Can I lose My Salvation?

Westside Christian Fellowshihp ^ | Jan 12, 2017 | Shane Idleman

[metmom]

A common question for many is, “Can I lose my salvation?” I’ve heard both sides of the argument, and only God truly knows a person’s heart, but I can share a few thoughts. The reason there is a debate is because the Scriptures teach that salvation is a gift from God that cannot be earned, but they also offer warnings about falling away. There should be a healthy tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. This issue should not create a spirit of division, elitism, or theological superiority.

One school of thought suggests that salvation cannot be lost, as in losing your car keys, but that it can be left, as in walking away from it. This may be why Jesus spoke of the man who said in his heart “my master delays His coming; therefore, I will turn from living a godly life”. When the master returned unexpectedly, the servant was banished because he chose to turn from what he knew to be right.

In another passage, Jesus said, “You have left your first love,” when speaking to the church in Ephesus (Revelation 2:4). James 5:19-20 adds, if anyone wanders from the truth and someone turns him back, a soul is saved from death. If anything, these Scriptures, and many more, reinforce the fact that we have certain responsibilities.

[metmom]

So, one question I have asked earlier, and will ask again, is will we have unfettered free will in Heaven, and if not, doesn't that make us lesser in Heaven than on earth?

Maybe. Since sin isn't going to be in heaven, then everything we do is going to be in conformance of God's will anyway.

Are there any passages that address that?

Because honestly, I don't see spending the time trying to answer something there likely isn't an answer to.

[amorphous]

I'm saying God gives man freewill, whatever His reasons may be, the fact that He does is factual.

You are the one saying if he does/has to, it means he's not omniscient. To me, that's a typical human attempt to put God in a box.

I realize this omniscient, therefore everyone must be predestine, belief is a big part of the Calvinist doctrine - it ain't mine.

Later...

[kosciusko51]

I ask since unfettered free will is being held up by some as a condition of humanity, and to deny it would be to reduce man to a mere automaton.

[metmom]

The thing that gives me the most trouble about that is that is the primary passage that Calvinists hang their hat on.

I'm of the *Let everything be established by two or three witnesses* and I use that in interpreting Scripture.

Are there other passages that say essentially the same thing?

I am not comfortable with one passage that stands alone to support a doctrine.

Additionally, I see it as contradicting many other passages of Scripture that indicate we do have a choice.

And since I am convinced that Scripture cannot contradict itself, then there's the need to explain the apparent contradiction.

Or someone's interpretation is wrong.

[editor-surveyor]

.
Please wake up!

That verse does not say that any righteousness can or will be “imputed” to anyone!

Our righteousness comes exactly as the apostles told us. His Torah absolutely must be written on our hearts.

When it is so written, we will find ourselves obeying all that is commanded of us.

If your hope is for anything else, it is written on the excrement that characterizes all that the human mind can imagine.

Just what do you think Isaiah was provided?

The covenant is solely with those that love Torah; Paul made that abundantly clear in Hebrews.

Yeshua also made it clear in Matthew 7:21-23

If you insist on being a “worker of iniquity” (without Torah) you will hear those words at the great white throne as Yeshua speaks them to you.

Just keep on imputing your own preferred interpretation (idios ipsalusos) to the words we are given with your churchian sound bites.

.

[metmom]

No, I’m talking about the one who may have walked away from Christ but then later changes his mind/repents and comes back. That passage in Hebrews if read the way it was explained makes it sound like there IS no coming back and I reject that (i.e., the Prodigal Son).

And the son never stopped ceasing to be the son and the father RAN out to meet him, welcoming him back and forgiving him freely.

Now that doesn't mean there aren't consequences. The son lost his inheritance but he was still home with the father as part of the family.

Likewise, those who stray will lose reward, but not salvation.

Salvation is not the reward. Crowns are and I think other rewards, but the salvation itself is sealed.

[kosciusko51]

Psalm 139:2-6

You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
You understand my thought from afar.

You scrutinize my path and my lying down,
And are intimately acquainted with all my ways.

Even before there is a word on my tongue,
Behold, O LORD, You know it all.

You have enclosed me behind and before,
And laid Your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me;
It is too high, I cannot attain to it.

[metmom]

And yet Paul says we are either slaves to sin or slaves to god.

I believe man has a will. I just don’t think it’s as free as some make it.

Well, lunch is over. Back to work.

It’s glorious outside.

[amorphous]

Ezekiel 18:19 “Yet you say, ‘Why should the son not bear the guilt of the father?’ Because the son has done what is lawful and right, and has kept all My statutes and observed them, he shall surely live. 20 The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.

21 “But if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all My statutes, and does what is lawful and right, he shall surely live; he shall not die. 22 None of the transgressions which he has committed shall be remembered against him; because of the righteousness which he has done, he shall live. 23 Do I have any pleasure at all that the wicked should die?” says the Lord God, “and not that he should turn from his ways and live?

24 “But when a righteous man turns away from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and does according to all the abominations that the wicked man does, shall he live? All the righteousness which he has done shall not be remembered; because of the unfaithfulness of which he is guilty and the sin which he has committed, because of them he shall die.

FREE WILL!

[kosciusko51]

In addition to Romans 8,

John 15:19

“If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you.

Ephesian 1:4-6

... just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him

He predestined us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the kind intention of His will,

to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.

1 Peter 2:9-10

But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God’s OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;

for you once were NOT A PEOPLE, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had NOT RECEIVED MERCY, but now you have RECEIVED MERCY.

2 John 1:1

The elder to the chosen lady and her children, whom I love in truth; and not only I, but also all who know the truth, ...

Rev 13:8

All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain.

All passage from NASB

[kosciusko51]

But if a wicked man turns from all his sins which he has committed, keeps all My statutes ...

This is showing the consequences, it does not say WHY the wicked man turn from his sins, does it?

[kosciusko51]

Freewill

Rush

There are those who think that life
Has nothing left to chance
A host of holy horrors
To direct our aimless dance

A planet of playthings
We dance on the strings
Of powers we cannot perceive
The stars aren’t aligned
Or the gods are malign
Blame is better to give than receive

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice

You can choose from phantom fears
And kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that’s clear
I will choose free will

There are those who think that
They’ve been dealt a losing hand
The cards were stacked against them
They weren’t born in Lotus-Land

All preordained
A prisoner in chains
A victim of venomous fate
Kicked in the face
You can’t pray for a place
In heaven’s unearthly estate

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice

You can choose from phantom fears
And kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that’s clear
I will choose free will

Each of us
A cell of awareness
Imperfect and incomplete
Genetic blends
With uncertain ends
On a fortune hunt
That’s far too fleet

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice

You can choose from phantom fears
And kindness that can kill
I will choose a path that’s clear
I will choose free will

[amorphous]

This is showing the consequences, it does not...

You have no argument. If God is good, and He is, as soon as something goes wrong in the world, your Calvinist doctrine fails.

[kosciusko51]

I’ve posted my argument in may posts, and have quoted many passage from the Bible in support of my position, and several other links. Please see post 284 for a further expository (included additional Bible references) on the subject.

[metmom]

And again, He chose to save those He knew would accept His gift of eternal life that He offered mankind.

He didn’t choose them to believe to be saved.

He chose them to be saved who He knew would believe.

I don’t see any contradiction with the rest of Scripture as I do with the doctrine that God chooses to save some and chooses to send others to hell, He making the choice Himself for us.

[kosciusko51]

He chose them to be saved who He knew would believe.

If I may, how would He know they would believe? What or who sets them apart from the rest of humanity? Is there some characteristic that they have that is not from God that makes them special?

[amorphous]

How do the fallen Angels fit into the predestined theory?

[kosciusko51]

The same manner as Adam's sin. The difference is that for the angelic beings, God did not show them the grace He shows man.

Also, Satan was used by God to tempt Job. What Satan could do to Job was limited by God.

[amorphous]

The same manner as Adam's sin.

Explain please.

[kosciusko51]

Of God's Eternal Decree

I. God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass;[1] yet so, as thereby neither is God the author of sin,[2] nor is violence offered to the will of the creatures; nor is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.[3]

II. Although God knows whatsoever may or can come to pass upon all supposed conditions;[4] yet has He not decreed anything because He foresaw it as future, or as that which would come to pass upon such conditions.[5]

III. By the decree of God, for the manifestation of His glory, some men and angels[6] are predestinated unto everlasting life; and others foreordained to everlasting death.[7]

IV. These angels and men, thus predestinated, and foreordained, are particularly and unchangeably designed, and their number so certain and definite, that it cannot be either increased or diminished.[8]

Footnotes with Scripture references can be found at the link.