Hey my brothers and sisters! I’m confident that the Lord is building a family of warriors in this area with whom He will work powerfully and we’re going to be a part of it if we walk in humility and allow Him to continue to teach and train us. I know it’s very important to the Lord and to our effectiveness in ministering to others that we be united in our beliefs.

This matter of “once saved, always saved” is one that we need to get on the same page with the Lord and one another on. If it’s a true doctrine, yet I tell people it’s false, then I could be robbing people of the sense of security and peace the Lord wants them to enjoy. On the other hand, if it’s a false doctrine, yet we teach it as truth, we can give people a false sense of security that allows them to remain comfortable in sinful, lukewarm lifestyles; we can rob people of a healthy fear of the Lord that may be just what they need. So this is a significant matter that we should seek the truth of the word on.

I want to first clarify my view, then present the evidence from the Scriptures for it, and then address some common proof-texts for “once saved, always saved.”

My view

My view is that to stay in a saved relationship with Christ He requires that we continue to trust and obey Him. If we quit believing in Him or decide to go on sinning deliberately and won’t repent of it, we will not be saved. When our lives are over we will only be saved if we were faithful to the end.

I believe it is possible for a person to have a salvation experience, but down the road lose their faith and rebel and be lost again. I’ll give some examples of this from the New Testament.

I am NOT saying that every time a Christians sins he loses his salvation. The blood of Christ covers sins of ignorance and moments of weakness. None of us can discern all his errors (Ps 19:12). We all stumble in many ways (Jam 3:2). The Lord is patient and gracious with our growth process as long as we keep listening and trying to follow Him. But what the blood of Christ will not cover is “going on sinning willfully” (Heb 10:26). His grace is not a covering for ongoing rebellion. His grace is for those who are honestly trying to learn His ways and follow Him.

What’s the New Testament say?

I. Words of Jesus

1. To the church in Smyrna in Revelation 2:10 Jesus said, “Be faithful unto death, and I will give you the crown of life.” What if you become unfaithful? Do you still get the crown of life? The way He words that makes it sound to me like the crown of life is only for those who stay faithful.
2. Revelation 3:11, Jesus says, “I am coming soon. Hold fast what you have, so that no one may seize your crown.” Why would He say that if they couldn’t possibly lose their crown?
3. Revelation 3:16, “So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth.” What does that mean for Jesus to spit someone out of His mouth? Sounds like rejection to me. Sounds like a warning that He will reject them unless they repent of their lukewarmness.
4. The promises of ultimate salvation and eternal life at the end of every message to every church in Revelation (2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21) are not to the once saved, or to the baptized, or to those who responded to an invitation at church one time. They are to the ones “who overcome,” to the ones who persevere as followers of Christ, not letting the world or Satan or the flesh conquer them.
5. Jesus said, “The one who endures to the end will be saved” (Matthew 24:13). To whom is the promise of ultimate salvation? It’s not to those who start the Christian life. It’s to those who endure to the end.
6. Consider the parable of ten virgins in Matthew 25:1-13. It falls in a context about being ready at all times for Jesus’ second coming because you don’t know the day or hour. All 10 of the young ladies were ready with burning lamps if the bridegroom came early in the evening. But 5 of them were foolish and brought no extra oil to keep their lamps burning if he delayed his coming. They weren’t ready for a long wait. When the bridegroom came late that night, their lamps had run out and by then it was too late to get more oil. When they later knocked on the door of the marriage feast, saying, “Lord, lord, open to us,” the Lord answered, “Truly, I say to you, I do not know you.”
7. Matthew 5:13, Jesus gave an illustration of what happens when a disciple stops functioning as the salt of the earth. “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.”
8. Consider the allegory of the vine and the branches in John 15. Jesus is the vine, disciples are the branches, and the Father is vinedresser. Jesus said, “Every branch of mine that does not bear fruit he [the vinedresser/Father] takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:2). I think by “fruit” He means righteousness and justice, Christlike ways, which is what God has been longing for from the vineyard of Israel since they were planted in the promised land (cf. Isaiah 5:1-7; see also Luke 3:8-14). Jesus issues a warning in this verse that if a disciple/branch won’t bear the fruit of righteous living they will be cut off the vine. Then Jesus commanded them, “Abide in me, and I in you” (15:4). Abiding in Jesus is our responsibility. And if we abide in Him, He will abide in us, and that will enable us to bear the fruit. But then the Lord warned them what would happen if a disciple did not abide in Him: “If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned” (15:6). So if we detach from Christ, then He won’t continue to abide in us; we’ll be cut off and wither and eventually go to the burn pile. Reminds me of II Chronicles 15:2, “The LORD is with you while you are with Him. If you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you.”

II. Many NT passages that use the word “if” indicate that remaining in a right relationship with God is conditional on us continuing to trust and obey.

1. I John 1:7, “If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin.” The word “if” indicates there’s a condition for the blood of Jesus to be cleansing us from our sins. That condition is that we continue to walk in the light (continue to listen, learn from and follow Jesus, the Light of the world). If we walk in the darkness, the blood of Jesus won’t be cleansing our sins. “If we say we have fellowship with Him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.” (I John 1:6).
2. Galatians 6:9, “Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” What will we reap? The previous verse tells us. “the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.” What’s required to reap eternal life? That we do not give up in doing good.
3. Hebrews 3:14, “For we have come to share in Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the end.”
4. I Corinthians 15:1-2, “Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast the word I preached to you…” Notice in this passage that we are “being saved.” Salvation is not just a one-time event. It is a process that continues until we are completely conformed to the image of Christ and stand in resurrected immortal bodies in the new creation. We are in the process of being saved right now. He’s purging us of sin and doubt. He’s teaching us to love. But notice there is a condition: “If we hold fast the word”. If we don’t hold fast the word, if we quit trusting and following the word, we halt the salvation process.
5. Colossians 1:22-23, “He has now reconciled you in His body of flesh by His death, in order to present you holy and blameless and above reproach before Him, 23 if indeed you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard…” “If” indicates that being presented holy and blameless and beyond reproach to the Father is conditional on continuing in the faith.

 III. We have warnings in the NT about falling away.

1. Hebrews 3:12, “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.” Now, in order to fall away from the living God, you must have a relationship with the living God. I cannot fall from a 3rd story building right now, because I am not in a 3rd story building right now. You can’t fall from God, if you’re in a relationship with God. These readers had a relationship with God, and the writer is warning them that they will fall away from God if they lose their faith.
2. In I Corinthians 10:1-12 Paul brings up the ancient Israelites whom God freed from Egyptian bondage as an example for us to learn from. He mentions similarities between their experience and ours. As we are baptized into Christ, they were baptized into Moses through the Red Sea. As we receive our spiritual nourishment and drink from Christ, so they were fed and watered by Christ in the wilderness (10:1-4). “Nevertheless,” Paul says, “with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness” (10:5). Most of them did not make it to the promised land, because of their persistent rebellion against God. Paul says twice “these things happened to them as examples for us” (10:6,11). Paul is warning us that if we do what they did, then like them we too will fall short of our promised land. At v12 Paul says, “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.” It doesn’t make any sense to me that Paul would give that exhortation if it is impossible for us to fall.
3. I Corinthians 6:9-10, Paul warned the Corinthians. “Do not be deceived; neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.” One cannot lead one of those lifestyles and be okay with God.
4. Hebrews 10:26-31, “For if we [notice “we”, the writer includes himself and he’s writing to Christians. If we Christians…] go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. [Then he gives mentions how it was in OT times under the Law of Moses] 28 Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. [Then here’s the application.] 29 How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? [He is saying that when you turn your back on Christ and go on sinning willfully as a Christian, that’s worse than it would have been for a Jew to reject the Law of God, because when you turn your back on Christ it is like you’re laying the Son of God out on the ground and trampling him under your feet and you’re regarding the blood He shed for you as nothing special and you’re are insulting the Spirit of grace that has worked so mercifully in your life. Then he quotes from the OT to substantiate God’s intolerance of rebellion even in His people.] 30 For we know Him who said, ‘Vengeance is mine; I will repay.’ And again, ‘The Lord will judge His people.’ 31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.“

IV. We have examples in the NT of people who fell from grace.

1. Some of the Galatian Christians had teachers come in among them that are commonly referred to as Judaizers. They told the Christians “It’s good that you’re following Jesus, but that’s not enough to be saved. You also must follow the Law of Moses. You must be circumcised and observe the Sabbath day and eat only Kosher and so forth.” Throughout the letter Paul shows that we are not under that Law today, and we cannot think that those things are necessary for our salvation. We must realize that Christ is all we need for salvation. At Galatians 5:4 he says to those thinking that their relationship with Christ is not enough and that they need to also observe elements of the Law of Moses, “You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace.” In order to be severed from Christ you must have been joined to Christ. In order to fall from grace you must have stood in grace. Here are Christians who stood in grace, but because they began to depend on following elements of the Jewish Law for their salvation, they were severed from Christ and fell from grace.
2. There’s also the example of Hymenaeus and Alexander in I Timothy 1:19-20, and Simon the magician in Acts 8:13-24. And in I Corinthians 9:25-27 Paul indicates that it would be possible for even he himself to lose his salvation if he quit exercising self-control in his life. I’ll let you look at those ones for yourself.
3. A very decisive passage on this issue is II Peter 2:20-22. Peter talks about the spiritual history of some Christians-gone-bad. Peter summarizes the spiritual history of these people. He talks about three stages of their spiritual history.

II Peter 2:20, “For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.” Do you see the three spiritual conditions they’ve been in? First, they were in the defilements of the world. Second, they escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. They escaped the filth of their sin through coming to know Christ. Third, they got themselves entangled again in the defilements and overcome. They became addicted, overpowered, enslaved to sin again. And Peter says the last state is worse for them than the first. They are worse off now that they have fallen away than they were before they became Christians.

II Peter 2:21 further explains, “For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.” Again, you can see the three states they’ve gone through. First, they did not know the way of righteousness. Then they came to know it; they became familiar with what life God calls us to live is. But then they turned away from the way the Lord commands us to live. Peter says the last state is worse for them than the first, because in the last state they know better. In the first state they could at least plead some measure of ignorance. When Jesus comes back, the unsaved are not all going to be punished equally. The punishment will be adjusted according to what each one deserves. Jesus illustrated it this way in Luke 12:46-48: He said, “And that slave who knew his master’s will and did not get ready or act in accord with his will, will receive many lashes, but the one who did not know it, and committed deeds worthy of a flogging, will receive but few. From everyone who has been given much, much will be required; and to whom they entrusted much, of him they will ask all the more.” So all those who do not do the will of the master are punished. But those who did not know His will receive few lashes, and those who did know His will receive many.

In II Peter 2:22 he applies this proverb to them. “It has happened to them according to the true proverb, ‘A dog returns to its own vomit,’ and, ‘A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire.’” So first they were like a sick dog, like a dog that got into the kids’ Halloween candy or the medicine cabinet. Then they barfed up what was making them sick. Yet then, like dogs do, they disgustingly went back and lapped up the vomit; they ingested again what had made them sick… They were like a filthy pig. Then they got a bath, became a clean pig. Then, as pigs do, they went and rolled in the filth again. Peter wants Christians to know it can happen, and the last state is a worse condition to be in than having never come to know Christ at all.

Commonly used passages to teach “Once saved always saved”

John 10:28-29 is often used to teach once saved always saved. Jesus says, “and I give eternal life to them [My sheep], and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”

• People say “See, Jesus promises that His people, His sheep, have eternal life; they will never perish; no one can snatch them out of His hand. That means they cannot be lost.”
• Well, the passage definitely promises wonderful security for those who are Jesus’ sheep. But you can notice in the verse right before, in v 27, that to be one of Jesus’ sheep is conditional. Look at v 27, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” To be Jesus’ sheep, to be in His flock, there are two conditions that we must meet. (1) We must be hearing His voice (listening to Him), and (2) we must be following Him. If we quit listening and following Jesus, we are no longer one of His sheep, we’ve left the fold, and the security He promises His sheep does not apply to us.
• Jesus is saying that for those in His flock, those who continue to hear His voice and follow Him, they are safe, they can rest assured that nothing will separate them from God, nothing will take away their eternal life. But it is reading too much into it to say that we cannot rebel and separate ourselves from Him.

Another passage commonly used to support the idea of once saved, always saved is John 5:24, “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life.”

• It’s very similar to the one we just looked at. People will say, “See a Christian is given eternal life; they will not be judged or condemned. They can’t be lost.”
• But again notice the promises are conditional. Notice the conditions – “he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me.” Those are present tense verbs in the Greek text, meaning continuous action. If we keep on listening to Jesus and believing, which will manifest itself in following His teachings, then we have the security promised here. But if we quit listening and trusting Jesus’ word, then these promises do not apply to us.

The teachers of once saved always saved use a lot of passages that promise eternal life to followers of Christ. But if you use equal reasoning with other passages you will come to an absurd conclusion.

• Let me show you what I mean. In John 3:36 it says, “… he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.” If you use equal reasoning with this verse then you would have to conclude a doctrine of “once lost, always lost”, right?
• If passages that promise eternal life to believers mean once saved always saved, then it follows that passages that promise condemnation on unbelievers must mean once lost, always lost. But we know that’s not true. Throughout the whole Bible lost people are being called to repentance and promised forgiveness and a right relationship with God if they will repent.
• In John 3:36 the condemnation is conditional. The condition is not obeying the Son. But if a person changes his ways and starts obeying Jesus, then the condemnation no longer applies to him. It’s the same way with the passages that promise eternal life to followers of Jesus. It’s a conditional promise, you have eternal life as long as you continue to hear and follow Jesus. When you quit doing that the promise doesn’t apply to you.

Another commonly used passage to teach once saved always saved – Romans 8:38-39, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

• He’s talking to Christians and he’s saying none of these things can severe the good relationship we have with God. But you notice what’s not in the list – ourselves. The passage does not say that we cannot separate ourselves. Nothing external to us can severe our relationship with God. Satan can’t take us away, no religious teacher can banish us from God, death cannot separate us from God, nothing external to us can separate us. But the passage does not say that we cannot severe the relationship.
• If you keep on in Romans, he will say over in 11:19-22 that if you do not continue in God’s kindness (by continuing to trust in Jesus) you too will be cut off like many of the Jews were for their unbelief. Paul is not going to say something in chapter 8 and then contradict it over in chapter 11.

Also, those who teach once saved always saved I’ve noticed often will tell you that salvation is a free gift. We are saved by grace. It is not earned or merited. (All of which I agree with. That’s what the Bible says; salvation is a gift (Rom 6:23).) But then they say the fact that salvation is a gift means that our actions and conduct have nothing whatsoever to do with it. They say that if we have to do anything to be saved or stay saved then it is not a gift. And that I do not agree with.

• Let’s say someone offered to give you a million dollars, and they said that all you have to do to receive it is take the check, get in your car, drive to the bank, endorse the check, and deposit it, and the money is yours. Would you have to do something to receive the money? Yes. Would it still be an unearned undeserved gift? Absolutely.
• Was the cleansing of Naaman’s leprosy an unearned gift of grace? Absolutely. But submitting to dipping in the Jordan seven times was required for him to receive the gift (II Kings 5).
• God’s requires that we continue to trust and obey Christ, and on that condition He gives us the gifts of forgiveness, His Spirit and eternal life, gifts that we could never earn or merit.

Some appeal to Romans 11:29, “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.”

• They say, “See, if God gives a gift to someone, such as salvation, it is irrevocable. It cannot possibly be lost.”
• But Paul is not saying a gift cannot be possibly be lost through failing to meet God’s conditions for the gift.
• There are many examples in the Bible of men losing gifts God gave them, because those gifts were conditional on their faithfulness.
  • Saul lost the gift of God’s Spirit. I Samuel 16:14, “The Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and a harmful spirit from the LORD tormented him.”
  • The ancient Israelites likewise lost the gift of God’s blessing presence at many times in their history. Isaiah 63:10, “They rebelled and grieved His Holy Spirit; therefore He turned to be their enemy, and Himself fought against them.”
  • Samson lost the gift of his supernatural strength, because it was conditional on him remaining a Nazarite with uncut hair (Judges 16).
  • The servant forgiven of a 10,000 talent debt lost his gift of forgiveness because he refused to forgive his fellow servant. Matthew 18:32-35, “Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”
  • There are many other Biblical examples of people losing gifts they had from God, because they were conditional gifts.

The gift of salvation is a conditional gift. It is given on the condition of obedient faith in Christ. That will never be revoked. God will never change His mind about that. If a person rebels in sin, it is not that God is revoking His gift, it’s that they are rejecting His gift. God’s gift on the condition of obedient faith is still there for them if they will just repent.