Question of the Day
Question of the Day: Can a person lose their salvation – whether consciously or unconsciously?
It’s definitely a touchy subject that has been reviewed and debated many times over. There are those who believe once saved always saved. This is essentially the belief that if a person confesses with their mouth and believes in their heart that they are saved. Period. If the person did that at 10 years old and never again acknowledged God, they would still go to heaven.
One the other hand, there are those that believe that if you don’t change your lifestyle and you continue in sin that you’ve relinquished your salvation and would face the punishment of the unbelievers.
I happen to believe that the answer lies somewhere in the middle. Consider this: salvation was a gift. We didn’t earn it though our works, it was given to us. If you can’t earn salvation with works, how can you lose it with works? I doubt that we all have a sin bank, and once you’ve sinned x amount of times you’re cut off. But, at the same time I don’t believe you can confess Jesus as Lord at one point in your life, continue living in sin, never acknowledge him again and still make it into heaven. If that were the case, what would be the point of living right? If you could fulfill all of your lustful desires here on earth without remorse and still go to heaven after a lifetime of unrepentant sin, how many of use would choose to live right regardless?
I think it has to do with the condition of your heart. The purpose of lust is to lure you away from God, and I think that you can get so caught up in your sin that you consciously or unconsciously walk away from God. Colossian 1:21-23 says, “And you, who were once alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight – if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.” Selah.
This says that you will be presented to God blameless and holy because of your faith through the death of Jesus IF you continue in faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the Gospel which you heard. To me, that’s a pretty big IF. One could argue that a person addicted to porn is not continuing in faith grounded and steadfast and indeed have been moved away from the Gospel they’ve heard.
In the midst of my addiction to porn, I was completely unrepentant. It has gotten to the point where I just made up my mind that this is something I wanted to do, and I was going to keep doing it. Eventually the conviction of the Holy Spirit stopped, and I no longer felt guilty about my sin. I had become completely comfortable and accepting of it. I think during that time, had I died, I would’ve left the earth without Christ. That’s just my opinion. In Matthew 7:21-23 Jesus says, “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!’”
What do you think?
What about Acts ch5: Ananias and Saphire. Sinning against the Holy Spirit.Matt12:31-32 It takes works to loose the salvation. It takes time to renew the mind. Thats maybe we experience The Spirit as a little withdrawn in periods of maybe years. In thiese periods we often do sinful things without regrets. But i think the Spirit is working us over leading our steps into events that really catches our attention and wakes us up.
At some point God will stop his rebuke. At that point The Spirit has "left the building" the person have become hatfull of God and resent his very existens. Read about Judas Iskariot. As long as you haven't reach this point you're probably safe. But if you die you loose the chanse to make a nice heavenly paycheck. ;-}
Well in order to loose something, then to start with one must define what salvation is? Please do not say it is just a set of beliefs.
Secondly there is the great falling away, which leads one to believe that those falling away are not saved and third if we look at Matthew 25:31-46 we have what salvation is and what it is not, because it was the righteous that were told to go away, for Jesus knew them not, referring to those that did not take care of those that were hungry, needing shelter, clothing, were sick or in prison, so if not taking care of those in need is not salvation, then one definition of salvation is having the heart to take care of those in need. One is led to believe the righteous are or were those that considered themselves saved.
I would assume that salvation would be those that loved others, because Jesus said they will know that you are mine by your love one for another. I do find it interesting that today more churches are built than any time in history and at the same time in record numbers there are more people starving to death than any other time in history. Currently there are about 13,600 some PER DAY that are starving to death. So it would seem obvious those that are building church buildings believe that is taking care of people and thier needs, because scripture tells us that it is better to have Jesus than food.
Of course then the other question is what is love? Is love making sure that peoples needs are cared for or is it simply to say "I love you?" While granted salvation is a gift if the heart is actually NOT changed enough to turn things around, then it does seem to be just a bunch of words.
Faith is an action word requiring the user to actually do something or go in a direction, part of it may be living a certain way, granted, but what are we standing in faith on, that it is the way it is or that we can do something about what is happening on earth today?
Then again there is also the belief in the rapture that Jesus will fix it when He returns and those that have the belief will be taken away without having to do anything.
What are we called to do, which seems to suggest we need to be doing something.
Either way no one deserves to be saved. It is not a right but a gift, but if we have accepted that gift and if we have laid down our lives and will then we will actually be doing something.
By the way there is also a lot of scripture even in the NT that suggests that we should be keeping the commmandments and that includes the Sabbath, so is scripture serious or is it the belief that we do not have to keep the Sabbath. There are actual teachings that tell us that we are excluded from keeping the Sabbath or is that just rational justification. I had a minister tell me that he was justified by faith in whatever he did or didn't do. hmmmmmmmm
Scripure indicates that those led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God and there is those that overcome by the blood of the lamb and the words of their testimony, but then again if one reduces their testimony to how they met Jesus, that is different than what one did during thier life after, which is more than just meeting Jesus. In other words or testimony is what we work on in life. It is also something that we witnessed. What have we witnessed. I know we can talk about Paul or whomever but that was Paul witnessing something and not us, unless we have witnessed the same thing.
The word sin came from an archery term which means not just doing bad or dumb stuff, but means missing the mark and being perfect. Sin is missing the bullseye. If one is just 1/4 of an inch, then one is in sin according to that definition of sin. Of course then again there are those that believe there are levels of sin and while some sin is horrible, other sin of not doing all what one can, is alright or at least excusable.
Then of course part of the salvation prayer used to be, believing that scripture was the true word of God, but then you have people like Richard De Haan that disagrees that there are some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers for the edification of the body and so all can come to maturity so one can stop being tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine.
The point of that is if it takes the five fold gift ministry so one can come to maturity then why are so many churches being built that do not even have the five fold gift ministry around and many that profess to believe scripture, but then argue that it is no longer valid?
So if sin is missing the mark then we all are in sin or some level of sin and then it is grace if we are saved. “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!’” This leads to the concept that even if one has the power of God and even does good then they may not be saved, so then the only answer is to be perfected by love, not in the hereafter, but today. So how much do we love? Do we love enough have the heart and if we have the heart then we will be doing something to end starvation or homelessness, for example?
Sarah
God does have a plan for everyone and everyone is called to be a part of ministry somewhere. All jobs in ministry are important as it is designed by God to be a servant and save lives. God gave us so much, but how much do we give Him in return?
No you can't lose salvation.
The problem with people who think people can lose salvation is a problem of failing to realize that these people were never saved in the first place.
When you're "saved" and then live a life without consideration for God and his law and everything, then I don't believe you were saved in the first place.
I believe people are saved when the "continue in faith".
Of course this is a bit of a general statement and we can discuss how far someone can fall after they're saved, but I guess as a rule you can say that when people don't repent of their sin they're not saved.
You always have people who then claim that I (the one who states you are not saved when you can't see it in your life) believe in salvation by works, but that's nonsense.
The thing is: When God elects you to be one of His people, then you will be saved... and as RESULT of that salvation you will see the fruit in your life. When there's no fruit, there's no salvation. You can't turn that around and claim that the fruit gets you saved. It's just an inevitable result of salvation, by which you can (to some extent) judge whether someone is saved or not.
This is much like the discussion on the rapture, while it would be nice to think there is one, there is no scripture that says there is a rapture, except where Jesus comes to get His faithful, but the term faithful is not exactly clear either. We do know that there needs to be a great falling away from the faith, which is mentioned in Thessalonians. Depending on how one sees that it can happen in two ways one because something bad happens on a global basis and secondly perhaps it is a falling away because the ones falling away have not come to maturity, because they have been tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine. How that happens is that there is a common belief in the church that what its about is leading people to Jesus, instead of bringing people to maturity. The reason maturity is important is because then in maturity it is really about standing with each other in love or out of love. So if that is the case we have to look at perhaps "how many really stand together out of love?"
In Matthew 25:31-46 it was the righteous that thought they were saved that were cast out. They were cast out because they did not have the heart of God to care for those that are hungry, or homeless etc. There is a whole wave of believers that seem to think its just about them and God or Jesus, when the real truth is how we show our love for God and Jesus as they are one by loving others and at the very least making sure they are not starving to death.
Also in Revelation it talks about names being blotted out of the Lamb's book of life and salvation would seem to be having your name stay in the lambs book of life.
We all seem to like to use vague termonology which has different meanings to different people, such as "I believe people are saved when the "continue in faith"." What exactly does that mean? To me it means that the faith is learning who we are in Christ and then learning to walk in the power and authority which has been given to us, while another may define faith as believing one is saved.
I do know Paul wrote and exhorts people to "work out thier own salvation with fear and trembling," which at least suggests to me that there is probably more to it than we want to think.
So, if the body of Christ by working together in love and unity has all power in heaven and earth and we have each been given the authority to bind and loose then standing in faith seems to be doing those things.
Why is it we like to use vague terms? Is it because we do not want to be called on the carpet for stating specifics? Like bearing fruit. What does that mean? What does it mean to be a Christian or what does it mean to stay in the faith? Being vague allows for confusion and different winds of doctrine.
Clarity. Salvation is for today and we can stop the nonsense if we are all willing to stand together and face the enemy and basicly release the heavenlies on the enemy. That's fairly specific? Have we had enough fun? We have the power to put an end to the enemy and by faith that is what we are here to do. Jesus was sent to destroy the works of the enemy and if we are of Him then that is our mission also and if we did and did stand together then there would be peace on earth and good will to all.
Are we working together to destroy the work of the enemy? Yes part of that is ending starvation and homelessness and also putting an end to white slavery and even porn and unless we learn and accept the reason it continues is because we do not stand together in love and unity, then it will probably continue.
Honestly on starvation or even ending porn, most look up, instead of accepting the responsibility that it is up to us to end it. Our promise is that we can do all things through Christ and by faith we should be doing all things through Christ. Granted some are called to do different things, such as like this site, deals with porn, prostitution etc in an attempt to end the work of the enemy in this one area, but each of us are called to work in different areas such as starvation etc. It is salvation to us to find our calling and purpose and it is salvation to others when we work together to reach out to all on earth with God's will and love.
Why do we need each other? So we can stand in agreement, for what we agree to and touch will be done.
Sarah
God does have a plan for everyone and everyone is called to be a part of ministry somewhere. All jobs in ministry are important as it is designed by God to be a servant and save lives. God gave us so much, but how much do we give Him in return?