Perseverance of the saints is one of those subjects that used to bedevil me for a long time. It seems that there are strong proofs on the other side - until you examine each of these "proofs" point by point and in context.
But rather than go right to those problem passages, it seems that the better course would be to state the case positively, to find from the Bible just what it means to be a Christian, This in itself will be the best proof against the idea that anyone, truly born again and given a new nature, gets unborn again and has the new nature taken away.
God's gift is not like that. Jesus Christ is the Door, the Way, the Life, the True Shepherd, the True Vine and so much more. The predetermined plan of the Father for the Son was a bloody painful death so that He could rescue us from sinful rebellion and poverty and give us an inheritance, a hope and new life in the Spirit. It is an insult to think that, after he did all this for us, and after the Son willingly suffered for us, that He would be unable to keep the gift in our hands. His love and grace made us new creatures. We cannot erase our new nature. Neither can we lose the gift He gave us. "He who began a good work in us will complete it until the Day of Christ Jesus".
Consider these verses: Rom. 8:29- 30, 38; 10:28; 11:29; Phil. 1:6; Heb. 6:17; 2nd Tim. 2:19; 1st Pet. 1:4- 5 and see that:
What God plans will not change - and His elect were planned to be so
from before time.
Our inheritance will not be revoked.
Our foundation cannot be shaken.
Our seal cannot be broken.
All these things that have to do with our salvation were given to us
by the grace of God. Do we think that somehow by our effort we can
hold onto it now? "Having begun in the Spirit, are we now to be
perfected in the flesh?" (Gal. 3:3) If it would be up to us then we
would certainly lose our salvation. But since we did not enter into
this new life by the will of the flesh (John 1:12- 13), neither do we
maintain it by our own efforts. We are "kept by the power of God".
Jesus assures us that all that the Father gave to Him (Jesus) were
kept. Not one of them will perish.
It is very possible that God's saints do sin horribly and become backslidden. But they do not stay there. They are not happy there. Shortly after Balaam's prophecy, in which he praised God and the people of God, he was killed by those very same people. He never joined the people of Israel, but stayed with the people who were a curse to Israel. And in their judgment he was judged too. Likewise, God tells us (anyone who possesses or professes love to God) to "come out from among them and touch not the unclean thing".
Mr Arminian gets saved. After a certain amount of time, Mr. A. heads for a crisis in which God knows that he will deny the faith and turn back on God (This is, after all, what many Arminians believe). Since God foresees what A. will do, why doesn't God take A home before he "becomes" unsaved? After all, any disaster would be preferable to going to Hell.
This is a predicament for anyone who doesn't believe in the perseverance of the saints, yet believes that God loves the Christian and that He is omniscient. He must say that either:
1. God is omniscient, but is unable to intervene (unbiblical), or
2. God is not truly omniscient in a perfect sense, but, since reality
is time-contingent, God's omniscience is limited by time's
constraints (unbiblical), or
3. God is truly omniscient and sovereign, yet does not love those He
saved enough to see them through to Heaven (also unbiblical).
What is the answer to this predicament? To recognize that God's love plus His sovereignty plus His omniscience means perseverance for the elect. Or to use Jeremiah's words (Jer. 31:3):
"Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you."
Or Paul's (Rom. 8:31- 39) " Who shall separate us from the love of God....?"
John 6:39 is just as straightforward, in which Jesus says:
"This is the Father's will [thelema - "intention"] who has sent Me, that of all whom He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day".
Did you catch that? We were thinking about our gift of eternal life as something given to _us_ by God, forgetting that we ourselves are the Father's gift to the Son. We may lose our own gifts - and often do - but God knows how to keep His gifts.
Everyone one who is given by the Father to the Son will be saved and will be be presented again to the Father. For us, this means perseverance of the saints. For God it means the perfection of His plans and the unchangeableness of His purpose.
Written Feb. 1, 2003
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Updated: August 8, 2005.
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