Can you lose your salvation?

Can you lose your salvation? Is it something that you can gain and then be have it taken away?

That's what we'll talk about today on the rap report Welcome to the rap report with your host

Andrew rap reports where we provide biblical interpretation and application This is a ministry of striving for eternity and the

Christian podcast community for more contents or to request a speaker for your church Go to striving for eternity .org

Well, welcome to another edition of the rap report glad to have you with us I am your host

Andrew rap report and I am a joined by my friend in sunny Florida a joined not conjoined just a joined.

Okay joined. I'm just joined joined Good I see the

Sun in the window there when sunny, Florida Well, it's it's light but it's foggy out this morning

So I just wonder what they are you gonna keep the Sun when I come back down there in May? Like last time where there was no

Sun and it was cold But the track record so far as you come to Florida and things just fall apart

It's just like a nor 'easter blows in or something. Oh Well, I will be

I will be your way in May I'll be at Beulah Baptist Church And that's gonna be

May 7th 8th 9th and 10th. That's a Friday through Monday. We're doing a snatch them from the flames

That's in Winter Garden. Just a just north of Orlando Yeah, and that is going to be with Justin Peters.

Dr. Anthony's special myself. It's a discernment conference we cover topics like You know the sufficiency of scripture how to interpret the scriptures we're gonna have a session on social justice

Discerning that we're going to have a session on how to discern false teachers how to identify false teachers both

Justin Peters and I are going to be teaching on Sunday and then a Monday night Justin Peters will do a special session

Something he's never done before but one on pragmatism in the church So that's something to look forward to you can get in touch with Beulah Baptist Church in their winter garden

Florida if you're interested in joining us Since we're giving some events.

I'm also going to be at in June the first week of June June 3rd to the 6th

We will be at the cruciform conference. Dr. Silvestro will be there Justin Peters and myself

Will be there speaking at cruciform that the topic this year is is standing firm

The pre -conference will be on I know dr. Special is doing to I think two sessions on presuppositional projects at the pre -conference

So you want to look go search for cruciform? Conference and get that detail.

So with that out of the way bud didn't plan on giving that announcement It's good for folks know where we're speaking

We did get a review Really? Yeah, and you were mentioned on it. Oh, oh, yeah.

I know It's bad because mentions your name so here's what it says and this is this review came and I don't know the person will mention

An episode but I have no idea what episode it was because the reviews don't give us episodes But it the review is a five -star review, which is surprising.

I like that even now I'm refreshing. So I don't know.

Are you I don't know which one of us is the stellar which ones the detailed neither One of us are refreshing.

I don't know Here's the review it says I've listened to a lot of various podcasts and sermons from Andrew, but the rap report is my favorite

Andrew often speaks with bud on major issues of today facing

Facing the Christian it is refreshing to hear deep solid truth that greatly assists

Christians in their walk with their Lord There are dot dot dot that's for some reason.

That's all that came in It's one of the things with with the reviews is they don't

I'm actually gonna go out I'm gonna go out to my To the way that we get here we go so if I go to Love the podcast comm is the best way to leave a review is love the podcast comm

Slash rap report. That's rap report two -piece because from there I can actually read the whole thing

Where I was reading was an email that came in from from them. And so it's cut off. So says

I've I've had the oh it actually read where I left off. So I Just reread that again.

I'll let it this part out I've listened to a lot of various podcasts and sermons from Andrew But the rap report is my favorite

Andrew often speaks with bud on major issues of today Facing the

Christian it is refreshing to hear deep solid truth That greatly assists

Christian Christians in their walk with their Lord There are two few strong Christian leaders like Andrew and bud

Willing to go into such great length to share the truth I've had the pleasure

I'm gonna question this I've had the pleasure to meet Andrew multiple times.

I try I Tried to share his podcast with as many

Receptive Christians as I can because I know they will great be greatly blessed by his teaching

Keep up the godly or keep up the great godly work your brother in Christ, Kevin so so we thank him for the review and He even speaks highly of you bud

What impressed me the most honestly, he noted that you were speaking with me and not at me not

Would not be uncalled for certainly, but I was appreciative of that. Thank you,

Kevin So we are we appreciate the fact that we do like to get into detail

We do like to and we're gonna do that in this episode We want to jump in because there is a thing that for many people struggle with this issue, but about Can I lose my salvation?

There's a lot of Christians That are Dealing with this.

There's there is a belief that some say you can lose your salvation some say you cannot and One of the things that I find often is the fact that for many

Christians there's an there's a Lack of an understanding of what the nature of salvation is

And so we want to do today is go over the nature of salvation Let's look at what salvation actually is before we answer the question.

Can we lose our salvation and Then we're gonna get into why people struggle with this question

Experientially theologically, it's a different issue There there's some things we will deal with with that as well from a theological perspective.

So let's start with this we talk about salvation and We have to first understand what is salvation and I think that one of the clearest text or at least the most detailed texts

With this and you can look at the entire book of Romans Galatians But let me start with one verse

I think this is the clearest verse when we talk about salvation and it is

When we look at 2nd Corinthians 521 I Use this as this is salvation in one verse in fact, this describes what

I would call salvation in one word and the one word is the the theological term

Where we basically have the Its imputation is the theological term.

It is the idea that we see here in 2nd Corinthians 521 where it says

He made him who knew who knew no sin To be sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God so the imputation here that's being discussed is

The our sin is being imputed get put upon Christ and his righteousness is put upon us

I I think that's salvation in a nutshell It's the clearest

Simplest way of explaining what salvation is Yeah, don't miss the last don't miss the last two words that in him that verse in him.

Yeah Because the thing that we see in this is this is really encapsulates the core of what is salvation

We no longer have sin. It was our sin and and I'll note this the sin is singular

Not plural. Why is that a big deal? When people make a mistake or they say well you have to repent of your sins

You don't think through that that's actually a heresy. It's actually works righteousness. We don't repent of the works that we do

Like stop doing those and turn to Christ. It's sin singular It means our pride our sin nature that thing that we're we're doing everything for self

That's what we turn from we turn from self that's selfishness that pride and turn to Christ But that pride is what brings about all the the actual acts of sin that we do

So it's really encompassing in that sense of all of our sin because it's all rooted in the pride so all of our sin was laid upon Christ and Then we in Return get his righteousness, but we have to be in him and that means through Christ So what you see in this is you see that Christ isn't is it cannot just be a human being?

He has to be something beyond that because he has the righteousness of God that a human being doesn't have he cannot give us that Righteousness if he doesn't possess that righteousness, which is saying here that he is

God why because he has the righteousness of God. So one of the things you see in this is that Jesus is

God That's the who the in him is is Christ when you look at the context.

So we have to recognize Christ as God That he died for our sins. He took our sins upon himself and he gives to us an exchange

Right his righteousness. This is what Martin Luther referred to as the great transaction and The idea of imputation is probably the simplest.

I remember in when I was in seminary This is the thing bud that seminarians do think of really stupid questions to ask each other to figure out

How mundane we could we could be? one of one of the discussions was How can you know, what is this?

When you think about the gospel What is the absolute basic?

What is it that you how? Articulate can you be using as few words to define the gospel and I came up.

Well, I I had Romans 8 and 9 When you look at sorry Romans 10 8 9 when you look at Romans 10 8 9

It says but what do you what does it say? The word

I'm sorry reading verse verse 8 just for context. The word is near you

In your mouth in your heart That is the word of faith Which we are preaching that if you confess with your mouth

Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead. You will be saved for with the heart a person believes

Resulting in righteousness and with the mouth confession resulting in salvation. So I thought okay, we got two things

Right that you see here confession and belief So I thought okay that that would

I thought I had it down to two words and then one of the other guys said Imputation and I realized he then only answered it better And so I had two verses and he had one verse so he got me both ways but I think that that really does encapsulate it very well is

We first have to understand what? Salvation is that this is Christ Taking our sin upon himself and in exchange giving us his righteousness.

I Think this will be helpful when we get into the question of whether you can lose your salvation When we think about what salvation is, however, there's another passage bud

That we should look at It's a little bit of a longer passage and and this is one of these ones.

This is Ephesians chapter 1 and The thing I like about Ephesians chapter 1 is because of the fact that it helps me to feel better about the fact that I was always in trouble in school in English class for these run -on sentences and And I'm glad that when

I read the scriptures, I realized that Paul has a run -on sentence This is where John Owen if you've ever read the

Puritan John Owen, this is where he learned it You can start on page 1 and 5 pages later you finally find the periods

This is a Ephesians chapter 1 3 Down to 14 is one sentence one very long sentence

And so but how about how about you read those those 11 verses for us

Okay, Ephesians 1 3 through 14 And this will be from the LSB, oh

Oh, so someone's got a new translation, right? So everyone knows. Yeah I'm waiting for Shepard's Conference to get mine, but I want to give it when we have the full

You know the full Bible right now, they just have New Testament and Proverbs and Psalms, so I'm waiting for The whole thing.

No, I've been reading the New Testament. I've Been into my day. Oh, I love it.

I have said you get to Psalms and Yahweh you see that everywhere And then it's just really refreshing.

Anyway back to Ephesians and to Paul's long sentence Ephesians chapter 1 verse 3

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world that we would be holy and blameless before him in love

By predestining us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself

According to the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace Which he graciously bestowed on us in the blood of it in him

We have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of our transgressions according to the riches of his grace

Which he caused to abound to us in all wisdom and insight Making known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in him for an administration of the fullness of times that is

The summing up of all things in Christ things in the heavens and things on the earth in him in him

We have also been made an inheritance having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will

To the end that we who have first hoped in Christ would be to the praise of his glory in him

You also after listening to the word of truth the gospel of your salvation Having also believed you were sealed in him with the

Holy Spirit of promise Who is given as a pledge of our inheritance unto the redemption of God's own possession to the praise of his glory

Now that's a very long sentence, but it's packed One of the things I love about this passage is it shows all three members of the triunity

Involved in our salvation you see God the Father you see Jesus Christ the Son and you see a spirit all together

Working in salvation and so I want to break this down, but as we look at the idea of the nature of salvation

Right off the bat in verse 3 We're seeing blessed be the God and the Father Lord Jesus Christ who blessed us with what with every spiritual blessing

So we don't lack anything We have we have every spiritual blessing

That we that we need so the this has I mean, you know This actually has a if you think about maybe the charismatic movement these days where they're always looking for more spiritual blessings

Are more revelation or yeah, there's nothing more that we have every spiritual blessing

He blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ It's funny because you know as you read through this in Christ and in him is throughout all over it

No wonder we have solus Christus Christ alone one of the five solos because he

How do we get? Salvation other than through Christ and that's what this this text is gonna help us to see but notice

Not only does he give us every spiritual blessing, but verse 4 and this becomes an important thing Just as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world

Okay that we would be holy and blameless before him This is a key passage to look at so let's break this down.

So God chose us now I know there's some who go no, no, no way. I believed I believed The idea that God chose us before the foundation of world some people go.

Well, okay before there was time God picked people you're gonna be saved.

You're not you're gonna be saved You're not and they believe that is what we would hold to However, let's think about something

God being a being who created the the time matter space continuum.

I Believe that he is outside of time. He's not bound by time. He can work within time

But he's not a being That is bound by time in other words

There it's hard for us not to comprehend this but I believe that for God there was a time before there was time

I don't know else to say that So, what does it mean before the foundation of time what

I think he's getting at is before there was a creation God in his omniscience

He's all -knowing he didn't learn anything this is something that we don't often think about God never learned anything

He never had a bright idea He just knows everything There's nothing that is

Happened is happening will happen that he did not know about He knows everything even though he knows it outside of time.

So everything to him is the same eternal now I mean we're sitting doing this recording right now.

Our listeners are listening to it later And yet Christ is on the cross Abraham's act of sacrificing

Isaac You know Everything is the same point in time is I mean, it's a hard concept for us to understand so I think when he says before the foundation of time what what our

Lord is trying to tell us is Basically baby talk is this this is the simplest way

I can explain it when we talk to babies we dumb things down for Children, we make it simple well

We cannot comprehend what it means time before time Right.

We can't understand what it means before the foundation of the world But the idea of it is that we had nothing to do with it

God chose us before the Before the world existed.

In other words, he's trying to say that there is is not based on merit or anything It's based on his choice.

He chose why I Can't answer that but he chose

Without us having any involvement in it. That's what it means before the foundation of the world It's to say that's before before there was a world.

He had already made his decision But what did he choose us for?

Because look in this verse that we would be holy and blameless before him

So as we stand before him He sees us as holy and blameless But when you and I look at each other, we don't quite look at each other as holy and blameless on this side heaven

No, I look at you with complete piety. I think that you were really up there. So Lying is a sin my friend

That is the 9th commandment violation there. It's jesting a sin. That's what

I need to know. It's jesting a sin Yeah, there's a point to the there's a point to his election and that's what we're talking about here in this verse particularly is his election

There's a point to it. And the point is that we would be holy and blameless before him

How are we going to do that Andrew? Well We we can't do that.

Ultimately God does it through love and we're gonna get there But there's something more that we if we keep looking at this

We're not only we are we made chosen to be holy and blameless but look what he says in the very next verse in verse 5

He predestined us to adoption as sons

Through Jesus Christ to himself So he the idea of predestined or a foreknowledge that he knows ahead of time

Now again, this is a strange term to use For a being that knows everything

For a being that is outside of time But how else could he communicate the concept that he has here that this is all based on what

God has has in his mind And how he's gonna work everything in creation

So he predestined us in other words. He he Chose us to be holy and blameless, but he predestined us to be adopted into his family in Christ So it's because of Christ through Christ and Christ alone

That we can be adopted into his family And it this is according to the kind intention of his will

So again, who's who who do we put all this on? This is God notice the emphasis here.

It's all God's planning God the father's planning of our salvation

Okay, and it's to the praise and glory of his grace so he gets all the glory Which he freely bestows on us.

So notice he's the one bestowing this we we're not having say in this in a sense we're gonna get to whether we do have a say in it, but What we see here is that God is laying out that this was something he decided long ago before the world existed

Now as we think about the nature of salvation we end up seeing that You see in verse 7, what do we how do we have redemption we have redemption through Christ The forgiveness of trust of our trespasses.

So it's in Christ. So now you're seeing that this is the again No, he is God doing all this laying out this plan

Christ is providing that Solution to to our salvation. He's providing the salvation

So you have God the Father is the planner God the Son is the provider we see it's through him and him alone

That the riches of his grace which he lavished on us. So he's one

I'm pressing this to show you us What scripture says is the force behind our salvation it is all

God God the Father you're seeing the emphasis on Christ the provider That he made known the mystery according to his kind intentions

Which he purposed on him notice again. It's his intention. It's his planning

It's his provision and it doesn't stop with the

Sun Because we we drop down to verse 13 and we see that knowing is God the

Father the planner God the Son is the provider But God the

Spirit is the protector We see here. It says in him you also

After listening to the message of truth the gospel of your salvation Having believed so this is now dealing with people who have believed having believed you were sealed in Him with the

Holy Spirit of promise who gave a pledge of our inheritance with a view to redemption on God's own possession

To the praise of his glory. So what you see here is the Holy Spirit himself is the seal of our salvation

So when we say that someone is saved what we see is God the Father planned it before there was a creation

God the Son provided it at the cross. We're gonna get there in a moment and then the

Holy Spirit Protects us protects it by being the seal.

He the the person of the Holy Spirit is the seal of our salvation and it says the

Holy Spirit of Promise who has given us a pledge of his inheritance.

This is something that Many Jewish people would understand this is

Goes back to Ezekiel to Jeremiah 29 29 and following in Ezekiel 36 where what you end up seeing is this is the idea of a the

New covenant that the Jewish people would look forward to in it in Ezekiel 36 25 and following We have the same reference

That Paul I think is referring to in this passage in Ephesians 1 it says there in Ezekiel Starting at verse 25 then

I will sprinkle clean water on you and make you clean. I will cleanse you From all your filthiness from all your filthiness.

This is the promise He's gonna cleanse us of all our filthiness and all your idols moreover,

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh

And then here's where it's different verse 27. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statutes and You will be careful to observe my ordinances

You will live in the land that I give you to your forefathers so that you will be my people and I will be your

God moreover, I will save you from all uncleanness and I will call the grain and Multiply it and I will not bring a famine to you

I will you know, he goes on there And so what you end up having here is a promise that God would do something that in the

Old Testament We only saw at different at certain times We'd see men like Saul or David we would see the

Spirit come upon men for leadership But we don't see in the

Old Testament the Spirit coming upon every believer so I think what's being referenced here in Ephesians is the fact of the new covenant that the

Jewish people would look forward to and That is that there would be a time as it says in in Jeremiah 29

Is I'm saying 29 now. I'm thinking it's I'm I don't think it's

I'm totally off on that one. I think it's 25. I got a look.

All right, I Will edit that too. I'll have to put that in 31 that's what it was so if we look and I Got the passage from earlier in Jeremiah.

It's Jeremiah 31 31 and following But what you see in this in in there is a reference to the fact that We no longer will need priests between these two passages.

What do we look forward to in the new covenant that? God himself in the personal Holy Spirit will indwell us and in that indwelling

We would we would have the Holy Spirit who would illuminate our minds to an understanding of God's Word and the application of it

God himself in the personal Holy Spirit is the seal. He's the down payment

So we have the indwelling of the Holy Spirit when we get saved We are baptized with the

Holy Spirit doubt for people that are in the charismatic circles This is different than filling of the Holy Spirit and it's different than the way charismatics refer to this so let me define this a little bit bud for folks because sometimes there's confusion is when people talk in the charismatic circles they will talk about the fact that Someone gets saved and then they start speaking in tongues and they refer to that speaking in tongues as baptized in the spirit

In other words now they have the gifts of the spirit What we end up seeing

I don't have time in this episode to do this. Maybe we'll do it another We look at the what happens at salvation

We we get at the moment of salvation we are baptized in the spirit that means we're we're immersed

For our Presbyterian friends. That's what baptism Oh means to be plunged immerse

Dip, so we are plunged with the Holy Spirit. He doesn't just sprinkle himself on us

He indwells us. So we're baptized with the spirit. That's the idea of the indwelling of the spirit

That is a one -time event that we are We're filled with the spirit he comes in and dwells us

This is different than the filling of the spirit the filling of the spirit is when we think of in the Old Testament and that's when the spirit would come upon someone and For leadership or for for service and that can come and go

Okay, so that's where there's some confusion with this So when the charismatics say that you get gifts after you're saved

If you look at first Corinthians 12 13 and 14 You end up seeing that we're all baptized into one spirit into one church when we are saved

So we get those gifts at salvation. So the emphasis that we see here is that through the

Holy Spirit when we believe as It says here in Ephesians verse 13

Having also believed you were sealed with him In him with the

Holy Spirit of promise who's given the pledge of our inheritance our inheritance That's future to us.

That's a moment we die He is going to protect our salvation until we die

He is that pledge Okay to break that seal you'd have to be greater than God To break the seal.

That's the idea here that the idea of a seal is that that Only someone who has the authority to open it can open it and The Holy Spirit is the one that is the seal only

God himself has the authority to break the seal Okay, so so with that so far, but anything you want to add to that?

No, I don't think so. I think that you're gonna lead into the question that we were gonna also talk about is

Can you lose your salvation and I think part of that is is because people don't know Truly these days what the effects of salvation should look like now these things have happened.

These are forensic Truths that Paul is giving to us here And they have implications

It's not merely head knowledge of doctrine. They actually have implications. So that I know that's what you're gonna go into Yeah, because I think a lot of people bud

Because they don't have a good foundation of what salvation is That's where the struggle is

I mean we're seeing in Ephesians 1 God is the one that it's laying out the plan providing the the plant plan and Protecting the plan.

I mean, this is all the Trinity, but then we get into this fact that in Ephesians 1

We're seeing that this was done before the foundation of the world. This was laid out All before there was time before any of us were even a conception

So I'm not of course to God he had the conception but not to not to you know people like we didn't exist but here's the other thing a lot of people don't understand in a struggle for many is

They they see that they made a profession of faith, but then they are living in some sin and they start to question their salvation

Now there are passages and I'm gonna include in my in the show notes here an article that I wrote on Hebrews 6 because many people will argue that Hebrews 6 teaches that you can lose your salvation and There are different passages in the

Bible where people use to theologically make an argument. You can lose your salvation The issue is that what

I end up seeing in those passages is they are typically talking about false converts someone who is a hypocrite

They make profession of faith, but they don't actually believe. Yeah, and so I'll give you that article to read in more detail and That's worth a study because you need to really understand

Who is the author of Hebrews talking about and until you clarify that sure you could come away thinking.

Oh my goodness I can I can lose my salvation. It's written right here. No no you need to understand that the the text there and who the target audience is that he's

Talking to and who he is also talking about and this is the thing that we have to do with all these texts is is to dig in and interpret them and when we do

We work through these texts as we've just done with in Ephesians Briefly you end up realizing that God is making it really clear that we had nothing to do with the salvation

He had everything to do with it. And so you come to Colossians Let it turn to Colossians to if you're not driving if you're driving just listen.

Don't take your hands off the wheels Just listen but for the rest of us open your Bibles to Colossians chapter 2 verses 13 and 14

Because verse 14 is going to be very important in this area because part of this question is

When was I forgiven and what was I forgiven of when I was I forgiven? I asked this question often to people

I recently in my apologetics live podcast did a debate with someone on Calvinism and The issue

I asked him is when were your sins forgiven? At the cross or when you believed

And he said when I believed and many people believe that yeah, but let's see what Scripture says 2nd

Corinthians 2 13. No Colossians. Sorry. Thank you. Oshins. Yeah 13

See, that's what I got you to keep me on when you were dead in your transgressions and And uncircumcised in your flesh he made you alive together with him

Having forgiven us of all our transgressions, so let's stop there and just look at what's 13 is saying first off We were dead in our transgressions

We needed him to make us alive notice that what's happening there. We can't do this. We're dead in our transgressions

He makes us alive with him. How does he do that? Having forgiven us of all our transgressions

So when someone is made alive, they are forgiven not of some of their transgressions

But all of the of our transgressions Now notice what it says.

Not only are all our transgressions forgiven but verse 14 Having canceled out the certificate of debt can

Consisting of Decrees against us. So he cancels this right all these transport transgressions that we have that we're forgiven of he canceled them out

He gave a certificate of them being canceled. This is like when you pay off your mortgage it gets stamped paid in full

Everything all of the debt all your transgressions have been canceled out paid in full everything against us

It's and it says which was hostile to us and He has taken it out of the way

Having nailed it to the cross What happens at the cross when someone would be crucified what they would do is that?

Crucify the person and above him they would put the offense of what he's being crucified for stealing murder, whatever it is in This case with it what we have

Paul saying in Colossians is that all of our sin was canceled out completely paid in full when when it was nailed to the cross our

Sins were forgiven at the cross So when we think about this, it's saying all of it

So what sin is left out? none nothing

We everything was paid at the cross and it said it was nailed to the cross in other words For those of us that profess the name of Christ Every sin we have ever done

Every sin we are doing every sin that we have yet to do Was all nailed to the cross

It was all future to the cross The idea that somehow we could we could be sinning in such a way that we're we were saved

But then we were really got really into sin. Oh, it's so bad. We kept sinning and The idea that we would be in some sin that would cause us to walk away from Christ Guess what that sin that you are doing is future to the cross

It was already paid at the cross if you're believing in Christ So there is no sin in the future that could cause you to lose your salvation in that sense because it's all future to the cross now

I'm kind of giving away my answer but to the question But what we're seeing is that the sins we do

Have all been paid at the cross and that cross was 2 ,000 years removed from you and I So I'm helping us to hopefully get this out this groundwork

I mean, we're 40 minutes in bud to to the episode and we haven't even gotten to the question yet But I think that this groundwork will lay the foundation to where the answer is clear and we won't have to spend much time on it the idea here being is that when we are

Believing in Christ We're sealed and protected with the Holy Spirit he indwells us

Until our inheritance which is at our death and that every sin we've ever committed all of our

Transgressions was canceled paid in full and nailed to the cross. In other words when Christ died

He died for those sins now remember earlier. I mentioned it was sin in this case.

It's sins. It's transgressions This is the payment for the individual things we've done and it says all of them and they've been paid in full and They were late as it were.

Those were the labels that were above Christ's head on the cross So again, what we're seeing is

Christ made the provision of our salvation So some people think

What the theory is with those that believe you can lose your salvation is the fact that they believe that people can

God saves us through faith But essentially we maintain it through works in other words

God saves us through faith alone in Christ alone and Then what ends up happening is we end up losing our own salvation on our own the idea being that We somehow commit some sin that causes us to leave

Christ's hands. He holds us but we walk away. In other words, it's not that they'll say that it's not that Christ is an

Indian giver You know as it says in in Romans that God when it speaks about the the gifts of salvation and He he ends up saying that you know

You know God does not take it back and that becomes in in This is

Romans 11 29 I'll start in verse 28 just to give a little context from the standpoint of the gospel

They are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God's choice

They are beloved for the sake of the fathers for the sake of the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable

That's the idea there. God's not gonna take it back And this is the question is

God's gift of salvation revocable or irrevocable This is irrevocable.

It's this is something God chooses to do. He provides it. He plans for it. He protects it and He's not gonna take it back but the idea is that some people have is well

God's not gonna take it back But we can walk away We we become the ones that lose our salvation

Because the reason they do that they have to say that is because they know Romans chapter 8 and This is a key passage to turn to because here it says

Romans chapter 8 starting in verse 1

Therefore there is now no Condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, but how much condemnation is there for the believer?

It says no condemnation. No kind of so like none none. So I'm thinking that's like a void.

There's none And he says, you know He gives this whole long thing for the for the law spirit is life in Christ and sets

Sets you free from the law of sin and death for what the law could not do weak as it is though in the flesh

God did sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh as An offering for sin he condemned

Sin in the flesh. So he's he's giving the argumentation why we have no condemnation. It's all because of what

Christ did Okay, and we go through this and you read through this whole thing

To see that Christ provided this There's there's there's nothing in here that We can separate ourselves from Christ is the one that's doing this the law couldn't do this.

And if we think that we're Saved by faith, but then we keep our salvation through law -keeping through obedience

It really puts our final kind of Say a sanctification upon us

Whether we're truly saved in the end becomes becomes law -keeping and and here he's saying it has nothing to do with the law

Okay, we can't keep ourselves The idea is

God did the work for us he's gonna be the one to hold us So it's not about us trying to work ourselves in maintaining our salvation because He's gonna say for in this verse 6 for the mind is set on the flesh is

Death and the mind set on the spirit is life and peace peace because the mind is set on the flesh is hostile toward God The idea of the flesh being the law for it says here for it does not subject itself to the law of God But it but even able to do so to those who are able according to flesh cannot please

God So the idea that we end up seeing is that for those who believe in Christ We do so all because of what

God has done and we cannot

Walk away from this. In fact what he's gonna do is If we continue in Romans chapter 8

He's going to further say that it's in verse 27, it's God It's he who searches the hearts and knows the mind of the spirit because he intercedes for the for the

Saints according to what the will of God and Verse 28 and we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love him and are called according to His purpose and then he's gonna explain that calling

He's gonna explain that in verse 29 for those who whom he foreknew he also predestined to become conformed to his image so that He would be the firstborn of the brother of the brethren and these whom he predestined

He also called and these whom he called. He also justified and these whom he justified. He also glorified

What then shall we say to those things? If God is for us who can be against us?

We are included in that who by the way who could be against us if God is for us who can be against us?

Can we be against us? That's that becomes the question in this. Well, let's read on in verse 32

He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us How will he not also freely give us all things?

He who he who will bring a charge against God's elect God is the one who justifies knows

God's the justifier and he's the one who saved us Who's gonna bring a charge against us when

God's the one that justified us? That's the the argument that we have here.

So he says in verse 34, who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is

He who died? Yes, rather who was raised and sorry raised

Who is at the right hand of God who also intercedes for us? Who can separate us from the love of God and this is really the question

What can separate us from the love of God here? Because the thing that we would say is nothing.

What is it? What is it? Those others would say is they'll say well we can separate ourselves because we're not mentioned here

Well, I think we are mentioned when he says who can be against God But look at what he says here in verse 35 who can separate us from the love of God will tribulation

Or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword?

For just as it is written for your sake we are being put to death all day long We are considered as sheep to slaughter but in all in all things

We overwhelmingly conquer through him who loved us

For I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities Nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other created thing

Will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our

Lord. That's the clearest argument we have And so And now i'm building this so I haven't even gotten to our question yet But I think as you're seeing when we get to the question

We're going to be able to answer very easily. So what is he saying? Who can who can?

Give a charge against God when he is the one who justifies The the answer is no one but he's going to define that very clearly

So can tribulations can when we have tribulation in our life? Can that separate us because this is one of the things people say is that when things go really bad

They start to question whether they really are saved Persecution distress famine nakedness peril all these things that we have everything that happens to us in life

The question can any of that separate us from the love of God? And the answer there is no But then he goes on to say that he's convinced that Death can't separate us

Angels can't separate us Principalities would be the thought are is governments or rulers

Uh, some will you know will end up adding more as you have the angels some will say demons here

Uh, but and some will put the demons when it says nor powers so but the idea is that one is governing one is is

Demonic, uh things present or things to come in other words the things you're dealing with now are stuff that's still future to us

Height or depth, but here's the thing nor any created thing Now here's the thing if no created thing can separate us from the love of God Are we but I know this is gonna be a tough question.

Are we a created thing? We think andrew i'm going with yes

Well, I guess then we fit in this definition, don't we Absolutely So when people say well, you know,

I can lose my own salvation The the thing I look at here is go well not according to this text you cannot separate yourself from the love of God And that's what all of romans chapter 8 is dealing with we're not under condemnation because God provided this salvation

And he will not let us go and we cannot be separated so so that's the thing that we end up seeing that all this is

I wanted to build all this up for us to Have an understanding of the nature of salvation Now at this point, but you know, there's there's some things we we have to deal with and there's a lot of different views that people have

When it comes to you know, we talk about that inheritance when we talk about being glorified

And the idea of what happens like when we die And some have the idea of soul sleep

It's it's this idea that we kind of just go into a non -existent state until a judgment I think the reason that they struggle with this bud is because I really think and you you can correct me if you think i'm wrong.

I think you'll probably correct me but I think what it is is because they're lacking a good pillow

See, they're they're lacking they believe it. They're not understanding a good sleep and if they would have had

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I told you you were going to correct me. I just I just wanted to put that in I I want to be contrary for a moment for folks that aren't patreon, uh, patrons and that support us through patreon and get to watch the video of this but it is always fun to when

When you're trying you never know when it's coming when i'm going to slip the advertisement and it's it's great

You just whip this stuff in here and i'll i am completely Uh surprised it's a good good transition that one was a you know a bad transition because it was theologically

So let's now get to with we have you know, like 55 minutes in we now have a good foundation of our of our

Of the nature of salvation I think the answer to the question becomes quite clear now.

Can we lose our salvation? I think the answer is no you know the first time bud that I came across this was

I was in college and for folks who don't know my background. I grew up I grew up jewish not knowing anything of christianity.

I got saved at 16 Didn't know any other christians didn't just read a bible That's all

I had for two years got to college and started to meet with other christians and in college

You know, I ended up getting into word of faith, unfortunately Got you know, that was bad got out of that but what ended up happening was there was a couple by my college and they had

They would take students in they had some they they would have students come in on every other friday

They'd provide a home -cooked meal which for college students is great and a bible study and so They were a more mature believers

And they would just sit and study the bible and go through verse by verse and I remember The the issue came up where we came to the passage

I read in romans 8 and the the person who was leading it said that he doesn't want to get into because someone asked a question about whether you can lose your

Salvation he he really didn't want to get into he knew there were differing views there And he just he didn't want to get into it.

I was just being ignorant. I'll be honest with you. I was ignorant I didn't understand the doctrine.

I never heard the idea that you could lose your salvation before And it was brand new to me.

But the way I approached it was I asked this question I said I i'm confused by this because one person's saying you can lose your salvation the person the gentleman whose house we're in is saying you can't lose your salvation and The person is saying you lose your salvation saying but what if someone sins really bad?

What what if they they persist in sin and asking all these type of things? And I brought it back to this.

I asked this question. I don't understand something I said if god is the one

Who regenerated me? And god is the one who holds me and god is the one who says he he's he's never going to let me go

How can I undo what god did Yeah, in other words i'm going back to the nature of salvation and saying if god's the one who saved me

How can I be the one to undo that? And That's the really the thing why we want to spend the time understanding this whole foundation

For the nature of salvation if you understand the nature of salvation this question becomes very easy to answer but if you don't

Understand salvation if you think that salvation was based upon something you did That you made a choice

Then you can make a choice and you can choose otherwise and therefore you can lose it And so this is why it's important for us to have an understanding of that now

Really, but what most people deal with when they deal with the question there's there's the theological issue that people would have and that's why

I We know we went through the time to go through the scriptures explain the nature of salvation I give the article about hebrews 6 to show one example of How to deal with the text where people say you can lose your salvation

But most people that are experiencing this bud. It's not an issue of Am I saved but do

I feel like i'm saved? Well, you've got an evangelical church climate for decades now that has emphasized the motive rather than the doctrinal

So it's natural Not only because of the lack of doctrinal teaching in the church, but it's natural to our flesh that that we're going to be driven by emotions

Uh, that's not what scripture does So yeah That's absolutely true and and our culture is that way.

They don't think anymore. They feel yeah feel that true Well, I don't care how you feel. Is it true? Yeah, right you know the the thing that we end up seeing though with this is that there is a an importance of recognizing the fact that There is a difference between what we call the assurance of our salvation, which is that feeling when we're in sin

We do not feel like we're saved. We feel like there's distance between us and god Have you ever read the the footprints poem?

That you know is so well known Oh, yeah You know where we're two there's two steps walking in the sand, but when the guy has trials there's only one

Pair of footprints and god says that's when I picked you up and carried you The idea being you know, it's it's the idea that we don't always feel that closeness the idea is that sometimes

You know, we feel like there's a distance We don't recognize that that god's still there and it we we feel in Times of when we're close to him in trials that we we feel we might feel that But when we are in sin, it often is a thing that we don't feel the salvation

Well, the feeling the assurance of salvation has nothing to do with the security of our salvation We've gone through You know for this past hour is that our secure our salvation is secured how secure it's secured by god planned provided and protected by god

And therefore it is secure But one of the things bud is we don't always feel that way because we still sin

You had had some notes and and let me give encouragement Before you read your notes on this

There's two books. I encourage you to read if you're struggling with this First john first john has written to deal with the issue of you know

The assurance of salvation to help you understand what if you really are A christian this will help you to have that assurance

The second is james and the book of james will give you the Tests of what genuine faith looks like so you could test yourself and see do

I actually have a genuine faith? And if you do then go to first john and go, okay Then this is what

I what I recognize and I should correct my feelings But you had some notes of uh, 12 tests of assurance that you had gotten bud from macarthur

Maybe you could just go through those 12 before we close out. Yeah, absolutely. Let me

I just want to Exclamation point with a quote from calvin about what you were just talking about regarding knowledge and and and feeling

Uh, very pithy so I don't want to prolong this but calvin said we shall now have a full definition of faith

If we say that it is a firm and sure Knowledge, which is to say understanding of doctrine a firm and sure knowledge of the divine favor toward us

Founded on the truth of a free promise in christ and revealed to our minds and sealed on our hearts by the holy spirit

That's a summary of what paul is doing in ephesians that we opened up reading so but yeah, the notes that I took and I don't know if you can attach these this little page to the

Show notes or not Uh, but I called these from a sermon by macarthur and I don't remember which sermon it was because I didn't have that in my notes, but I did have the um 12 tests of assurance that he goes through primarily from the book of first john and these are kind of questions.

They're uh, They're somewhat subjective in some cases. They may be objective others could look at you and recognize this about you

But these are essentially effects of salvation question number one Do you enjoy fellowship with christ and his people and that would be cited to first john one three

Number two, are you sensitive to sin? And you look at first john one nine

Number three, do you hate the world and it's evil first john 2 15?

Number four are you obedient to god's word first john 2 3

Question number five would be do you love jesus christ with an unusual love first john 3 2

It's number six do you see a decreasing pattern of sin in your life first john 3 5

Number seven, do you sacrificially love other christians? first john 3 14

Eight do you experience answered prayer first john 3 22? Number nine, do you experience the inner working of the holy spirit?

Uh first john 3 24 and 4 13 Number 10, do you discern between spiritual truth and error first john 4?

Number 11. Do you believe scripture first john 5 1? And then number 12.

Have you been attacked or persecuted for the truth and it goes to philippians 128 for that I'm going to challenge bud to write an article on this so that we can have all of that up and just have that article

That's my challenge to bud And but I i'll include that in the show notes, so here's the thing that we want to show is to wrap up with If you are a professing believer

You name the name of christ But you do not feel like you're saved

You have been struggling with a sin. You've been struggling with something Go through understanding the nature of salvation

My challenge to you is to go through the scriptures. We've given lots of scriptures here today In this episode

Go through those scriptures And look at the things like bud just ended with and what we want to do is look at this and say

Am I a believer a person who's struggling with this question It's one of two things

I'm a sinning believer in which case Recognize christ died for those sins repent

And draw close to christ or You're a false convert

Yeah You're one who thought you were a believer You named the name of christ in in voice in confession, but not in belief

And so if that's the case, then you need to repent of your sin And believe on christ

And then you will draw close to christ so In closing with this

I have one last verse for us and you know, we we are going to suffer we are going to struggle

And you you mentioned philippians 1 28. Well, I want to read philippians 1 29 because I want to end with this.

There's many who are maybe still saying but those that believe you can lose your salvation. They're arguing

Yes, but You know, I did believe I'm the one who believed And when

I got saved I believed in christ and I can walk away from that They they're

Still maybe thinking that And again part of the nature. I said that I would address the issue of belief when we get saved does god do everything and and Force us to believe against our will as some argue.

The answer is no God works through us in such a way that Even our choices are exactly as god intended them to be it is a doctrine known as super intending

You see this in the doctrine of inspiration paul wrote colossians

He had his own style. He had his own way of doing it He wrote colossians and yet god worked through him so that every letter he wrote was exactly as god intended it

So that it is god's word god gets a hundred percent of the credit even though paul wrote it

Paul experientially he wrote it theologically god wrote it So we end up seeing that god worked through paul.

It's the same thing in sanctification. We don't do good works God does them through us. We can't take credit for doing good work

God gets that credit even though we do it, but that choice of doing good works is something god works through us to do the same thing when it comes to salvation

God works through us. So even though we think we believe and we do believe we're believing

But god is working through us in that belief so that he gets a hundred percent of the credit

Is there a verse for that? Well, yes philippians 1 29 For it has been granted

For it has been granted for christ's sake not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for his sake

So for to you you and I that name the name of christ. It has been granted for us

Not only to believe but also to suffer god has granted us that belief now

In the debate that I did on apologetics live and I brought this verse up the gentleman tried to argue Well, that just means grant.

I still have a choice I could choose to accept that grant or not That's an argument some might make there's just one problem with that bud

The problem with that is well English isn't the language that the bible is written in This was written in greek

And therefore when we look at the greek word for this it does mean to to give it can mean to give

But it's it means to pardon to cancel to forgive In other words it has been pardoned

For to for to you it has been pardoned or cancelled Or forgiven for christ's sake not only to believe you've been pardoned to believe

Yeah, this isn't the same word as as just to give the way some would think of it.

This is the idea of a pardon And so where you're giving you're giving favor and that is undeserved

And you're giving it as a as a forgiveness Not as a gift So this is something where we're stated that so that belief that we have

The belief that we have has been given to us granted to us pardoned to us by christ

And so For those that even would say well, I believe therefore I can if I If I sin god will will remove that salvation because of my choices.

I would say here, but you didn't believe You did but you didn't I mean you did but god gets the credit for that belief

And so again, it goes back to the romans 8 we're part of the all creation Yeah, so we can't lose it and just you know

MacArthur had the the pithy little quote About this very issue if you could lose your salvation you would

And and that's absolutely true. If you're genuinely believed you cannot lose it A false salvation certainly you can so you need to be cautious about that and then the other thing

My pastor andrew smith from a sermon this past week regarding the works or the sin even but in particular the works

He said there is no such thing as spiritual extra credit if you have christ you have everything you need

That's assurance that's that's an understanding of what It is written in the word says

So you've got to have that you you can't lose your salvation, but you should examine yourself paul paul challenges

You know the thessalonians to that examine yourself to see that you're in the faith. Well, what's that examination look like?

Well, it looks like some of these tests of assurance that macarthur preached on We need to constantly be thinking about these things and we're pursuing christ -likeness because that's the point that you read from romans

What's the goal of your salvation the goal of your salvation is to be conformed to the image of the sun Uh, that's what we're after and that cannot fail because we're sealed with the holy spirit

So the simple answer to the question bud can we lose our salvation No That's right.

You know what else bud? What's that? That's a wrap This contest is part of the striving for eternity ministry to promote contests or to request a speaker or seminar to your church

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