christ, thus falling away from Christ Himself, there is no hope for you, no promise of future redemption / justification / salvation or glorification (Rom. 8:30); God's promises are found solely in Christ (2 Cor. 1:20).
Those who fall away from Christ: did they not lose or forfeit their salvation? No. They revealed that they retained a profession of saving faith without the possession of saving faith. "Now I make known to you, brethren, the Gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved," but here is the caveat, "if you hold fast the Word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain" (1 Cor. 15:1, 2); cf. "unless you believed at first without effect and all for nothing" (AMPC--Amplified Bible Classic, ©1964, ©1987); "unless you believed in vain [just superficially and without complete commitment]" (AMP--Amplified Bible 2015 update); "unless somehow you believed it for nothing" (CEB, CEV, EEB, ERV, LSB, NCV, NIRV); "For if you don't, your trust will have been in vain" (CJB); "unless you believed for nothing [in vain; or superficially; or in something of no value]" (EXB); "unless you believed it without thinking it over" (GW, TLV); "unless, of course, your faith was worthless [1 Pet. 1:7]" (ISV, NLV); "unless, of course, your faith had no meaning behind it at all" (PHILLIPS); "unless you believed to no purpose" (LEB); "unless of course you never really believed it in the first place" (LB, NLT). True and saving faith continues to the end.
You argue: But you say that no one can believe / exercise faith / trust in Jesus without first being regenerated; so, if they were regenerated, and thus saved, and they believed in Christ, then they spiritually died and forfeited / lost their salvation when they ceased to trust in Christ. Not at all. I am saying that, yes, a person must first be regenerated in order to trust in Christ (1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:14; Eph. 1:20; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6; Titus 3:4, 5; 1 Pet. 1:1); and such a person, regenerated and saved by the grace of God, is also kept by that same grace and power of God from stumbling and falling away from Christ, causing us efficaciously to stand in the presence of the glory of God, blameless with great joy (Jude 1:24); such a one was sealed in Christ with the promised Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:13); such a one, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, is promised by God Himself to inherit the riches of Christ Jesus his Lord, Savior, Shepherd and King (Eph. 1:14); such a one was raised from the dead in Christ (Eph. 1:20) and is seated with Christ even now (Eph. 2:6). This spiritual state is a gift of God's grace, to the praise of the glory of His grace (Eph. 1:6), a state of grace that he did not effect (Rom. 8:7; 1 Cor. 1:30, 31; James 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:3), that he cannot keep by his own strength or power (Phil. 2:12, 13; 3:8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14), and that depends entirely upon the power of God for its fulfillment (1 Pet. 5:10); such a one will, by the power of God, obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in Heaven for him, who is protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (1 Pet. 1:4, 5). There is not even the slightest chance that such a one could fall away from faith and fall away from Christ--that is, unless God loses His power to keep such a one, or unless He arbitrarily changes His mind.
Consider Jesus' words about the different types of soil that produces different results. The same seed is sown: the Word and Gospel of God (Matt. 13:1, 2, 3, 4, 19). The varying types of soil include ground on the side of the road (Matt. 13:4), rocky places (Matt. 13:5, 6), thorny places (Matt. 13:7) and good soil that yields a good crop (Matt. 13:8). Incidentally, Jesus also reveals here of God's particular and efficacious grace, granted to the disciples of Jesus but not to everyone (Matt. 13:10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17). He then explains the parable. The Word and Gospel of God falls upon the ears of those who do not understand it; so the Devil snatches that Word away from them (Matt. 13:19) because he is the god of this godless world (2 Cor. 4:4, 5, 6). The Gospel of the Kingdom falls upon the ears of some, and they seem to receive or welcome it with joy, but that joy does not last: when hardship comes, as it comes to test us all (Ps. 66:10; Isa. 48:10; 2 Cor. 13:5; James 1:2, 3, 4; 1 Pet. 1:6, 7), their "faith" is revealed as a fraud (Matt. 13:20, 21). The Word of God falls upon the ears of others who are consumed with worry, easily deceived by the insatiable desire to gain wealth, and the Word is quickly forgotten (Matt. 13:22). But there is a category of people who effectually hear the Word of the Kingdom, the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and they understand it (Matt. 13:23a). These are the ones who receive a saving faith (Matt. 13:23b; 2 Pet. 1:1). Just because a person claims to believe, even if for years, does not mean that he believes savingly. The ones who fall away demonstrate that they professed a faith that they did not possess. If they had truly been among the saved then they would have remained among the saved.
Moreover, being precise, "people who profess to be believers" are referred to in Greek by Paul as τῇ (tē) πιστεύοντας (pisteuontas), the article τῇ being plural and the verb πιστεύοντας being present active passive, "the ones believing" (1 Cor. 1:21). God was well-pleased by His mercy and grace to save "the ones [who are] believing": the believing ones are those whom God has already saved (saving faith is the result of having been saved). They did not believe in Jesus so that God would then save and regenerate them. Regeneration precedes true and saving faith: Paul teaches that, even when we were spiritually dead in our sins--while being (Eph. 2:1) spiritually dead in our sins--God regenerated us, "made us alive together with Christ" (Eph. 2:4, 5); God "saved us in accordance with His mercy by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5)--which indicates that salvation and regeneration are inseparably interconnected like the soul and the spirit (Heb. 4:12). Even belief itself, faith, is a gift effected by the saving act of regeneration (Eph. 2:5, 8, 9), and is a gift of grace we passively receive, to which even Peter himself explicitly refers (2 Pet. 1:1). The gifts of faith and of salvation are but some of the results of being unconditionally elected by God the Father from all eternity past, by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit [see 2 Thess. 2:13, 14; Titus 3:5], unto or for obedience to Jesus Christ and to being spiritually sprinkled with His precious blood (Heb. 9:13, 14, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 10:22, 23, 24; 12:18-24; 1 Pet. 1:1, 2).
Furthermore, though we did not earn or merit this grace of God, and we were given the gifts of redemption, salvation, regeneration, faith, justification, sanctification and the promised future glorification (noted by Paul in the past tense, Rom. 8:29, 30, because in the mind of God, our redemption and salvation and justification and sanctification and future glorification is already purchased, and guaranteed, and is a present reality in Heaven for us with and in Christ: cf. Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 19b, 20, 21; 2:4, 5, 6); for God has called us to these promises through the Gospel so that we may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ (2 Thess. 2:14); and yet still we are commanded to "stand firm and hold on to the traditions which [we] were taught, whether by word of mouth, or by letter from us" (2 Thess. 2:15 NASB). The blessings bestowed upon us are not to be taken for granted, not to be abused or neglected, but are to be treasured and carefully guarded (2 Tim. 1:13, 14).
Though we who trust in Christ are inheritors of all Christ's riches in glory (Rom. 8:17; Gal. 4:7; 1 Pet. 1:4); and though even now we are "a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that we may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called us out of spiritual darkness into His marvelous Kingdom of Light" (1 Pet. 2:9); even still we are instructed, and commanded, for our own good:
Pursue peace with all men and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord. See to it that no one [among you] comes short of the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springing up causes trouble and by it many be defiled; that there be no immoral or godless person [among you] like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal. For you know that, even afterwards, when he desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for repentance even though he sought for it with tears (Heb. 12:13-17 NASB).Paul says that, since God has gifted to us such wonderful promises, let us then "cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Cor. 7:1). Paul urges us "not to receive the grace of God in vain" (2 Cor. 6:1). He reminds professing believers that all of our Jewish fathers were under the Cloud of Glory, which was the Presence of God, and they were all, in a sense, baptized into Moses: they all "ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them; and the Rock was Christ" (1 Cor. 10:1-4). Paul concludes: "Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased (1 Cor. 10:5):
Now these things happened as examples for us, so that we [who profess to believe in Jesus] would not crave evil things as they also craved. Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink and stood up to play [a euphemism for committing orgiastic sex]." Nor let us act immorally as some of them did and twenty-three thousand fell [died] in one day. Nor let us try the LORD, as some of them did, and were destroyed [killed] by the serpents. Nor grumble, as some of them did, and were destroyed [killed] by the Destroyer. Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore let him who thinks he stands [securely] take heed that he does not [or lest he] fall (1 Cor. 10:6-12 NASB).Paul is writing to the churches, to those who profess faith in Jesus Christ, and his warnings for us are to be taken seriously by us. We who have been graced of God, born again by the Holy Spirit for changed hearts and minds, need to look carefully at our lives. Are we truly trusting in Jesus Christ or are we trusting in our perceived holiness? Do we love Him and hate our sin? If so then that is good--very good. But our gaze must be fixed always upon Christ (Col. 3:1, 2, 3, 4), not ourselves, and not our perceived faithfulness. Yes, the grace of regenerative salvation produces the fruit of salvation, the fruit, or evidence, of the indwelling Holy Spirit (Rom. 8:1-8; Eph. 5:22, 23). But our gaze must always be on Christ, His Kingdom and His righteousness (Matt. 6:33), so that we understand properly how to live. Always looking at other believers, or constantly looking inward at our progress but seeing more failures than we care to admit, produces neurotic and anxiety-inducing doubt, depression, and disappointment. Look to Christ! Stop looking at your disappointing faithfulness. The man mowing his lawn must look ahead in order to cut in a straight line. (He certainly can't look behind him! Stop looking in the past!) Look up! Let Jesus be your obsession and not your failures. Don't chase holiness as an abstract concept. Chase the One who is Holy! You will never grow to be like Christ by continually looking at yourself.
THE PURPOSE FOR THE WARNINGS
Think about the context of the warning passages to the congregations of professing believers. People would join with them in worship of Jesus, seeming so sincere, and later abandon them. Dr. Greg Morse writes: We see these thorns grow even in the hearts of those who seemed
most dedicated to Christ and His work in this world. Such was the tragedy of Demas. Paul writes to the Colossian church, "Luke the beloved physician greets you, as does Demas" (Colossians 4:14). Paul calls him his "fellow worker" in his letter to Philemon (Philem. 1:24). Yet thorny soil he proved to be in the end. "For Demas," Paul writes to Timothy at the end of his life, "in love with this present world, has deserted me, and gone to Thessalonica" (2 Timothy 4:10). In love with this present world, they desert us, they desert Christ--thorny soil.The born-again believer can take these warnings very seriously because he does not want to fall away, because he knows that if he does in fact fall away from faith and from Christ, it proves that his faith was false all along--and that terrifies him. This is why he "takes heed" lest he fall (1 Cor. 10:12): the example of others who fell away "were written down to warn us, who live at the time when this age is drawing to a close. If you think you are standing strong, be careful, for you, too, may fall into the same sin" and fall away (1 Cor. 10:11, 12 NLT 1996). These warning passages, then, possess a truly sanctifying effect. But the fact that the threat of falling away from Christ scares him is itself a good sign. The unregenerate in our midst--do you think they care about warning passages? Hardly! Whatever their confidence that they will be "okay with God" on that Day, whatever soothes their consciences that they don't have to worry about warning passages, these are false hopes indeed!
Still, the believer knows that the heart is deceitful (Jer. 17:9), and he knows this to be true about himself. As devout as he believes himself to be, feeling conviction of sin, feeling the terror of falling away, wanting nothing more than to be a truly regenerate and saved child of God, he knows how deceptive his heart can be; so he presses in even more to the Lord because he does not want to be found out to have been a false believer: someone who professed saving faith but who did not possess saving faith. The warning passages concern me greatly. Why? Because I love the Lord, I want to be with Him forever, and the idea of discovering at some point in the future that I was actually a false believer is so utterly terrifying to me. You will never convince me that the warning passages have no sanctifying effect when I feel the effect within me. I truly believe that the warning passages throughout all of Scripture are endued with power toward sanctification (1 Thess. 4:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8).
Consider Judas. No one thought that he would be the one to betray Jesus. What does that tell you about the outward character of Judas (though no one could see his inner heart)? On the very night when Jesus Himself announced that He was about to be betrayed, many of the disciples wondered if he himself would be the one (Matt. 26:22), but no one turned and pointed the finger at Judas--yet Judas was the one (Matt. 26:23, 24, 25)! What does that tell you about the nature of deception? The purity of deception is that the one deceived does not know that he is deceived. This is why we are urged and warned about looking at ourselves honestly (1 Cor. 11:31; 2 Cor. 13:5; Gal. 1:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 6:7; 1 John 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 2 :1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24; 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; 4:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 5:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21)--taking heed lest we, too, fall (1 Cor. 10:11, 12). Paul urges us not to receive the grace of God in vain (2 Cor. 6:1). We have promises from God that we will be saved by His grace through a saving and living faith in Jesus Christ: "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Cor. 7:1).
Notice he instructs us to be perfecting (present active) holiness--perfecting and perfecting and perfecting. Perfecting something takes a very long time. We will, all of our lives in Christ, be continually perfecting holiness in the reverence and awe of God: trying, failing, recovering ourselves; and progressing, failing, recovering ourselves; then progressing, failing, and recovering ourselves; on and on and on until we finally see Jesus. You fear: "But I'm weak; I'm often frail; and I fail; and there are times I feel overwhelmed; and there are times I don't want to pursue holiness; and I go through seasons of doubt, or depression, or both!" Welcome to life in Christ Jesus! You fit right in with the rest of us! Keep reminding yourself that you didn't save yourself, and you couldn't possibly have saved yourself, and you can't keep yourself saved either! This is why God is working within you and preserving you by His grace and power (Phil. 2:12, 13; 1 Pet. 1:4, 5; Jude 1:24, 25). You ask, "So, He will keep me saved, even though I often fail?" Now you're thinking like a biblical Christian. Yes, God will keep all of us sinner-saints, even though we fail. God isn't saving heroes and saints who attain perfection. There are none! All God has to work with is us sinner-saints: sinners in reality (Rom. 3:23) but saints in Christ (Rom. 3:21, 22, 24, 25, 26; 1 Cor. 1:1, 2)--saints by calling (Rom. 1:7). That means that God called us to be saints, not because we actually became sinless, but in and through the righteousness of Jesus Christ (Rom. 3:24-26 ESV; 1 Cor. 1:30 NIV; 2 Cor. 5:17, 18, 19, 20, 21).
Paul himself confesses that God had set him apart even from his mother's womb, and called him through His grace [Acts 9:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19; see Jer. 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10], God was pleased to reveal His Son in him so that he might preach Christ among the Gentiles (Gal. 1:15); and, yet, he also confesses that he disciplines his body, making it his slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified (1 Cor. 9:27). I must interject here: Paul would not be disqualified from salvation but from ministry (1 Tim. 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-9, 16), since God is the One who has qualified Paul and us who by grace through faith are in Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:6 NKJV; 2 Cor. 3:5, Col. 1:12). This is the same Paul who knows that God has unconditionally elected to save and to justify certain from among mankind (Rom. 9:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5, 13, 14); and, yet, he still strives to keep his mind on Christ and heavenly realities (Col. 3:1, 2, 3, 4); and he considers the parts
of his earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. For it is because of these things that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience, and in them we also once walked, when we were living in them. But now we also put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from our mouths. We are not to lie to one another, since we laid aside the old self with its evil practices and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him--a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian [Indo-European nomadic peoples], slave and freeman, but Christ is all and in all [who belong to Him] (Col. 3:5-11).Paul knows he has not yet attained to perfection (Phil. 3:12, 13), as such is impossible in this life (Rom. 7:14-25), but he still presses on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:14). He knows that God is working within him, to will and to work for His good pleasure (Phil. 2:13), but he also knows that he is called of God to work out his own salvation with fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12). God is working effectually within those who are working out their salvation with fear and trembling. Those who profess faith but who do not possess faith are not working out their salvation with fear and trembling because God is not working effectually within them. This is why they only last for a little while. I don't care if someone claims to be a believer in Christ for 60 years, but then falls away, rejecting faith, rejecting Christ, and remains indifferent to God to death: that person was never truly saved because God is working effectually within those who possess saving faith.
So now you fear that you have to persevere unto the end in order to prove that you are truly saved and in order to have assurance that you will be saved. Good! In one sense I am comforted that you feel the weight of that fear just like the rest of us do at times. Let the godly fear serve you--let it motivate you to press in to Christ and to cling tightly to Him. But know this: 1) that fear is a good sign that saving faith resides within you because those who are not regenerated and saved don't care about spiritual matters (1 Cor. 2:14); and 2) God is the one preserving you (1 Pet. 1:5; Jude 1:24), not you, not your frail attempts. God is the one who will see that you persevere to the end because He knows our weaknesses and our frailties. He remembers that we are but dust (Ps. 103:14). We are fragile, and fickle, and wrestling with inner sin that refuses to die (Rom. 7:14-25), a world that wants nothing but for us to join them (1 Pet. 4:4; 1 John 3:13), and a devil that wants to see us destroyed (John 10:10; 1 Pet. 5:8); and this is the same problem for all of mankind since the Garden of Eden: Eve was tempted with the lust of the flesh (Gen. 3:6a), the lust of the eyes (Gen. 3:6b), and the boastful pride of life (Gen. 3:6c), against which we are sternly warned not to be seduced (1 John 2:15, 16, 17).
IS SALVATION CONDITIONAL?
The answer seems to be yes: "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ," which is the condition leading to the result, "and you shall be saved" (Acts 16:31). Salvation seems to be conditional and, if entirely so, then remaining saved seems inevitably to be conditional. That means that your eternity is in your feeble hands and I think that should greatly trouble you. I will demonstrate below, under "Is Salvation Unconditional?," how salvation is unconditional in its eternal nature rooted in an eternal God--God has unconditionally elected to save some people. The doctrine of Conditional Security holds that perseverance in the faith and, thus, in Christ, as well as final salvation and future justification, depends--with emphasis on the word depends--upon God's work and man's work: the believer "may lapse into a state or period of backsliding and, unless there is return to the Lord, the believer could fall into apostasy and be eternally lost."4 Advocates of this view highlight such passages as the following:
- Whoever has sinned against Me, I will blot him out of My book (Ex. 32:33);
- know the God of your father and serve Him with a whole heart and a willing mind; for the LORD searches all hearts and understands every intent of the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will let you find Him; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever (1 Chron. 28:9);
- May they [enemies of God, Israel, and His people] be blotted out of the Book of Life and may they not be recorded with the righteous (Ps. 69:28);
- "As I live!" declares the LORD God, "I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked but, rather, that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways! Why then will you die, O house of Israel?" And you, son of man, say to your fellow citizens, "The righteousness of a righteous man will not deliver him in the day of his transgression; and as for the wickedness of the wicked, he will not stumble because of it in the day when he turns from his wickedness; whereas a righteous man will not be able to live by his righteousness on the day when he commits sin." When I say to the righteous he will surely live, and he so trusts in his righteousness that he commits iniquity, none of his righteous deeds will be remembered; but in that same iniquity of his which he has committed he will die. But when I say to the wicked, "You will surely die," and he turns from his sin and practices justice and righteousness, if a wicked man restores a pledge, pays back what he has taken by robbery, walks by the statutes which ensure life without committing iniquity, he shall surely live; he shall not die. None of his sins that he has committed will be remembered against him. He has practiced justice and righteousness; he shall surely live (Ezek. 33:11-16);
- You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless [or loses is saltiness], how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men (Matt. 5:13);
- Not everyone who says to Me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in Heaven will enter. Many will say to Me on that day, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your Name, and in Your Name cast out demons, and in Your Name perform many miracles?" And then I will declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness" (Matt. 7:21-23);
- At that time many will fall away and will betray one another and hate one another. Many false prophets will arise and will mislead many. Because lawlessness is increased, most people's love will grow cold. But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved (Matt. 24:10-13);
- Then the Kingdom of Heaven will be comparable to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were foolish and five were prudent. For when the foolish took their lamps, they took no oil with them, but the prudent took oil in flasks along with their lamps. Now while the bridegroom was delaying, they all got drowsy, and began to sleep. But at midnight there was a shout, "Behold, the bridegroom! Come out to meet him." Then all those virgins rose and trimmed their lamps. The foolish said to the prudent, "Give us some of your oil for our lamps are going out." But the prudent answered, "No, there will not be enough for us and you too; go instead to the dealers and buy some for yourselves." And while they were going away to make the purchase, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding feast; and the door was shut. Later, the other virgins also came, saying, "Lord, lord, open up for us." But he answered, "Truly I say to you, I do not know you" [cf. Mat. 7:23; they knew about Him but did not know Him savingly: Matt. 7:21, 22, 23]. Be on the alert, then, for you do not know the day nor the hour (Matt. 25:1-13);
- No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the Kingdom of God (Luke 9:62);
- If you continue in My word then you are truly disciples of Mine (John 8:31);
- I am the true Vine and My Father is the Vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the Word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the Vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit--for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch, and dries up; and they gather them and cast them into the fire and they are burned (John 15:1-6);
- Do not be conceited, but fear; for if God did not spare the natural branches, He will not spare you, either. Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God's kindness, if you continue in His kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off (Rom. 11:20-22);
- but I discipline my body and make it my slave, so that, after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified (1 Cor. 9:27);
- Now these things happened to them as an example, and they were written for our instruction, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed that he does not fall (1 Cor. 10:11-12);
- Now I make known to you, brethren, the Gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the Word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain (1 Cor. 15:1-2);
- I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ for a different Gospel (Gal. 1:6);
- You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by Law; you have fallen from grace (Gal. 5:4);
- He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach--if indeed you continue in the faith, firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the Gospel that you have heard (Col. 1:22-23);
- Let no one in any way deceive you, for it [the return of Jesus] will not come unless the apostasy [the falling away] comes first (2 Thess. 2:3);
- fight the good fight, keeping faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith (1 Tim. 1:18-19);
- Demas, having loved this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica (2 Tim. 4:10);
- we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard so that we do not drift away from it. For if the word spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just penalty, how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? (Heb. 2:3);
- but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house--whose house we are if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end. Therefore, just as the Holy Spirit says, "Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as when they provoked Me, as in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your fathers tried Me by testing Me, and saw My works for forty years. Therefore I was angry with this generation, and said, 'They always go astray in their heart and they did not know My ways'; as I swore in My wrath, 'They shall not enter My rest.'" Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called "Today," so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end, while it is said, "Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, as when they provoked Me." For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief (Heb. 3:6-19) [they never truly possessed saving faith];
- Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it. For indeed we have had Good News preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them because it was not united by faith in those who heard. For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said, "As I swore in My wrath, they shall not enter My rest," although His works were finished from the foundation of the world. For He has said somewhere concerning the seventh day: "And God rested on the seventh day from all His works"; and again in this passage, "They shall not enter My rest." Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had Good News preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, He again fixes a certain day, "Today," saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before, "Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts." For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another Day after that. So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. Therefore let us be diligent to enter that rest so that no one will fall through following the same example of disobedience (Heb. 4:1-11);
- For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good Word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame (Heb. 6:4-6);
- Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful; and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. For if we go on sinning willfully [in a lifestyle of sin upon sin upon sin with no conviction; cf. Rom. 6:1, 2, 3] after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the Covenant by which he was sanctified [this seems to be a backslidden believer], and has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know Him who said, "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge His people." It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. But remember the former days, when, after being enlightened, you endured a great conflict of sufferings, partly by being made a public spectacle through reproaches and tribulations, and partly by becoming sharers with those who were so treated. For you showed sympathy to the prisoners and accepted joyfully the seizure of your property, knowing that you have for yourselves a better possession and a lasting one. Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised (Heb. 10:23-36);
- For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness than, having known it, to turn away from the holy Commandment handed on to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and, "A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire" (2 Pet. 2:20-22);
- He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the Book of Life, and I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels (Rev. 3:5);
The passage referenced above in Ezekiel (Ezek. 33:11-16) has a context that does not relate to New Testament life in Christ for the born-again believer. Our first clue is the commission of Ezekiel to be God's Watchman on the Wall of Jerusalem (Ezek. 33:1-2). God is addressing faithless Israel, those pretending to be righteous but who are not, but holding Ezekiel accountable to warn God's covenantal people to remain faithful to Him; with a reference to discipline by God regarding other nations coming against them. Ezekiel had waited for the fall of Jerusalem for 70 years because of Israel's unfaithfulness to YHWH--the time had finally arrived. This passage has nothing to do with New Testament salvation, justification, or preservation in the faith of Jesus Christ. Context is King when we are interpreting God's Word. We must pay close attention.
I understand the concern of he Conditionalist regarding salvation and the threats of forfeiting salvation, because in some of the passages quoted, the person being warned is said to have been in Christ--a term reserved for the regenerate believer who is in union with Christ by grace through faith in Him. "Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away" (John 15:2). You are the salt of the earth, but if the salt becomes tasteless, it is good for nothing (Matt. 5:13). Conditionalists say that there were Ten Virgins in Jesus' parable, Virgins referring to being clean, proper, and considered holy, but only Five Virgins prepared themselves for Christ's return (Matt. 25:1-13). Conditionalists argue that some believers begin well but end badly, becoming progressively estranged from God, and later forfeiting their salvation. But the branches that do not bear fruit "in Jesus" are wild branches connected to Him but do not belong to Him;5 much in the same way that there are wheat and tares in the field of God, the Church of Jesus, and, even though some of the tares look like wheat, and even though they grow together with the real and true wheat, they will never be wheat, and their presence among the wheat--like the presence of wild branches that produce no spiritual fruit (because they are not connected to the Vine) among true branches of the Vine--does not validate their status as being salvifically in Christ.
Moreover, the salt in Christ that loses his saltiness does not refer to salvation but to productivity and usefulness. Salt, in the ancient world, was used as a preservative so that meat would not decay quickly. "Similarly," writes Dr. Daniel M. Doriani, "the presence of a morally strong disciple can retard moral decay in society."6 Recall how God blessed wicked Egypt for the sake of Joseph (Gen. 39:2-6, 21-23; 40:38-44). We are not saved by being salt and light: salt and light are results and evidences of being saved. "If any man's work" for Christ "is burned up," having been tested by the purifying flames of Christ's righteousness, he will suffer loss but he himself will be saved" (1 Cor. 3:15; cf. 1 Cor. 3:10-15). Paul says that believers plant the Seed of the Word in the world, and we water that Seed, but God is the One who makes it grow (1 Cor. 3:5, 6, 7, 8). Paul calls us God's fellow-workers, God's field, and God's building (1 Cor. 3:9). Regarding our personal building, in which God resides (John 14:17; 1 Cor. 3:16), Paul encourages us to be careful how we build onto our personal house--that we should be very careful with the resources we use: Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones (good resources), or perhaps with wood, hay, or straw (bad resources), each person's work will become evident on the Day of Judgment when Christ Jesus rewards the spiritual work of God's children (see 1 Cor. 3:10-15).
Furthermore, some of the references above appear to refer to people who have a saving relationship with Jesus--and such only occurs by grace through faith in Him--but some people may not. "I am amazed that you are so quickly deserting Him who called you by the grace of Christ for a different Gospel" (Gal. 1:6). These professing believers were being deceived by false teaching. Hence the warning. But God uses Paul to shake His people from such deception. So the warning retained an efficacious work: God is protecting His people (John 17:15, 16, 17), He is keeping His people in the true faith (John 6:37, 39; 15:26; 17:11, 12), and He is enlightening His people to truth (John 14:26; 16:13; cf. the difference between believers and non-believers at 2 Thess. 2:8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14). "You have been severed from Christ--you who are seeking to be justified by Law; you have fallen from grace" (Gal. 5:4). Essentially Paul's message is this: If you want to return to failed attempts at perfectly keeping God's Law, the Law of Moses, then that will sever you from Jesus because Jesus fulfilled the Law of God sinlessly on our behalf (Rom. 3:21-26; 11:1-36; 1 Cor. 1:30 NIV). You can have grace, or you can have Law, but you can't have them both: yet only one saves. "For the Law was given through Moses; grace and truth were realized through Jesus Christ" (John 1:17 NASB). So God shakes His people, through Paul's message, from the yoke of attempting to perfectly keep the Law, which they cannot do, in order to grant them the grace He intended them to enjoy solely in Christ Jesus.
"We must pay much closer attention to what we have heard so that we do not drift away from it" (Heb. 2:3). Can the true believer drift away? Rational thinking would answer that, if we cannot drift away from the Gospel we heard, then we need not be warned against it. The Jewish believers to whom the author of To the Hebrews writes were under pressure by Jewish leaders who still embraced the Law of Moses in order to attain the salvation and justification of YHWH but who also rejected Messiah Jesus. The theme of "drifting away" from faith and from Christ is repeated throughout. Richard D. Phillips writes: "One of the key ideas here is that drifting away is something that happens largely unnoticed. While it is happening the changes are imperceptible; only later do its consequences become clear. This is a grave danger against which we must respond with careful attention."7 This reminds me of the time that I went swimming with a couple of buddies in the Pacific Ocean in San Diego. We had no idea that the current was gradually taking us further and further from the shore. We were playing games and joking around, laughing, and not paying attention. Suddenly, I looked toward the beach and said to the guys, "Wow. Look how far away the beach is." We didn't know that we had drifted so far from shore. I panicked, because there were no lifeguards, I am not a strong swimmer and I'm also asthmatic. One friend said: "Don't panic. We will begin to swim southward and gradually reach the shore. But don't panic." So that's what we did. We swam for about half an hour, little by little, but eventually reached the shore. I was shocked that we had unnoticeably drifted so far away.
That panic inside of me was intense. Within a couple seconds I imagined that there was no way I would reach shore, that I would drown, and that my parents would be so heartbroken to have lost me in such a needless way. Phillips continues: "There is a current to this present evil age, pulling strongly out from the safe harbor of salvation in Christ. We do not have to actively betray Jesus or renounce our faith. Simply by not paying attention, by becoming preoccupied with the sights and sounds of this world, we can be easily drawn out until we are swept away forever."8 Because some professing believers neglected "keeping faith a good conscience," they eventually "suffered shipwreck with regard to the faith" (1 Tim. 1:19-20 NIV). Phillips adds: "Do you realize that? Do you realize that if you do not pay attention to your spiritual condition it will deteriorate on its own? Do you realize, given the corrupt nature of this world and of your heart, that you naturally become dull and then deadened spiritually, steadily believing the lies of this evil age? Without giving heed to the spiritual resources God provides, your heart will revert to greed, pride, avarice, sensuality, and malice--all those characteristics that define our natural state in sin and lead to destruction."9
Some Conditionalist may snidely remark: "But you say truly regenerate people cannot fall away so how can you believe this to be true?" That is not helpful (or fair) at all. We are not to so arrogantly presume upon God's sovereignty and unconditional election that we neglect to obey His Word: "continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling" (Phil. 2:12 NIV). That is a biblical command of God to the believer. But, should the believer panic because he knows his own frailty and inefficiency, we are comforted: "for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose" (Phil. 2:13). The two are not mutually exclusive. God ordains the means as well as the end. Phillips adds:
Drifting away happens on its own without much effort on our part but staying on course is quite the opposite. It requires constant diligence. C.S. Lewis was typically perceptive when he wrote: "We have to be continually reminded of what we believe ["So I will always remind you of these things even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have. I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live ... And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things" (2 Pet. 1:12-15 NIV); "I want you to recall the words spoken in the past by the holy prophets and the command given by our Lord and Savior through your apostles" (2 Pet. 3:1-2 NIV)]. Neither this belief nor any other will automatically remain alive in your mind. It must be fed. And as a matter of fact, if you examined a hundred people who had lost their faith in Christianity, I wonder how many of them would turn out to have been reasoned out of it by honest argument? Do not most people simply drift away?" In the matter of our belief, as in all other matters, Christianity requires hard work; the New Testament describes the life of faith as a fight, a race, and a field in which a farmer labors. Paul says in various places: "I press on [Phil. 3:12-14] ... I follow after [1 Cor. 1:11] ... I strive [1 Cor. 9:24-27] ... I fight [2 Tim. 4:7]."10Even if you drift away to a certain degree, but you do not lose your salvation, what if you drift away into heresy, or into immorality that causes you to lose your ministry, or your marriage or your godly reputation? What if you drift away from your relationship with Christ in such a way that you do not lose your salvation but you become ineffective in His Kingdom and then have to stand before Him and give an account (2 Cor. 5:6, 7, 8, 9, 10)? How do these warnings not at least sting the conscience of some people with regard to having to give an account to God with what He has given us to do in His service (Matt. 25:14-30)? Regardless, I believe Dr. Phillips is right in concluding, "When it comes to the past tense of our salvation [Rom. 8:29, 30]--to what is already finished and secure, namely, our justification through faith in Christ--there is no place for our works [Gal. 2:16]. We receive forgiveness of our sins not by our work but by Christ's work. Faith is, first, essentially passive; we do not act but [passively] receive [Eph. 2:8, 9; Titus 3:4, 5; 2 Pet. 1:1], resting upon Christ's saving action on our behalf [Rom. 3:21-26; 1 Cor. 1:30]."11
Even if you disagree on the issue of faith being effectually given to, or birthed within, only certain people--the unconditionally elect--you can at least agree, I should hope, with these remarks: "But when it comes to the present tense of our salvation--that which is worked out progressively, namely, our sanctification--this is extremely active [Heb. 12:14]. Martyn Lloyd-Jones explains it well: 'In the matter of our righteousness and justification we can never say too often that we do nothing, we can do nothing, it is entirely the work of Christ. But once we are saved and given this new life, then the progressive work of sanctification does not call for passivity, and we are exhorted to activity.'"12 We have even been sanctified, made holy, or rendered holy and redeemed for the sake of Christ (1 John 2:12) by grace through faith (Acts 26:18) in a past-tense sense (1 Cor. 6:11; Heb. 10:10, 14). But we are also being progressively made more and more holy (2 Cor. 3:18), being progressively conformed more and more to the image and likeness of Christ Jesus our Savior, LORD and King (Rom. 8:29); but we are also commanded to continually keep perfecting holiness in the fear (or awe and reverence) of God our Savior (2 Cor. 7:1; 1 Pet. 1:13, 14, 15, 16). This is a life-long process.
Language can be a trickster. We often make statements that seem to indicate one manner of thinking but intend nearly the opposite. "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be My disciple" (Luke 14:26 NASB; cf. ASV, CEB, CJB, CSB, EHV, ESV, GNV, HCSB, ISV, JUB, KJV, LEB, LSB, MEV, NABre, NET, NIV, NIRV, NKJV, NRSV, RGT, RSV, TLV, VOICE, WEB, WYC, YLT). That is quite the literal translation but not at all what Jesus means to convey. The GNT, Good News Translation (which is, from what I can tell, the second edition of the Today's English Version), translates the verse properly: "Those who come to Me cannot be My disciples unless they love Me more than they love father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters and themselves as well" (Today's English Version, Second Edition, ®1992). The same proves true for 2 Peter 2:1 regarding false teachers who deny "the Master who bought them," the question being if such people were truly "bought," or "purchased," by the blood of Christ Jesus (Acts 20:28; 1 Cor. 6:19, 20; 7:23); for Peter also writes: "Knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot" (1 Pet. 1:18-19 ESV). So we read:
But false prophets also arose among the people [of God], just as there will also be false teachers among you [the godly in Christ], who will secretly introduce destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing swift destruction upon themselves. Many will follow their sensuality and, because of them, the way of the truth will be maligned; and in their greed they will exploit you [the truly regenerate believer] with false words; their judgment from long ago is not idle and their destruction is not asleep. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to pits of darkness, reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; and if He condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly lives thereafter; and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from [overwhelming] temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the Day of Judgment, and especially those who indulge the flesh in its corrupt desires and despise authority (2 Pet. 2:1-10a NASB).I will focus briefly on three issues: 1) the false prophets who deny "the Master [Jesus] who bought them"; 2) that there is a sharp distinction between the ungodly and the godly who occupy the same space in worship--we are not called to try and rip out the tares from the wheat; and this will remain so until Christ returns (Matt. 13:24-30); and 3) that the Lord knows how to protect His true children from this world of sin.
False teachers creep secretly into the church, posing as true believers, but bringing in with them their heresies. In what sense, then, can false teachers who are not regenerate believers be "bought" or "purchased" or "ransomed" by Jesus? The simple answer is that they were not bought / purchased / ransomed by Jesus or they would not embrace heresy and deny Jesus Christ. These false teachers "refused to submit to Christ's authority yet claimed to be part of His household. They claimed Christ as their Redeemer, but they refused His lordship, thus revealing their true character as unregenerate enemies of biblical truth."13 The notion of being bought extends to the purchasing of a slave and then assigning "that slave responsibilities over various tasks. They now owed their complete allegiance to him," the master who bought them, "because they were his personal property."14 False teachers wanted people to think they had been bought by the Master, Jesus, in order to draw away from His own church those who would listen to their heresies. Their refusal to submit to Christ proves they did not belong to Him; they were not truly purchased by the blood of Christ. They didn't lose their redemption because they had never been redeemed in the first place. They didn't lose their salvation because they had never been saved in the first place. Redeemed and saved people forever remain redeemed and saved people.
The nature and the character of false teachers and false believers is further detailed by Peter in the rest of the chapter (2 Pet. 2:10b, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22). The context does not support the idea that these people were once regenerate believers who later rejected Christ and thusly forfeited salvation: regenerate believers do not "forsake the right way" (2 Pet. 2:15). Nor can this passage be a proper reference for the truly regenerate: "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them" (2 Pet. 2:20-21). These people here were given knowledge of how to escape this world of sin and be saved; but they lasted only for a bit and then they went back to the world, became entangled in sin, and were overcome. These people reflect those who hear the Gospel as it is sown among the thorns, but the worry or concerns of the world, and the deceitfulness of wealth or greed or lust choke the Word, and it becomes unfruitful (Matt. 13:22). There is a stark distinction between the true and false believer--at least there is to Jesus: the Lord knows those who belong to Him (2 Tim. 2:19). They went out from us, thus displaying that they never truly belonged to us, or else they would have stayed with us who are in Christ (1 John 2:19).
The Lord also knows how to protect His own from this world of sin and He knows how to keep His own from embracing this world of sin and from falling away from Him. If we could fall away from Him then we would fall away from Him; for we are weak, we are tempted by inner sin (Rom. 7:14-25; James 1:13-18), the world (1 Pet. 4:4; 1 John 2:15-17) and the devil (Eph. 4:27; James 4:7; 1 Pet. 5:8). "No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation He will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it" (1 Cor. 10:13 ESV). The Lord knows how to rescue the godly from overwhelming trials (2 Pet. 2:9 ESV). But He does not rescue the ungodly; He does not purchase / ransom / redeem the ungodly; He does not claim or save the ungodly. We know the Lord Jesus had not "bought" the false teachers, and false believers, because His blood will only atone those whom God His Father intends to save, to rescue, to ransom, to justify, to sanctify and to glorify (Rom. 3:21-26; 8:29, 30; 1 Pet. 1:1-2 ESV). "Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory with great joy, to the only God, our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen" (Jude 1:24-25 ESV).
The passages in Hebrews are not all exactly the same. Regardless, the writer grants these warnings and we are to take them seriously, yet he concludes the section in this manner: "But we are not of those who shrink back to destruction, but of those who have faith to the preserving of the soul" (Heb. 10:39)! Why do Conditional Security advocates miss this conclusion? All of these warnings, all of them true, and yet the author is convinced that the true believer possesses a faith that preserves his soul to the very end! This person will not lose his saltiness (Matt. 5:13); he does not rely on his works or his ministry for his salvation (Matt. 7:21-23); he does not fall away and betray others and hate others (Matt. 24:10-13); he is prepared with oil in his lamp (Matt. 25:1-13); he does not look back with favor upon his old life in sin (Luke 9:62); he continues in the Word of Christ (John 8:31; 1 Cor. 15:1-2), bears fruit in Christ (John 15:1-6), remains humble in his love for the Lord and for Israel (Rom. 11:20-22) and disciplines himself so as not to be disqualified (1 Cor. 9:27; 10:11-12); and he loves the Gospel and he loves Christ Jesus (Gal. 1:6).
He does not seek to be approved by the Law (Gal. 5:4) but by grace and the righteousness of Christ imputed to him (Rom. 3:21-26; 5:1; Eph. 2:8, 9); he continues in the faith, firmly established and steadfast (Col. 1:22-23), refusing to run away from Jesus (2 Thess. 2:3); he fights the good fight, keeping faith and a good conscience (1 Tim. 2:18-19), hating this present world (2 Tim. 4:10; 1 John 2:15, 16, 17); he pays close attention to the Gospel and rejoices in so great a salvation (Heb. 2:3); he has no intention of hardening his heart by the deceitfulness of sin (Heb. 3:6-19) because he has united what he has heard with faith in Christ (Heb. 4:1-11); he has been enlightened, and he has tasted of the heavenly gift, and he has been made a partaker of the Holy Spirit by having tasted the good Word of God and the powers of the age to come--and, so, the thought of falling away from it is treacherous to him (Heb. 6:4-6); he holds fast the confession of his hope in Christ, and has by grace forsaken a life of sin, for he loves the Lord his God and knows that it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of a righteous God (Heb. 10:23-36); he has by grace and the power of God escaped the defilements of the world (1 Pet. 1:3, 4, 5) and, so, he will not get entangled and overcome by sin, for he is not a dog returning to its vomit, and he is not a pig returning to wallow in the muck and mire of sin once he has been cleansed (2 Pet. 2:20-22); he, by the grace and power of Christ within him, is an overcomer (1 John 5:4) who cannot have his name blotted out of the Book of Life (Rev. 3:5).
IS SALVATION UNCONDITIONAL?
The question of the conditionality of salvation seems also to be unconditional. God chose to be the God and Savior of certain people from among Israel (Gen. 17:7; Ex. 6:7; Lev. 26:12; Isa. 46:4; Jer. 31:33; 32:38; Ezek. 37:27; Amos 3:2; Rom. 2:28, 29; 11:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29; 2 Cor. 6:16; Heb. 8:10); and He chose to be God and Savior of certain people from among Gentiles (Rom. 11:11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32). They did not choose Him. He unconditionally chose them to be His special people: Jew, Gentile, one in the Messiah (Eph. 2:11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; cf. Rom. 1:16; 2:9, 10). God never said, "I'll be your God if you want Me to," or "I'll be your God if you choose Me," but, from all eternity past, He decided to have a people for Himself (Deut. 14:2; 28:9; Isa. 62:12; Eph. 1:5 ESV; 1 Pet. 2:9) and graciously chose each individual who would make up His people (Deut. 7:6, 7, 8, 9; Rom. 8:29, 30; 9:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33; 1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16; Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; James 1:18). Why? Because our fall into sin rendered us entirely helpless to choose our own God (Rom. 3:10-18; 1 Cor. 2:14).
God was predetermined to have a people for Himself (Deut. 7:1-8; Eph. 1:5). Satan and other fallen angels, perceived as gods governing various territories of earth (cf. Deut. 32:8, 9; see Deut 7:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18; 2 Cor. 4:3, 4; 10:3, 4; Eph. 6:12; Rev. 2:13), took control over the fallen mass of people estranged from God because of sin (Isa. 59:2; 2 Cor. 4:3, 4 Eph. 2:1, 2, 3). God reclaims people, one person at a time, from the mass of fallen sinners taken captive by devils (Col. 1:13) and He intends to keep His spoil (John 10:10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 27, 28, 29, 30). Since God has determined to take for Himself a people, to unconditionally be their God, then our assurance of final salvation and future justification is utterly irrevocable because our salvation is rooted in the eternal nature, work, and character of God our Redeemer (Rom. 11:29).
THE CONDITION OF THE REGENERATE BELIEVER
The born-again believer can rest in his final salvation and future justification not only in Christ's accomplished work for him; as well as God the Father's preserving power and grace to keep His elect; but also by his being baptized in the Holy Spirit. There is an explicit imperative to the believer to always be in a state of being passively influenced by ("filled with") the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18). We are called to the practice of being led and influenced by the Holy Spirit (Eph. 5:18)--to always keep in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:25 NIV; cf. Gal. 5:16)--so that Jesus can effectively live His holy life in and through us (Gal. 2:20) while God the Father conforms us to the image of Jesus (Rom. 8:29). We infer that the baptism in the Holy Spirit is an initiation in the Spirit by the act of Christ, and an initiation into the body of Christ, by the universals we read in Paul: For ἑν, in, one Spirit we were all baptized εἷς, into, one body [the body of Christ] ... and we were all made to drink ἑν, in, one Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13).
The baptism in the Holy Spirit identifies every believer with / in / to Jesus Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. Every believer is "in" Christ (Eph. 1:20; 2:6) and Christ is "in" every believer (John 14:20). We are in Him, one in Him, united with and in Him forever. There cannot exist today a regenerate believer who is not at the same time immediately identified with Jesus, baptized in the Holy Spirit, and immersed into His Church. Paul insists that all believers were made to drink in one, or the same, Holy Spirit. If we believers have all been baptized into Christ Jesus, and we believers have all been baptized into one Body--the Body of Christ Jesus--then we believers have all been baptized into the Holy Spirit by the act of Christ because there cannot be some believers who have been baptized into Christ, and also into His Body, but not into the Holy Spirit. That negates Paul's use of the word all (1 Cor. 12:13). To someone who informs me that I am saved by grace through faith in Christ, and that the Holy Spirit dwells within me, but that I still need to step into "the next spiritual level," to be baptized in / of / with / or by the Holy Spirit--some suggesting the caveat of the evidence of speaking in tongues as a result of this baptism in the Spirit; others suggesting the caveat of any manifestation mentioned at 1 Corinthians 12:7, 8, 9, 10 as a result of this baptism in the Spirit--I kindly respond accordingly.
When I was saved and regenerated by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5), given spiritual birth by God the Father (John 1:12, 13), the life-giving and Christ-resurrecting Holy Spirit who created me (Job 33:4; Ps. 104:30) took up residence within me (Rom. 8:11), and He changed my wicked heart, so that now I desire what I once had no desire to do: to worship God the Father and Creator through God the Son, Jesus Christ, in the power of God the Holy Spirit (Ezek. 36:26, 27; John 4:23, 34). The indwelling Holy Spirit speaks to me through the unerring and Spirit-breathed Word of God (1 Tim. 4:1; 2 Tim. 3:16 ESV; Rev. 2:7, 11, 17, 29); He opens my understanding to spiritual issues (1 Cor. 2:12); He teaches me and guides me into all truth (John 16:13; Rom. 8:14; 1 John 2:27); He gives me inner strength (Eph. 3:16); He moves me to pray and intercedes to the Father on my behalf (Rom. 8:26, 27, 28); and He enables me to avoid temptations of my old way of life (Rom. 8:13). He is proactively preserving me.
He produces Christlike character in me, progressively (2 Cor. 3:18), as evidence of His indwelling (Gal. 5:22, 23); He calls me into the service of God in Christ Jesus (Acts 13:2, 3, 4) by granting me spiritual gifts (all gifts listed in the New Testament include the following: Rom. 12:6, 7, 8; 1 Cor. 12:7, 8, 9, 10, 11; Eph. 4:11, 12, 13; 1 Pet. 4:10, 11); and He gives me power to tell others the Gospel (Acts 1:8). I have been given all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in and seated with Christ Jesus (Eph. 1:3; 2:6); I have been elected unto salvation by the grace of God (Eph. 1:4) through faith in Jesus (Eph. 2:5, 8), considered absolutely holy and blameless before God in Christ (Eph. 1:4) even though I, most clearly, am not; and I am predestined from all eternity to be God's adopted son through Jesus Christ by God the Father and for God Himself (Eph. 1:5).
I have been lavished with His love and grace (Eph. 1:6, 8), redeemed by the blood of Jesus and forgiven of all my offenses--past, present, and future (Eph. 1:7)--having been sealed by the Holy Spirit for the Day of Redemption (Eph. 1:11, 12, 13, 14) so that my salvation is already a "done deal" from God's perspective (Rom. 8:29, 30); and the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ has been irrevocably imputed to me by grace through faith (Rom. 3:21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26; 4:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16). In Christ by the Holy Spirit I have been raised up with Christ and seated with Him in the heavenly places, so that "in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:6, 7). I am His workmanship, created (re-created) in Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand for me to walk in (Eph. 2:10). I am not a stranger to His Covenants, nor a stranger to His Kingdom, but am a full citizen of God's Eternal City with full rights of the firstborn son because of the work and grace of God's one and only unique and eternal Son Jesus (Gal. 3:26, 29; 4:4, 5, 6, 7, 28; Eph. 2:19).
I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives His life in and through me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me (Gal. 2:20). I have received the promise of the Holy Spirit through faith (Gal. 3:14). I have been "filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God" (Phil. 1:11); for life, to me, is Christ (Phil. 1:21); God is at work within me, giving me the will to work for His good pleasure (Phil. 2:13). The Gospel of God, the Gospel of Christ, came to me in power and in the Holy Spirit with full conviction (1 Thess. 1:5); God graciously graced me from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth (2 Thess. 2:13); He saved me, not on the basis of deeds which I had done in righteousness (Isa. 64:6), but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon me richly through Jesus Christ my Lord; so that, being justified by His grace, I would be made an heir according to the hope of eternal life (Titus 3:5, 6, 7), which I have as an anchor, an absolute future certainty (Eph. 1:13-14 NLT), for my soul (Heb. 6:18).
All three Members of the Godhead Trinity, the limitless power of the Triune Creator of the Universe and of Heaven and Earth, lives within me--God the Father (John 14:23), God the Son, Jesus (John 14:20), and God the Holy Spirit (John 14:16); including the reality of all the biblical truths above that God caused to work for me and in me, and yet you think I can lose all that I have already been graciously given? By the eternal foreordination of God the Father I was elected to salvation by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit to obey Jesus Christ who, according to His great mercy, has caused me to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Pet. 1:1, 2, 3).
I have graciously received a faith of the same kind as that of the apostle Paul and the other disciples of Jesus Christ by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ Himself, as well as granted the multiplying of the grace and the peace and the knowledge of God the Father and also of Jesus my Lord, for His divine power has granted to me everything I need pertaining to life and godliness through the true knowledge of Him who called me by His own glory and excellence (2 Pet. 1:1, 2, 3). Through these graces, God has also granted me His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them I may become a partaker of the divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4). I lack nothing of God in Christ. In Jesus Christ, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell in Him (Col. 1:19), and He dwells within me--God in Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit--God the Sustainer dwells within me. I lack nothing. I need no other imagined blessing. I can rest in His finished work and eternal promise to save me.
CAN THE BELIEVER HAVE ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY OF FUTURE SALVATION?
The only biblical answer possible is yes. Not only can the believer have absolute certainty of future salvation but he is called of God to embrace this certainty! Having explicitly informed us that saving faith is a gift we receive by the grace of God (2 Pet. 1:1; cf. Eph. 2:5, 8, 9; Phil. 1:29), Peter then instructs us: "make every effort to confirm your calling and election" (2 Pet. 1:10 CSB). The "call" is the effectual invitation of the Gospel to God's family by His grace through faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:6, 7; 8:28, 29, 30; 9:24; 11:29; 1 Cor. 1:2, 9, 24, 26; Eph. 1:18; 4:4; 2 Tim. 1:9; Heb. 3:1). This effectual call is heard by the elect alone. First, Peter wants the believer to know, "His [God's] divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of Him who called us to [or by] His own glory and excellence, by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that, through them, you may become partakers of the divine nature--having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire" (2 Pet. 1:3-4 ESV). We escaped this corruption solely by the proactive and effectual grace of God (Col. 1:13). Second, because we are granted these privileges, he then writes: "For this very reason, make every effort," the same phrase found at 2 Peter 1:10, "to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love" (2 Pet. 1:5-6 ESV).
The reason for this strong encouragement is to give the believer the "how to" when he commands us to make every effort to confirm our calling and election. "For if these qualities are yours, and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind--having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins" (2 Pet. 1:8-9 ESV). Notice that the believer who has neglected to develop his faith thusly did not lose his salvation but, rather, has been rendered blind, with a sort of temporary amnesia, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. We make our calling and election sure by being active in our faith--a faith that was give to us as a gift of God (2 Pet. 1:1; Eph. 2:8, 9)--supplementing our faith with ever-increasing virtue, spiritual or biblical knowledge, self-control, steadfastness (when you continue regardless of negative circumstances), godliness, brotherly affection for our brothers and sisters in Christ, and, ultimately love: love for God (with all our heart, soul, and mind: Matt. 22:37), love for neighbor (which includes every single person we meet: cf. Luke 10:25-37), and a proper and biblical love for ourselves (Matt. 22:39).
Dr. Thomas Schreiner writes: "Those who live ungodly lives show no evidence that they truly belong to God, that they have genuinely received forgiveness,"15 that they have not been born again by the Grace and Work of God. The Book of 1 John repeats this theme in nearly every chapter (1 John 1:5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 2 :1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24; 3:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22; 4:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 5:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 11, 12, 13, 18, 19, 20, 21). The person who has been regenerated by God cannot live an entire life of sin because God's seed, σπέρμα (sperma), dwells within him (1 John 3:9). We might say that God's life-giving residue abides within the believer to such a degree that, no matter the challenges or pitfalls or difficulties that confront him throughout his lifetime, he belongs to God as one of His offspring. In essence, then, the born-again believer will not live his life entirely in and consumed by sin (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3). He is no longer under the sovereign dominion of sin (Rom. 6:14) even if he daily feels the deadly effects of sin (Rom. 7:14-25). The indwelling Holy Spirit "bears witness with our spirit" that we belong to God, that we are adopted children of God and confirmed in His family, children whom He has promised to save (Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 13, 14; 2 Pet. 1:4), children who share in His divine nature (2 Pet. 1:4), as well as co-heirs with Jesus Christ (Rom. 8:12-17).
CONCLUSION: WHO SAVES WHO?
The only biblical answer possible is that God and God alone saves us. We did absolutely nothing to be saved by God. We cannot give the Lord our hearts, as we often hear the Gospel framed, but only give God our sin. The unregenerate "person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor. 2:14 NASB 2020). If God did not save us then we would not and we could not be saved. Prior to His effectual grace, we did not know about our need for salvation, and we did not care about our need for salvation. Salvation belongs to the LORD (Ps. 3:8; Jonah 2:9; Rev. 7:10). Our fallen and dead state in sin renders us entirely helpless with regard to salvation (Rom. 8:5, 6, 7, 8; Eph. 2:1, 2, 3). God is the only Savior and He cannot fail to save those whom He saves.
You may argue that we had to believe / trust / exercise faith in Jesus in order for God to save us. After all, Scripture reports, "Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved" (Acts 16:31). Do you think God responds to your faith by saving you? That is unbiblical. We are saved by grace through faith (Acts 2:8)--"and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God" (Eph. 2:8b EHV); "and this ... is not of yourselves [not through your own effort] but it is the [undeserved, gracious] gift of God" (Eph. 2:8b AMP). Grace saves you, not faith, as faith is merely an instrument through which the song of God's salvation is played--to His tune and not to one of our own making. Peter writes to "those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours, by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ" (2 Pet. 1:1 NASB 1995). Paul teaches us: "But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life" (Titus 3:4-7 NASB '95). God saved us by regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit: the words are right there in the text (see also Eph. 1:20; 2:6; James 1:18).
Note carefully: the Holy Spirit preserves the believer in Jesus. The apostate--the one who at one time claimed to have believed in Jesus and was saved by God's grace but who later rejects Christ and remains in that condition--is entirely without hope (Heb. 6:4-8; 10:26-31). What apostates prove is that they were never really a born-again believer who belonged to Jesus or else they would have remained with us (1 John 2:19). They did not lose their salvation. Born-again believers cannot lose their salvation because their salvation was predetermined by God from eternity past (Rom. 8:29, 30; Eph. 1:4, 5; Rev. 13:8; 17:8), they are presently being kept for salvation (Eph. 1:13, 14; 2 Cor. 3:18; 4:6, 7; Jude 1:24, 25), and God has determined beyond all shadow of doubt that they will be saved (1 Cor. 1:30, 31; 2:6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 15, 16; Eph. 1:11; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; Phil. 1:6; 3:20, 21; Col. 3:1, 2, 3, 4; 1 Thess. 1:2, 3, 4, 5). The late John MacArthur was right: "Salvation is meaningless if it isn't eternal."
To suggest that a truly regenerate person can fall away from faith, fall away from Christ Jesus, spiritually dying yet again, therefore losing his salvation, is to infer that God is powerless to keep His own promises to save the ones believing in Christ (1 Cor. 1:21, 30; 1 Pet. 1:3, 4, 5), and to keep by His own power those who are His children (Eph. 1:13, 14; Jude 1:24). The warning passages serve as a great sanctifying effect because the regenerate person does not want to be found outside of Jesus Christ--to be found as a fraud and one whose faith was not genuine. There are wheat stalks in the fields of God and there are also weeds (Matt. 13:24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30). Sometimes they both look alike and are nearly indistinguishable. But God knows the distinction (Matt. 13:29, 30). The believer should neither be worried every day of his life about not being a true believer nor so confident and arrogant that the issue of his eternal salvation never crosses his mind. The Christian should live a balanced life: humbly relying on Christ for his salvation while seeking to be obedient to the Word. We he falls, and fall he will, he is to get back up, confess his sin and ask for forgiveness (1 John 2:1, 2), and carry onward. A sinner-saint is one who, as the song says, falls down and gets back up.
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1 Archibald Thomas Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, Vol. V, the Fourth Gospel and the Epistle to the Hebrews (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1932), 445.
2 Douglas Sean O'Donnell, Reformed Expository Commentary: 1-3 John (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2015), 96.
3 Ibid.
4 Kevin J. Conner, The Foundations of Christian Doctrine: A Practical Guide to Christian Belief (Portland: City Christian Publishing, 1980), 261.
5 Richard D. Phillips, Reformed Expository Commentary: John, Volume 2: Chapters 11-21, 284.
6 Daniel M. Doriani, Reformed Expository Commentary: Matthew, Volume 1: Chapters 1-13, 135.
7 Richard D. Phillips, Reformed Expository Commentary: Hebrews, 47.
8 Ibid., 47-48.
9 Ibid., 48.
10 Ibid., 49.
11 Ibid.
12 Ibid.
13 Jim Shaddix and Daniel L. Akin, Christ-Centered Exposition: Exalting Jesus in 2 Peter and Jude (Brentwood: B&H Publishing Group, 2018), 52.
14 Ibid.
15 Thomas R. Schreiner, Christian Standard Commentary: 1 & 2 Peter and Jude, eds. E. Ray Clendenen and Brandon D. Smith (Brentwood, TN: B&H Publishing, 2020), 360.
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