Before we bring the big guns out in terms of pronouncing this Christian or that Christian worthy of having lost their Salvation, consider what Paul and the Holy Spirit did to try and bring an errant one back from spiritual apostacy...
Please note verse 5.(this isn’t necessarily directed at you Elsie). Apparently Christ and the Spirit can take some extreme measures before declaring an erring Christian irretrievably plucked out of the Olive tree. Certain Human Christians seem ready to damn the whole lot of Christians who have been imperfect in their walk with God without considering what the Holy Spirit might do himself to bring such poor misfits back from the edge of perdition.
1 Corinthians 5:It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate: A man is sleeping with his father’s wife. 2 And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have gone into mourning and have put out of your fellowship the man who has been doing this? 3 For my part, even though I am not physically present, I am with you in spirit. As one who is present with you in this way, I have already passed judgment in the name of our Lord Jesus on the one who has been doing this. 4 So when you are assembled and I am with you in spirit, and the power of our Lord Jesus is present, 5 hand this man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.
Consider also this passage...1 Corinthians 3:10 By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. 11 For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, 13 their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. 14 If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. 15 If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames.
The context refers to both those who lay foundations of faith in people’s lives and those who build upon them(pastors and teachers) and one’s personal self building of works of faith and righteousness upon the foundation of Christ that has been laid in each of us.(self accountability for the good work that was begun in us that another passage says will continue until completed in the day of resurrection)
My point is people may drift irretrievably away but not before Christ via the Spirit gets in their face. People won’t just be allowed to just take themselves back from God without a fight. Some might just end up being killed phycially rather than God letting that happen. Some Christians may find that all their works may be completely burned up but at least Christ won’t be burned up inside of them. That is the assurance of our faith.
Consider 1 John2:19-23 “19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us.
20 But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and you know all things. 21 I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and that no lie is of the truth.
22 Who is a liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist who denies the Father and the Son. 23 Whoever denies the Son does not have the Father either; he who acknowledges the Son has the Father also.
These people who appear to lose their Salvation are described in 1 John 2. They were never part of us to begin with. It’s really that simple. If you are truly saved you abide in him even when you screw up and have to come crawling back to the light and have your sins reproved by the light...you’ll endure the reproval because you know that only Christ has the means of eternal life. If you aren’t saved in the first place, you’ll never come crawling back.
....he that doeth the will of God abideth forever (he that doesn't, is lost).
I see a lot of Ravi's life in that passage.
1 Peter 4:17For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God: and if it first begin at us, what shall the end be of them that obey not the gospel of God? 18And if the righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear? 19Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.
Why would the righteous "scarcely be saved"?