The Gospel for Life预览

The Greatest Guarantee

Getting Our Toes Wet: 

Some say ‘change’ is the only thing that’s permanent. You can get a ‘permanent’ wave in your hair, but it doesn’t last. Same with ‘permanent’ hair color. You can even take ‘permanent’ marker off most things. Unlike earthly things, God doesn’t change. His promises are permanent. One of those promises is that our salvation is permanent.

Diving in Deep:

The Holy Spirit lives in a believer’s heart as God’s guarantee of salvation. The Bible refers to our salvation as eternal. We can never lose something God says lasts for eternity. If salvation wasn’t eternal, that would imply that we could do something to lose it. Since God requires perfectly holy obedience, there is no way we wouldn’t lose it if it was possible! Our salvation rests solely in what Jesus has already done. It’s the Holy Spirit residing in us that makes us able to persevere until the end. 

In Philippians 2:12, Paul tells us “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” He was exhorting the Philippians to strive against sin and choose righteousness. But in the next verse Paul added, “For it is God who works in you, both to will and to work, for his good pleasure,” because without the Holy Spirit’s power, we wouldn’t be able to do it! 

If a person professes faith in Christ and then walks away from it, that doesn’t mean they have lost their salvation. It shows that they were never truly saved to begin with, as 1 John 2:19 says. Judas is an example. But sometimes truly regenerate believers backslide and fall into serious sin. King David committed adultery and murder. He may have fallen away from grace, but he never fell out of grace. After being rebuked by Nathan, he repented.  

 Back on Dry Land:

God starts with a promise to finish. Philippians 1:6 says, “And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.” Saved is a permanent condition! If you are a believer, nothing can separate you from the love of God. You were chosen by the Father before the foundation of the world, bought with the precious blood of Christ, sealed with the Holy Spirit, for eternity!