The Unconverted “Believer” (17): Assurance of Salvation (1) 06/13/2021

First Baptist Church Leominster

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The Apostle Paul has completed his three missionary journeys and now he's in Jerusalem.

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And of course, he was arrested. He'll be incarcerated two years on the coastal city of Caesarea in his preparation to be taken to Rome.

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And of course, the Lord promised that he would go to Rome and bear witness of the gospel to that place. And so here we see

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Paul being persecuted, and yet God in his providence was using these difficulties to put

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Paul in a place where he could bear witness of the kingdom. Acts 22.

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Acts 22. Brothers and fathers, hear the defense that I now make before you.

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And when they heard that he was addressing them in the Hebrew language, they became even more quiet.

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And he said, I am a Jew born in Tarsus of Sicilia and brought up in the city, educated at the feet of Gamaliel, according to the strict manner of the law of our fathers, being zealous for God as all of you are this day.

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I persecuted this way to the death, binding and delivering to prison both men and women, as the high priest and the whole council of elders can bear me witness.

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From them I received letters to the brothers and journeyed toward Damascus to take those also who were there and bring them in bonds to Jerusalem to be punished.

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As I was on my way and drew near to Damascus, about noon a great light from heaven suddenly shone around me.

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And I fell to the ground and I heard a voice saying to me, Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

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And I answered, who are you, Lord? And he said to me, I am Jesus of Nazareth, who you are persecuting.

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Now those who were with me saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of the one who was speaking to me. And I said, what shall

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I do, Lord? And the Lord said to me, rise and go into Damascus, and there you will be told all that is appointed for you to do.

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And since I could not see because of the brightness of that light, I was led by the hand by those who were with me and came into Damascus.

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And one Ananias, a devout man according to the law, well spoken of by all the

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Jews who live there, came to me and standing beside me said to me, brother Saul, receive your sight.

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And at that very hour, I received my sight and saw him. And he said, the

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God of our fathers appointed you to know his will, to see the righteous one and to hear a voice from his mouth.

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For you will be a witness for him to everyone of what you have seen and heard. And now why do you wait?

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Rise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on his name. When I had returned to Jerusalem and was praying in the temple,

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I fell into a trance and saw him saying to me, make haste and get out of Jerusalem quickly because they will not accept your testimony about me.

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And I said, Lord, they themselves know that in one synagogue after another, I imprisoned and beat those who believed in you.

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And when the blood of Stephen, your witness was being shed, I myself was standing by and approving and watching over the garments of those who killed him.

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And he said to me, go for I will send you far away to the Gentiles. Up to this word, they listened to him.

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Then they raised their voices and said, away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live.

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And as they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, the tribune ordered him to be brought into the barracks, saying that he should be examined by flogging to find out why they were shouting against him like this.

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But when they had stretched out him, but when they had stretched him out for the whips,

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Paul said to the centurion who was standing by, is it lawful for you to flog a man who is a

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Roman citizen and uncondemned? When the centurion heard this, he went to the tribune and said to him, what are you about to do?

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For this man is a Roman citizen. So the tribune came and said to him, tell me, are you a

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Roman citizen? And he said, yes. The tribune answered, I bought this citizenship for a large sum.

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Paul said, but I am a citizen by birth. So those who were about to examine him withdrew from him immediately.

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And the tribune was afraid for they realized that Paul was a Roman citizen and that he had bound him.

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But on the next day, desiring to know the real reason why he was being accused by the Jews, he unbound him and commanded the chief priests and all the council to meet.

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And he brought Paul down and set him before them. Let's pray.

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Our father, we thank you for this glorious conversion of Saul and Lord, when we see

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Paul's life, we know that there is hope for any man. Paul considered himself the chief of sinners, and yet by your great grace, you saved him.

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And by your great grace, you save us. And Lord, we rejoice in the salvation that is found in Christ Jesus.

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And Lord, we pray that we would have a greater understanding of this salvation. We pray

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Lord, that you would help us in our understanding, that we would understand the ins and outs of what it means to be in Christ.

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We pray Lord, that you would help us in our study of the word, that you would help us as we hear the sermon proclaimed this morning.

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We pray that you would guide us and direct us in your truth. And Lord, we pray for comfort for those who are struggling.

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We pray for conviction for those who need it. And we ask Lord that you would be honored here by our proclamation of your word.

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Thank you, in Jesus name, amen. Amen. Well, let's turn in our

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Bibles to 1 John chapter five. Just a reminder that we have a weekly prayer meeting at down in the fellowship hall at six o 'clock on Wednesday evening.

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And then of course, we also have a conference call. And so if you care to participate in that, we would welcome your calling in.

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You don't need to pray out loud, but you can pray with us. And when those folks make known their prayer requests, say here in the

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Lord's day morning, there are others that take note of that and pray for you through the week.

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I know Mary takes notes of it. And so we have those for Wednesday night. And so even though my list gets rather encumbered after a while, we attempt to be faithful to all of the requests that's given to us.

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Well, today we begin to address what the word of God teaches regarding the true believer's assurance of salvation.

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I'm kind of glad we've arrived here. Aren't you? This is a very important matter for throughout this series that we've entitled the unconverted believer.

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We've sought to reveal and expose nominal Christianity. Those who think they're

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Christian, but they are not. And of course, in doing this, we're aware that the confidence of tender hearted

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Christians can be shaken. And we know that that has taken place, even though that's not our desire.

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And the reason they didn't tend to be shaken is that they tend to be more quick to question their own hearts and life than perhaps they are to trust solely and only the promises of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

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It's more easily to see ourselves and what we experienced than necessarily see him.

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And so as we've said all along, it's our desire that every true Christian obtain and retain a joyful, settled peace in the soul that God is their

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God and that they belong to him through Jesus Christ. And so understanding what the

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Bible says about assurance of salvation is of the utmost importance. And so we'll begin today's exploration and we're gonna be here a few

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Sundays, probably. We'll begin today's exploration of God's word about this matter of assurance, biblical assurance by reading a couple of verses in 1

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John 5, 11 through 13, in which John summarizes the reason why he wrote 1

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John. And this is the testimony that God has given us eternal life and this life is in his son.

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He who has the son has life. He who does not have the son does not have life.

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These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the son of God that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may continue to believe in the name of the son of God.

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Now, we can make several assertions of what the Holy Spirit reveals to us in these few words.

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First, he was writing to those who believe in the name of the son of God. So he's writing to Christians.

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Second, we may say that there were apparently some among these believers that lacked assurance of their salvation.

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He felt motivated to write to them, to convince them and show them that they may have assurance of their salvation.

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Third, we may conclude with certainty that it is both desirable and possible for Christians to possess assurance of salvation.

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Actually, relatively few people through church history have believed that it was possible. And we'll talk about that a little bit.

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And lastly, John indicated that assurance of salvation was possible, notice through hearing and understanding and believing what he calls these things.

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And what did John mean by these things? Well, again, everything he included in this epistle, the first John.

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And so he had written that this was his purpose, that they would have assurance. He wrote these things, referring to all that contained in first John, not just the paragraph in which these words are found, but the entire epistle as one wrote.

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Actually, this is in the Reformation Study Bible. John's gospel, the gospel of John was written to move readers to faith in Jesus, that they might receive eternal life.

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This letter was written to assure those who have believed that they actually possess the priceless gift.

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In other words, it was written for true believers assurance. Now, John wrote this epistle toward the end of the first century, which he addressed a

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Christian probably living in the region of Asia Minor. If I were to hazard a guess,

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I would say around the region of Ephesus, but that's just a guess. At this time in history, in this part of the world, there existed certain

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Greek styled pagan teachings, religions that had infiltrated the churches.

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And later in the second century, these teachings really became a major threat to true biblical

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Christianity. The heresy came to be known as Gnosticism.

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It wasn't known as that when John wrote this epistle. Adherence to these false religions, these pagan religions had distinctive views about the physical and spiritual realms.

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They were contrary to biblical teaching. The one characteristic of this incipient

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Gnostic philosophy that made it particularly dangerous to Christianity was that it was syncretistic.

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In other words, it tended to adopt and adapt to other religions in which it found itself.

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And when it came in contact with Christianity, these false religions adopted much

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Christian teaching. In fact, they claimed to be converted to Christ while they retained these heretical views.

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And so numbers of people professed to have become Christians while retaining and promoting their aberrant, even heretical beliefs.

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They twisted and distorted the Christian message and the nature of the Christian life, even while they joined themselves to Christian churches.

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And so the churches were all mixed up with truly converted people and those that were not converted, but they were claiming to be

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Christians. And the churches couldn't sort it out. They didn't know who's a Christian, who's not, because there was so much confusion and error.

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One of the chief heresies held by these false Christians was a denial of the human nature of Jesus.

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They claimed that Jesus was divine. Yes, he's God, but he was not really a human being.

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He did not become man. He only appeared like he was a man. People only thought he was a man.

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After all, they reasoned God who is spirit, which is inherently good and holy cannot simultaneously become flesh, which is inherently evil.

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And so they denied the humanity of Christ, and yet they claimed to be Christian.

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John the Apostle described this heretical understanding of Christ to be the spirit of antichrist in that day, to deny the humanity of Jesus.

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So the result was that the churches were comprised not only of true Christians, but of those who claimed to be

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Christian, but who were actually unconverted and damned in their sins.

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So John wrote this epistle to help the churches identify and distinguish true from the false

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Christians, and to give reasons to true Christians that may have assurance of their salvation.

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And so the apostle set forth that true Christians had a legitimate basis for assurance, even as he exposed the heretics as ones who had no ground, biblical ground of assurance of their salvation.

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They were condemned for their beliefs and their practice showed that they did not really know the

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Lord savingly. And so we might say that through John's inspired response to the

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Holy Spirit, giving instruction in this historic setting, the Lord has given us this epistle as one of the clearest and fullest treatments of assurance of salvation that is contained in the

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Holy Scriptures. If you are doubting your salvation, or you know somebody who is troubled about this matter, direct them to First John.

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This is where they will find their answers if the Lord blesses the truth. Now we're coming toward the end of our series that we've entitled

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The Unconverted Believer. I don't know how many more we have, maybe three or four Sundays. I keep thinking about more things that need to be addressed but I don't know, we'll see.

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And it's a sad reality that we've shown is that it's a fact that there are many nominal

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Christians in churches, in so -called Bible -believing churches. They believe themselves to be true

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Christians but when their confession and their lies are biblically examined, they fail the tests of true

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Christianity. And so they will prove the words of our Lord Jesus that he gave toward the end of his servant on the mount.

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Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, that is those who profess to be Christian, shall enter the kingdom of heaven.

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But he who does the will of my Father in heaven, see, true Christians live like Christians. Many, Jesus said, many.

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There'll be many nominal Christians. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name?

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They preach, preachers, cast out demons in your name, done many miracles, wonders in your name.

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And then I will declare to them, I never knew you'd depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.

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In other words, they were living lives contrary to the law of God, the will of God. And so it's implied by our

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Lord's words that these many in protesting our Lord's sentence of condemnation on the day of judgment, thought that they were saved people,

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Lord, Lord. However, in this life, they had only a false assurance, but it was only revealed, only will be revealed on the day of judgment or confirmed on the day of judgment,

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I should say. They'll cry out to Jesus with a measure of knowledge of who he is, as if they had a personal acquaintance with him, for they will appeal to him,

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Lord, Lord. They will perhaps go into the final judgment, having had assurance of their salvation, but I put that in quotation marks.

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But only on the day of judgment do they learn they had possessed false assurance. They had been under the wrath of God during this life while assuming they had been genuine

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Christians. That to me is about the scariest thing I could possibly conceive of. They had been sadly deluded as to their true spiritual condition before God.

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Now, actually, self -delusion regarding personal salvation is a common condition of people.

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In fact, much of evangelism is actually first convincing people they're not saved, and then you show them how and what true salvation is.

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They are commonly deceived, for it's a rather easy matter to deceive them. And the scriptures say that there are a number of different reasons that people become deceived, respecting their own salvation.

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We might consider a few of these. Now, we've got too many notes to get through today, but I did want to include these in detail for future reference.

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We'll just touch on them. The fact is, first of all, because people are sinners, they are unwilling to know the truth.

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All sinners don't want to know the truth. They turn away from the truth.

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That's the nature of sin. And Jesus himself spoke about this. They love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil.

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And so when the light of Christ begins to shine upon them, they're repulsed by it. They're not willing to know the truth.

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They're unwilling to come to truth because of their sin. They love darkness. In other words, they prefer to remain in ignorance and error for when they get a glimpse of the inkling of God's word, they intuitively know it's going to expose and reprove their sin.

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And so they turn away from the truth of God. And there are people like that, and it's pretty common.

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I'm sorry, but I don't want to hear that. That's too unsettling. I want to go somewhere where I'm reaffirmed, like the people of Israel, ancient

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Israel, saying to Jeremiah, stop talking to us in this way.

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Speak to us with smooth words. And there were false prophets perfectly willing to do so.

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And so they gravitated to them. They're unwilling. Everyone's that way apart from the grace of God.

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And then secondly, top of page three, a second reason is not only are they unwilling, but they're unable to know the truth.

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They're not spiritually capable of doing so because they're spiritually dead. And Paul declared that to the

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Corinthians who were rather proud of their knowledge, some of them. And he said, why are you proud as though you attained this yourself?

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No, anything you know about God and Christ is because God revealed it to you because no one knows the things of God except by the spirit of God, no one.

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Sinners are not only unwilling, but they're incapable of understanding the gospel so as to see its relevance and its impact to be transforming.

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They're not capable because they're dead in their sins. In fact, the things of Christ are foolishness to the world.

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The world, when you represent Christ in the Bible faithfully to the world, they will think less of you and look down upon you.

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You're an ignoramus. You're deluded. You're ignorant and in error.

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This is how fallen people think of the truth of God. Fallen people are unwilling and they're unable to know the truth.

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And then thirdly, self -delusion is common because a person's sinful condition is rated to subject to the devil and his influence.

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And the devil deceives him and holds him in ignorance and error. Paul told

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Timothy that you're gonna have to deal with this in your ministry. He said, as a servant of the

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Lord, you must not quarrel. Don't get into arguments with them, but be gentle to all. You know, as they're railing on you, you've got to be gentle in your response and appeal out of concern rather than getting reactionary and all angry and upset because they're not listening to you.

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No, but be gentle to all, able to teach, be patient in humility, correcting those who are in opposition.

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Some of the ones who are most in opposition make the greatest converts. The apostle

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Paul was one, right? Come to me in November of 1991 and you would have seen somebody who was belligerent and opposed to the gospel.

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Come back in February of 1972 and it was a whole lot different. I was converted.

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Unwilling, unable, bound by the devil and just deceived.

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And so the devil is a deceiver. He's the father of lies and he is the God of all unconverted people.

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And so Paul said, you have to be patient, deal with humility, correcting them.

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If God perchance perhaps will grant them repentance so that they may know the truth, that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil having been taken captive by him to do his will.

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Unconverted people are doing the will of the devil. And again, we've always said biblically, that means when they do their own will rather than God's will, they're doing the will of the devil.

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That's the nature of sin. Top page four, fourth reason. The self -delusion, respecting, and assurance of salvation is common among people is because there are many false teachers that encourage and reinforce their self -delusion.

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It's a sad fact that through this life, they've had many preachers and teachers who had taught them that they were saved and had propped up their false assurance.

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In ancient Israel, there were many false prophets who had told the people of Israel they were in no danger of God's judgment upon them.

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Even as Babylon was looming upon Jerusalem and Judea, you're gonna be okay. Within two years, we're gonna be set free, said the false prophet as Jeremiah said, no, you're going in captivity for 70 years.

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And so they were lulled into a false sense of security. Jeremiah was one of the few voices who told them otherwise, but he had to always counter the messages of the false prophets.

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And so we read repeatedly of Jeremiah's denunciation of them, for they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, peace, peace, when there is no peace.

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And the apostle Peter declared there would be similar voices in this church age. Second Peter too, there were false prophets among them, the

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Israelites, even as there will be false teachers among you who will secretly bring in destructive or damnable heresies.

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I think how the King James reads, even denying the Lord who bought them and bring on themselves swift destruction and then notice many will follow their ways.

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Many are deceived by them. They claim to be teaching the Bible. They're in the churches.

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They're preaching, they're teaching, but they're deceptive. They're not recognized. They secretly bring in destructive heresies and nobody's even aware of it.

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Many will follow their destructive ways. And so they teach people that they have salvation, even though they're still under the wrath of God for their sins.

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These false teachers assure people they're proclaiming a biblical message of salvation, even while they, the false teachers, are themselves in a damn condition.

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For Peter wrote, while they promised them their hearer's liberty, they themselves are slaves to corruption.

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They're living in wickedness, in sin. For by whom a person is overcome, by him also he is brought into bondage.

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And so they assure their followers that they are under the grace of God, that Jesus Christ is their savior.

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But the assurance that is promoted and promised by them is false assurance. And then fifthly, self -delusion is common among people because it is the result of God's own judicial dealings with them.

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When he's determined to overthrow them and destroy them because of their hardness of heart and their refusal, their rebellion against him.

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And the Lord Jesus, of course, denounced the cities of Galilee in this way. Woe to you,

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Chorazin, is how that's actually pronounced in Greek. And woe to you, Bethsaida, for if the mighty works were done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.

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I say to you, it'll be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon in the day of judgment than for you. And for you,

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Capernaum, the center, the seat of this earthly ministry in Galilee, who are exalted into heaven will be brought down to Hades.

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For if the mighty works were done in you, had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day.

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But I say to you, it'll be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for you.

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And then Jesus wasn't lamenting the fact that they were gonna be damned in their sin.

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He actually celebrated the fact. He prayed, I thank you. I thank you,

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Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you've hidden these things from the wise. This would be the self -righteous, the arrogant.

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And you've revealed the debates. In other words, the sinners, the simple ones, the ones who recognize their ignorance and their need to be taught.

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Even so, Father, for it so seemed good in your sight, all things have been delivered to me by my

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Father. No one knows the Son except the Father, nor does anyone know the Father except the

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Son, and he to whom the Son wills to reveal him. And so self -delusion is very common.

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And vast numbers of people are deluded with respect to their souls. It's a sad thing that there are and will be many deceived people, many,

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Jesus said, who at the last will be seeking to enter the kingdom and will not be able to. And so he warned his disciples.

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Top of page five, strive to enter the narrow gate. Why, why did

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Jesus say strive to enter the kingdom? He's talking about laboring here throughout life, by the way, strive to enter the kingdom.

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Why? For many, I say to you, will seek to enter and will not be able.

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When once the master of the house has risen up, shut the door, you begin to stand outside, knock at the door saying, Lord, Lord, open for us.

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He'll answer, say to you, I do not know you, where you're from. Then you'll begin to say, we ate and drank in your presence.

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You taught in our streets, but he will say, I tell you, I do not know you from where you were from.

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Depart from me, you workers of iniquity. Same kind of language at the end of Matthew seven. Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.

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And there'll be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God and yourselves.

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He's speaking principally to Jews who refuse to embrace him in faith. You yourselves thrust out.

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And then Paul wrote, of course, of many like this who thought themselves to have been saved.

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He urged the Christians in Philippi, the church of Philippi, brethren, join in following my example.

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Don't follow those others who so walk. As you have us for pattern, follow me as I follow

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Christ, he says. For many walk. Now here he's talking about professing

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Christians. For many walk, walking is what Christians or professing Christians do.

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For many walk, of whom I have told you often and now you'd tell you even weeping, they are the enemies of the cross of Christ.

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Now they're not openly antagonistic of the enemies, but they don't apply the cross of Christ to the way they live.

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They don't deny themselves and take up his cross. They live any old way they please. Whose end is destruction, whose

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God is their belly. Jesus Christ is not their God, but rather their appetites, their fleshly appetites, their fleshly sinful desires is what governs them.

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Don't follow them, follow me, is what Paul says. They whose glory is in their shame, who set their mind on earthly things.

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They're not true Christians. Don't follow after them. But in of course addition to these number of clear statements that we could cite of the many who are and will be to see, we could cite other conditions that will most certainly result in the damnation of many.

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We could talk about apostates. I'm sad to say my grandmother was an apostate.

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She died in 1991, 91 years of age.

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She was born in 1900. Her dad's portrait is in my office downstairs, a personal friend of D .L.

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Moody, who was in the house the night that my grandmother's older brother was born.

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And so my great -grandfather named his son Dwight Lyman Johnston, and my grandmother told me that she had been to a tent meeting, probably around 1910 or 12, of an evangelist, and she was converted.

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She says it stuck with me for about three years. And then when she lost a child in infancy, she had a

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Christian science neighbor befriended her, and she embraced Christian science, which is a heresy, and she held that teaching till the day she died.

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Although she had such an upbringing in a Christian home, her dad read to her and the other eight kids from the

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Bible every night, read from the classics every night. She had a Bible knowledge that was quite amazing.

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And when she'd visit my church, people would always comment afterwards, my, what a godly, saintly grandmother you have.

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She could talk the best of being a Christian, but she had these very weird views of Christian science and Mary Baker Eddy and all that nonsense.

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She was an apostate. She turned away from Christ. They have no salvation. And then hypocrites, again, they're ones who may understand and believe all the right things, but their life says they're not a believer, just the way they live.

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And then, of course, I mentioned heretics. My grandmother was not only apostate, heretic too, embracing false views of Jesus Christ.

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And so there are many that have a false assurance. And so it's an easy thing to be deluded, and sadly, it's an easy thing for true

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Christians to be troubled about these matters. And so I think it's really important for us and good for us to basically trace down through Christendom, Christian history, the different views of assurance of salvation that have been held and promoted.

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Because as I say, actually relatively few down through church history understand the

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Bible's teaching about assurance as we espouse and as our historic

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Protestant confessions espouse. And so I want us to trace through this.

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Some of you have heard this before, but I think it's important. Teaching regarding assurance of salvation through history.

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So in order for us to understand better this teaching, let's reflect how this matter has been viewed.

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The faults and errors respecting this subject may still be found among people today. And as we talk about these historic situations, you may think of people that you know that hold these views today.

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First, let's consider assurance as taught by Roman Catholicism. In the men's group yesterday,

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I asked the 20 plus guys that were there, how many were raised in Roman Catholicism? Well over half of them raised their hands.

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We're in a Roman Catholic region. And this is how most people have been taught about assurance of salvation.

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And so in larger Christendom, in other words all people who claim to be Christian among different denominations or different theological persuasion, there are differences respecting their beliefs about assurance.

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Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodox or the Russian Orthodox Church, same denomination, teach their people that assurance of salvation is not the common experience of Christians in this life.

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They say the only ones who can have assurance is if you had a direct revelation from God. You know, you saw the

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Virgin Mary or some angel spoke to you, then you can have assurance. Otherwise, the common people cannot have assurance.

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Well this is understandable when we consider what they believe in that salvation is attained through a lifelong accumulation of one's own good works as enabled through the grace the

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Church of God administers through its sacraments. How can anyone be assured of salvation if it's the result of a lifetime of doing good?

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And so through many centuries because of these teachings, there was an inability and refusal to develop a doctrine of assurance.

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After the first centuries, the few centuries of the Christian era, salvation became viewed as mediated by the

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Church through the sacraments, the mass, confession, pilgrimages.

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Rather than believing justification before God through faith at the onset of the Christian life, justification was projected to occur in the distant future.

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Justification after living a life of good works and then going through a period of purgatory, of purification for maybe 10 ,000, 20 ,000 years.

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After that, when you're finally righteous, then you're justified. Whereas the

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Bible says no, you're justified at the outset when you first believe. They've turned it on its head.

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Understandably, if this is your view of salvation, assurance would suffer under this system. And so to Roman Catholics, the notion of assurance is viewed as presumptive.

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You're self -righteous to think that you have salvation. Well, obviously they'd think this way if they think that you earn your salvation by meritorious works.

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You must think you're pretty good if you have assurance of salvation. And so they would view us as self -righteous and arrogant as well as ignorant.

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Yet this is how they view things. Philip Chaff, who is a church historian, he's got six or seven volumes on church history.

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It's a little dated, but good. He described Pope Gregory the Great, who died in 604

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A .D., as the best representative of medieval Catholicism.

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He was one of the first really full -flown popes. He wrote of assurance.

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"'The greater our sins, "'the more we must do to make up for them.'" That's works righteousness.

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"'Whether we've done enough to atone for them, "'we cannot know until after death. "'We can never be sure of success.

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"'Assurance of salvation and the feeling of safety "'engendered by it is dangerous for anybody "'and would not be desirable even if possible.'"

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Now that went on for centuries. The official church said you cannot have assurance.

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Can you imagine the trouble under which people, now the Lord still saved people.

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You know, not by Roman Catholic doctrine, but by his grace in spite of it.

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And I think one of the foundation doctrines that every true Christian knows that the Holy Spirit teaches is that my salvation's dependent upon Christ alone, his life, his death on the cross, his resurrection, and not on anything the church is doing or saying that I must do, it's

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Christ alone. And I think Roman Catholics that have been taught that by the

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Spirit of God, you know, they're giving evidence of new life.

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The Lord's always had his people. Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century advanced no further in this understanding from Gregory in the 7th century.

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Many Roman Catholics believe Aquinas was the greatest theologian of the Christian era. His teaching about assurance is how

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Rome has dealt with the matter of assurance even till today. In fact, the

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Council of Trent, which was an effort to oppose and counter the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century, formalized this teaching of Aquinas as official church dogma.

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And so Rome declared the impossibility of assurance of salvation at the

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Council of Trent. Here are those words. And this is viewed by Rome as authoritative as the

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Bible, as inspired and inerrant as the Bible. No one moreover, as long as he in this mortal life ought so far to presume as regards the secret mystery of divine predestination as to determine for certain, he is assuredly in the number of the predestinate, as if it were true that he is justified, either cannot sin anymore, or if he do sin, that he ought to promise himself an assured repentance, for except by special revelation, see, you gotta have that vision or you gotta have that miracle, it cannot be known by whom

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God hath chosen to eternal life. Now again, we saw in 1 John 5, 11 through 13, you can know.

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Rome says you cannot know. Rome is in conflict with the word of God.

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And also Trent stated, let no one herein promise himself anything as certain with an absolute certainty, though all ought to place and repose the most firm hope in God's help.

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Yeah, I believe God will help me, but I can't be assured. Because they believe, of course, salvation is the result of good works, merited by the grace of God given to them, by the church through its sacraments.

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And so the result, no assurance is possible for the one who follows Rome's teaching. And this remains true today as well.

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Most Catholics view any Christian that claims to have assurance of salvation as self -righteous, for to them salvation is obtained through the merit of one's works.

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You must be self -righteous if you think yourself to be saved. Well, it's out of reaction to Romanism, some have said that the early reformers failed to link assurance in life to a life of faith, teaching that assurance was the very essence of faith.

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In other words, the early reformers, some would say, said if you believe on Christ alone, then you have every reason for assurance.

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That's all it takes. The early reformers did emphasize assurance based on faith, but their emphasis was in reaction to Rome's assurance based upon the merit of personal works.

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Martin Luther viewed assurance as the privilege and blessing afforded to every believer. If you believe on Jesus alone, you should have assurance of salvation.

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He would reason if you don't have assurance, you must not be trusting in Jesus. And so they said assurance always comes with true faith, and true faith always comes with assurance.

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Although he said assurance could be weakened at times, which is really shows some inconsistency in his position.

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Zwingli in Zurich, Switzerland had some similar views, will not recount those. Calvin affirmed what

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Luther and Zwingli taught in Geneva, but added additional elements. He denied that saving faith was assent to the truth of the gospel only.

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In other words, Calvin realized there had to be something different in a person's life. Assurance is personal and subjective, which is to be sought in the word, which flows forth into the soul from the word, he advocated.

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But what about assurance taught by the English Puritans? The understanding of the biblical teaching on assurance of salvation developed significantly through the ministry of the

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English Puritans. And we would say biblically, they recovered biblical teaching.

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The doctrine of assurance is set forth in the Westminster Confession of 1647, which of course is very similar to our, almost identical to our

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Baptist Confession of 1689. There's a development in the doctrine of assurance held by the

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Puritans and Baptists of the 17th century over that of the early reformers.

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And so generally speaking, assurance according to the Puritans involves these elements or emphases.

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And this is from our confession. Saving faith is to be in a measure distinguished from assurance of salvation.

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In other words, they're saying you can be saved but not have assurance. Contrary to those who would say, if you have saving faith, obviously you have assurance.

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If you're doubting, you don't have faith in Jesus. Now the Puritans said, no, no, the

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Bible doesn't teach that. The Bible teaches that truly saved people may not have assurance of salvation.

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And that is true, that is biblical, that is right. Assurance does not so belong to the essence of faith.

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In other words, they don't go so hand in hand, but rather the fruit of it. Assurance is the fruit of faith, not faith itself.

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In other words, a true Christian may have saving faith but lack assurance of salvation. And we're gonna deal with this more fully, but not today.

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Okay. Secondly, our confession emphasizes that there are three means of assurance.

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How does God give assurance of salvation to his people? First, the promise of the gospel in Jesus Christ.

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Second, the internal witness of the Holy Spirit. Sometimes the

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Holy Spirit just gives an absolute assurance. You're saved.

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That was my experience. Now this isn't everybody's experience, but when I was converted, I can show you the place on Highway 1, two miles north of Fort Bragg, California.

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And when I was converted, nobody needed to come and give me assurance. I mean, it was the

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Holy Spirit. It was supernatural, a settled peace.

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It was, there was a sense of cleansing. It was incredible. It wasn't anything out of my wit, my knowledge, anything.

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It was the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives an internal, the

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Holy Spirit witnessed with our spirit that we are the children of God is what Paul says.

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Now that is the possibility, but not necessarily a reality of every true Christian, but it can be.

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And third, sanctification. In other words, a life characterized by growing in holiness.

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That's what distinguishes us as Reformed people. We believe you cannot truly claim to be justified unless you are being sanctified by the

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Holy Spirit. Most evangelicals in the world said, no, no, as long as you believe on Jesus, outside of yourself, don't look to yourself, look to him alone.

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After all, we're saved by his work, not ours. Don't look at your work. Only if you believe him, you may have assurance.

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Bible doesn't say that. John wrote, and we'll give attention to this verse on another time soon, do not be deceived in this.

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I always forget whether it's 1 John 3, 7 or verse 10. Do not be deceived in this. He who does righteousness, sanctification, is righteous, justification.

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The only way you can truly know you're justified before God through faith alone is if you have a work of grace being shown in your life, of becoming more holy.

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It doesn't mean that you're not troubled by sin or plagued by sin, you may be, probably are, and you're deceiving yourself if you're saying you're not in some measure.

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But the fact is that true understanding,

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I'm justified, I know I am, not only because of the promise of the gospel, not only because of the assurance of the

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Holy Spirit, but because I can see the work of God's grace in my life. You can't credit to anything else but a work of saving grace.

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And so those are the three ways, and we're gonna go into detail about these in the next few

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Sundays. And then third, there's an emphasis on sanctification as a basis of assurance, as well as evidence of true saving faith.

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And so great effort was put forth by the Puritans and Baptists to discern and distinguish between true and false conversion.

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That's what we're doing in this series. But again, you don't hear it, do you?

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Do you hear it, do you read it? I don't know of a book that deals with it thoroughly because most evangelicals teach you as long as you believe on Jesus and what he did, you're saved, irrespective of how you live.

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You're not saved because of how you live. You know, you're saved because of how he lived.

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But if you're saved, you're gonna begin to live like he lived and follow him.

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He's the Lord. This is what a Christian does. And so fourthly, faith and works are not in tension with one another.

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As say among Lutherans and dispensationalists who tend to view them. Law and grace, they are opposed and you can never see the two of them together.

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No, we quite understand them. You know, obviously you can't be saved by law or works, but we certainly do not see faith and works in conflict with one another.

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One who truly believes on Christ attempts to live for Christ and that's the response of a new nature in salvation.

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And fifth, grace and law are not to be seen as mutually exclusive to one another.

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And again, this is a teaching of dispensationalism. Law is something that the law of God, that's gone, that's passed, that was under Moses, that's before the cross and now we're under grace and therefore it doesn't matter anything about what the

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Bible commands. We don't have to worry about what the

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Bible commands as long as we believe on Jesus. That is not biblical, that is antinomian by definition.

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Jude's epistle repudiates it. And so the Lord, in our understanding, brought a more full and true declaration of the

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Bible teaching on assurance and salvation through the teaching and ministry of the Puritans. And this is reflected in our

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Baptist Confession of Faith of 1689, article 18, and I put article 18 on assurance at the end of your notes that you can read later.

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I hope you will. But what about, as we kind of bring things to a close, what about the general teaching of assurance by most evangelicals?

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Again, the majority of evangelicals, those who claim to believe and teach the Bible as the word of God, declare that assurance of salvation be enjoyed by anybody and everybody who but trust

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Jesus Christ alone as his personal savior. Now that might sound good.

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On the surface, we hear it all the time. The believer is not to look at himself in any way as a basis or means to attain assurance of salvation.

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After all, they argue, we're saved by God's grace through faith in Christ, apart from works.

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Therefore, it's not biblical to look to your own works as a basis of personal assurance.

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Anyone, therefore, who believes on Jesus Christ alone, who trusts in his life's sacrificial death upon his cross for sinners, whom

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God raised from the third day, has as much right to assurance of salvation as any other believer in God's world, they argue.

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They teach and proclaim. You are to look to Christ alone for assurance of salvation, but not at yourself in any way.

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In other words, as long as you believe the right things, you have salvation, and you should never doubt it.

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And that's the message that most evangelicals proclaim. The problem is that, that even though it's common to evangelical

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Christianity, the Holy Scriptures repeatedly talk about the need to have a life that confirms our claim to faith.

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Without works, faith is dead, is what the Scriptures declare.

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Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, depart from me, you who work iniquity.

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But Lord, we believed on you. Depart from me, you who live lives of lawlessness.

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Salvation is not just the forgiveness of sins, it is deliverance from sin, from the power of sin, a life of living for and in sin.

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And rather, the Christian lives for Christ. And we just lament that we don't do so better, and more consistently, and more faithfully, and more fully.

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But that's our intention, that's the desire of our hearts. He's put it there. That's what we want to do.

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Now, because of this common evangelical teaching, that as long as you believe in Christ, it doesn't matter how you live, you can have salvation.

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When you encounter reformed Christians like ourselves, and what we teach, sometimes you'll find it quite common for Christians under reformed teaching to struggle with assurance of their salvation.

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And we have to acknowledge this. And so, in this third section,

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I want to just touch on this before we close. It is common for Christians who are reformed to struggle with assurance of their salvation.

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It's unfortunate, but it's common. This important and biblical teaching regarding assurance causes us to struggle, and sometimes wait upon the

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Lord for his confirmation, that we belong to him. And so there may be doubts, fears, struggles among us respecting our assurance of salvation.

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And this is consistent with what our confession states. Consider what this says.

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This infallible assurance, it's certain, doth not so belong to the essence of faith, saving faith, that a true believer may wait long and conflict with many difficulties before he be a partaker of it.

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And yet, being enabled by the spirit to know the things which are freely given to him of God, the promises in the gospel, he may, without extraordinary revelation, there's a slap against Rome, in the right use of means, use the biblical means, attain thereunto.

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In other words, you can attain true biblical assurance. And therefore, it is the duty of every one to give all diligence to make his calling and election sure or certain.

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Those are words directly from Peter's epistle. And thereby, his heart may be enlarged in peace and joy in the

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Holy Spirit. You can grow in assurance, in love and thankfulness to God, in strength and cheerfulness and the duties of obedience, the proper fruit, fruits of this assurance.

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So far from inclining men to looseness, that again is another slap against Rome.

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You can't have assurance because that will include people to go out and live like the devil. No, the Bible says, if you have assurance, it'll lead to godly living, a true biblical assurance out of love and devotion, appreciation, desire to please your savior.

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And so let's wrap this up, let's conclude. We may say, therefore, that though you may doubt your salvation, that's no proof that you do not currently possess salvation in Jesus Christ.

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And I've had to tell some people, I've got more assurance for you than you have assurance of yourself. And believe me, we don't add anybody to this church unless we, the elders, see some evidence of a work of grace in the soul.

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Not just because you can rehearse the right things, but we see evidence of a tenderness of heart, a love for the word, a desire to be around other

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Christians, a love for Jesus Christ, a desire to break with sin and a love to live a life of obedience.

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We look for an inward work of grace, not just an affirmation. You believe these four spiritual laws, you prayed the prayer, you're in, brother.

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Come join us. And that's how evangelical churches end up being filled with unconverted people, sadly, many times.

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They're clueless. I wish we had more time, but we need to stop. I included a note here on page 10 from John MacArthur's good book on assurance.

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Saved without a doubt, how to be sure of your salvation. In the introduction, he gave a letter from a church member of his church, been in his church two years, a

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Christian who was plagued with doubts about his salvation. And it is a sad, sad letter.

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And this is what motivated him to write a book about assurance. And as I read over that letter,

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I thought I'm sure that there is some people, maybe among us, that would say, resonate with this kind of comment.

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Well, that's how I feel. And if I had time to sit down with this guy, I would point out a number of things that his little note revealed about his errant thinking, about salvation, about sin, about Christ, about himself.

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But he struggled with assurance, and true Christians can struggle with it. The devil plagues their conscience, their own sin plagues their conscience, their ignorant of passages like Romans 6 troubles them, and we need to sort through this.

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Because again, it is our desire that every one of you that are in Christ know that you're in Christ, and that you be filled with sense of joy and peace.

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That needs to be a settled matter as you go forth in this world.

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I can't imagine being fearful of my soul, just the torment that one would experience.

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And I want to deliver every one of us from that. May the Lord help us. Let's pray.

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Thank you, Father, for your word, and we thank you, Father, for being able to live on this side of history in which so much has been learned and brought forward from your holy scriptures to teach us about these things, our

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God. And so give us grace, our God. Help us, our Lord, to be better equipped to awaken these sad people who are deluded about their souls, who claim to be believers in Christ, but whose lives seem to testify in every way.

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They are strangers to Jesus the Lord. And we'll thank you, our God. Bring revival to us.

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Awaken us, our God. Help our churches, our Lord, to be aware of these important matters.