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ONCE SAVED, ALMOST ALWAYS SAVED
#1
AN IRREVOCABLE TICKET TO HEAVEN
Do you ever do research, looking for a particular tidbit
— and you don’t find it — but while you’re digging around, you do find
about 25 other items of interest? That’s where we are on this Monday.
We were pulling things out of the files, hoping to find a Gallup poll
number or two on the following question: What percentage of people believe
that the way to get into heaven is to basically live a good life? Pushing
to the side the endless discussions among theologians about justification
and sanctification and Ephesians 2:8 and the “forensic” model of righteousness-by-faith,
and so on, how many people think, deep down, that if you live a quiet,
well-ordered life and pay your taxes and don’t cheat on your spouse or
embezzle funds at work . . . you’re going to get past St. Peter at the
gate? Quoting off the Abbey Road album by the Beatles, “One two three
four five six seven, All good children go to heaven.”
I know one thing for sure: the people at Saatchi & Saatchi and the
other top ad agencies on Madison Avenue certainly have bought into the
be-a-good-boy theology. We mentioned a few years ago, in a radio series
called Popcorn and the Pearly Gates, a TV ad where people couldn’t get
into heaven unless they could prove to the guardians at the gate that
they had only eaten Orville Redenbacher’s low-fat, sodium-free, not-too-sinful
kind of popcorn, not the gooey, artery-choking, evil, hedonistic kind.
And admittedly, this is a cute, popular genre of advertising which apparently
hits people right in the center of their belief system. But we weren’t
able to get that Gallup number to share with you today.
And we wanted to dig it out for this reason: our series this week has
a rather controversial title: ONCE SAVED, ALMOST ALWAYS SAVED. Which,
if you do a word count, is exactly one word over the normal evangelical
limit, which is, of course, four words: “Once Saved Always Saved.” It’s
a very accepted belief among many Christians that once a person has accepted
Jesus as their Savior, they are — that very moment, and forever — saved.
No doubt about it. No holds barred. No added conditions. No exceptions.
They absolutely have, without question, a home in God’s kingdom. “Once
Saved Always Saved.” Which, of course, if you included those people in
the Gallup Poll, would not be in the Orville Redenbacher test group desperately
trying to get into heaven because they ate the low-fat popcorn and filled
out their 1040 forms honestly.
So this is the question of the week: Does the Word of God teach eternal
security? Is “Once Saved Always Saved” biblical? Can you “lock in” your
relationship with Jesus Christ and know, right now, that you are going
to be with Him forever?
Well, we didn’t find the poll numbers we were looking for. We did find
that 10% of Americans believe Elvis is still out there, and 53% think
aliens have visited in the last 100 years. 65 million Americans went to
church in a given week — that’s pretty good. But you wonder what they’re
hearing there, because in the last 26 years, belief in spiritualism is
up from 12 to 52 percent, astrology has gone from 17 to 37, reincarnation
climbed from 9 to 25, fortune telling from 4 to 14. And the “kicker,”
probably the number coming closest to the one we were looking for, came
from the Princeton Religion Research Center: One-half of all respondents
told pollsters they were “fearful of being unforgiven by God, or cut off
from God’s love when they die.” These certainly would not be subscribing
to the O.S.A.S. Newsletter — “Once Saved Always Saved.”
Probably the clearest expression of this doctrine, “Once Saved Always
Saved,” is found in a very compelling book we’ve used these past couple
weeks here at the beginning of 2003, as we’ve tried to explore together
just what is the role of commandment-keeping and healthy-popcorn-eating.
The book is entitled Protestants & Catholics: Do They Now Agree?,
by John Ankerberg and John Weldon, and we have carefully not been using
it to slice away at either of those two groups. But the key pillars of
the Christian faith, for purposes of discussion, are well articulated
there, and we find this paragraph about salvation:
“The Bible teaches,” they write, “that any person who
simply and truly believes in Jesus Christ as his or her personal Savior
from sin is at that moment irrevocably and eternally justified.”
Now, that is pretty heavy, isn’t it? “Irrevocably and
eternally justified.” “Once Saved Always Saved.”
These two gifted writers go on with this:
“Justification is the final verdict of God whereby
He not only forgives and pardons the sins of the believer, but He also
declares him perfectly righteous by imputing the obedience and righteousness
of Christ Himself to him through faith.”
Notice here that the basis of you getting into heaven,
or of me getting to heaven has nothing to do with how good we are, or
how many empty bags of fat-free popcorn we can show St. Peter. “Justification”
means that God simply gives, or imputes, the goodness of Jesus to our
accounts. Boom! We have instantaneous credit . . . and instant salvation.
According to Ankerberg and Weldon, it’s not only instant salvation, but
it’s eternal. It cannot be taken away. It cannot be revoked. It cannot
be lost.
We’re going to spend all week thinking about that, but let me get back
for a moment to the polls we just talked about. Not the Elvis one, although
we might go there as well one of these days in a discussion of what the
Bible teaches about death. But in a sense, I do want to visit Graceland
right now, because the Bible absolutely does teach instant grace, instant
salvation to those who believe. Proponents of “Once Saved Always Saved”
love to quote this marvelous Bible verse — and you know something? So
do I. John 5:24, and what great news that Jesus Himself says this to us:
“I tell you the truth.” Don’t we love it when Jesus
begins like that, although it’s rather moot coming from Him. “I tell you
the truth, whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal
life.”
Notice: He has it. Right now. He has eternal life.
Friend, that is very present-tense, isn’t it? He has it. She has it. You
and I can have it . . . right now. Here’s the rest of this wonderful promise
in John chapter five:
“Whoever hears My word and believes Him who sent Me
has eternal life . . . and will not be condemned; he has crossed over
from death to life.”
What do you think of that? I’ve preached sermons before
where I put a big picture of a bridge on the screen. We’re on one side
because of our sins; our holy God, our Creator, is on the other. Friend,
sin does separate us from God, no two ways about it. But listen. Jesus
Christ — meaning the Cross of Jesus Christ — is a bridge across that great
divide. Because of that cross, we can cross over. And Jesus Himself, the
Builder of that bridge, says to us: “If you listen to Me, and believe
in the God who sent Me, you have eternal life. I will not condemn you.
Why? Because you’ve crossed over from death to life.”
In one of my favorite C. S. Lewis passages, he reminds us that we have
to take all of our St. Peter-at-the-gate ideas, and all of our “If I’m
good I’ll get into heaven” beliefs, and literally tie them to a bomb and
then light the fuse. No kidding. Here’s how he puts it:
“If there was any idea that God had set us a sort of
exam, and that we might get good marks by deserving them, that has to
be wiped out. If there was any idea of a sort of bargain — any idea that
we could perform our side of the contract and thus put God in our debt
so that it was up to Him, in mere justice, to perform His side — that
has to be wiped out.” Then he adds: “I think every one who has some vague
belief in God, until he becomes a Christian, has the idea of an exam,
or of a bargain in his mind. The first result of Christianity is to blow
that idea into bits.”
Well, as we’re gathering up the dynamite and burning
our self-made report cards, let me close with this. A person who hopes
to get into heaven on the basis of their good deeds, their obedience,
is never going to have assurance. Zero. Because how many good deeds would
be enough? How much no-salt popcorn would it take? But even for the born-again,
grace-abounding Christian, a series title like ONCE SAVED, ALMOST ALWAYS
SAVED might sound like I think you and I as Christians should walk around
with just 90% assurance. And I don’t think that. The Bible doesn’t teach
that. I agree completely with Dr. Ankerberg when he writes in that same
book I mentioned earlier:
“Justification is an eternal verdict pronounced by
God.”
“An eternal verdict.” That means complete assurance.
We have crossed over from death to life. At that very moment, we have
life.
Really, the only question left is this: Are we forced to keep it?
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