 The Perseverance of the Saints
Part One
John G. Reisinger
We now to come the fifth point in the study of the five Doctrines of Grace. We have covered the following:
In this article we begin a study of the fifth point, Grace Victorious, or the nature of true saving faith, and develop the doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints. The basic question we are discussing is this: "Can a true child of God lose his salvation and be eternally lost?" Historically some Christians known as Arminians answered "yes" and another group of Christians called Calvinists answered "no." The Arminian was perfectly consistent with the basic premise of his theological system. He taught that the one decisive factor in any individual's conversion was the sinner's free will choosing to accept Christ. The Arminian correctly and logically reasoned that "If a sinner's free will could begin salvation then that same free will could chose to end salvation." If the system based on free will is correct then it indeed logically follows that a Christian can choose to quit following Christ just as he chose to follow him in the first place. If the one is true the other is also true. The Calvinist was just as consistent and logical as the Arminian but since the basic presupposition of his system was different, he naturally came up with a different answer. The Calvinist said, "What God's sovereign grace and power begins, it will also finish." A true Christian will be kept by the power of God and be given grace to persevere to the end. It is essential to see that at that point in history all Christians, both the Arminians and Calvinists, agreed that only those who persevered in faith would ultimately reach heaven. A true Calvinist today is far closer to a historic Arminian in his understanding of the nature of saving faith than he is with the "eternal security anti-Lordship" crowd. Obviously both of these groups quoted texts of Scripture that appeared to prove their particular position. One group quoted texts such as the following to prove that one can lose his salvation:
Most discussions about this subject today are of a totally different nature than they were historically. Today people have a tendency to start in the middle of the subject and then proceed to go round and round in useless arguments. The whole discussion of this subject has radically changed in the last one hundred years. As mentioned above, it must be emphasized that in the beginning of this dispute both Calvinists and Arminians agreed that only those who persevered unto the end would be saved. Both sides accepted Matthew 10:22 at face value. The Calvinist insisted just as strongly as the Arminian that one had to endure to the end or he would indeed be lost. The argument was not over the necessity of perseverance but over the certainty of it. The argument was over whether all Christians would be able to persevere unto the end. The doctrine of free will forced the Arminian to believe that some Christians would not be able to hold out and could, with their free wills, turn back to unbelief and be lost. The doctrine of free and sovereign grace forced the Calvinist to say, "We agree that only those who persevere to the end will be saved, but we also insist that God's grace and power will enable all true believers to persevere." I am sure the reader will notice that I keep speaking of "the perseverance of the saints" and not "eternal security." I assure you that the choice of words is deliberate. If we understand three things we will not only understand the biblical doctrine of perseverance, we will also see how radically different that doctrine is from the idea of eternal security as it is believed and taught by most evangelicals today. Here are the three things:
We could ask the same questions another way:
As you can see from the questions, the doctrine of perseverance is tied up very closely with both the nature of salvation and the assurance of salvation. Let's start at the beginning and discuss what we mean by the word Christian. Let's get the drowning man safely onto the beach before we start arguing about happens to him if he falls back into the water. Before we argue about whether a true Christian can be lost, let's be sure we all agree on what kind of person we are calling a true Christian. We are now confronted with the major problem in trying to answer the basic question. Even if we prove that a true child of God can never lose their salvation, we have really not answered the question or solved the real problem. The question now becomes, "Exactly who is a real child of God?" As already mentioned, in the days when Arminians and Calvinists were arguing about losing one's salvation, they never argued about the necessity of the perseverance of the saints. Both groups taught that perseverance was absolutely essential to salvation. Both Arminians and Calvinist insisted that Matthew 10:22 meant exactly what it said, namely, that only those who "endured to the end" in faith would be saved. There were only two spiritual classifications of people. There were saved people and lost people. There were Christians and there were non-Christians. All of that changed a little over a hundred years ago and we are now told there are two radically different kinds of Christians. There are "carnal" Christians and there are "spiritual" Christians. The basic difference between these two clearly defined groups is that one group acts like they are Christians and the other one acts exactly like lost, or natural, men. The carnal Christians are said to be just as saved and just as eternally secure as the spiritual Christians. A carnal Christian will make it to heaven "by the skin of his teeth" but lose all his rewards. (This gross error is based on a totally wrong interpretation of I Corinthians 3:11-15). We will look at this theological shift in more detail in a future article. For now we are going to reject this two fold division of Christians and say that (1) all Christians are carnal in that they are not sinlessly perfect, and (2) all Christians are spiritual in that they are born of Spirit, live in the Spirit, and walk—with varying speeds—in the Spirit. Carnality and spirituality are both a matter of degree and all Christians without exception have varying degrees of both carnality and spirituality. Perhaps it would be wise to explain a few different terms that are used when discussing this subject. Some people will say, usually very piously, "I do not believe in the perseverance of the saints, I believe in the perseverance of the Savior." Well I also believe in the perseverance of the Savior. However, I believe His perseverance includes His praying that I will be given grace to keep persevering in faith and God giving me the grace to persevere is the proof of the Savior's perseverance in my behalf. Other people say "I do not believe in the perseverance of the saints, I believe in the preservation of the saints." This is merely a more supposedly pious way to express that previously stated. Every time I hear this statement I think of a pickle in jar. It is preserved. The people who talk about preservation versus perseverance are usually teaching that once one "accepts Christ" he is put into a jar of grace, the lid is sealed, and no matter what one does he can't get out of the jar. Sadly, I am not caricaturing. That is exactly what these eternal security people mean by preservation. Let's begin with some basic foundation blocks. Our first question then is this: "Exactly who is a true child of God?" It would be both interesting and profitable to look at the many verses of Scripture that describe true Christians. They are called saved ones, called ones, elect ones, sheep, disciples, believers, children of God, brothers of Christ, etc. However, we will look at only two texts of Scripture that I think best describe a true Christian. The first is II Corinthians 12:2. Notice the following descriptive phrase:
That is the best description of a true child of God that I know of in the whole Bible. We cannot describe a true Christian in terms of his theological understanding. A wicked man may declare the truth of sovereign grace. His theological knowledge about sovereign grace will not put grace into his heart. A man may be a member of the best and most orthodox church and still be as lost as the Devil. A man may go forward in a revival meeting, memorize John 3:16, be baptized by immersion, and still be headed for hell. In other words, theology, church membership, outward life style, and a testimony of faith all put together does not make or keep anyone a child of God. To be "in Christ" means that a man is literally joined to Christ in spiritual life and union through a spiritual birth. It means that Christ lives in him and he lives in Christ. A man in Christ is a living part of a new spiritual creation. Something has happened to him that produces a genuine transformation and change from the old creation of Adam into the new creation of Christ (See II Corinthians 5:17). There is no other literature in all of the world's history that uses this phrase to describe the relationship between two people. It does not matter if it is poetry, prose, or history, nor does it matter in what time period it was written or in what language it was written. Never was it recorded that one person was "in" another person. This can only be understood when we grasp what happens when a sinner is truly "born from above." A real and vital union occurs and this union is described from two different perspectives. The sinner is said to be "in Christ" (Col. 1:2) and Christ Himself is said to be "in the sinner" (Col. 1:27). Paul describes this reality as being part of a "new creation" (II Cor. 5:17) and a "new man" (Eph. 2:15). It should be evident that such a union does not take place because someone walks down the aisle to the front of the church and utters a prayer and memorizes a verse of Scripture. We are talking about the result of a spiritual encounter that produces a radical change in relationship between two persons. What we will insist on is the obvious: A person cannot get "out of Christ" if he was never "in Christ" in the first place. Everything is going to hinge on what it means to be in Christ and what happens to a sinner when he is baptized into Christ by the Holy Spirit—and every Christian without exception has been baptized into Christ. The second verse we want to look at explains what happens in every true conversion. The text shows how the gospel affects every part of man's being. Notice how the sinner's mind, his will, and his affections are all involved in conversion:
Notice that conversion always begins with acknowledging that God is the sole author of this work. "God be thanked" must always precede every single blessing we receive. Paul does not start by saying, "You are to be congratulated for giving God a chance." Likewise, Paul emphasizes that we were "delivered to the truth." He does not in this text speak about the truth being delivered to us, which of course truly happened, but he speaks here of God's sovereign grace and power literally delivering us over to the power of truth. Paul never misses an opportunity to emphasize sovereign grace! The next thing to note is the change of masters, the transfer from our slavery to sin to our slavery to righteousness. Any person who is a "slave to sin" has never obeyed the gospel. The whole purpose of God in electing grace and particular redemption is to deliver His people from the bondage to sin. To even think of people being both saved and still slaves of sin is a contradiction. Please note that slavery to sin does not mean saints do not sin nor that they may not have besetting sins. It means sin is not their master in the sense that they are no longer the willing slave of sin. Likewise, being a slave of righteousness does not mean sinless perfection but it does mean a willing change of ownership from self to Christ. Now notice exactly how this transforming work of conversion takes place:
All three of the above must be involved in true conversion. If the emotions are stirred and a decision of the will is based only on the emotions, there will be no true conversion. The individual cannot possibly make a valid spiritual choice while he is ignorant of what is involved in the choice he is making. This is the great tragedy of many "converts" in mass evangelism meetings. Many people sincerely make a decision but unfortunately very soon thereafter they make another decision and decide to deny the first decision. What the emotions and will can do in their own power they can also undo. With such pseudo conversions, generally the problem lies not with the sincerity of the individual. More often than not the true gospel was not being preached. He had no clear knowledge of what or for whom he had decided. In reality he was emotionally raped. Likewise if a person is intellectually convinced (as were many of the Pharisees) of the historical truth of the claims of Christ, he may decide to believe in Christ the same as he decides to believe that Columbus discovered America in 1492. Such a person may sincerely "take up Christianity," but, as Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, "he was never taken by Christianity." There is a great difference between those two things, The Reformed faith appeals to the mind. When correctly understood it will run any and every philosophy off the campus. The Reformed faith will stand on its own as a valid world and life view. However, it can be held and taught as merely the correct philosophy of life. If the gospel of sovereign grace has not penetrated the very heart of a person, their decision to "accept the Reformed faith" is merely mental assent to the truth and that is not the same as saving faith. What are the specific truths that must illuminate the sinner's mind and penetrate his affections? There has to be recognition of God as Holy and Sovereign. This will produce a realization of actual sin and of being lost. There must then be an understanding of the gospel of God's amazing grace in Jesus Christ. The birth of the Son of God for sinners, His death to pay for our sins, and His glorious resurrection and ascension to the Father's right hand must be understood. We must grasp the Cradle, the Cross, and the Crown of Christ. God does not save men in a state of total ignorance about either Himself or their own miserable estate. The gospel is good news and must be heard, understood, and believed with the mind and felt, in some degree, with the heart. |