I had a really interesting conversation at the bus stop tonight with a guy who goes to another church here in the burg. It started out and we agreed on pretty much everything but then the conversation took a couple unexpected turns and I discovered a couple things we differed slightly on. One of them was the context of Scripture. He argued that the best way to study the Bible was to do so topically rather than going through a chapter or a book together. His argument was that we often don't get the entire Biblical perspective on something when we read through a chapter on it and that we can come away with a flawed understanding of the ideas presented in the passage. For instance, if we were to study marriage we would study only Paul's writings on wives submitting to their husbands but we would pull in 1 Corinthians 13 to understand God's perspective on the matter. I argued that the best way to study the Bible was to do so exegetically, going through one passage at a time. There is context both in the larger biblical scheme (as he was talking about) but there is also very strong context simply in the book we are reading from. While it may appear to someone just glancing over the passage that the author is skipping around, a closer examination reveals subtle clues linking different passages in the same chapter or book to each other. He conceded to me on that one. :)
The other thing we diverged upon was eternal security. He was pretty opposed to the entire doctrine arguing that it costs many people their eternities who "accept" Christ as their savior and then plunge headlong into sin believing they will never have to pay for anything they do. He used a few passages to defend his position. One of these was the passage in 2 Thessalonians where Paul talks about the great falling away before the man of sin is revealed. He was saying that some passages specifically seem to indicate the presence of saving faith in a person and then a subsequent denial and loss of faith. I argued that if a person dies in a state of unrepentance then they were not saved to begin with and that if a person has genuine saving faith in their hearts they will strive to follow Christ. Eternal security signifies to me that a person cannot choose to deny Christ or fall away into a state of unrepentance. Eternal security is when God plants in us a desire that we cannot smother, choke, or suffocate that will inevitable cause us to pursue Him and a deeper joy in Him.
I do believe, however, that a believer who has genuine saving faith can slip into a cycle of sin that they do not emerge from for a very long time. Let us say, for instance, that a 12-year-old boy is moved by a sermon delivered by the pastor at his parents' church, goes to the altar call and, subsequently, has quiet times on a regular basis, and basically lives the Christian life. Then let's say that when this boy is 15 he discovers alcohol and marijuana and gets addicted to these. He drops out of high school and spends the next 30 years of his life fleeing from Christ, paying no heed to spiritual things, getting drunk and high on a regular basis, getting involved with the law, etc. Then let's say that when he's 45 years old he hears a particularly poignant message being delivered by a prison ministry team and he repents of his sin, renews his convictions and turns his life back over to Christ. Here are a couple of questions to consider:
1. Was the boy genuinely saved at the age of 12?
2. If he had died at the age of 30, would he have gone to heaven?
For the first question, I would say it doesn't really matter. Whether he was saved at age 12 or not is of no consequence as he repented of his sin at 45, turned to Christ, and thereafter followed the Christian faith. It's not any point in the journey that counts. It's where you are spiritually when you are called to give a reckoning. Are you in Christ this very moment? That's all that matters. As CS Lewis wrote, "This moment contains all moments." The past doesn't matter. The future doesn't matter. What matters is if you are in Christ and are repentant right now in this moment.
For the second question, I would say such a question is worthless because it is completely hypothetical and could never come to pass. It's like asking "What if the sky were purple with pink polka dots instead of blue?" The Bible clearly states "And in Your book they all were written, the days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them" (Ps. 139.16 NKJV). If you believe this verse then there was obviously no chance that he even COULD have died at age 30. God ordained that he live long enough to repent.
We should not be concerned with any of these things, though. If we are eternally secure we will find in ourselves the natural desire to strive for holiness, to repent regularly, and to pursue Christ in all things. If you are unrepentant, you'd best immediately repent because God will not be trifled with. This may be the only chance he offers you to repent. This may be His call to you which, if left unheeded, will bring your own damnation down on your head. Don't fool yourself. While it's true that God must grant repentance, it's also true that we must seize the opportunity when it is presented to us. It'll feel like you're pulling yourself up by the bootstraps in deciding to repent but, I say again, don't fool yourself; the realization that you should repent and the desire to do so were only put there by God. Had He not acted you would never have had your eyes open to behold the necessity of repentance.
The True Eternal Security: "Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure" (Phil. 2:12-13 NKJV). If you are eternally secure, you will "work out your own salvation..." but you can only do this because "it is God who works in you..." Repent and learn to do good!
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