OSAS meaning once saved always saved?
I am steadfast in my belief, and can’t imagine anything that could cause me to lose my faith in God and Jesus. But I worry about others that are perhaps not as strong-minded. And I believe Jesus commented on how much worse it is for someone that is saved to then lose their faith. Much worse for them.
The problem is that some Christians wrongly think that nothing bad should happen to them if they put their faith in God. It’s unrealistic.
My neighbor, a devout Christian (he and his wife), just had a bad fire break out from a defective grill on Easter Sunday. The fire’s smoke went through the attic and the heat even crumpled their garage door, which was on the opposite side of the house where the fire was. There is now a big hole in their roof and they haven’t been back to the house since Sunday. Bad things happen to Christians all the time, but at least nobody was hurt or killed. That is the silver-lining blessing in that particular cloud.
[[OSAS meaning once saved always saved?]]
Yes that is what it means- We don’t work for our salvation, it is strictly through Christ- who God told will never lose even one of His that God gives to Him- While some may backlside- even severely, and may end up suffering or losing their life- they can not lose their salvation- IF they could, and regain it by being good enough or believing hard enough again, then that turns salvation into a work that the person does to ‘stay saved’
[[The problem is that some Christians wrongly think that nothing bad should happen to them if they put their faith in God. It’s unrealistic.]]
Some do i suppose, but not many- most know that the fall in the garden affect all of us- I was staying i n a place with my brother once, and it was wicked windy out- I had fileld the wood furnace a bit ago, and it was just about time for bed, and a person came running up on the porch banging in the window- We went outside to see what all the yelling was about, and saw that the whole roof was on fire- Had we gone to bed even a 1/2 hour earlier, we might not have survived as the fire was upstairs where the bedrooms were- God certainly was watching out for us that night- We did lose everything- as did the homeowner- but we were all safe-
Our neighbor though had a son just recently die in a fire- so you just never know- He also has several children with bad cancers- one will die soon- another is undergoing treatments- God has his reasons for why He allows certain things to happen- He works in ways we can not even begin to understand- It might just be that someone gets inspired by the faith of those facing death, and then seek the Lord themselves because of it-
Satan loves to hit people hard- but our neighbor has withstood it all, and realy is an inspiration to others- as are his children-
Anyways- the verse about Jesus saying that what you cited- that is not about losing salvation- Whenever you run across a verse or passage that looks like it means a person can lose salvation, do a search for say “Matt 5 5 does not mean losing salvation” or whatever the verse may be- and many times you will see that no- it is not talking about losing salvation at all- most verses like that are talking about CINOS (Christians in name only- or people that claim to be Christian but who never took the actual step of accepting Christ as Salvation- they come close to salvation, but then turn away and actually turn against Christ- and to those people Christ gives the warnings- They are called apostates- having tasted of the life offered by salvation- but not taking it in in the form of accepting Christ as Savior- They learn all the lingo, learn how Christians act, what Christians expect, etc- and by all accounts “appear” to be saved, but arent-
Paul spoke to churches that were severely backslidden- committing terrible sins- and He still called them brothers and sisters in Christ- He didn’t call them ‘Former Brothers in Christ” and he didn’t urge them to get re-saved either, because once a person is saved, they are always saved- -