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The Permanence of Salvation

Posted by Brance on March 27th, 2005 filed in Relationships

Part 3 of the series "Relationships, God’s Way"

This is a brief follow up lesson concerning salvation. I want to talk about the permanence of salvation. This is sometimes referred to as ‘the perseverance of the saints’, ‘once saved always saved’, or ‘eternal security’. The question that lies at the root of this discussion is this: is salvation permanent? Or can you loose it? Let’s see what the Bible says about it.

In our first lesson we took a look at the plan of salvation. We saw that it is God who saves us because our sin separates us from Him, and makes it impossible for us to attain to His glory (Romans 3.23). We learned that salvation was accomplished through Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross. His death paid the price for our sins (Romans 6.23). We saw that the reason God saved us is because He loves us (Romans 5.8). We also learned that his action was a freely given gift that required nothing more from us than belief and confession (Romans 10.9).

Ephesians 2.4 - But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions - it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God - 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

There is nothing we can do to save ourselves. God saves us because of his love, and by his grace. This passage makes it clear that we cannot earn salvation by our works. This means that our salvation is not dependent on our obeying the law of God.

Galations 2.16 - know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have put our faith in Christ Jesus that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by observing the law, because by observing the law no one will be justified.

No one will be justified by observing the law because "all have sinned" (Romans 3.23). Sin is disobedience to the law of God. So we see that we are saved by faith alone. What about this faith? Is our salvation then dependent on how strong our faith is? What if we lose faith? First let’s see where the faith comes from.

Romans 12.3 - For by the grace given me I say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you.

Our faith is a gift from God. He provides the faith for us. Sometimes in our weakness we do have doubts, but that does not mean that God abandons us. The Israelite people demonstrated a lack of faith time and time again throughout the OT, but God was faithful to his promise and did not abandon them though they had not yet been bought by Christ’s blood.

Jeremiah 32.38 - They will be my people, and I will be their God. 39 I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good and the good of their children after them. 40 I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them, and I will inspire them to fear me, so that they will never turn away from me.

Here God is obviously speaking of the Jews, but in Romans chapter 11 Paul tells us that we have been grafted onto that tree and become heirs of Abraham’s faith. Therefore this promise would hold true for us. God will see to it that those who truly belong to him will not turn away from him.

Philippians 1.6 - being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.

Hebrews 12.2 - Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Romans 8.38 - For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

These verses assure us that Christ will finish what he started, our salvation. And nothing can separate us from his love. In other words, once you’re saved, it’s permanent.

Some people believe you can lose your salvation. They usually arrive at this conclusion based on scripture passages that have been taken out of context, making it difficult to determine what was really meant. How could you lose your salvation? What if someone left the church? Left the faith altogether? Would that person lose their salvation?

1John 2.19 - They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.

We saw earlier that God would not let those who truly belong to him to turn from him. So if someone did appear to turn from God, he must have been a pretender to begin with. In this passage from 1 John, John is talking about false teachers leading people away from the church. While we are cautioned against false teaching, here John tells us that if anyone leaves the faith, then that person wasn’t a Christian to begin with. It is very possible for someone to be in church all their life and not be a Christian. James said that the demons believe in God and tremble, but they don’t accept him as God. Someone could believe in God but not accept his gift of eternal salvation. It seems foolish, but it does happen.

The other reason a person might believe they could lose their salvation is because of something they did, or didn’t do. First of all, the only sin that is unforgivable is to reject God until you die. If you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, then you haven’t rejected him. So any sin you might commit, even after getting saved, is forgivable. What about someone who just didn’t DO anything for the Lord?

1Cor. 3.10 - By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as an expert builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should be careful how he builds. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, 13 his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man’s work. 14 If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. 15 If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.

Here, Paul is saying that what we do after we are saved is building on that foundation. If you obey God and do his work, you are building something that will last. In other places Paul speaks of being rewarded in heaven for our work on earth. If you do not obey God and do not do his work, your works will burned up and nothing will be left. You will still be saved, but that’s all you’ll have to show for your life.

So we see that the Bible makes it plain that if you are truly saved, you can never lose your salvation. It is God’s gift to you. But he does expect you to use his gift wisely and build something worthwhile on that foundation.