“For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.” (Romans 10:10)
The very question as to whether a believer can lose his or her salvation has divided Christians for years? In fact, how your church answers that question will often determine whether a visiting family will come back for another service.
I recently watched as the question unfolded in my own church when a young lady rushed to the altar at the end of the service to speak with my pastor. She explained that she had not changed her sinful lifestyle since the day she accepted Christ and asked if her failure to change could result in the loss of her own salvation. My pastor recognized that many of us spiritually struggle with the very same question and asked her if he could share her dilemma with the congregation. “What do you think?” he asked us.
If you’re Baptist or Presbyterian, your church doctrine does not believe salvation can be lost. In other words, there are no conditions. Once saved, always saved! In fact, your members hold hard and fast to John 10:28-29, which reads, “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.”
How would those who believe that salvation cannot be lost answer the question that was posed to my pastor? While they are careful not to judge, the likely response is that someone who hasn’t changed their lifestyle may not have experienced salvation to begin with. After all, it was Jesus himself who said, “By their fruit you will recognize them.” (Matthew 7:20)
But if you belong to a Methodist or Pentecostal denomination, eternal security doesn’t make sense. There’s no way someone can get into heaven without changing the way he or she lives. Salvation and repentance go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other. The Assemblies of God Website puts it this way: “Because we are creatures with free wills, we must be vigilantly on guard because the enemy of our soul, the devil, “prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith” (1 Peter 5:8-9). In our Fellowship we believe carelessness can lead to apathy, apathy to neglect, and neglect to a conscious decision to sin. We often refer to this spiritual decline as backsliding. We believe one who backslides is in danger of losing his salvation if the individual persists in rejecting the Spirit’s call to repentance and restoration. Luke 8:13 makes clear the fact that believers can lose their salvation. It says some “believe for a while, but in the time of testing they fall away.” Revelation 22:19 says “If anyone takes words away from this book of prophecy, God will take away from him his share in the tree of life, and in the holy city.”
I asked my wife what she thought of all the arguments the other day. “What does it matter,” she quipped. “If you live your life in a way that is pleasing to God, then you never have to worry about it.”
She’s right. It really doesn’t matter if we continue in faith and grow in sanctification and holiness day by day.
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Absolutely Not! I do not believe in Eternal Security!
Think for a minute……… Lets say Ummmmm Okay;the crucifixion of Jesus!!!!!!!!!
What happened there?
Well I’ll tell ya what; I dont have my bible on hand so it may definitely not be word for word for word. But God knows my heart and intentions! But I’ll tell what I do know in my own words casue I believe the Lord has given me some wisdom in my young age!
Pontias Pilate asked who shall we free; Jesus of Nazareth, or Barabbas? The corwds of people all shouted; “Free Barabbas, Crucify Jesus, Free Barabbas Crucify Jesus!
Pontias wiped his hands and said his blood is on you.
Anyways, Nails in Hands, Nail in feet, spike in the side, crown of thorns, vinegar sponge!
Pretty gruesome if you ask me. and he didnt even deserve it. He chose, becasue he wahted to give people an optuion to choose him and eternal life!
For every drop of blood he shed, thats how much X 777,000 sins from the each of us that he died for! All 6.8000,000,000 of us now and however many were on earth since the beginning of time! Thats Something else huh!
I believe the crucifixion was the biggest rejection of all. They casted lots at the foot of the cross for Jesus’ clothes! Even though Jesus cired out Forgive them, they know not what they do; I dont think that all of them went to Heaven! Well definite except for the thief that before he died ask Forgive me, and remember me in your Father’s Kingdom!
So if someone who asks Jesus into their heart someday, and thanks him for dying on the cross for their sins and asks him to come in!…………..and then down the line they for some reason they fall away from Christ, they say for some reason “*F* the church nothing anymore in it for me! *F* Jesus, *F* the Holy Spirit, *F* Pastor So and So, I done with this BS!” they put their Bibles on the shelf, no longer listen to their Christian rock, skip out of church, absent from youth group, hanging out with the wrong crowd, drinking and smoking and drugs, baltenly taking the Lord’s name in vain without a care. etc.
if they died in their blatent Fallout. I dont really believe they;ll go to Eternal Life in Heaven! Sorry!
Im not saying we dont all sin, but……..
Why would/should Jesus accept the people in, that A. after they turn and run from him after B. they already accepted him at one time!
I believe its in Hebrews 6 somewhere where it states something like “its impossible for some one who has tasted the Lord’s Goodness, and the Holy Spirit, and his Promises! They fall away and be brought back to repentence; for it is their loss casue its as though they are Crucifying the Lord all over again!”
Now I dont think The Lord will turn away a Prodigal. Like if someone turned away and then truly sincerely recommited their life at a concert, or crusade or something like that! I believe the Lord wiped their transgressions clean and they are a new creation once more. Thats where the term Born Again Christian comes from I believe. Same with RECOMMITMENT!
but if they didnt come back to God before they died. sadly, I dont really think they’ll still enter the Kingdom!
Thankyou!
God Bless!
I do not think that someone who is truly saved will want to turn away from God, intentionally…therefore,, if you are truly dedicated to serving with all your body, mind and soul, no, you will not lose salvation….in retrospect, the drunkard runs to the altar, goes through the motions and doenst truly accept Christ, lives as if he has for a period of time and reverts to all his old ways of living, he was probably never truly saved and commited to start with….I think the drunkard will bust hell wide open….now, had he surrendered all, served, worshipped, prayed, studied, maintained his relationship with God, he had truly been saved and not did the acting show for all the other church members to see….just my view…