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Christian Apologetic
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[Basis of Salvation] [Means of Salvation] [Faith Plus Nothing] [Scriptural Basis] The assurance of one’s own salvation - that you will be going to heaven after death - is one of the most cherished parts of personal faith. But, for most people, it is an elusive “hope” at best. How can we be sure beyond any reasonable doubt that we have eternal salvation, or do we just have to stumble through life hoping for the best? What is the alternative to assurance of salvation? Unfortunately, the doubting Christian is necessarily very anemic in their faith because they are never sure as to whether the promises of the Bible are true. Understanding the assurance of our eternal salvation for believers in Christ is as much a part of our faith as the Resurrection - without it, it is impossible to be effective Christians. First, will have difficulty experiencing spiritual growth and renewal as we could otherwise if we continue to struggle with doubt. Second, without a firm belief in the promises of God, it is difficult to be effective in evangelization. But such doubts are unnecessary. Most Christians do not have the assurance of their salvation for two reasons; first, they do not understand the basis of their salvation, and second, they do not appreciate the means of their salvation. The basis and means of our personal salvation will next be discussed. When the rich young ruler came to Christ and asked Him what needed to be done for salvation, he asked, “Good Teacher, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” (Mark 10:17). Similarly, then an expert in the law asked Christ, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (Luke 10:25), he was asking a similar question. Both of these Biblical personalities are asking the same questions - and both are making the same mistake. They are assuming there is something they must do to achieve eternal glory. In fact, this is not the case - there is nothing they must do other than accept the free gift of salvation. We are “dead unto sin”, and dead things cannot do anything for themselves. But, God has redeemed us for Himself through the sacrifice of Christ - it’s a done deal. God has always demanded a blood sacrifice for sin - this is the pattern throughout the entire Old and New Testaments. God said, “It is the blood that makes atonement for the soul” (Lev. 17:11). God cannot look away from any wickedness, for as Habakkuk noted, “You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and cannot look on wickedness.” (Hab. 1:13). In order to resolve this dilemma, God provided a sacrifice to meet His own demands; just as He did for Abraham and Isaac (Gen. 22:1-14), so has he done at Calvary for us. God atoned for our sinful nature by providing His own Son who bled and died a sacrifice for us all because “without shedding of blood there is no remission” or payment for sin (Heb. 9:22). God gave up his own son at Calvary to be the sacrifice He Himself required to pay the penalty of sin for all of us - Jesus was “delivered up because of our offenses” (Rom 4:25), and He gave himself up for us willingly because he “has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God.” (Eph. 5:2). We are saved by the sacrifice of Christ because He was our substitute. We are ourselves incapable of making this sacrifice for sin - or doing anything else to help ourselves for that matter - because sin has permeated us so thoroughly as to make us totally unworthy. It is like trying to clean up a greasy spill with a greasier rag - it just don’t work no matter how hard you might try. Our sins are so pervasive, and our nature is so corrupted that we are simply unable to clean out our lives by our own efforts. Our best thoughts and deeds are as filthy rags before God. Jesus willingly and voluntarily took upon Himself the pain of our separation and sin and became our substitutionary sacrifice. The Bible notes that Jesus “bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness.” (1 Peter 2:24). Christ went to the cross in perfect righteousness and shouldered the entire burden of sin for everyone throughout the whole world throughout history - thereby paying the price for this sin. This is through this substitutionary sacrifice that Christ’s righteousness can become our righteousness - it is imputed to us. We can at some future day stand before God clothed in Christ’s righteousness instead of the nakedness of our own sinful nature. It is through this substitutionary sacrifice at Calvary that Christ “obtained eternal redemption (Heb. 9:12), so that by “the blood of Christ” (v. 14) He has “put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself” (v. 26). Christ has done this for us because we were totally incapable of doing it for ourselves. The Bible makes this message very clear. When Christ first was born, the angel told the shepherds, “For there is born to you this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” (Luke 2:11). John the Baptist pointed at Christ and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.” (John 1:29). What made Christ the Savior was His death on Calvary - with this sinless, substitutionary sacrificial act, Christ became the Savior of the world. Paul said, “For it pleased the Father that in Him all the fullness should dwell, and by Him to reconcile all things to Himself, by Him, whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of His cross.” (Col 1:19-20). Christ has made the sacrifice for us to allow us to be drawn back into God’s presence. Without this sacrifice we would be hopeless, but with this sacrifice, the payment has been made. But, how do we take possession of what Christ has done for us? Our situation is in some respects similar to the Hebrews while under Egyptian captivity as they were told to save themselves by spreading the blood of a lamb on the lintel and the doorposts of their house so that the angel of the Lord might pass over them and spare their family. The blood had to be collected from the lame, and then spread on the door; it was not enough to collect the blood alone; the means of salvation is just as important as the basis of salvation. Frequently, when people ask how to be saved, they are really asking “by what means am I saved.” The Philippian jailed asked Paul a similar question, “What must I do to be saved?” Paul did not say, “Live a good life.” No, he said, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved.” (Acts 16;31). Salvation is a matter of believing what Christ did on the cross; that’s all. So, what does it mean to believe in Jesus? To follow the advice of Woodrow Kroll, to have a saving faith in Christ consists of three elements: assent, repentance, and trust. These are the three qualities that make up salvational faith. You can’t do anything to be saved, but when you express your faith it will involve these three ingredients: Assent, Repentance, and Trust a. Assent We live in a rebellious society and frequently wish to pick and choose those aspects of the gospel which are pleasing to our worldview while discarding others. However, the gospel has to be taken in its entirety; the entire Bible, the entire gospel, and the entire Christ. We need to understand that we have all rebelled against God, and that this is sin (Gen. 3:1-6). Each new generation is sinful by birth - this is a characteristic of people as surely as our genes carry physical characteristics from our parents. This sinful nature is both by choice and by birth. As a result of this sin, we are all spiritually dead - we cannot help ourselves, stillborn in our relationship with God, without hope, and destined for eternal separation from God in hell (Eph. 2:11-13). Understanding this is true is a part of the gospel as real as those parts we might like more to dwell upon. Because of this natural rebellion against God, we are all condemned - condemned at birth. However, this does not stop God from loving us - that is the good news. Even though we are constantly sinning in rebellion against God, He is constantly loving us and has made provision for our salvation through the atonement of Christ (2 Cor. 5:21). Christ is the only way to return to God (John 14:6), and He and He alone can make us righteous before God (Rom 3:23-24). We need to believe these things - to give assent to them - in order to accept the sacrifice of Christ. But knowing how these facts does not in and of themselves make us saved; the demons in hell also know these things to be true. What brings us back to God is the opposite side of assent - that of Repentance. b. Repentance Repentance means a change in mine and attitude toward God and what He has done for us. When you give assent to the previously mentioned facts of the Gospel, your rebellious nature will begin to resolve and you will be drawn back toward Him. Repentance is very similar to Assent - for when you assent to the facts of the gospel, you will turn away from your sins and repent. They are like both sides of the same coin. Millard J. Erickson noted, “Conversion is a single entity which has two distinguishable but inseparable aspects; repentance and faith. Repentance is the unbeliever’s turning away from sin, and faith is his or her turning toward Christ. They are, respectively, the negative and positive aspect of the same occurrence. In a sense, each is incomplete without the other, and each is motivated by the other. As we beomce aware of sin and turn away from it, we see the necessity of turning to Christ for the provision of his righteousness. Conversely, believing in Christ makes us aware of our sin and thus leads to repentance.” (Millard J. Erickson, Introducing Christian Doctrine (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1992).Repentance means you turn away from your old life situations; your old friends, your old habits, your old thoughts - and become a New Creation. You accomplish this transition without your own efforts, but rather through the work of the Holy Spirit within you. You no longer thirst after your old ways - you find yourself wanting to follow God and godly things. Life isn’t perfect because we still are living with our sinful natures in a sinful, corrupted body. But gradually you become more and more like Christ as your mind is drawn toward Him. c. Faith You first give assent to the truths of Christianity, then follow repentance as the Holy Spirit works out the will of God in your life. Then you need to exercise faith. You develop faith in the facts as they are presented in the Bible by God, and you apply these facts to your own personal life. This is not a jump into the paranormal void, but rather believing that the Word of God is true (John 17:17), and a conscious embracing about what God says about Christ and His work. You cannot develop this faith by yourself. Just as with repentance, faith requires the help of God’s Holy Spirit. But when the Holy Spirit does draw you to God, He will enlighten your mind and make it possible to believe the facts of the Gospel (John 6:44). Without faith it is impossible to please God (Heb. 11:6); both faith and repentance go hand in hand as expressions of the assent you give toward Biblical truth. One of the most important assertions of Christianity is that you come to God through Christ through faith - period. As Paul told the Philippian jailer, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved.” Paul meant to believe in such a way that you give assent to the Word of God, repent of your past wickedness and sins, and have faith that what He says is true. You trust Christ as your Lord and Savior: Lord in that He becomes the most important thing in your life and you are His willing and obedient servant, and Savior in that you are redeemed by Christ from eternal punishment. Nothing else is required; not tithing, belonging to the “right” Church, baptism, speaking in tongues, nothing. Christ is all you need to come back to God. The facts of the gospel that relate to your assurance of salvation are summarized here; a. God says in His Word that we are all sinners - there are no exceptions,Scriptural Basis of Eternal Salvation The clear teaching of Scripture is that the believer has been taken forever out of the power of darkness (Col. 1:12-13), adopted into the light of God's family by the power of the Holy Spirit (John 1:12-13, Gal. 4:4-7), Rom 8:15), and that as an adopted person in the family of God, he becomes an heir of eternal salvation (Rom. 8:16-17, Eph. 1:1-14), and that he will - by divine preservaiton - persevere to the end and will never, ever be disowned by his Savior (Matt. 18:20, HEb. 13:5). While the believer can temporarily "backslide" through disobedience and fall into sin, he will always repent and return to the Lord and can never finally fall away and be lost. This is known as the doctrine of "The Perseverance of the Saints." A man of God might backslide but cannot possibly apostatize and are kept faithful to the end of their lives by the power of God: "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and He delights in his way. Though he fall, he shall not be utterly cast down; For the Lord upholds him with His hand." (Psa. 37:23-24). The Eighth Chapter of Romans is devoted to proving that the saints
are saved forever, and that there is nothing that can stand between them
and God. "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus...." (v. 1)Christ has already paid for all our sins upon the cross, including those we might commit after becoming Christian. Therefore, there can be no further condemnation for the believer after he is saved. "But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you." (v. 11)The indwelling of the believer by the Holy Spirit is our guarantee of future glory in the resurrection. "For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, 'Abba, Father'. The Spirit Himself bears witness with out spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs - heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together." (v. 15-17)We become heirs to what is Christ's through adoption into the family of God. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit - who is the guarantee of our future glory - bears witness to our salvation. "Moreover whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified." (v. 30)This is the Golden Chain of Redemption. One thing leads to another, such that those whom God has called, he has glorified. Although glorification does not happen completely during the believer's earthly life, it is plain from this verse that it is something that is irrevocably in our future. Each of these verbs is in the present tense, signifying that it is a "done deal." "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us form the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: 'For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter." Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." (v. 31-39)There is nothing - not even our foolish sins - that can break the future reality of glorification for believers. The assurance of salvation was also Jesus' teaching in the parable of the prodigal son. The prodigal son represents a child of God - one of the elect - who wanders off into sin. He soon finds that the pleasures of the world are temporary, and cannot satisfy his spiritual hunger. Eventually, he returns to his Father who gladly accepts him back into the family. Given all of the above, there are still some who would disagree with
the eternal security of the believer's salvation. The Scriptures
that are commonly used to suggest that Christians can lose their salvation are Rom. 14:15, 1 Cor. 8:11, and Heb. 6:4-6. Let's first look at
Rom. 14:15 and 1 Cor. 8:11 together as they express similar ideas. "Do not destroy with your food the one for whom Christ died." (Rom. 14:11)Because as we have already seen, the "destruction" of which these passages speak cannot refer to the spiritual body, it most likely refers to the physical body. Physical death can certainly be accelerated by our own actions. Even believers can be severely chastised and punished with an early death for their behavior (1 Cor. 11:30). These verses merely address the possibility that a weaker Christian may be led into a physical ruination or early death by their sins. "For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away, to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the son of God, and put Him to an open shame." (Heb. 6:4-6)It is clear that the person to whom this passage refers is not a true believer, but rather one who is a cleverly disguised false Christian. These people may very well go to Church frequently, read the Bible, even teach the Scriptures and might even perform miracles but have nonetheless have not given their life over to God. Jesus referred to such people as "tares" compared to the "wheat" or true believers (Matt. 13:24-30). This man indeed has been "enlightened." He may have gone to Church and listened to countless numbers of sermons, and been involved in Church activities and function. For example, Balaam was a person whose "eyes were opened" and who had "the knowledge of the Most High" (Num. 24:15-16), but still did not alter the fact that for him "is reserved the blackness of darkness forever." (2 Pet. 2:17). The man described in Heb. 6:4-6 may have "tasted the heavenly gift" - but that is all he has done - tasted. He might have been a "partaker of the Holy Spirit" - but one does not need to be a true Christian to be a partaker of the Holy Spirit - or even to have the operation of the Holy Spirit in one's life. King Saul, for example, had the trappings of faith - and even had the operations of the Holy Spirit in his life (1 Sam. 10:10), but who was in the final analysis an unbeliever. Jesus discusses such people in Matt. 7:21-23, "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'"These are the people referred to in Hebrews 6:2-4. They are "partakers of the Holy Spirit". However, they are false believers, fooling those around them and maybe even themselves - but they will not fool God. The unbeliever in Heb. 6 can "taste the good word of God." (Heb. 6:5). This again, is just another tasting experience, and is identical to the man in the parable of the sower, who "hears the word and immediately receives it with joy." (Matt. 13:20). He also has "tasted the good word of God" but ultimately he rejects its teachings in his life, for "he has not root in himself, but endures only for a while. For when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles." (Matt. 13:21). It is not enough merely to "taste the good word of God" - one also has to do the things it teaches (Matt. 7:24-27, Jas. 1:22-24). There just be a real change in our hearts - otherwise, great will be our fall (Matt. 7:27). Many people will "taste ... the powers of the age to come" (Heb. 6:5). They may have a good understanding of what it means to be condemned and to go to hell; however, these notions will not be enough to save them from their eternal destiny. Even the demons also have similar knowledge and beliefs as the man in Heb. 6:4-6, and like him, they are not true believers (James 2:19). The true believer has so much more than what is described for the man in Heb. 6. The true believer is not merely "enlightened' but has "the mind of Christ" (1 Cor. 2:16) and "knows all things" (1 John 2:20). The true believer does not merely "taste the heavenly gift" but has received it completely (Rom. 6:23). The true believer is not just a "partaker of the Holy Spirit" but rather the Holy Spirit has made a home in him (John 14:24). The true believer does not just "taste the good word of God" but lives it (Rev. 14:12). The true believer does not just "taste the powers of the age to come" but has rather entered into that age has is a citizen of its kingdom (Phil. 3:20). It is, I believe, nothing short of wicked to try to attempt to convince Christians they can lose their salvation and they do not have eternal security. There is perhaps no more pitiable thing than to see a Christian who is forever doubting in their own eternal security. "We know we have passed from death to life" (1 John 3:14). This assurance has not come cheaply, as we have been "bought at a price" (1 Cor. 6:20), and He will never leave us nor forsake us (Heb. 13:5). Perhaps it should not be too surprising that the belief that a Christian might lose their salvation has prospered most readily among those which believe in easy believism. If you can become a Christian simply through making some superficial statement as the result of an emotional appeal, then perhaps you might just as easily lose you salvation through "unbelief". If you saved yourself through your own decision to belief, then perhaps you might just as easily condemn yourself through unbelief. However, if we are brought to God through the power of God only, then you will also be preserved by that same power, and raised by that same power at the Last Day. |