ETERNAL SECURITY?
For if God spared not
the natural branches, take heed
lest He also spare not thee....
Romans 11:21
One debate among Christians which has raged throughout the centuries and continues to this day, is the debate over "eternal security". Simply stated, the main question of the debate is: Can a person who is once saved and places faith in Jesus, ever lose their salvation? The answers to this are generally never as simple as a mere 'yes' or 'no'. For example, we could also ask: What constitutes "saving faith"? What if someone expresses faith in Christ and shows no evidence of change whatsoever in their life? If a once saved person commits some deep horrible sin, are we to assume the person was never saved? If works are to be sought as evidence of saving faith, does this then contradict the fact that salvation and eternal life are a free gift? Any Bible student will find no shortage of works attempting to answer these questions. In my own personal study, I have never found any answers that truly satisfied me. Having gone from being Catholic as a young child to independent Baptist as a young adult, I have seen and studied both ends of the spectrum. As a Baptist I always vigorously upheld the doctrine of eternal security to the point where I believed that one single act of faith one time in a persons life was all that was required for salvation, but that any attempt to find evidence of this saving faith in a person's life was a perversion of the gospel which resulted in a salvation by works. I understand that this is still the view of many fine people. I do not doubt the sincerity of those who continue to believe and teach this. In general, those who believe this exhibit an evangelical and missionary zeal which is rarely seen in trying to reach the lost with the Gospel. However, I cannot help but think that the doctrine of eternal security in its most extreme form (that which requires only a simple one time act of faith, or a short prayer, and promises heaven regardless of how one's life is lived) is the natural reaction, and is directly related to the the teaching that the lost will suffer eternally in hellfire. No one wants to believe that anyone will burn forever. Many vehemently profess to believe this until death takes the life of one close to them. At that point, any rationale will be used to avoid the conclusion that a person has gone to hell to suffer eternally. This is where the doctrine of eternal security comes into play. It can be reasoned that although a person exhibited nothing in their life which would indicate faith in Christ, there is always hope that perhaps at some point in the persons life they called out to God, or prayed in such a way that God accepted as saving faith, thus guaranteeing the person's eternal destiny in heaven. Personally, the doctrine of eternal security has always made me a bit uneasy. As a Baptist, I was taught how to be a "soul-winner"; one who leads someone to Christ. This was to be done in four steps, followed by saying a short prayer with the person who was to be "saved". After this, it was the "soul-winners" job to give the "convert" assurance from scripture that they were "saved"; that they had passed from death to life, and that no amount of personal sin or unrighteousness in their life could ever undo it. They were bound for heaven, their destiny was sealed, and the person should never doubt it. I always thought to myself; "Who am I to tell this person or anyone else whether or not they are 'saved'". Ultimately it is God alone who knows who has trusted Him to the point of saving. In fact, it's God himself who does the saving. The last thing I wanted to do was to give anyone a false hope and assurance. But, on the other hand, if I asked someone to look at their life as evidence of salvation, wasn't this teaching salvation by works? These issues, which I have struggled with for a long time, finally came to head when I was studying prophecies relating to the end of the age. In Matthew chapter 24 Jesus says:
And then says at other points in the same chapter:
I found it rather confusing that we are introduced to one group which our Lord calls "the elect" of which he states, rather explicitly, that they can not be deceived. He also says of this same group:
On the one hand, we are introduced to this "elect" group which seemingly can not be deceived while enjoying special protection from God, but on the other, strict warnings to watch for the second coming lest it overtake those listening and they find themselves in the same position as "the hypocrites". This contrast between full assurance of salvation, and sober warnings to endure, is by no means limited to the book of Matthew, but can be seen to run through the entire New Testament. Anyone with even a slightly open mind will be forced to admit that there are scriptures that can be brought forth in support of either viewpoint. The problem in this particular case, is that this isn't simply a matter of plotting obscure passages against clear ones, but that both sides seam to have scripture which argues emphatically in their favor. Those that argue in favor of eternal security maintain that if salvation is truly a free gift, then nothing other than faith itself must be required to obtain it. Of those who hold this view, there are two main viewpoints as to what a Christian life should be after someone obtains salvation by faith. One group holds that a "saving faith" must, and always will result in a fruitful life of good works. They maintain that although the works have nothing to do with the salvation, they are the evidence that it's there. If someone who at one time claimed to have gotten saved shows no evidence of spiritual fruit in their life, it is maintained that the person was never saved to begin with. In this particular line of thought, the truly saved man will endure to the end because he can not do otherwise. Those who do not endure to the end were "never saved to begin with". If "the dog returns to its vomit" it was "never saved". If someone "fall's from grace", they never had it. Although "faith without works is dead", a "saving faith" will always produce good works. The other view of eternal security is more extreme. They maintain that a person can be saved even if the person shows absolutely no evidence of faith or change in their life. If a person expresses faith one single time, then the person is sealed for all eternity and is heaven bound, no matter how they choose to live their life. Those who hold this view maintain that to look for evidence of salvation in ones life shows a lack of faith, and is akin to "salvation by works". In recent years, these two schools of thought have been very antagonistic toward one another, even to the point of accusing each other of damnable heresy. Those who hold that evidence of saving faith must be demonstrated, have dubbed the opposing camp as "easy-believism". Those who hold that nothing except a one time act of faith is required have dubbed their opponents as "lordship-salvationists". In contrast to both of the above camps, are the "Arminians" who believe that salvation is gift which is conditioned upon our keeping the faith and maintaining good works. They believe that a person once fully saved, can sin to the point of losing their salvation and ultimately end up in hell. These views are summarized in the following chart:
The differences in these four views are striking, and to me, somewhat disturbing. How is "the church" supposed to make disciples when it can't even agree on the nature of salvation? Most people see the above three methods of scriptural interpretation as the only alternatives. The problem is, I have never felt comfortable with any of them, mainly because I don't feel that any of them do a good job of harmonizing ALL the scriptures without resorting to "mental gymnastics". One very common example of this is a passage out of Hebrews 6:
Those who teach "lordship salvation" say that the passage is hypothetical. That is, someone who is really saved can't really fall away, but if such a thing were possible, then they could never be renewed to repentance. Those who teach "easy-believism" maintain that the passage doesn't apply to Christians at all but to "tribulation age saints" after the "rapture". Or some teach the above method, that the passage is hypothetical, and still others believe that the person in the passage was never saved to begin with. They were "enlightened" but never "believed". They "tasted" but never "swallowed", etc. The third group maintains that the verse tells of a very real danger; that a Christian can lose their salvation and end up in hell. The problem is that those who teach this do not also teach what the verse so explicitly states... that those who lose it can never get it back! I would ask the reader, are you really truly comfortable with ANY of these explanations? Isn't it obvious that all of them seem to be avoiding what the passage so clearly states, even though different parts of the passage are denied by the different viewpoints? Let's look at another:
The explanations are as follows:
Once again, NONE of the explanations offered by orthodox scholars seem to fit the plain, literal sense of the passage. I don't claim to be a scholar or to have any advanced knowledge. But I honestly believe that if I come to a passage of scripture such as these, where no known explanation seems to fit the passage without resorting to twisting, then something is just wrong with our understanding. I don't believe that the word of God ever contradicts itself, but on the other hand, I don't believe that we should have to force it NOT to contradict itself. In other words, if the plain, clear sense of a passage contradicts my system of theology, then I'm the one who is in error. If no known explanation fixes the problem, then they are equally all wrong. This isn't a matter of pride, or of me thinking that I'm right and everyone else is wrong. It's a matter of honesty and conscience. I believe that there is a way to make sense out of all the scriptures without creating any contradictions, or having to resort to mental gymnastics. I believe that these problems are created by the following:
So once again we see that these problems run very deep. They run right to the core of what most people are taught from a very early age, and because of this, they are not easily solved. I believe that the reason why most scholars cannot resolve the seeming contradictions between the texts which would teach eternal security and those which would argue against it, is because their entire system of theology is fundamentally wrong. Any system which believes in the immortality of the soul, and in so doing founds itself on Satan's very first lie, "Ye shall not surely die", can only end in confusion and contradiction and such is the case when it comes to the doctrine of eternal security. I honestly believe that if we are willing to drop preconceived ideas, and believe the Word, even when it goes contrary to our our traditions, that we can, and will arrive at the truth. . I hope to show on the pages of this web site that there are no contradictions in the scriptures once we realize the following:
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