H.A. IRONSIDE Refuted!
Pastor Ironside was among the worse of the
early twentieth century Calvinists spreading the false doctrine of eternal
security. The reader should note that he seldom used more than a 'snippet' of
scripture to substantiate his notions. Regardless what 'else' scripture may say
about the subject in question, his conclusions were final. Like his contemporaries
he relied on his listeners having a very 'limited' knowledge of the Bible, and
being easily persuaded with smooth sounding words and flattering speech. The validly
of conversion under his ministry is explained in Luke8:13: "They believed
for a while and in a time of testing fell away." Like Moody,
Spurgeon, Pink, Tozer and other famous Calvinists, they do not understand saving
faith and have distorted the message of grace until people have the impression
they can live in sin all the days of their lives and still inherit the kingdom
when they die.
Can A Believer Ever Be Lost?
According to Ironside:
It has been announced that I will speak to you on a subject which has occasioned a good deal of controversy among the people of God. I want to take as a starting point--not exactly as a text, because we shall be looking at a good many Scriptures--Romans 8:38-39: “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor power, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This is the inspired answer to the question of verse 35: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” That is, once we have been justified by faith, who is there, what power is there, that can separate from the love of Christ? And the answer, how full, how clear, not a shadow, not a doubt, not a question left, when the apostle says that neither death nor life shall separate! Can you think of anything which is neither included in death nor in life? Neither death nor life shall separate!
No unseen powers can separate the believer from Christ, “neither angels, nor principalities, nor powers.” These terms are used again and again in the New Testament, particularly in the Epistles, for angelic hosts, good and evil. When our Savior rose from the dead He spoiled principalities and powers, that is, He defeated all the hosts of evil led by Satan; and so we may take it that the angels referred to here are good angels, and the principalities and powers are possible evil angels. But there is nothing that good angels would do and nothing that evil angels can do which will result in the separation of the believer from Christ. And then further he says, “neither things present nor things to come.” Again let me put the question, Can you think of any experience through which a believer might ever go which is neither a thing present nor a thing to come? And the Holy Ghost says that neither things present nor things to come shall be able to separate us from the love of Christ. As though that were not enough, He speaks in a more general way when He says that neither “Height nor depth (nothing in heaven, nothing in hell), nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” It looks to me as though we are safe if we are believers in the Lord Jesus Christ.
According to the Bible:
Every eternal security preacher who ever lived cherishes Rom8:38-39 as the Cornerstone of their doctrine. BUT NO WHERE in this passage is it implied that a child of God is secure while engaged in known & willful sin. (Heb10:26) The Scriptures clearly teach that willful disobedience to the truth will be Judged, Rom2:7-10, and those who refuse to remain Steadfast in the Faith WILL NOT inherit the Kingdom of heaven! Check it out for yourself. (Col1:22-23, 1Cor15:1-2, Heb3:12-14, 1John2:24, 5:13, Matt10:22) These passages are clear & very precise, ignore them at your own peril.
The Rich young man in Mark10:17-22 clearly rejected the Kingdom of heaven because he freely choose to 'covet' his worldly goods more than Jesus. What does the scripture say in 10:21, "Jesus, looking at him, LOVED him and said, One thing you lack, go & sell all you have and give the money to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven, then come, TAKE UP your cross and follow ME!" Although NOTHING could separate this man from God's love, he still missed heaven because he refused to Count the Cost and Follow His Lord. That's why Rom8:38-39 is NOT teaching that we have absolute eternal security in Christ.
Eternal Security: Its Meaning
According to Ironside:
When we speak of the eternal security of the believer, what do we mean? We mean that once a poor sinner has been regenerated by the Word and the Spirit of God, once he has received a new life and a new nature and has been made partaker of the divine nature, once he has been justified from every charge before the throne of God, it is absolutely impossible that that man should ever again be a lost soul. Having said that, let me say what we do not mean when we speak of the eternal security of the believer. We do not mean that it necessarily follows that if one professes to be saved, if he comes out to the front in a meeting, shakes the preacher’s hand, and says he accepts the Lord Jesus Christ as his Savior, that that person is eternally safe. It does not mean that if one joins a church or makes a profession of faith, is baptized, becomes a communicant, and takes an interest in Christian work, that that person is forever secure. It does not mean that because one manifests certain gifts and exercises these gifts in Christian testimony, that that person is necessarily eternally secure.
Our Lord Jesus Christ said to the people of His day, as recorded in Matthew 7:21-23: “Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name? And in Thy name have cast out devils? And in Thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity.” Such people then may have been very active in what is called Christian work--they have preached, they have cast out demons, that is, their influence has been such that men and women have found deliverance from satanic power through their ministrations in the name of Jesus, they have professed with their lips, they have accomplished many wonderful works, but they are found in that day among the lost, and when they plead their great activity and their earnestness in Christian testimony, the Lord says to them, “I never knew you.” Notice, He does not say to them, “I used to know you, but you have forfeited My favor and I do not know you any longer.” He says, “I never knew you.”
According to the Bible:
Like all devote Calvinists, he is setting you up for the common argument, 'They were NEVER saved to begin with!' But the Bible teaches that 'You shall know them by their fruit!' Matt12:33 1John3:7 says, "Little children, let NO ONE deceive you. He who does what is Right is righteous, just as HE is righteous." AND 3:10 "In this the children of God & the children of the devil are manifest (made known) WHOEVER does not DO what is RIGHT is NOT of God, nor is he who does not love his brother." Pretty clear cut, wouldn't you say? John was writing these things to CHRISTIANS, not the un-saved. WHY then would John issue these types of warnings to people who have NO possibility of straying from the faith and becoming lost souls again? It's important to note that in 1Jh2:24 he said clearly, "IF what you heard from the beginning abides in you, you also will abide in the Son." He said this because he understood fully the teaching of Jesus in John15:1-6 "IF anyone does not ABIDE in ME, he is cast out as a branch & is withered & they are gathered up & thrown into the fire & burned!" EVERY branch in the VINE (which is Christ) MUST bare fruit or be CUT OFF and burned. That's why the Apostle Paul said in Rom11:22 "Therefore, consider the goodness & the severity of God, on those who fell severity, but toward you goodness, IF YOU CONTINUE in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be CUT OFF!" Now do you understand why these people WON'T touch these verses, except to explain them away?
The Grace of God is clearly NOT un-conditional, as they would have you believe. And it does not magically remove you from the righteous decrees of Scripture. You still REAP what you SOW, Gal6:7-10. Notice how Mr. Ironside made such a lavish statement about the impossibility of falling away without quoting a SINGE verse of scripture! This is common among those who teach osas. They have a few select passages of scripture, and that's the end of it. They NEVER consider WHAT ELSE the Bible has to say about these things. But we intend to DO just that.
The Sheep Of Christ
According to Ironside:
You remember how He speaks of His own in John 10:27-30: ”My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand. I and My Father are one.” Of His own He says, “I know them.” Of these others, in spite of all their activity, in spite of all their accomplishments, He says in the day of judgment, “I never knew you.” That is a very solemn thing. That answers a question that is frequently put to us. I do not know how many times I have had individuals come to me with a hypothetical case like this: “Suppose a man who joined the church, who professed to be saved, who for a number of years was a very active Christian worker, perhaps a Sunday school teacher, perhaps an elder or a deacon in the church, maybe a minister, but after some years of apparent consistent Christian living and helpfulness in testimony he turns his back on it all, returns to the world, utterly repudiates Christianity, and now denies in toto the gospel he once professed. How does that square with your doctrine of the eternal security of the believer?” That does not touch the matter at all. The apostle John tells us how we are to understand a case like that. He says in 1 John 2:19, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us,” or literally, “That they were not altogether of us.” That is, it is possible to do all the things that I have spoken of and yet never be regenerated. It is quite possible to join a church, to make a Christian profession; it is quite possible to observe the Christian ordinances, to teach and to preach, and yet never be born again. If one teaches and preaches the truth, it will produce good results and will do men good whether the teacher or the preacher be real or not, for it is the truth that God uses. Of course He can use the truth to better advantage when it is proclaimed by a holy man living to the glory of God than when it is proclaimed by a hypocrite. Nevertheless, God uses His truth regardless of who may proclaim it, and that explains how people may do mighty works in the name of Christ and yet never be born again.
According to the Bible:
Again, ONE verse of scripture to prove 'they were NEVER saved to begin with'. But what about 1Tim1:19 where it says that certain men HAD Faith AND a Good Conscience, rejected it and suffered Shipwreck! Never saved to begin with? Paul states in verses 5-6 of the same chapter that the "PURPOSE of the Commandant is love from a Pure Heart, from a good conscience and from sincere faith, from which some have strayed and TURNED ASIDE to idle talk." If Grace indeed produces the things Paul said in verse 5, including Faith & a good Conscience, HOW is it possible that these men were NEVER saved to begin with? Did Paul suggest such a thing? Did he say, "I knew these men were NEVER saved, that they had made a false profession of faith and lacked the sincerity of heart to become real Christians!" HOW could he have known what was inside their hearts except by their FRUITS. "BY THIS WE KNOW!" John said, over & over again. KNOW WHAT? IF a person is RIGHTEOUS... "He who DOES what is RIGHT he is righteous!" Paul NEVER used this argument in Scripture, even with the man in 1Cor5:5 who was caught in the act of incest. It was not suggested that he was 'NEVER' saved to begin with because of his vile sin. Paul merely told the congregation to deliver the man over to satan for the destruction of the flesh that his spirit MAY YET be saved! And when Demas, 2Tim4:9, deserted Paul on the mission field, no one accused him of having false faith. The passage in 1Jh2:19 they are fond of using to prove this false notion is NOT speaking of religious hypocrites. Study the context, 2:18-23, It's speaking of the 'spirit' of antichrist at work in those who would deny Jesus is Christ! NOT believers who have 'departed' from the faith & suffered shipwreck.
The John10:27-30 passage is an all time favorite with the osas teachers. But ALL it proves is that HIS sheep who are NOW hearing His voice & NOW continuing to follow Him, have eternal life and no one can 'un-expectedly' come along and SNATCH them out of His hand. The word 'pluck' them out used here, is the same exact word used in 1Thess4:17, 'Caught up' It means to be taken away by surprise, suddenly without warning. The Promise of Christ in Jh10:28 is, "If you are NOW following Him and hearing His voice, no one can come along (satan) and un-expectedly pluck you away!" Again, this is by no means meant to convey that a follower of Christ is SAFE while walking in sin. The warnings of scripture are numerous and very clear: 'IF you live according to the flesh you will die!' Rom8:6,13, Gal5:21, Eph5:5-6 LET NO ONE DECEIVE YOU with empty words, those who DO these things WILL NOT inherit the kingdom of God!
We are NOT denying that a person can make a FALSE profession of faith. It happens all the time. But who can know the human heart but GOD!? The Scriptures clearly teach that a genuine child of God can indeed FALL from the faith and end up in hell. Ignoring the warnings and examples given us by the Holy Spirit is like walking blindly over the edge of a steep cliff. The eternal security message is giving people a false assurance in sin as well as creating multitudes of false converts. They hide behind this argument that those who fall into sin were 'never really saved to begin with' , but what about those who WERE indeed saved to begin with? See the dilemma? Under osas teaching the ONLY way you KNOW for sure you are REALLY saved, is endure to the end & make it into the kingdom! Otherwise, you were 'Never' really saved. What kind of security is that?
Think about it, WHAT qualifies you as 'Never saved to begin with', or a 'back slidden' Christian? Who makes the call? What defines the reality of your faith? You accepted Jesus as your savior, professed Him before men, believed in heart that God raised Him from dead, and now they are claiming you were 'never' really saved! When THIS is exactly what they told to DO to get saved! No wonder people are confused & bewildered.
Christ’s One Offering
According to Ironside:
When we say that the believer in the Lord Jesus is eternally secure, we base it upon a number of lines of scriptural testimony. In the first place, we rest it upon the perfection of Christ’s one offering upon the cross. Personally, I never can understand how thoughtful people, taught by the Holy Spirit of God, can carefully read the Epistle to the Hebrews and not see that throughout that Epistle the writer is contrasting the many sacrifices offered under law with the one sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ. That to which he particularly calls attention is this: under law every time an Israelite sinned, he needed a new sin offering, and every year the nation had to celebrate the great day of atonement when a new offering was presented to God for the people. Why? Because those sacrifices could never take away sin, they simply covered sin for the time being. But we are told in Hebrews 10 that when the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world and offered Himself without spot to God, the effect of His sacrifice was eternal. Verse 14 makes this clear: “For by one offering He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.” Perfected for how long? “Oh,” says somebody, “as long as they are faithful.” No, that is not what it says. “He hath perfected for ever.” Why? Because the sacrifice is all-efficacious.
I am sure my brethren who deny the doctrine of the eternal security of the believer do not realize that in so doing they are putting a slight upon the finished work of Christ, they are reducing the sacrifice of Christ practically to the level of the offerings of bulls and goats in the Old Testament dispensation. I am sure they do not mean to do that, for they love their Lord just as truly as I trust I love Him, and they do not want to dishonor Him. But they are afraid that this doctrine will lead people to be careless about their lives, and therefore they stress the possibility of a man losing his salvation after he has once been justified by faith. But they do not pursue that to its logical conclusion; they do not see that it is a practical denial of the finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ. We are saved eternally because the sacrifice of Christ abides.
When I came to the Lord Jesus Christ and put my trust in Him, not only were all my sins up to the day of my conversion forgiven, but all my sins were put away for eternity. When a young Christian, I was taught something like this: I thought when I was converted that all my sins, from the time of dawning accountability up to that night when I put my trust in the Lord Jesus, were put away, and now God had given me a new start, and if I could only keep the record clean to the end of my life, I would get to heaven; but if I did not keep it clean, I ceased to be a Christian and I had to get converted all over again. Every time this happened the past was under the blood, but I had to keep the record clean for the future. What a God-dishonoring view of the atonement of Christ that is! If only those of my sins that were committed up to the moment of my conversion were put away by the atoning blood of Jesus, what possible way would there be by which sins I have confessed after that could be dealt with? The only ground on which God could forgive sin is that Jesus settled all upon the cross, and when I trust Him, all that He has done goes down to my account.
According to the Bible:
They accuse us of dishonoring the sacrifice of Christ by saying that salvation is conditional on Steadfast obedience in the faith, Rom2:7 But at the same time they are preaching a gospel that permits ALL manner of lust, immoality, greed, and careless behavior because all our sins are 'covered' by the Blood of Christ. As though God is now blinded by the blood of His Son and sees only the 'imputed' righteousness of Christ. Sounds good, but is it scriptural?
Heb12:4 says, "You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin!" Strange verse if what they say about future sin is true. WHY would the inspired writer tell us to STRIVE (the same exact word used by Jesus in Lk13:24 'Strive to enter by the narrow gate') against sin, if God 'overlooked' our sin? Like the book of Romans, these men love to use only those passages that 'seem' to support this notion of eternal security and avoid the rest. How many places does the writer of Hebrews WARN us to remain 'diligent', 'Continue', be 'Steadfast in the faith', give earnest heed lest we drift away! Heb2:1-2, 3:6, 12-14, 4:11, 5:9, 6:12, 10:23, 35-36, 12:1-2, 14-17 to name a few. What they fail to grasp, because of Calvinism, is that making Salvation conditional on our continued obedience to the faith is NOT discrediting or limiting the ultimate sacrifice of Christ in the least, but HONORING it!
It's like Paul saying, "What then shall we continue in sin because of Grace, GOD FORBID!" The mere thought of reducing God's grace to such a level was repulsive to his soul. Grace was given not to 'COVER' man's sin, but to DELIVER him from the bondage of sin. God did not accommodate man by sending His Son to die on the Cross. He did so to REDEEM the world, including man, from the Corruption & devastation of sin! (Titus2:11-14, read it!) Thus man can become a Partaker of the Divine nature, through faith, 2Pet1:4, and escape the corruption that is the world through lust. By FAITH you 'lay hold' of these promises, obey God and enter into His rest, Heb4:11. It's the WORK of Faith with POWER that saves your soul! 2The1:11
His Word works in you, as you put it into practice through obedience, Jame1:21-22. If you do not CONTINUE to obey, cleansing your heart by obedience to the faith, you will defile your soul and end up BACK on the road to hell. THAT'S what the book of Hebrews really teaches
What Of Future Sins?
According to Ironside:
A lady came to me one day and said, “I do not understand you there. I can understand that Christ died for the sins I committed up to the night of my conversion, but do you mean to tell me that Christ died for my future sins?” I said, “How many of your sins were in the past when Christ died on the cross?” She looked puzzled for a moment, and then the light broke in, and she said, “How foolish I have been! Of course they were all future when Jesus died for me. I had not committed any of them.”
God saw all your sins, and He laid upon Jesus all your iniquity. Therefore, when you trusted Him, you were justified freely from all things. Do you say, “Does it make no difference then if a believer sins?” That is another question, and it would take a whole evening to go into that, but here is the point: the moment you trust the Lord Jesus as your Savior, your responsibility as a sinner having to do with the God of judgment is ended for eternity, but that same moment your responsibility as a child having to do with a Father in heaven begins. Now if as a child you should sin against your Father, God will have to deal with you about that, but as a father and not as a judge. That is a line of truth that stands by itself and does not contradict what I am now teaching. It explains some things that bewilder people when this doctrine is brought before them.
According to the Bible:
Again, notice the absence of scripture. He has made the most outrageous statements about sin without quoting a single passage! If our future sins are 'ALREADY' forgiven, as he insists, why does Christ Himself warn the churches in Rev 2-3 that they MUST repent or lose their inheritance in the kingdom? Read it for yourself. "Hold fast and repent, I come upon you as a thief!" Rev3:3 "He who overcomes, I will not blot out his name from the Book of life!" 3:5 These scriptures present HUGE problems for the osas teachers. Jesus is obviously speaking to the churches, not the unsaved and it's clear that the consequences of continuing in sin are dire. Namely, removal from the book of life & discharge from the Body of Christ!
Paul warned Timothy to 'Keep himself Pure' by not sharing in the sins of others, 1Tim5:22, and in 1Tim3:6 he actually said it was possible for a potential overseer to fall into the same 'condemnation' as the devil, through pride. How would such a thing be possible if Paul taught eternal security? James warned the 'Brethren' (not the unsaved) that 'wandering' from the truth made someone a 'sinner' James5:19-20 Again, how could this be, if what Ironside said is true? Why didn't these inspired writers suggest these people were 'never' saved, as the osas teachers do? In Gal6:7-10 We find another warning that sowing according to the flesh reaps corruption, but sowing according to the Spirit reaps LIFE everlasting! Not rewards, but eternal life. WHY do these men continue to tell people they can sin with impunity after they accept Christ, when the scriptures clearly teach otherwise? (then they turn around & tell them they were 'never' saved to begin with!)
How could Rom8:6,13 apply only to the unsaved and then 'magically' exempt the believer? Paul said plainly, 'To be carnally minded is death, to be spiritually minded is life & peace', 'If you sow according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live!' Ask yourself, how does this NOT apply to the Christian.
The Spirit’s Perseverance
According to Ironside:
In the second place, we base the doctrine of the eternal security of the believer upon the perseverance and omnipotent power of the Holy Spirit of God. Look at Philippians 1:6. Writing to these saints, the apostle says, when he thanked them for their fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now, “Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” Do you see that? Who began the good work in you if you are a believer in the Lord Jesus? The Holy Spirit of God did. It was He who convicted you of sin; it was He who led you to put your trust in Christ; it was He who through the Word gave you the witness that you were saved; it is He who has been conforming you to Christ since you first trusted the Lord Jesus. Having thus taken you up in grace, the Holy Spirit has a definite purpose in view. He is eventually going to conform you fully to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He never begins a work that He does not intend to finish. “Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” If when you were a poor sinner the Holy Spirit had power sufficient to break down your opposition to God and to bring to an end your unbelief and rebellion, do you think for one moment that He does not have power enough to subdue your will as a believer and to carry on to completion the work that He began?
People say, “I see you believe in that old Baptist doctrine of ‘once in grace, always in grace.’” Or another says, “I understand you hold that old Presbyterian idea of ‘the final perseverance of the saints.’” I do not know why this should be called either Baptist or Presbyterian, only to the extent that Baptists and Presbyterians agree with the Book, and the Word of God clearly shows that once God takes us up in grace nothing can separate us from the love of Christ so that evidently the expression, “once in grace, always in grace,” is a perfectly correct one. But, on the other hand, I am not so enthusiastic about the other expression, “the perseverance of the saints.” I believe in it; I believe that all saints--all really belonging to God--will persevere to the end, for the Book tells me, “He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved” (Matthew 24:13), and if a man starts out and makes a profession but gives it all up, he will never be saved, because he was never born again to begin with, he was never truly changed by grace divine. On the other hand, the reason he endures to the end is not because of any particular perseverance of his own. What I believe in, and what the Word of God clearly teaches, is the perseverance of the Holy Spirit. When He begins a work, He never gives up until it is completed. That is our confidence.
According to the Bible:
Circular reasoning. I thought Matt24 was speaking to the Jews during the Tribulation period. Why does it suddenly apply to 'endurance'? You see how these men miss-use the scriptures, if it fits, then it applies! Matt10:22 says, "he who endures to the end will be saved." SPEAKING to the disciples, not the Jews. Notice that it doesn't say, "Because you are saved you will endure to the end." Meaning that somehow God will KEEP you on the Narrow Path no matter what. The object, which is your own 'salvation', is entirely up to you. IF you endure, hold on, remain steadfast, you will be saved! Not to say that God won't assist you along the way. Many of the passages they quote to assure people the Lord is faithful in Keeping them saved, are actually saying something else. Let's look at them:
Phil1:6 for example, in proper context is NOT saying that Jesus will keep you in spite of everything. You are 'partakers' of his grace so you may approve the things that are excellent, be SINCERE & WITHOUT offense till the Day of Christ! (verses: 9-10 same context) What is the PURPOSE of the Commandant? 1Tim1:5 'Love, Purity, sincerity of heart', from which SOME have strayed & suffered shipwreck! (verses:19-20) God is able to WORK in you both to will & to do of His own good pleasure, IF you 'hold fast' the word of life, Phil2:12-16 Just READ the context & these arguments are cast down. 2Tim1:12 is another favorite, "For I know in whom I have believed & am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed to Him until that Day!" In the VERY next passage it says, "HOLD FAST the pattern of sound works which you heard from me. That the good thing which was committed to you, KEEP by the Holy Spirit who dwells in you!" In EVERY instance, there is human responsibility involved in the 'KEEPING' & the 'HOLDING'.
Even John who spoke of the Love & Sovereignty of God more than any Apostle instructed us to, "Keep yourself from idols." 1Jh5:20 And "Anyone born of God does not sin, but he who has been born of God KEEPS HIMSELF and the wicked one touches him not!" 1Jhn5:18 God has done His part by sending His Son to die on the Cross & Rise again. He now asks that you 'OBEY', 'ABIDE' & 'CONTINUE' in the faith! Another favorite passage of the osas teachers reveals the extent to which they are willing to twist scripture to fit their doctrine. Ps37:28, They quote: "For the Lord love Justice, and does not forsake His godly ones, they are preserved forever." To them, this PROVES eternal security. BUT what does the passage REALLY have to say? Ps37:27-29 "Depart from evil & do good; and dwell forevermore, for the Lord loves justice and does not forsake His saints; they are preserved forever, But the descendants of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land, and dwell in it forever!" See what I mean? NOW the passage is a 'warning' to peruse righteousness, shun evil and THEN be preserved by the Lord. Just as Christ Himself said, "Blessed are the PURE of heart, for they shall see God." Mt5:8
Experience And Faith
According to Ironside:
Forty-three years ago the Spirit of God in grace led me to trust the Lord Jesus Christ. I have had many ups-and-downs since then, as the old folks used to sing in a camp meeting I attended: I am sometimes up and sometimes down, But still my soul am heavenly bound!
I have had varied experiences, but the wonderful thing is this, the Holy Spirit of God has never given me up. And if at times I have been wayward and willful and did not immediately bow before God and repent of my waywardness and willfulness, then I found I had to come under the rod, my Father’s rod, and He whipped me into subjection until I came to the place where I was ready to confess by failure and be restored to fellowship with Him. But I was just as truly His child while getting a good whipping as I was when the effects of it had restored me to fellowship. Your child does not cease to be your child when you have him over your knee and are using the slipper on him. It is because he is your child and because you want him to grow up to be a well-behaved boy that you do that. And so we believe in the perseverance of the Holy Spirit of God, that having begun the work He will carry it on to completion.
According to the Bible:
"By this Gospel you are saved, IF you HOLD FAST that WORD which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain!" 1Cor15:2 WHY does the bible always command us to Continue in the Word, or hold fast to the Word, or receive the Word? WHO is the Word? 'The WORD became flesh & dwelt among us!" Jh1:14 Jesus is the WORD! That's why when you 'receive' the 'implanted' Word, James1:21, it is able to SAVE your soul, IF you put it into practice by becoming a DOER & not just a hearer! James1:22 The osas teachers will never tell you this because it is opposed to their theology. But it's the Simplicity that is in Christ! 2Cor11:3. "To as many as received HIM, to them He gave the POWER to become children of God!" John1:12 That's the WORK of Faith with POWER. His Power, our obedience. "We receive Grace & Apostleship for Obedience to the faith." Rom1:5 Salvation can be had by 'receiving' the free gift of His Grace, but it CANNOT be kept except by 'OBEDIENCE' to the faith. Rom16:26
New Creation
According to Ironside:
In the third place, we base the doctrine of the eternal security of the believer upon the fact of the new creation. In 2 Corinthians 5:17 we read: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” That verse may be rendered like this: Therefore if any man be in Christ, this is new creation; old things have passed away, and all things have become new.
What do we mean by new creation? Just this: we were once in the place of death; we were once utterly lost and ruined. How did we get there? Follow me now. It was not by any act of our own. Do you say, “I did not get into the place of spiritual death by any act of my own?” No, you did not. Do you say, “I was not lost because of any act of my own?” No, you were not. But why were you numbered among the lost? Because you were born into the world a member of the old creation of which Adam the first was the head, and every child of Adam’s race comes into the world lost and is under sentence of death. And so we read in verse 14, “The love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead.”
According to the Bible:
Again, Rom6:11 states clearly that YOU must 'RECKON' yourself dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Meaning you 'impute' your body, dead to sin by, 'OBEYING from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered. And having been set free from sin you become slaves of righteousness!' Rom6:16-18 Unless you PUT to DEATH the deeds of the body, by the Spirit, Rom8:13, you will never become a New Creation. It only happens as you OBEY the Word, PUT OFF the old man which grows corrupt according to deceitful lusts, be renewed in the spirit of your mind and PUT ON the New man which was created according to God in righteousness & true holiness! Eph4:22-24 Each step of the process is done by OBEYING God's Word, receiving His Power and Walking in Newness of life.
To imagine that you become a New Creation, 2Cor5:17, by merely 'confessing' Christ or acknowledging Him before men, is mere folly. This is NOT an abstract salvation. The New creation is the Metamorphoses that takes place as a result of the New Birth. Literally you pass from one state of being to another entirely different! Like the caterpillar to the butterfly. Don't tell me you can be a New Creature in Christ and still be in bondage to sin & lust. If you Obey Christ, sin no longer has dominion over you, Rom6:14. If you are IN CHRIST, you have Crucified the flesh with its passions and desires, Gal5:24. If you are Raised with Him, you seek those things were are above, Col3:1-3 But ALL these things are conditional on your willingness to OBEY, utilize the Power of God, put down the flesh, & Walk in the Spirit. Rom8:1
The Two Adams
According to Ironside:
Let me try to make that clear. Here is Adam the first, the head of the old creation, and he was placed on trial in the Garden of Eden. The entire world was represented in him--you were represented in him, I was represented in him. As the Spirit of God says of Levi, “He was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him” (Hebrews 7:10), so we, every one of us, were represented there in Adam when the old creation was on trial. Adam failed, and God said, “In the day thou eatest thereof, dying thou shalt die.” As a result of that failure the old creation fell down in death, and every person that has ever been born in the world since that time was born down there; no one has been born up here, where Adam the first started, except our Lord Jesus Christ, and His birth was a supernatural one. Therefore, as members of the old creation we were all dead, all lost. But now see what happened--our Lord Jesus Christ came into the world (the written Word here speaks of Him as the living Word) and He stood on this plane of sinlessness. Adam was created sinless but fell; Jesus came, the sinless One, conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of a virgin mother, but He saw men down there in death, and at the cross He went down into death, down to where man was, and came up in grace from death. But He did not come up alone, for God has quickened us together with Christ, so that all who believe in Him are brought up from that place of death; and as at one time we were made partakers of Adam’s race, so now we are made partakers of a new creation. What does God do for us now? Does He put us where Adam was before and say, “Now behave yourselves, and you won’t die again”? No, He puts us up higher than Adam could ever have gone except by a new and divine creation. “He hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:6), and because we belong to this new creation we can never be lost. You were lost because the head of the old creation failed, and you went down with him. You can never be lost unless the head of the new creation falls, and if He does you will go down with Him. But, thank God, He remains on the throne where God Himself has put Him, in token of His perfect satisfaction in the work He accomplished.
You may have heard of the Irishman who was converted but was seized with a dreadful fear that some day he might commit some great sin and lose his soul, that he might be lost after all, and he trembled at the thought. He went to a meeting and heard the words read, “Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.” “Glory to God!” shouted Pat. “Whoever heard of a man drowning with his head that high above water?” We are linked with Him, we belong to the new creation, and that is why we shall never be lost.
According to the Bible:
Once received, salvation can indeed be forfeited. Jesus taught this clearly in the parables. The Unforgiving Servant among the most vivid. Matt18:21-35 In answer to a simple question posed by Peter about forgiveness, Jesus made perfectly clear IF you DO NOT forgive those who sin against you, you WILL forfeit your own forgiveness and be held accountable. Have you ever wondered why these men avoid the parables? Why they insist they CAN NOT be used as doctrine! Because in them the message is clear, Keep your lamp burning, use your talent wisely & bare fruit, forgive others, watch & be diligent! Over and over again, Jesus is warning those who would follow Him to 'Count the Cost', Don't look back, take up your cross, deny yourself, enter by the Narrow Gate, etc, Men can attain false assurance from false doctrine, but that DOESN'T negate the truth. You can 'believe' yourself eternally secure by listening to the osas teachers and be as DEAD spiritually as the worst heathen in the Congo. Doctrines don't make you PURE, my friend, OBEDIENCE to the truth DOES. 1Pet1:22
Eternal Life Possessed Now
According to Ironside:
In the last place, we rest the truth of the doctrine of the eternal security of the believer upon the fact that the believer is the present possessor of eternal life. It is not merely that if we are faithful to the end we shall receive eternal life. There is a sense in which that is true; there is a sense in which our hope is eternal life. I am a Christian now if I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ; believing on Him I have eternal life, but I have it in a dying body. I am now waiting for the redemption of the body, and when the Lord Jesus comes the second time He shall change this body of my humiliation and make it like unto the body of His glory. Then I shall have received eternal life in all its fullness, spirit, soul, and body, entirely conformed to Christ. In that sense I am hoping for eternal life. But over and over and over again, Scripture rings the changes on the fact that every believer is at the present time in possession of eternal life. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3:14-15). Adam’s life was forfeitable life; he lost his life because of sin. Eternal life is nonforfeitable life, otherwise it would not be eternal. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). Everlasting life is life that lasts forever, and we have it now. “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him” (John 3:36). “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life” (John 5:24).
According to the Bible:
Stated literally every passage that has to do with 'Believing' on Christ is in the 'Present, perfect' tense or aorist tense of the Greek. Meaning, "He who is NOW believing & CONTINUES to do so has eternal life!" And this LIFE is NOT a present tense possession as he implies. According to scripture eternal life is a Hope, Titus3:7, yet to be reaped, Gal6:8-9, in the age to come, Mark10:30, and ONLY for those who persist in DOING GOOD! Rom2:7 Our 'believing' is in the PRESENT Tense, "We are justified by His Grace that we MIGHT become heirs according to the hope of eternal life!" Titus3:7 Read every verse quoted above thus, "He who is NOW Believing, shall not perish, but have eternal life!" In the Greek the Tense has to do with ACTION, not time, as in English....past, present & future. The Bible is speaking to you in the HERE & NOW, it's NOT a PAST moment of faith that KEEPS you saved! It's a Continual act of Abiding Faith. That's why Rom2:7 says, "Eternal life will be given ONLY to those who by patience continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor and immortality!" It's STEADFAST Endurance that keeps you saved, nothing could be more Crystal Clear throughout the entire Bible.
The worst thing that could possibly happen is for you to sallow the lie of eternal security! By doing so you relinquish the Spiritual safeguards of scripture and set yourself up for the snares of satan. Paul told us we wrestle NOT against flesh and blood, Eph6:12, and the Weapons of Warfare are not Carnal but spiritual! 2Cor10:5 If we do not utilize the armor of God to protect ourselves from the Wiles of the devil, he will DEVOUR us, 1Pet5:8-9 & put us BACK on the road to hell.
A Dangerous Doctrine?
According to Ironside:
People say, “If you preach this doctrine of the eternal security of the believer, men will say, ‘Well, then it doesn’t make any difference what I do, I will get to heaven anyway.’” It makes a tremendous difference what you do. If you do not behave yourself, it shows that you are not a real Christian. I know that a real Christian may fail, but the difference can be seen in Peter and Judas. Peter failed, and failed terribly, but he was genuine, and one look from Jesus sent him out weeping bitterly; his heart was broken to think that he had so dishonored his Lord. But Judas companied with the Lord almost three-and-a-half years and was a devil all the time; he was a thief and was seeking his own interest. He was even made the treasurer of that company and he held the bag, but we read, “He bare [away] what was put therein” (John 12:6), as this has been literally translated. At last remorse overtook him, not genuine repentance, and what was the result? He went and hanged himself. He was never a child of God. There is a great difference, you see, between a Christian and a false professor.
According to the Bible:
The bottom line of the doctrine of eternal security is stated above. "IT doesn't matter WHAT I do, for NOTHING can effect the outcome of my salvation!" Call it whatever you like, tell people they were 'never' saved to begin with, it makes no difference. By preaching a lawless gospel, you have created lawless converts. 1Pet3:15-17 says GOD will Judge you according to your WORKS!!! "But as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in ALL YOUR CONDUCT! because it is written, Be holy, for I AM holy. AND if you call on the FATHER, who without partiality JUDGES according to each one's WORK, conduct yourselves throughout the time of your sojourning here in fear!" In case you 'THINK' is is NOT a salvation issue, read Rom2:7-10 & Gal6:7-10.
These teachers try to convince you that Judas was 'never' saved to begin with, but always a 'devil' John6:70, but they NEVER seem to mention that Jesus ALSO called Peter a devil! Mark8:33. And as everyone knows, Peter became one of the greatest of the Apostles. The difficulty lies in their inability to accept the fact that, although God FOREKNEW Judas's betrayal, HE did not ELECT him to be LOST! The 'elect' according to scripture are those who COME to God, OBEY His voice, DO His will and remain Steadfast to the end. (Eph1:4-14, 2:4-10, Rom8:28-30, 2Pet3:9) Judas was indeed a genuine Disciple, according to Jesus Himself! Matt10:16-26, he was given the Commission to preach the gospel, power to cast out demons & wisdom to discern the spirits. Jesus WOULD NOT have promised the Disciples, Matt19:28, twelve thrones in the New Kingdom with Him, if ONE of them was a FALSE Convert, as described in Matt7:21-23. The people spoken of in Matt7 were NEVER called, chosen & SENT by Christ! They commissioned themselves and used His Name to gain the approval of men. Judas, like Demas, 2Tim4:10, Hymenaeus, Philetus and Alexander, 1Tim1:19-20, 2Tim2:17, REJECTED a good conscience & sincere faith, SHIPWRECKED and lost their souls to satan.
Justified By Faith
According to Ironside:
“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them eternal life.” Do you believe it? I do not understand how people can read a passage like that and then talk about a Christian losing his life. It would not be eternal if it could be lost. “And they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand.” The original is very strong here. In the English a double negative makes an affirmative, but in Greek it only strengthens a declaration. “They shall never, no never, perish.” It is impossible, it is unthinkable, that one who has eternal life shall ever perish. “My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.” Here I am, a poor lost sinner, but the Lord in grace picks me up and saves me, and I am in His hand. And now the Father puts His hand around too, and I am in the hand of the Father and of the Son, and the devil himself cannot get me unless he can loosen those hands. Could you think of any greater security than to be in the hands of the Father and of the Son? “Never perish,” “eternal life”--what wondrous words are these! Do not be afraid of God’s truth. You might as well be afraid of the beginning of the gospel that God can freely forgive and justify a guilty sinner by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. People try to put guards around that truth and say, “Yes, you are justified by faith if you have enough good works to add to it.” That is not true. It is by faith alone, and good works spring from that. When you know you have eternal life, you will find your heart so filled with love for Christ that you will try to live for His glory.
According to the Bible:
"You see then that a man is JUSTIFIED by WORKS and NOT by FAITH alone!" James2:24 The danger with this doctrine is it completely eliminates works from the equation. When it's the WORK of Faith with Power that saves! 2Thes1:11. The LAW OF FAITH, Rom3:27, governs our salvation and it TURNS on our OBEDIENCE to the faith! (Rom1:5, 16:26, 1Pet1:2, 2Cor9:13, 7:15, 1Pet2:24, Acts5:32, 1Pet1:22) THAT'S why the Scripture demand we remain Steadfast to the end, Rom2:7, Col1:23, If you DO NOT Continue in the faith, you WILL NOT remain IN HIM and will therefore be LOST. John10:28 ONLY applies to those who do what 10:27 instructs, "FOLLOW, HEAR & OBEY My Voice!" These are in the 'Present tense' (aorist) Meaning, "Those who are NOW Hearing, following & Obeying My voice have this promise." It is NOT an unconditional declaration that God will NEVER allow any of His sheep to perish, who REFUSE to follow Him! Look at Matt18:10-14, the Parable of the LOST sheep....remember, we're talking about a SHEEP here NOT a goat.... Yes the Father will Seek the one who is STAYING, but notice what is says in verse 13, "And IF he should find it, He then rejoices!" Of course He is not WILLING that any perish, but NOT all of them will be found & Willing to return to the fold.
Scriptures proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that Faith is Obedience. The very definition given in Heb11:1 indicate such, calling it: 'Substance & Evidence'. Abraham 'believed' God & it was accounted unto him as righteousness, Rom4:3, yes, BUT not before he: Remained faithful to God, Did not waver, endured & was fully convinced that God would deliver what He had promised, Rom4:19-22, THEN 'it was accounted unto him as righteousness!' Heb11:8 says, Abraham OBEYED God & went forth to inherit the Promise. Many scripture confirm that this is HOW salvation is obtained and retained. Heb4:11, 5:9, 6:12, 10:35-36, 12:1-2 and so on. It's satan's greatest lie to think that genuine faith is merely acknowledging Christ as Savior and waiting for the promise doing nothing, because it's all been done for you! What if Abraham had said to God, "I believe, God, now I'll just wait here for the promise!" God would have been forced to CHOOSE another to inherit His Promise, because NO ONE inherits eternal life unless they OBEY! Heb6:11-12. To give people the impression that Grace makes no demands on their conduct, behavior and Steadfastness, is to preach satan's lie.
Objections
According to Ironside:
There will be certain passages coming up in the minds of different ones, and they will say, “What he has said may sound logical enough, but what about this Scripture and that?” Let me say, there is no possible Scripture that will come to your mind that the present speaker has not considered carefully over and over again. I have not time in one address to go into all these, but I can assure you that having examined them all with the greatest degree of care, I have never been able to find one that can set aside this: “Neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” If you have a clear, definite, positive Scripture, do not allow some passage that is perplexing, that is difficult to interpret, that seems somewhat ambiguous, to keep you from believing the positive statement, “He that believeth hath everlasting life.” It is because I have a salvation like this to offer to men, it is because God has sent me to proclaim a salvation like this to sinners, that I have confidence in inviting people to come to Jesus, for I know if they get in living touch with my Savior He will make them His forever.
I recently received from a gentleman a tract entitled “All about the Eternal Security Doctrine.” He is afraid that this doctrine may have a tendency to make people careless about their lives. I can sympathize with him in that for this reason: I was a Christian worker in an organization that believed in what is commonly called the Arminian view; that is, when a person gets converted he has a good start for heaven, and then it is up to him to keep on going. As my old instructor used to say, “Getting to heaven is like riding a bicycle: if I stop, I will fall off.” I believed that thoroughly, so thoroughly that when people spoke to me about being eternally saved I used to say, “That is a doctrine of the evil one; that would mislead people and lead folks to become careless,” until I had a rather rude awakening.
I found our halls were thronged by people who were getting converted over and over again every few weeks. It seemed as though that old hymn, “Ye Must Be Born Again,” should really be sung, “Ye must Be Born Again and Again and Again.” That puzzled me, for I never read of anything like it in the Bible. Then I found that the falling away doctrine had a tendency to make people very careless indeed. Let me give you a concrete example. A young man in whom I was quite interested had been addicted to a certain sin in his unconverted days. After he professed conversion he turned from that particular sin, but he confessed to me privately that he had gone out in the darkness of the night, when no one knew where he was, and had fallen into the same sin many times. “How can you do it?” I asked him. “Well,” he said, “I always make up my mind that I will commit the sin and then get converted again when I come home.” I saw from that how dangerous was the doctrine of being saved today and lost tomorrow. The last time I saw that young man, he said to me, “It’s no use; this sin has such a grip on me that I cannot stand it.” “Don’t yield,” I said. “Let me call in several of the others and let us pray with you.” So four or five of us knelt and prayed very earnestly, but he rose again and clenched his fists, for he was in great agony, and said, “It’s no use. I am going out to sin, but I am coming back to get converted afterwards.” I never saw him again, and I do not know what became of him. That, you see, was one effect of this doctrine that a person loses his salvation when he sins but can come back again and get converted any time he desires. Certainly the Word of God teaches nothing like that. You can see that the Arminian view can be used to turn the grace of God into lasciviousness. It is possible for the other view to be misused also. But I want you to see that the misuse of any doctrine does not in itself prove the teaching is wrong. We need definite Scripture upon which to base our faith. If people have no conscience toward God, they can misuse any doctrine in the Bible. But what we want to get at is this: Are the objections brought against the doctrine of eternal security really tenable?
According to the Bible:
I have ONE question about the above story, WHY wasn't this man NEVER saved to begin with if he would not yield up his sin to God!!!? You see how they manipulate you with this doctrine. On one hand those who won't endure in the faith or live a holy devote life were NEVER saved, but NOW because they want to discredit the other side, they attempt to show the futility of getting saved over and over again! It really doesn't make sense. If this man knowingly and willingly 'thinks' he can go out and indulge in his favorite sins and then come back and get saved again by asking for mercy, where is his HEART with God? Then he says that 'conditional' security turns the Grace of God into Lawlessness!!! That's like satan saying he has a wonderful plan for your life! NO TRUE man of God would ever permit such a person to assume themselves saved by Grace who REFUSES to yield up ALL their sin in true godly repentance. What did Jesus Himself say? "You put your hand to the Plow and look back, you are NOT Worthy of the Kingdom!" Lk9:62, "You love anything or anyone MORE than you love ME and you're not worthy of Me!" Matt10:37-39 "He who seeks to find his life will lose it, he who loses his life for MY sake will find it!"
The problem is these men DO NOT understand the Gospel message! They attack what they do not understand, offer Grace as un-conditional and TWIST everything in scripture that doesn't apply. The fact that one, or many, men 'think' they can be born again & again, is no proof that osas is correct. It only proves the insincerity of their repentance in the first place! Anyone touched by the True Grace of God is NOT going to have the attitude described in this story. The very nature of Grace is God's redemptive Power to Purify the human heart from the corrupting influence of sin, Titus2:11-14. Just because someone 'thinks' they can sin, repent, sin repent and be right with God, doesn't automatically make eternal security the only way of true salvation. God requires Steadfast endurance in the faith and NOTHING can change that. ONLY those who MAKE EVERY EFFORT to enter by the Narrow Gate will inherit eternal life! Lk13:24, Rom2:7
The osas preachers insist that you sin everyday in thought, word and deed, and by NO means are they just talking about the 'little' things, such as lack of humility, fear, a slip of the tongue. NO! They mean LUST of the eyes, heart & flesh! Immorality of the highest order! Their doctrine permits it all. Just ask them if you don't believe me. Did King David LOSE his salvation when he committed murder & adultery? Did the Apostle Peter when he denied his Lord? If NOT, then you are saying there is such a thing as a 'Christian' adulterer, murderer, That you can OUT RIGHT DENY Christ and He WON'T deny you! Matt10:33 Now whose preaching lawlessness!!!!? It doesn't matter what side of the argument you are on in this, IF you are preaching ANYTHING that permits or gives people the impression they can commit acts of immorality and remain a Christian by merely repeating a few words of forgiveness, you are NOT preaching the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Question 1 – Man: A Free Moral Agent?
“Is not man an absolutely free moral agent?” as one objector insists. He says, “We can quote no Scripture on unconditional eternal security, because there is none.”
I do not know what he means, but of course there is no eternal security that is not based on personal faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. But this writer goes on to say, “When a man is saved, he is on God’s altar to live or die, for service or sacrifice, and neither the devil nor demons can pull him off so long as he chooses by God’s grace to keep himself in that place.” The fact of the matter is that man is not an “absolutely free moral agent.” In his unsaved state he is the slave of sin “led by the devil captive at his will.” When regenerated he is the servant of Christ, delighting in holiness and indwelt by the Spirit of the loving God. I was not saved by placing my all on the altar. I was saved when I trusted Christ who gave Himself as the offering for my sin. I am not keeping saved by my surrendered life. I am “kept by the power of God.” The same grace that saved is the grace that keeps.
I do not simply “choose” to keep myself in the place where I am secure. God has chosen me, and I say amen to His choice. But if it were possible for me to choose to abandon Christ, would I not perish? Yet the Word tells me that Christ’s sheep shall never perish. Let us look again at the words of the Lord Jesus in John 10:27-29: “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My Father’s hand.”
I wish you would look at verse 27. Who is a sheep of Christ? He is one who hears His voice and follows Him. If a man says, “I am a Christian,” but does not hear the voice of the Good Shepherd and does not follow Him, that man is a hypocrite; he is not a Christian. Jesus says, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” Notice the expression, “I know them.” I pointed out in my former address that in Matthew 7:22-23, the Lord Jesus says, “Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name? And in Thy name have cast out devils? And in Thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work iniquity.” Observe that according to Scripture He never says to any soul in the day of judgment, “I used to know you, but I do not know you now.” He says, “I never knew you.” That ought to clear up the whole question. He says of His sheep, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them.” Therefore, if one has ever been a sheep of Christ, the Lord Jesus knows him. Now if by some strange metamorphosis that sheep of Christ were changed into a goat, one of the devil’s goats, and appeared at the day of judgment among the goats, Jesus could not say to that goat, “I never knew you.” He would have to say, “I used to know you but I do not know you now.” But He says, “I never knew you,” because He gives His sheep eternal life. What is eternal life? One asks, “If the spiritual life of Adam were conditional, how could the life of a believer be secure? Adam must have been eternal in nature.” This shows how little well-meaning people distinguish between the life that God gave to Adam by creation and the life that He gives to us by regeneration. Adam’s life was simply natural life and he forfeited that when he sinned, but God gives to believers eternal life, and that can never be forfeited. It would not be eternal life if it could. So He says, “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish.” He puts no conditions around that promise, “They shall never perish.” The word “perish” is in the middle voice, so that if rendered literally in English, you would have to make two words of it, because we do not have a middle voice. The words “perish” and “destroy” are the same in Greek. “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never destroy themselves.”
Sheep so easily destroy themselves. I was going over the desert when out among the Indians, and as we passed a bridge over a deep chasm, we heard the pitiable bleating of a lamb. We went to the edge of the bridge and saw the lamb about fifty feet down on a little ledge. It was a sheer descent of nearly two hundred feet to the creek below that. We looked to see whether there was any possible way to get down there, and we could not find any. That lamb had been eating and had come to the edge and had looked down. There was that little ledge all green, and so down he went and ate all the green that was there before he found that he could not get back. We tried to lasso him, but were not expert enough to do that. We looked up, and already there were three great buzzards flying around, just waiting for the time when the little animal would give up. That lamb was destroying himself. Jesus says, “My sheep will never destroy themselves. I give unto them eternal life and they shall never perish” (in the middle voice, “never perish themselves”). Why not? Because they have the Holy Spirit dwelling in them.
The Word of God says, “Being confident of this very thing, that He who hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.” Jesus first says, “I give unto them eternal life,” and then, “They shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand.” Some may say, “Well, I know a devil cannot pluck me out, no angel would want to, and man could not, but I might pluck myself out.” Then you would perish, would you not? And He says “They shall never perish,” before He tells you, “neither shall any pluck them out of My hand.” Is man an absolutely free moral agent? He was when God created him, but is he now? Is the sinner a free moral agent? What does Scripture say? “Ye are led by the devil captive at his will.” What? A man led by the devil captive at his will is a free agent? “Know ye not, that he to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his slaves ye are?” (Romans 6:16). Man is a slave to sin and Satan; he is not free. But now the gospel comes to the man, and he does have the power of decision, and when he decides for Christ he gets eternal life with all that that implies, and that life is the same life that is in the blessed Son of God. It is communicated to him, and now he is led captive in the chains of love to the Savior’s feet, and he does not want to be a free agent. He is glad to be a bondman, as Paul puts it, of Jesus Christ.
According to the Bible:
In the first paragraph we can see why these people 'think' you can never lose it. We simply have NO free will. This is straight out of Calvinism. That man was somehow created by God to be 'elect' or non-elect and nothing he can do will change that. Now these men don't hold to this tenant of Calvin's doctrine, but they cling desperately to the the last one that says you are eternally secure no matter what. And they go to Great lengths to prove scripture teaches such a thing, even if they have to twist it into oblivion to make it fit. Man is indeed a FREE moral agent. Created thus from the beginning to CHOOSE by his own free will to either OBEY or DISOBEY God. You must choose to Obey God out of Love, because true faith WORKS by love, Gal5:6. That's the difference between a Slave & a Servant. The Slave obeys out of fear & dread of reprisal, he is compelled to do as his master says or suffer the consequences. But the Servant obeys from his heart, freely giving of his own free will his dedication, service & sacrifice. Rom6:16 explains this, "You obeyed from your heart..." Rom10:10 "With the HEART man believes unto righteousness!" The seat of ALL moral and free will volition is in the heart. Out of the heart proceeds the issues of life! Matt15:17-20 That's why God calls upon man to OBEY from the heart, love Him with all the Heart, Serve Him from sincerity of heart. It is correct to say that were indeed 'slaves' to sin, the scripture says so, the devil himself was our father! But NO LONGER! "But GOD be thanked that though you were slaves to sin, yet you OBEYED from the heart that form of doctrine to which you were delivered and having been set FREE from sin you become slaves of righteousness!" Rom6:17-18 By your own FREE choice.
Are we then 'secure' eternally because we 'hear & follow' Him? What of the ten Virgins, notice the Lord did not say to them, "I never knew you", but "I don't know you!" Matt25:12 They were ALL Virgins, representing what? Safe, secure, followers of God, waiting for the wedding feast. Clearly FIVE didn't make it because they allowed their Lamps to run out of oil. Not that they NEVER had the oil (Spirit) in the first place, but they ran out! How? By not being diligent as instructed, to watch, pray and remain steadfast until HIS return. Hearing His Voice NOW, proves you are one of His, yes, but it DOSE NOT prove you will never depart from the faith, shipwreck or be deceived by false doctrines! Middle voice in the Greek or not, you will 'never perish' IF you hold firmly to the end! 1Cor15:2
Every scripture that promises you will be KEPT by the Power of God or that He will Finish the Word He started, taken in CONTEXT involves human responsibility. Check them out for yourself: Phil1:6-11, 2:12-18, 2Tim2:12-18, Ps37:27-29, 1Thess5:12-23, Jude20-25. Of course His Grace has the POWER to KEEP you, but only IF you Continue in it Obedient to the end. Why did Peter tell you to ADD TO YOUR FAITH...2Pet1:4-11 These men are saying you have NOTHING to ADD! But Scripture says otherwise. Remember, Jesus doesn't consider His true followers 'slaves' in the sense they no longer have any rights! We are His beloved FRIENDS, John12:26, 15:14-15 "No longer do I call you servants, for a servant DOES NOT know what his mater is doing, but I have called you Friends, for ALL things that I heard from the Father I have made known to you!" Because who the SON sets FREE, is FREE indeed! John8:36. We SERVE Righteousness by CHOICE, from our heart, because we LOVE HIM!
Question 2 – Matthew 24:13
What about Matthew 24:13? “But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” Weymouth says, “He who stands firm unto the end.”
According to Ironside:
The writer of this question recognizes that primarily this refers to the great tribulation, but it is a principle that I believe every preacher of the Word should insist on. There is no use in people professing conversion, going forward, raising their hands, going to an inquiry room, joining the church, getting baptized, taking communion, teaching a Sunday school class, doing missionary work, giving their money for Christ’s work, and going on like this for years, and then by-and-by drifting away, turning from it all, denying the Lord that bought them, refusing absolutely the authority of Jesus Christ, and yet professing to be saved. It is endurance that proves the reality of a work of grace within the soul. That is the difference between one who is merely reformed by the teaching of Christianity and one who has been born again. You see this very clearly when you contrast Peter and Judas.
Peter slipped and sinned grievously, but in spite of it all he endured to the end. Jesus said, “I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not,” and though his outward life for a brief period was not what it should be, his faith remained, and Jesus restored him, and he went on to the end of his life until crucified for his Savior. Judas was one of the chosen, he was with the apostolic band but never was regenerated, and so when he sinned and sold his Lord, he turned away an apostate and died a suicidal death. Jesus said of him long before, “Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?” Not, “One of you is in danger of becoming a devil,” but “One of you is a devil.” And we are told: “Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place” (Acts 1:25). Peter was a backslider, Judas was an apostate, and there is a great difference between the two. If a man says, “I am saved,” let him prove it by going on. That is why I say we should not be afraid of the doctrine of the eternal security of the believer. Some say, “But I knew a man who was a wonderful Christian, and now he has given it all up and says he is still saved.” He is only deceiving himself. The next time you see him you tell him that the Bible says, “He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” There is no use your carrying on a profession if your life does not prove it to be real. Men can misuse any doctrine.
According to the Bible:
Here again we have the mis-use of Scripture. By that I mean, Matt10:22 CLEARS up the entire argument. "You will be hated by all men for My name's sake, But he who endures to the end will be saved!" This is spoken DIRECTLY to the disciples, not during a Tribulation period or another 'dispensation' but in the HERE & NOW! The Present tense reality. Again he says that 'endurance' is the evidence of genuine salvation. How convenient. But a few statements back he was ridiculing the possibility of being born again & again and NEVER suggesting that such a person who would not forsake all his sin & obey Christ was NEVER saved to begin with! Let me repeat his own words, "If a man is saved, let him PROVE it by going on!" Here again he compares Judas with Peter and the fact that Judas didn't make it, is proof positive he was NEVER saved to begin with. Why then did he trifle with men who were obviously engaged in false repentance? Who by their very attitudes toward sin, had no intention of following Christ. His arguments prove nothing except that he will go to any length to protect his precious false doctrine. Jesus told us to ENDURE to the end because it FITS perfectly with everything else he taught about true salvation. "Watch, be diligent, forgive others, produce fruit, take up your cross, or forfeit your salvation!"
Question 3 – John 8:31
What about the Scripture found in John 8:31? “Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on Him, If ye continue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed.” Is not the condition for permanent discipleship “if ye continue in My word?”
According to Ironside:
Certainly. Every man who knows the truth of eternal security believes it. There is no use for a person to profess to be a disciple of Jesus if he does not continue. It is this that proves there is a genuine work of the Spirit of God in his soul.
According to the Bible:
This passage is NOT teaching eternal security! Just the
opposite. The Condition of discipleship is stated clearly, 'if you continue in
My word!' Not 'you will continue', IF YOU CONTINUE! The reverse of what he is
trying to imply. That's the problem with this doctrine, the impression it leaves
on the human mind. Not only can you 'sin and not die', NOTHING can effect the
outcome of your salvation! God 'continues' for you, that's why HE commands you
to Hold Firm, Remain Steadfast, & endure to the end, because HE is going to
do it for you! Can you see how this line of reasoning distorts the simple truth
of scripture? I pray you do. This type of flattery is designed to deceive the
hearts of the simple minded. Are you one of them?
Question 4 – John 6:66
What about John 6:66? “From that time many of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him."
According to Ironside;
That has happened down through the centuries. Jesus distinguishes between a disciple and “a disciple indeed,” or between one who is only a disciple and one who is a true believer. The Greek word translated “disciple” means “a pupil” or “a learner.” There were many who up to a certain point learned of Jesus, and they were learning more and more every day as they listened to Him. But when He declared, “Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal life” (John 6:54), they said, “That is too much for us; we are not going on with this man,” and they went back. It was not a question there of whether people were born again and lost, but whether they who had been numbered among the learners would go on learning and let Him be their teacher, or whether they would refuse further instruction and turn back. We are not told that even those who turned back ever again returned.
According to the Bible::
"THEY BELIEVED FOR A WHILE!" Luke8:13 The presence of life was within them. LIFE had sprang into existence! But when the TEST of persecution & temptation came, the plant withered and died because it had no root. The ROOT is 'Remaining Steadfast' in the faith, which MOST people have NOT been told they must do to remain saved. That's why so many do not remain. Discipleship is not optional, as these men would have you believe. "EVERY tree that does not bring forth fruit is CUT down and thrown into the fire!" Matt7:19, Luke3:9. Jesus referred to His true followers as His DISCIPLES. (type it into a bible concordance!) They were disciples 'indeed' (of a truth!) IF they CONTINUE to Abide in His Word, John8:31 AGAIN the Condition is set forth to anyone who 'believes' you MUST also ABIDE & Continue in the faith, then & ONLY then are you Set Free from sin, Jh8:36, and secure in His hand. The Scripture says, "Many of His DISCIPLES went back & walked with Him no more!" Jh6:66 You decide whose telling the truth.
Question 5 – John 6:67
John 6:67, “Will ye also go away?” What about this question?
According to Ironside:
The question and the answer bring out the very thing I am speaking of. He turned now to the apostles, that little group who had accompanied Him so long, and said, “Will ye also go away?” and Peter said what every truly converted soul always says, “Lord to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life” (John 6:68). If you are really born again, that is always the answer. I remember reasoning on this subject with a dear good brother for something like two hours one day, and he was insisting that a man could take himself out of the Lord’s hand. I said, “Why do you keep insisting on this? Are you sure that you are saved?” He said, “Absolutely.” “How long?” I asked him. “Forty years,” he replied. “And you have been kept for forty years? Do you want to take yourself out of the Lord’s hand that you are talking like that?” “Certainly not,” he answered. “Well,” I said, “you are better than your creed.”
That is just the point. If a man is born again, he never wants to take himself out of Christ’s hand even if he could. Christ alone is the one who satisfies the soul.
According to the Bible:
If it's impossible to shipwreck your faith, depart from Christ or be deceived, why the constant warnings about these things in scripture? 2Pet3:17, 1Tim1:19-20, 1Jh4:1, Jh15:6. That a man has been 'kept' forty years, or has 'Kept himself' 1John5:18-21, proves only that he loves Christ & has continued to follow Him. It does NOT prove the doctrine of 'eternal security'. Convincing someone by force of argument still doesn't change what the Bible teaches. "Eternal life is given ONLY to those who by Steadfast endurance seek for glory, honor & immortality!" Rom2:7
Question 6 – 2 Thessalonians 2:3
How about 2 Thessalonians 2:3? “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.”
According to Ironside:
The word translated “falling away” is “apostasy” in the original. That has nothing to do with the question of individual salvation. It does not touch this doctrine. Can you not see that it is a prophecy of what is happening all about us at the present time? Recently, we were told that seventy-five per cent of the ministers in the church federation in the city of Chicago signed a questionnaire saying that they did not believe in some of the great fundamental truths of the Bible. There you have apostasy. Does that mean that these ministers were all Christians once and now are not saved? My dear friends, I am afraid the whole trouble is that most of them have never been born again at all. They do not know anything of regenerating grace and therefore are quite ready to apostatize from the doctrines held sacred by the great evangelical denominations. I remember when a certain preacher came out with a blatant attack on the doctrine of blood atonement. It shocked a lot of people who had been reading his books, and they said, “Isn’t it strange that a man who was once such a fine Christian now denies the blood of Christ?” I sat down and read every one of his books and found that he never mentioned in any of them the blood of Christ or Christ’s death on the cross, except in one when he spoke of the example of humiliation Jesus set by going to the cross. But there was never one other reference to the death, the blood, or the atonement. Later he stated: “They charge me with giving up the doctrine of blood atonement; I never believed it.” He showed that he was simply an apostate. These things had no place in his heart or life. The apostasy is coming; it is coming fast. The great professing church is going into it, but not one born again person will ever bow to the Antichrist.
According to the Bible:
Apostasy means simply, 'Departure from the faith' or to 'forsake or defect'. Technically it could mean those who NEVER believed Christ to begin with or those who did indeed know Him and defected from the faith. The fact that certain men have infiltrated the ministry who do not believe in the Deity of Christ, His blood atonement or resurrection, is certainly NOT proof no one can ever 'depart' from the faith. Rather the Biblical record is our final authority, which clearly shows that men had rejected faith & a good conscience toward God & suffered shipwreck. 1Tim1:19-20. One of these men even resorted to teaching 'false doctrines', 2Tim2:16, that overturned the faith of others!
If the man in 1Cor5:5, caught in the act of incest, was 'saved', as MOST of the osas teachers conclude, then WHY not the men from 1 & 2 Timothy? It's not 'convenient' to their doctrine for these men to be have been truly 'saved' and now lost as a result of rejecting faith & a good conscience. Therefore, they were NEVER saved, like the people spoken of in Heb6:6 & 10:26 and so on. That's why they reject the parables. Christ said IF you don't forgive others you will FORFEIT your own forgiveness! Matt18:35. Plain & simple, but REJECTED by 98% of the professing Church! Why? Because of men like Ironside, Moody, Spurgen, Stanley & Swindoll TWISTING the truth of scripture.
Question 7 – Hebrews 12:14
What about Hebrews 12:14? “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.”
According to Ironside:
That is exactly what we stand for. Anyone who says “I am a Christian” and does not follow peace and holiness will never see the Lord. But I remember how that used to trouble me. When a young Christian, I was taught that when I was converted all my sins up to that moment were put away, and then it was as though God said, “I have wiped off the past and have put you back where Adam was before he fell: if you can keep the record clear from now to the end, you will be saved and you will get to heaven.” I started out and soon began to fail, and then they said to me, “The trouble with you is you have not gotten holiness yet. If you get that you will be able to live the right kind of a life.” I asked, “What is this blessing of holiness?” and was told, “When God saved you, He only justified you.” Only justified you? “He forgave your past sin, but now you have to get sanctified, and that means you must have all your inbred sin rooted out, and you will get true holiness.” I thought, “But it didn’t work very well with Adam,” and it rather bothered me. Yet they assured me that was the thing, and so I went in for it and for six years I struggled. (For a more thorough treatment of this subject, see Holiness: The False and the True, Loizeaux Brothers.)
I was working on a text that is not in the Bible: “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord.” I heard many sermons preached on it, and sometimes I preached on it myself. I had a large red banner with that text in white letters, and I tried to get holiness. Sometimes I thought I had it, and then something would go wrong and I would have to try to get it all over again. I shall never forget the first time I read, “Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.” I thought it said, “Without holiness it is impossible to see God.” I thought I had to get perfect holiness in this life, but what it says there is, if you do not follow holiness you will not see the Lord. Every Christian follows holiness. A man who says “I am a Christian” and does not follow holiness is either self-deceived or a hypocrite. I maintain this with all my heart.
According to the Bible:
Many translations use the word, 'Pursue' peace with all men & holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord'. The meaning is very interesting: "Pursue, run swiftly to overtake, press on, & suffer persecution" In many passages the word is translated 'persecution', Matt5:10-11, "Blessed are you when men shall revile & 'persecute' you, for righteousness sake, for yours is the kingdom of heaven!" In other words this passage of scripture is actually saying that you NOT only MUST peruse holiness, but be willing to press on in the face of severe persecution to see the Lord! Packs a bit more punch than saying, "A real Christian will follow after holiness, a false one won't!"
Many Bible passages tell us to Clean up our act and Walk Straight with the Lord. 2Cor7:1 "Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us CLEANSE ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh & spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God!" Why fear, if there's no possibility of falling away? Eph4:22-24 "Put off concerning the old man which grows corrupt according to deceitful lusts, be renewed in the spirit of your mind and PUT ON the new man which was created according to God in righteousness & true holiness!" Again, this is something you MUST do in order to remain in Christ. Col1:3:1-3 "IF then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, set your mind on things above, not on things of the earth. For you DIED and your life is hidden with Christ in God!" EVERY promise is given with the CONDITION that you 'OBEY, ADD TO, PUT ON, CONTINUE IN' (2Pet1:4) The osas doctrine says NONE of these things are necessary, for they have all been done for you! Herein lays the great danger of this awful doctrine, because you are 'eternally secure' you have no need of diligence, steadfastness or righteous behavior.
Question 9 – Ezekiel 18:24
Ezekiel 18:24: “But when the righteous turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and doth according to all the abominations that the wicked man doeth, shall he live?”
According to Ironside:
Is it not strange for anyone in this dispensation of grace to quote a passage like that, as though it had anything to do with the question of the soul’s salvation? Go back and read Ezekiel 18. Of what is it treating? We read in verse 21: “If the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath committed, and keep all My statutes, and do that which is lawful and right, he shall surely live, he shall not die.” Is that grace? No, that is law. That is just the quintessence of law. Do you believe that if a wicked man turns from his wickedness he will live? If this is true, why did Jesus die? Would you preach that to sinners? Would you have me stand up and say, “You wicked people, you have been doing wickedness; you start in tonight to do righteousness and you will live”? Would you have me preach that? I would be deliberately deceiving people if I told them that. But you see, here God was testing people under law and said, ”The man that doeth these things shall live. . . .But when the righteous turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and doeth according to all the abominations that the wicked man doeth, shall he live? All his righteousness that he hath done shall not be mentioned in his trespass that he hath trespassed, and in his sin that he hath sinned, in them shall he die” And what has happened? Not one man ever continued in all the things that are written in the book of the law to do them. Therefore, they were all under sentence of death. How then were they to be saved? By turning over a new leaf? Oh, no--but by confessing that they had no righteousness. If they had, it would only be filthy rags. But now they find all their righteousness in the Lord Jesus Christ, “who of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption.” Do not ever quote Ezekiel 18 as though it were gospel; it is law. And remember the “life” spoken of in Ezekiel is not eternal life in Christ. It is life here on earth prolonged under the divine government, because of obedience, or cut short because of sin.
According to the Bible:
How strange it is that these men will discredit a passage that CLEARLY refutes their doctrine but use Ezk36:27 as a Proof text for it! Name a person in the Biblical record who experienced the salvation of God by anything other than FAITH! It simply cannot be done. By FAITH Abraham obeyed God, By FAITH Abel offered a more excellent sacrifice to God, By FAITH Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter!!! Heb11:1-27 Arguing that the Prophet Ezekiel was speaking to people from a 'legalistic' point of view is not only erroneous, but intentionally mis-leading! He was stating the simple fact, "The soul that sinneth, shall surly die!" Ezk18:2 NO ONE takes responsibility for your sin but you. Each person is accountable to God for what they do, good or bad. If the Righteous man turns from his position of Righteousness & commits iniquity & does according to all the abominations of the wicked, he shall die in his sin, and all the righteousness he has done shall NOT be remembered.
How is this teaching different than 1John3:7-8? "Little children let NO ONE deceive you, he that DOTH righteousness is righteous, just as HE is righteous. He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this reason the Son of God was manifested, that He 'might' destroy the works of the devil." The Promise is SIN shall NOT have dominion over you, Rom6:11, IF YOU reckon yourself DEAD INDEED to sin & alive to God! NOT that sin has somehow LOST it's ability to defile your soul. What's not fair about the Righteous Decrees of God? Ezk33:20 If the Wicked turns from his sin, he lives, if the Righteous returns to his sin, he dies. The problem is that these passages DECIMATE the doctrine of osas and MUST be ripped out of context to protect it. Nothing has changed with God, He is the same yesterday, today and forever, Heb13:8. His Word stands regardless what men may say.
Question 10 – 2 Peter 2:20-22
What about 2 Peter 2:20-22? “For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.”
According to Ironside:
Does it say, “But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The sheep is turned to its own vomit again”? No, it does not. It says, “The dog is turned to his own vomit again.” How many of these dogs there are! They escape the pollution of the world temporarily by the knowledge that comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. If you were brought up in a Christian home and taught the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ from your youth, you escaped a great deal of the pollution of the world. But after you have known all these things, you can turn aside; you can take your own way into the world and live in its filth and pollutions. What does that prove? That you used to be a Christian and are not now? That you used to be one of Christ’s sheep but are no longer? Oh, no. What then? It proves that “the dog has gone back to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.” The remarkable thing about this doctrine of the eternal security of the believer is that many of the greatest men of God who have ever lived have believed in it. C. H. Spurgeon, D. L. Moody, Dr. R. A. Torrey, Dr. A. C. Dixon, and scores of others whom we revere believed in it. C. H. Spurgeon said very beautifully, “If this dog had ever been born again and gotten a sheep’s nature, it never would have gone back to its own vomit; and if this sow had ever been regenerated and had the heart of a lamb put in it, it never would have gone back to its wallowing in the mire.” It is not a question of a sheep of Christ perishing. The devil has a lot of washed sows, but they are not, and never have been, Christ’s sheep.
According to the Bible:
Peter is speaking about New Converts, just as Paul warned the 'simple minded' to avoid flattering speech & people who would exploit them, Rom16:18. 2Pet2:18 says, "They promise them liberty while they themselves are slaves to corruption!" Meaning, as he pointed out at the beginning of chapter 2, 2Pet2:1-3, these men preach a 'Sensual' message that corrupts the minds of the hearers! They go after the new converts who have 'escaped indeed' from those who live in error. The word here suggests genuine conversion, used elsewhere in similar manner: Jh8:32 "Who the Son sets free is free 'INDEED!" Lk24:34 "The Lord is risen INDEED!", 1Tim5:3 "Honor those who are widows INDEED!" That the writer compared them to dogs does NOT mean they were never Sheep to begin with. Read the Proverb: 27:3-12. Also Jesus called His own servants 'wicked & lazy' who did not Obey His Word to bare fruit, Matt25:26. Does that mean they were 'never' servants? These people have 'escaped indeed!' scripture declares, not 'temporarily'. They became deceived by false teachers, just as Peter warned was a possibility, 2Pet3:17
The fact that renowned men have believed the doctrine of osas proves nothing, only that 'many' false teachers have risen up among us, speaking perverse things & drawn away disciples after themselves, Acts20:30. As Jude warned they 'Mouth great swelling words, flattering people to gain advantage!' Jude16. Seldom do they agree with one another on these important issues, but they ALL agree that you can 'sin and not die!'
Question 11 – Hebrews 6:4-6
Now we come to the crucial text, Hebrews 6:4-6. “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame."
According to Ironside:
Watch this carefully. See if I read it correctly. “For it is quite possible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.” Is that what it says? You believe that a man can be once enlightened, made a partaker of the Holy Ghost, can taste the good Word of God and the powers of the world to come, but fall away and then repent--don’t you? That is what all the folk believe who do not believe in the eternal security of the believer. What are you going to do with your backslider? If backsliding and apostasy are the same, don’t you see this passage is the worst possible passage in all the Bible for their favorite doctrine? If those who hold that a man can be saved over and over again will ponder this passage, I am sure they will see how fatally it knifes their theory.
This is the way it reads: “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted of the good Word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.” If this passage teaches that a man once saved can be lost again, then it also teaches that if that man is lost again, he can never repent and be saved. In other words, if that passage teaches that a man once saved can be lost again, it teaches that if you have ever been saved and you are now lost, you have a one-way ticket for hell, and there is no turning back. But what is the real question here? It is almost impossible to explain it in a minute or two, for you need to study the entire fifth and sixth chapters of Hebrews together.
The apostle is speaking to people who have the Old Testament and have been intellectually convinced that Jesus is the Messiah but who are exposed to persecution if they confess His name. Even if not genuine, they know that Jesus is the Messiah, and they must have felt the power and seen the evidence of His authority in the miracles wrought. Yet they can turn their backs upon it all and go back to Judaism, and go into the synagogue again and say, “We do not believe Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the Son of God; we refuse the authority of this man. He should be crucified.” “They crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.” The apostle says, “Do not try to do anything there; you cannot, for they have gone too far. They are apostate.” It proves that they are not real Christians. In verse 9 we read, “But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak.” That is, you could have all these things and not have salvation. You say, “I don’t think so.” But look at it: “It is impossible for those who were once enlightened.” What does that mean? Born again? No one could listen to a gospel address without being enlightened. “The entrance of Thy words giveth light, it giveth understanding unto the simple” (Psalm 119:130). “. . .and have tasted of the heavenly gift.” It is one thing to taste; it is another thing to eat. Many a person has gone that far and never been saved. The angel said to Ezekiel, “Son of man, eat this roll.” But the angel saw that Ezekiel had only tasted it, so he commanded, “Son of man, cause thy belly to eat it.” It was in his mouth, and if his head had been cut off all the truth would be gone, but “God desires truth in the inward parts.” “. . .and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost.” They were neither sealed, nor indwelt, nor baptized, nor filled with the Spirit. He does not use one of the terms that refer to the Spirit’s great offices, but says, “and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost.” Did you ever see a man in a meeting where the Spirit of God was working in power, and have you ever gone over and talked to him and said, “Don’t you want to come to Christ?” And he has answered, “I know I ought to come, I can feel the power of the Spirit of God in this meeting. I know this thing is right and I ought to yield, but I don’t want to, and I won’t.” And he goes away resisting the Spirit although he was a partaker. So these people described in Hebrews 6 had been in this way outwardly acquainted with Christianity, but they now denied it all. For such there could be no repentance.
Now in order to prove that this is the correct interpretation of the passage, let me draw your attention to Hebrews 6:7-9: “For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God: but that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned. But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you; you have gone farther than these apostates ever did, you have been saved; and so do not think we are confounding you with people like these.” He uses this little parable to make clear what he means. Here are two pieces of grass growing side by side, we will say, just separated by a fence. The earth is the same, the same sun shines on them both, the same kind of rainfall waters them both. When the time of harvest comes, one of these plots brings forth herbs, but the other only thorns and briers. What is he teaching here? This is a message to the Jews, trying to make them see the reality of Christ’s messiahship and His fulfillment of all the types of old. These two plots of ground are two men, they are the hearts of two men. We may think of them in this way to make it all more graphic. They grow up side by side; they both are taught the Bible; they both go to the same synagogue; both wait for the Messiah; both go down and listen to John the Baptist preach; perhaps both were baptized by John the Baptist, confessing their sins. John’s baptism was not salvation; it was just looking forward to the coming of a Savior. Both of them hear the Lord Jesus; both of them see Him do His works of power; both are in that crowd watching when He dies; both are there when the throngs go out to see the open tomb; both are near when He ascends to heaven; both see the mighty work of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost; both of them move in and out among the apostles; and outwardly you could not see any difference between them. But by-and-by persecution breaks out. One of them is arrested, and they say to him, “Deny Jesus Christ, or you will die.” He says, “I cannot deny Him; He is my Savior.” “Then you will die,” the first one declares. “I am ready to die, but I cannot deny Him,” the second man replies. The other one is arrested and they say, “You must deny Christ or die.” He says, “I will deny Him rather than die. I will go back and be a good Jew again rather than die.” “Come out here, then,” they command him.
They had a terrible way of taking him back. I remember reading how in such a case, they took him to an unclean place where a man slew a sow, and this one going back to Judaism, in order to prove his denial, spits on the blood of the sow and says, “So count I the blood of Jesus the Nazarene.” And then they purify him and take him back. Could any real believer in Jesus do that? What made the difference between the two? Those plots of ground had the same rain, the same sunshine, but there were different crops. What was the difference? One of them had the good seed and brought forth good fruit; the other did not have the good seed and brought forth thorns and briers. These two men were both familiar with the truth, but one received the incorruptible seed, the Word of life, and brought forth fruit unto God. The other has never received the good seed, and the day comes when he is an apostate.
If you will keep in mind the difference between an apostate and a backslider, it will save you a lot of trouble over many Scriptures. The apostate knows all about Christianity but never has been a real Christian. The backslider is a person who has known Christ, who did love Him, but became cold in his soul, lost out in his spiritual life. There is not a Christian who has not often been guilty of backsliding. That is why we need the Lord as our advocate to restore our souls. When backslidden, it is not our union with Him that is destroyed, but it is our communion. You may say, “Why are you so sure that a real Christian does not apostatize?” Because God says so in His Word. 1 John 2:18: “Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time.” Antichrist means “opposed to Christ.” The apostate is always a man opposed to Christ. A man says, “I have tried it all, and there is nothing in it,” and so denounces Christ. “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.” The words “no doubt” are in italics and really cast a doubt. Leave those words out for they do not belong in the Greek text, and read it, “They went out from us, but they were not of us: for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us.” And then he adds, “They went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not altogether (that is the literal rendering) of us” (1 John 2:19). In other words, they were with us in profession, in outward fellowship, but not altogether of us, because they had never really been born of God. This also explains Hebrews 10 which is the next passage brought up here as an objection.
According to the Bible:
The Prodigal returned, Lk15:24, as did Peter and King David! And Rom11:23 declares that God is able to Graft them in AGAIN if they continue not in unbelief. Therefore Heb6:1-6 MUST be speaking about something other than a Christian who falls into sin & then repents. (2Cor7:10-11) However the people in this passage were definitely genuine converts who had forfeited their salvation. The word 'enlightened', meaning to illuminate or give understanding, is used elsewhere in the New Testament in reference to true salvation: Eph1:18, 3:9, Heb10:32 "Recall in the FORMER days in which after you were ILLUMINATED, you endured a great struggle with suffering!" WHY wouldn't it be the same here? 'Tasted' is also used to describe those who have life, Matt16:28, 'You shall not TASTE death!', Jh8:52 "he who believes on ME shall not TASTE of death!" And BOTH these words are given in the Present, Aorist tense, meaning 'He who is NOW enlightened & NOW tasting!' 'PARTAKERS' is more than obvious, it means, to have a Share of something. Also used to describe people as 'partakers' of Christ, Heb3:1,6,14, 12:8....where you 'partake' of the Lords chastisement, proving you are His Child! CLEARLY these men are miss-leading you into dangerous error.
Without question a person who has knowingly & deliberately committed the type of sin described in Heb6:6 & 10:29 can NEVER return. They have blasphemed the Holy Spirit & are guilty of 'eternal sin' Mk3:29. And for those who 'think' this is a hypothetical warning, know that verse 6 DOES NOT say, 'IF they fall away', but "Having ALREADY fallen away!" in the original language. (check it out in some other translations) True Grace raises the standard, not lowers it, as the osas teachers have done. It is worse to sin willfully against a knowledge of the truth than to violate the law of Moses, Heb10:26. That's why Jesus told you to Pluck out your eye or Cut off your hand if they cause you to sin! Matt5:27-30. Because SIN can cause you to perish! (be destroyed & sent to hell!) Notice the lengths these men will take to explain away these passages in Hebrews, flattering you with their knowledge of history and persuading you with great swelling words of emptiness! When it all boils down to ONE thing. The True follower of Jesus Christ is warned again and again that the powers of darkness are out to ensnare him & destroy his soul. Giving them a false sense of security is like throwing them to the wolves. But equipping them Spiritually with the proper tools to combat the principalities and powers is the merciful thing to do.
Question 12 – Hebrews 10:28-29
Explain Hebrews 10:28-29: “He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?” People are troubled here, for they say, “Well, this man was surely a Christian, because it says that he was sanctified.”
According to Ironside:
That does not necessarily prove that he was a Christian. The whole nation of Israel was sanctified by the blood of the covenant; in a certain sense the whole world has been sanctified by the blood of the cross. If it were not for that blood shed on Calvary’s cross the whole world would be doomed to eternal judgment, but because Jesus died for the entire world God says, “Now, I can deal with all men on the ground of the blood of the cross,” and, as we often put it, the great question between God and man today is not primarily the sin question. Why? Because the blood of Christ answers for sin. What is the great question? It is the Son question: How are you treating God’s Son who died to save you? Christ has died for all men, His blood is shed for the salvation of all men, and it will avail for every sinner in all the world if they trust Him. (See John 3:18-19.)
Here is this Hebrew who has followed along to a certain point, and now the question comes, “Will you confess this Christ as your one great sin offering no matter what it means?” And he answers, “No, I cannot do that. I am going back to the temple. There is a sin offering there, and I will not have to suffer as I may if I confess Jesus Christ.” But he cannot do that. God does not accept any more that “there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins.” “If we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins.” “There remaineth no other sacrifice for sins: is the true meaning. This sacrifice at the altar was commanded by God. He said, “If you sin, you must bring a sacrifice, and I will accept you.” “The life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul” (Leviticus 17:11). “All right,” this Jew says, “I have a sin offering.” But he has met Jesus Christ or heard of Him as the great sin offering; he knows that God accepted Him and raise Him from the dead; he has all this knowledge, but having it all he is afraid to come out definitely and confess Christ as his Savior. He says, “I do not need this sin offering; I will go back and be content with the sin offering of the temple.” Before Jesus came, that was acceptable because it pointed to Him, but now He has come. If you reject Him, there remains no other offering. This passage, you see, has nothing to do with a real Christian turning from Christ, but with a man thoroughly instructed who refuses to accept Him. And how many people there are, not only among the Jews but in Christendom, who are refusing this sin offering.
According to the Bible:
This passage, as Heb6 has EVERYTHING to do with 'real' Christians. The 'Knowledge' spoken of here is, 'precise & correct knowledge', and used constantly by Paul as he offered his prayers that the Christian people he was writing to would grow in this same 'knowledge' & wisdom of God, were they merely 'professing Christians' as this man suggests? (Eph1:17,4:13, Phil1:9, Col1:10, 2:2, 2Pet1:2, 2:20) Sinning against this knowledge is called 'insulting' the Spirit of Grace. How can you 'insult' something you don't have? These people were 'sanctified' by the Blood of the covenant. Compare that to Titus3:5 where it speaks of the 'washing' or regeneration & renewing of the Holy Spirit. The exact same word is used in 1Cor6:11, a passage the osas teachers 'love' to use to explain away 6:9-10 WHY weren't the people in 1Cor6:11, false converts, 'sanctified' by the blood? Jesus said we are 'Sanctified' by His Word in, Jh17:17 Therefore if we have received the 'implanted word' Js1:21 that is able to save our souls, we are automatically sanctified by God. To say we have not received his sacrifice for sin & thereby found Justification in his grace, would be to preach 'another' gospel. (Gal1:8) Which they are perfectly willing to do to protect the false notion of eternal security.
Question 13 – Luke 9:61-62
The next passage brought up is Luke 9:61-62: “And another also said, Lord, I will follow Thee; but let me first go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”
According to Ironside:
What a terrible thing it would be if this were the way into heaven! How many thousands of earnest Christian people there are who have allowed what they thought was their responsibility to their friends to keep them from fully following Christ. Suppose they went to heaven only on the ground of fully following Him. You see, these Jews were looking for the kingdom, and many said, “I will follow Thee, but my friends have a claim on me.” “No, the Lord says, “I must come first. No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God” That is the test of discipleship. But it is necessary to distinguish between salvation by grace and reward for faithful discipleship. The rewards are connected with the kingdom. No matter how faithful I may be as a Christian, it does not give me any better place in heaven than if I were taken there the moment I was saved. Suppose the very instant you were converted you dropped dead--would you have gone to heaven? Yes, you would have gone there on the ground of God’s delight in the work of His Son. Suppose you were converted fifty years ago. There have been ups-and-downs in your life, but you have been saved all those years. Where would you go if you died suddenly? You would go to heaven. On what ground? On the ground of God’s delight in the work of His Son. There is not a bit of change in fifty years. “But,” you say, “I have been a wonderfully faithful Christian.” Have you, indeed? I am surprised that you should think so. The more we serve Him, the more most of us feel how unfaithful we have been. But you insist, “I have been a very faithful Christian.” Does that make you any more fit for heaven than you were the moment you trusted Jesus? You ask, “Does faithfulness as a disciple go for nothing?” It goes for a great deal, but it has no saving merit. You have a place in the Father’s house on the ground of pure grace, but the Father’s house is not the only thing before us. There is also the kingdom of God. “Then shall the righteous shine forth in the kingdom of their Father.” And here there are different rewards according to the measure of faithfulness in this life.
Here was one to whom the Lord said, “I want you to follow Me to Africa or India,” and he said, “O Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. I have an old father here and cannot bear to leave him as long as he lives. After he is dead, I am willing to follow Thee.” And the Lord says, “Let the dead bury their dead.” Of course, if he had the responsibility of providing for his father, that would be a different thing. Because that man has not the faith and courage to make that break, does he cease to be a Christian? He may stay at home, he may be of great value and great use, but when he comes to the judgment seat of Christ there is a reward he might have had that he will not have, because he did not go the whole way with the Lord Jesus Christ. If going the whole way entitled men to heaven, none of us would ever get there. But as we go the whole way, as far as we understand, He is going to reward us. If people could learn to see the difference between salvation by grace and reward for service, this question would settle itself. From this point on, most of these objections really have to do with this very fact.
According to the Bible:
The last verse of Luke9:62 explains the entire matter, "No one having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God!" To think there's a difference between a disciple and a 'fully' committed disciple is pure non-sense! Nothing of any kind exists in the bible. What if Paul or any of the other 1st Century disciples had felt this way? Christianity would have ceased to exist. From the very beginning the new converts were burning with love and desire to serve God, Continue in the faith and live a blameless pure life in the midst of a wicked & perverse generation. They understood the gospel message and they were willing to DIE to prove it! (which they did by the thousands)
How many times did Jesus tell those who believed in Him to take up their cross, deny themselves & follow? (7 times in three gospels!) If this isn't the gospel according to Jesus, I don't know what is! To tell people they do not have to fully commit themselves to Christ for salvation is to fill the churches with false converts. (which is exactly what they have done!) From the beginning Jesus demanded ALL or nothing and everyone who followed understood they must 'count' the cost or stay behind. Produce these so-called non-committed disciples in the pages of scripture....who perceived Grace in this manner. It simply cannot be done! "NARROW is the Way that Leads to Life & FEW there be that find it!"
Question 14 – Hebrews 3:12-14
The next passage is Hebrews 3:12-14: “Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. But exhort one another daily, while it is called Today; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast unto the end.” That is one of the “if” verses. Another one is found in I Corinthians 15:1-2: “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; by which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain.” Another one is found in Colossians 1:21-23: “And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in His sight: if ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister.” I might add others to these, but here are three “ifs.”
According to Ironside:
What does the Spirit of God mean by bringing these “ifs” in? In every one of these instances He is addressing bodies of people. I stand here to address you as a body of people. If I were to ask everybody who professes to be a Christian to stand, I suppose nearly everybody would rise. Would that prove that you are all Christians? It would show that you profess to be Christians. What would prove that you really are? “If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel.” You profess to have received the gospel; you are saved if you keep in memory what has been preached unto you. If you do not, it just shows that there is no reality.
The faith here is not the faith by which you are saved, it is not the faith by which you believe; but it is that which you believe. Jude says, “Earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). That is the body of Christian doctrine, and, if a real Christian, you will stand for that Christian doctrine to the end; but if not, you may become a Mormon, or a Christian Scientist, or a theosophist, or something like that. Then you simply show there is no reality. It is a very easy thing to say, “I am saved”; it is another thing to prove it.
According to the Bible:
Where in Scripture did Paul address professing Christians in such manner? He simply told them, "IF you Continue, grounded & Steadfast in the faith, you shall be saved!" NOT 'Since you are saved, you WILL continue grounded & steadfast.' In each of these passages the Apostle is issuing a Warning, not a statement of fact. Why would the translators since 1611 have stated these passages thus, 'IF ye continue in the faith', If they meant exactly the opposite, as the osas teachers proclaim? 1Jh3:7 settles the argument over false converts, "Little children, LET NO ONE DECEIVE you, he who does what is right is righteous, just as He is righteous!" How is this different that what Paul is saying? It's NOT! "IF you do what is right, you will Abide in Him & He in you!" 1Jh2:24 The Condition stands. Twist it if you like, the truth stands firm.
Question 15 – 2 Peter 3:17
What of 2 Peter 3:17? “Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye how these things before, beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own steadfastness.”
According to Ironside:
We come back to what we were speaking of a few minutes ago. There is always a possibility of a real Christian falling, and we need to be warned again and again. How many we have known who at one time had a bright Christian testimony but fell? They were not watchful, they were not prayerful, and they stumbled and fell. Does that mean they are lost? No, not if really born again. If born again, they have received eternal life; and if people thus fall, that is where the restoring work of the Spirit of God comes in. David fell in a most terrible way but he says, “He restoreth my soul”; and sometimes in restoring His people’s souls, God has to put them through very bitter experiences. He loves them too much to let them be happy when away from Him.
According to the Bible:
If no real Danger exists, WHY issue the warning? Instead assure them (as he has done) that NOTHING can effect the outcome of their salvation, so 'fear not' the error of the wicked! (reverse reasoning) Similar twisting occurs in 1Cor3:17 where these men conclude that God will 'kill' a person who falls into gross sin & take them to heaven! The passage states that 'If any man defile the temple of God, God will DESTROY him!' The word used here has a very similar definition of the Greek word used in Lk15:24 describing the Prodigal son, who was LOST & now found, 'Apollumi', Meaning 'To put out of the way entirely, destroy without hope!'.
The language of 2Pet3:17 is not offering the hearer the 'hope' of eternal life if he 'falls' into the error of the wicked. As Jame5:19-20 identifies a 'Brother' as a 'Sinner' if he strays into sin, so this passage warns that you can 'FALL' from you own STEADFAST position in Christ by listening to false teachers! The Apostle would not have expressed this warning in such manner, had he believed in osas. Steadfast endurance is said throughout scripture to be the attribute of your faith that KEEPS you saved! (Rom2:7, Heb4:11, 10:35-36 etc) Peter himself said, "BE DILIGENT (Steadfast) to add to your faith....IF you do these things you will neither stumble or fall away & an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting Kingdom!" 2Pet1:4-11 By 'Making you Calling & Election sure', you have the assurance of eternal life. Otherwise you have the 'doctrines' of men.
Question 16 – 2 Timothy 2:18
Explain this passage. “Who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some” (2 Timothy 2:18). A writer says, “We see here the possibility of having our faith overthrown.”
According to Ironside:
That’s not what Paul is talking about. He is speaking of the faith. Again you must make the distinction. Our faith is that by which we believe. We believe God; that is faith. But we believe the truth that God has revealed to us, and that truth is the faith, and that is what has been overthrown in the mind of the professed believer in this instance. That is the same thing that you get in 1 Timothy 5:15: “For some are already turned aside after Satan.” Some real Christians do that, but what a blessed thing to know the Lord goes after them and never gives them up.
According to the Bible:
Explore the context of this passage and find it's discussing 'false