Editors’ note: The Christian Post Opinion Page has published two countering views on Calvinism. To read the opposing view in the piece titled “Is ‘once saved always saved’ a biblical teaching?,” click here.
It’s a scenario that’s puzzled countless Christians for a very long time.
It’s along the lines of something I’ll bet you’ve heard before from another believer at some point in your Christian walk: “My Uncle Henry used to be someone who was at church every time the doors were open. He taught Bible study, served in various capacities within the church and other Christian organizations, and prayed all the time. Now, he says he doesn’t believe in God and won’t set foot in church. I can’t figure out what’s happened!”
Ever heard a story like that?
John Chipman refers to just such a thing in his opinion article “Is ‘once saved always saved’ a biblical teaching?” and quotes several places in Scripture about supposed believers abandoning the faith, just like Uncle Henry, in an attempt to argue that Christians can lose their salvation. It’s a position that many take and is a cornerstone doctrine in Arminianism.
Let me tell you why I respectfully disagree, and also tell you what I think happens with the Uncle Henry’s of the world.
When it comes to our salvation and its perpetuity, we only have two options open to us: 1. A temporary regeneration in both reality and experience or 2. a permanent regeneration in both reality and experience. There are no other possibilities.
Those who think you can lose your salvation believe in option 1 — that a person can be born again and start down the road of repentance and godly living but “die” spiritually once more through deserting the faith, which results (again) in no holy longings for the things of God. Both the saving act of God and their sanctification process can be nullified by said person; the permanence of their salvation is ultimately in their hands alone.
Does that give you any pause at all? Hopefully, the idea of your eternal destination depending (in the end) on your own willpower sends a chill down your spine.
Chipman says, “I believe that it is entirely possible to be confident of one’s future salvation.” But my question to that is, how can you, if everything is riding on you? As John MacArthur says, “If it is possible to lose my salvation, then I will have very great difficulty enjoying my assurance. If my salvation can be temporary, then at best, my assurance is temporary too.”
But that’s not the case if the reality of yours and my salvation is option 2.
If our regeneration is permanent, it’s of God’s doing and under His protection, as Peter says:
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in Heaven for you, who are protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:3–5, my emphasis).
God does our keeping and maintaining of the faith needed to spend eternity with Him. Chipman disagrees and quotes Phil. 2:12 about our charge to “work out your salvation” in an attempt to argue that our salvation’s security is on us alone. However, he fails to quote the next verse, though, where we’re told, “for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”
That verse loudly trumpets an important fact we need to remember: God doesn’t just purpose the beginning of our salvation; He also purposes its end. A. A. Hodge reminds us of this when he writes: “Regeneration is a single act, complete in itself, never repeated.”
But what about the Uncle Henrys out there who walked the walk and now don’t? Aren’t they living examples of salvation being uncertain in this life?
Not at all.
John tells us, “They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19).
In their commentary on 1 John, Kistemaker and Hendriksen say of this verse: “This text teaches the doctrine of perseverance. The unbelievers … were never part of the Church because they did not belong to Christ. Their presence in the visible church was temporary, for they failed in their perseverance. If they had been members of the invisible church, they would have remained with the body of believers. As F. F. Bruce observes, “The perseverance of the saints is a biblical doctrine, but it is not doctrine designed to lull the indifferent into a sense of false security; it means that perseverance is an essential token of sanctity.”
Will some professing believers bail on Jesus? Yes. But that’s because they had a false vs. true faith, with the evidence of that being their apostasy. True believers are “kept for Jesus Christ” (Jude 1).
And that’s the best news we can get.
It delivers the peace and confidence we need where our eternal destiny is concerned, plus, it shows the brilliant beauty and strength of the true Gospel in contrast to one where my salvation is always in doubt, as Charles Spurgeon says:
“I could never either believe or preach a gospel which saves me today and rejects me tomorrow, a gospel which puts me in Christ’s family one hour, and makes me a child of the devil the next, a gospel which first justified and then condemns me, a gospel which pardons me, and afterwards casts me down to Hell. Such a gospel is abhorrent to reason itself; much more is it contrary to the mind of the God whom we delight to serve.”
Amen to that.
Robin Schumacher is an accomplished software executive and Christian apologist who has written many articles, authored and contributed to several Christian books, appeared on nationally syndicated radio programs, and presented at apologetic events. He holds a BS in Business, Master’s in Christian apologetics and a Ph.D. in New Testament. His latest book is, A Confident Faith: Winning people to Christ with the apologetics of the Apostle Paul.
