GRACE FOR TODAY Radio Message #521
DO GOD’S SAINTS PERSEVERE IN FAITH?
or
IS THE
BELIEVER KEPT IN ETERNAL SECURITY?
Pastor
Don Fortner
Grace Baptist Church of Danville
2734 Old Stanford Road
Danville,
Kentucky 40422-9438
Perseverance
The Word of God clearly teaches the
perseverance of the saints. Those who are born of God must and shall
persevere. They will continue in the faith of Christ. We both believe and keep
on believing. The true believer begins in faith, lives in faith, and dies in
faith. True faith never quits (Matt. 10:20; John 8:31; 1 Cor. 15:1; Col. 1:23;
Heb. 3:6, 14). “The righteous shall hold
on his way, and he that hath clean hands shall be stronger and stronger.“ The
Word of God is very clear in this matter: Only those who continue in the faith
shall enter into glory. This is the doctrine of the final perseverance of the
saints. Those who forsake Christ never knew Christ. Those who depart from the
gospel never knew the gospel. Those who fall from the doctrine of grace never
had a true experience of grace. Those who fall away were never truly in the
Way. All true believers shall persevere in grace to the end. Perseverance
requires diligence and effort on our part. But the cause of our perseverance is
God’s grace. It is the grace of God working in us which causes us to persevere
with diligence. We must hold on to Christ. But it is Christ’s holding us that
causes us to hold him, not the other way round.
Preservation
The Book of God teaches that the perseverance of God’s elect is the
fruit, the result, the product of their preservation in Christ. Those who are truly born
of God will most certainly persevere in faith, because we are preserved in
Christ by almighty grace. Not one of God’s elect shall ever perish. The Word of
God teaches the preservation of the saints just as plainly, just as fully, just
as forcibly as it teaches the perseverance of the saints.
We
believe and preach both. Perseverance is
the believer continuing in faith. Preservation is God keeping his people in
faith. Perseverance is the believer holding Christ by the hand of faith.
Preservation is Christ holding the believer by the hand of grace.
Jesus is our God and Savior,
Guide, and Counselor, and Friend:
He will never, never leave
us, Nor will let us quite leave Him.
Having Christ as our
Shepherd, all of God’s sheep are absolutely secure in his hands. It is not
possible for any true believer to perish, because we are preserved by the grace
of God in Christ. Is this, or is it not, the teaching of Holy Scripture? This is
what the Book of God says…
"I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it
shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken
from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him." (Ecc. 3:14) “I give unto them eternal life; and they
shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck
them out of my Father's hand." (John 10:28-29) "My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin
not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the
Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 2:2)
AMEN.