Most Protestants who believe in eternal security believe that if you fall away, you were never saved in the first place. Some Fundamentalists, however, believe that even if you do fall away, you will still be saved, no matter what. This essay is aimed mostly at those Fundamentalists who believe that you can't lose salvation, even if you fall away.

John 4:14 - "but those who drink of the water that I will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I give will become in them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life."

John 5:24 - "Very truly, I tell you, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life, and does not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life."

John 6:37 - "Everything that the father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away."

Romans 8:38-39 - "For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Ephesians 1:13-14 - "In him you also, when you had heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and had believed in him, were marked with the seal of the promised Holy Spirit; this is the pledge of our inheritance toward redemption as God's own people, to the praise of his glory."

1 John 5:13 - "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life."

These passages, and others, are used by Fundamentalists to "prove" that once you believe, you are guaranteed salvation no matter what, even if you fall away. While there are others, I think that these 6 passages pretty much sum up the whole argument from Fundamentalism; most (if not all) other passages they use basically just reiterate what these 6 say. While these passages may seem convincing at first, I will go through and explain each one of them, explaining why they don't support the "Once saved, always saved" belief. Afterwards, I will give some biblical proofs against "Once saved, always saved."

At first, this may seem like irrefutable proof for the "Once saved, always saved" belief; once we drink of what Jesus gives us, we will never be thirsty. What could be more secure? However, upon closer examination, this argument falls to pieces. The water that Jesus gives IS salvation, and Catholics agree that you cannot lose your salvation. The difference here is that while Catholics believe we are saved when die and get to heaven, Fundamentalists believe that we are saved once we accept Jesus. So, the real issue here is not can we lose our salvation, but when are we saved. Since this passage says nothing about when exactly we are saved, it gives no proof or disproof for the "Once saved, always saved" belief.

This verse seems VERY convincing at first because it says that all who believe will be saved and have already passed on from life into death. Now, if we read a little bit further, to verse 29, we read, "those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of condemnation." This may seem like a contradiction. At first Jesus says that all we have to do is believe, and then he says that we must do good works. Taken hyper-literally (and out of its context), John 5:24 would mean that all we need to do is believe that Jesus died for us, even if we reject Him. However, any Protestant will tell you that we must also accept Jesus and repent, so belief doesn't mean ONLY belief. With this in mind, I ask how can belief NECESSARILY exclude works if it doesn't exclude repentance and acceptance?

All this verse says is that Jesus will never cast out those who come to Him. What it DOESN'T say, however, is that people can't cast themselves away from Jesus, and this is what Fundamentalists try to prove with this passage. Catholics agree. Jesus will never cast us away, but that doesn't mean that we can't leave Him.

All this passage says is that nothing can separate us from the love of God. Fundamentalists use this passage to try and prove that nothing, not even falling away, can separate us from God, but they misinterpret it. All it says is that nothing can separate us from the LOVE of God. God still loves those who won't be saved, but that doesn't mean that they're going to heaven. In John 3:16, it says that God loves the whole world. If we are to use the Fundamentalist interpretation, we would come to the conclusion that nothing, not even rejecting God, can separate the whole world from Him, and therefore everyone would be saved. This, however, is absurd. Fundamentalists don't believe that EVERYONE will be saved.

Fundamentalists use this verse to try and prove that God PLEGED (or guaranteed) our salvation. They say that if He were to take back His pledge, then He would be a liar. Now, this may seem convincing at first, but it falls under careful scrutiny. In Colossians 1:22-23, Paul tells us that this guarantee is conditional. He says that we have been reconciled to God as long as we continue in the faith.

Again, because we need to repent and accept Jesus in addition to believe, there's no reason why Fundamentalists can automatically rule out works in the salvation process. Plus, the whole letter is about how we must stay in God's grace by loving our neighbor (1:6; 2:3-11; 3:10, 23; 4:20; 5:3), indicating that we must continue to love our neighbor and stay in God's grace to be saved.

Matthew 24:13 - "But the one who endures to the end will be saved."

1 Corinthians 4:4 - "I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me."

1 Corinthians 9:27 - "but I punish my body and enslave it, so that after proclaiming to others I myself should not be disqualified."

Romans 11:22 - "Note then the kindness and severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God's kindness toward you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off."

1 Corinthians 10:12 - "So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall."

*Galatians 5:4 - "You who want to be justified by the law have cut yourselves off from Christ; you have fallen away from grace."

Philippians 3:11-14 - "if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained this goal; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. Beloved, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press onward toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly (Greek literally means upward) call of God in Christ Jesus."

1 Timothy 5:8 - And whoever does not provide for relatives, and especially for family members, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."

Hebrews 3:14 - "For we have become partners of Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end."

Hebrews 10:26-31 - "For if we willfully persist in sin after having received the knowledge of truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful prospect of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has violated the Law of Moses dies without mercy 'on the testimony of two or three witnesses.' How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by those who have spurned the Son of God, profaned the blood of the covenant by which they were sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know the one who said, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay.' And again, 'The Lord will judge his people.' It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."

2 Peter 2:20-21 - "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overpowered, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than, after knowing it, to turn back from the holy commandment that was passed on to them."

*Note - while this verse doesn't really apply to us because we do not look to the law for justification, it does show that we CAN fall away from grace.

Some Fundamentalists will object and say that John 5:25 and 1 John 5:13 say that Christians have eternal life, and it wouldn't be eternal if we could lose it. We can see from John 5:29 that salvation is dependent upon (at least in part) our works, so Jesus could not have been speaking hyper-literally and saying that we have eternal life the way the saints in heaven do. In 1 John 5:18, John says that Christians don't sin, which is obviously a hyperbole. From this, we can reason that verse 13 MIGHT also be a hyperbole (or, maybe more accurately, not hyper-literal), which would better fit in with passages that say that we can fall from grace.

Both Catholics and Fundamentalists agree that salvation is a free gift from God that we can't earn. However, Fundamentalists say that having to stay faithful would be "earning" our salvation, so we don't have to stay faithful. However, they misunderstand why salvation is a gift. Salvation is a gift because no matter what we do, God doesn't HAVE to save us. It's a gift in the same way that giving a tip to a waiter is a gift. We give them a tip because of their service, but we don't HAVE to give it to them.

Jesus and the apostles placed a TON of emphasis on doing good works (and also not doing bad works). Jesus' commandment was that we do good works (John 13:34-35, 15:12, 1 John 3:23). To give one example of an apostle preaching the importance of works, Paul said that we MUST NOT indulge in sexual immorality (1 Corinthians 10:8). Now, are these just "suggestions"? Did Jesus just "recommend" that we do good works? Or are these binding only on those who have not fallen away? Do God's commandments cease to mean anything once we fall away? Are humans so powerful as to nullify God's commandments, yet still be saved? The same can be said of believing; we MUST believe.

There is one big logical inconsistency in the Fundamentalist belief in salvation. While they believe that "Those who believe in him are not condemned; but those who do not believe are condemned" (John 3:18), they fail to realize that someone who believes CAN stop believing and start not believing. So if I, as a "saved" Fundamentalist, stop believing, then I don't believe, and the bible says that those who don't believe won't be saved! Believing is like breathing; we can't take just one breath and then continue to live without breathing. Similarly, we can't just believe once and then continue to be saved without believing. It is a life-long process that must be continued till the very end.

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