Search the Scriptures Daily Program #3902d:
Gary:
Please stay tuned and at the end of the program we will let you know where to send your questions for Dave and Tom to respond to in a future “Contending for the Faith.” You are listening to Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call. We turn now to our final segment:
UNDERSTANDING THE SCRIPTURES
We continue our exploration of the doctrine of salvation. Here again are Dave and Tom.
Tom:
We are continuing with the Gospel of John and currently we are in John:10:29My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand., but in my own inimitable way Dave, which makes Gary happy, I like to back up a couple just to set the context. Picking up with verse 27 which we went over last week: “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And 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.
Dave:
“I am my Father are one” verse 30.
Tom:
Verse 30. Well Dave, it seems to say something very straight forward—that we couldn’t save ourselves and we can’t keep ourselves, but he seems to claim—Here it is: Jesus will keep us.
Dave:
Yes, that’s a controversial subject Tom, we didn’t bring it up. I guess it comes right here—
Tom:
Dave a lot of these verse through out John, throughout the scriptures—and why are they controversial? This is God’s way, this is God’s plan and men like to massage things around.
Dave:
Well I can understand why some people do not believe in eternal security, or what they call “once saved, always saved.” Because there are people who claim to be Christians and fall into gross evil sin. And they say well how can you possibly be a Christian? Well maybe that person never was a Christian. And we quoted Jesus from Matthew 7 in our last segment. “Many will say to me Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name and so forth.” He doesn’t say you were doing really well until you fell from grace. He says, “I will say to them, I never knew you.” And those are solemn words from the one who right in this chapter says, “I know my sheep and am known of mine.” So if he never knew them, they were never his sheep. Yet they passed themselves off as Christian leaders, miracle workers, signs and wonders and apparently many people accepted them as that. They were very popular and yet Christ said they never were Christians. But there are problems. There are other scriptures besides this one. You know: “He that endureth to the end shall be saved.” Oh but that’s not—that’s Matthew 24. That’s not talking about hanging onto your salvation. It’s talking about those Jews who are alive at the end of the Great Tribulation in the midst of Armageddon when Christ comes to rescue them. They will all—all Israel will be saved at that point. “They will all look upon me,” God says, “whom they have pierced and every Jew left alive on this earth will be saved.” It’s pretty clear that that is what it’s talking about. “He that endures to the end shall be saved.” There are other scriptures. “If we continue steadfast in the faith, Colossians 1, but it has to do with our walk as Christians. We are to walk by faith, live by faith and so forth. But now Jesus as you said, he’s making a very straightforward statement. He does say—you read from verse 27. In verse 27 he talks about my sheep. Verse 28 he says, “I give unto them eternal life.”
Tom:
Now Dave, let’s stop on that point. Eternal life. If I am given eternal life, I have it. Eternal is eternal.
Dave:
If you have eternal life today and don’t have it tomorrow, eternal has lost its meaning. He says, “They shall NEVER perish.” That’s pretty clear. We could give some other scriptures. John:5:24Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life., Jesus said, “He that hears my word and believes on him that sent me, HAS everlasting life and shall NOT come into condemnation, but is passed from death to life. Some people say, well that’s so long as you continue to believe in him you have eternal life, but then eternal doesn’t mean eternal. You could hardly have eternal life once and then not have it again. Or you could go to 1 John:5:13These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God., “These things have I written unto you that believe in the name of the Son of God that you may KNOW, [that’s present knowledge] that you HAVE [present possession] eternal life. So once again, there seem to be verses and there are many verses that seem to warn us. For example, 2 Corinthians 13 where Paul says, “Examine yourselves, check yourselves out, whether you really are in the faith.” He doesn’t say whether you have fallen from grace, whether you have lost your salvation, but whether you really are in the faith. But here it says “No man can pluck them,”—in fact man is in italics—it says “neither shall ANY—anything, anyone—pluck them out of my hand.” And then, “my Father which gave them me is greater than all and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. I am my Father are one.” It sounds pretty secure. Well, but then Tom, I understand those who say, but wait a minute, look at this person. They got saved, I really was sure they were saved. They seemed to have the fruits and so forth. But now look at the way they are living. Well, John writes in his first epistle 1 John 2, “If any man sin [he’s talking about Christian now] if any Christians sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous and he’s the propitiation for our sins and not for ours only. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins…” so it doesn’t say that there’s any limit to the sin that a Christian might commit or for which he could be forgiven if he avails himself of that.
Tom:
Dave, and also in his epistle, he says, “If they left us,” and that’s a complaint that people have. Look, they’ve apostatized, they’ve gone away, but I believe that they really knew Christ. Well, who can know that a person is truly saved? God knows and I believe the scripture teaches that the person themselves—but what do we have to go on? We have fruits, we have the experiential side and so on. But that has to do with our relationship with them. We can’t truly know the heart of a man. So if they left us, as John writes, they were never of us.
Dave:
That’s what John says. And Tom, you made a good point at the beginning. We couldn’t save ourselves, then how could we keep ourselves? Well we’re saved by faith and here the Calvinists would enter in and he says, there’s your problem. You allow the sinner to have faith and if he can have faith today, why couldn’t he lose his faith tomorrow and then he would lose his salvation. But Christ said that once we receive him, we become new creatures. We are born again of the spirit of God into the family of God and Hebrews 12 tells us that the Father chastens the sons that he receives. It doesn’t say that he damns them. That he puts them out of his family. And if sin would cause a person to lose his salvation, then he doesn’t have sons to chasten. He’s lost them. He can’t discipline sons because they’re no long his sons when they sin.
Tom:
And Dave you brought up a point. You’ve been talking on and off throughout the program about Calvinism and we get letters. Alright? And we’ve gotten letters that accuse you of being a closet Calvinist because you believe in eternal security. I mean that would make you at least a one pointer, according to their view although that’s not true. But explain yourself.
Dave:
And the Calvinists accuse me of being an Armenian because they think I believe in falling away which I don’t. Tom, there are so many—this is an important subject, maybe we need to come back to it again next week, but an important point is this: if it is up to me to keep my salvation and I can keep my salvation—well first of all, it doesn’t tell you what sin loses your salvation. It doesn’t give you that. Surely it would define it. What sin is bad enough so that you lose your salvation? But if it’s up to me to live a good enough life or to be faithful enough, to keep my salvation, then could I not boast about that before the throne of God? I could walk the golden streets and say Lord, it’s wonderful about your grace and mercy and you saved me. You paid the penalty for my sins, but after all I kept myself saved. I should get some credit. But we get no credit. It’s all of God and Christ is the one who is my life. He doesn’t fall away. So if Christ is really my life, if he has come to live in my heart, as Paul said, it is no more I but Christ who lives in me. Then he is going to keep me and Jude says, “Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy and so forth. So my trust is in him. Now I remember, having a discussion with Jimmy Swaggart about this, years ago. He believes in falling away. And I said maybe the difference between us is that if somebody falls into sin, you would say they fell away, I would say they were never saved. Or if they were, they need to get right with God. I noticed that Jimmy, when he fell into sin a few times, I don’t recall that he ever said he was lost and got saved again. He tells us that he repented. I don’t know of people out there who say you can fall away who get lost and then get saved again. Generally, they repent. It’s a solemn issue Tom. It’s not to be taken lightly. We don’t give people false comfort who are living in sin, but I believe the Word of God does give us comfort if we truly know him.
Gary:
Dave and Tom will resume their discussion on the topic of salvation next week; we hope you can tune in. This is Search the Scriptures Daily, a radio ministry of The Berean Call.
And now, to tell you more about our ministry, here’s TBC Executive Director, Tom McMahon:
Tom:
The name The Berean Call is taken from the Book of Acts:17:10-11 [10] And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews.
[11] These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
, where we find the Apostle Paul entering the synagogue in the Greek city of Berea, after he had just come from Thessalonica. To these Bereans he preached that Jesus was the long awaited Messiah sent from God. They were commended for being noble or fair minded, not only for their willingness to hear what Paul had to say about the matter, but more specifically, because they “searched the scriptures daily” to find out whether or not what the apostle was saying was found in God’s Word. That’s what we hope to encourage through this ministry. Our mission is to alert believers in Christ to unbiblical teachings and practices impacting the church. We want to exhort believers to give greater heed to biblical discernment and truth regarding what they are accepting as spiritual. We hope to supply those who profess to be biblical Christians with information and materials that will encourage the love of God’s truth. Hopefully we can help mobilize believers in Christ to action and obedience to the scriptural command to earnestly contend for the faith found in Jude 3. And finally our prayer is that we can be used of God to stimulate Christians to look to the Bible alone as their rule of faith, authority, and practice in living lives pleasing to our Lord and Savior.
Gary:
If you are a serious student of God’s Word, we offer many materials that you’ll find helpful. From books and tracts to video and audio tapes, CD-ROM, our internet website, and much more. If you would like a copy of this broadcast, ask for Program #1012 and be sure to mention the call letters of this station. Next week, we’ll interrupt our series of programs based on Dave Hunt’s book In Defense of the Faith and pay a revisit to our two program series with Martin and Deidre Bobgan entitled “12 Steps to Destruction: A Critical Look at Alcoholics Anonymous.” And, “Why does the church support 12 steps programs?” “Recovering Catholics and the 12 Step Mass,” we’ll take a look at that story and examine the question “Should Alcoholics Anonymous be considered a religion?” We hope you can join us. If you have questions or comments about this program, we urge you to contact our offices. Search the Scriptures Daily Radio Ministry is made possible by God’s grace, your prayers, and your financial support. I’m Gary Carmichael and for Dave, Tom, and everyone here at The Berean Call, I would like to thank you for joining us and invite you to tune in again next week. Until then, if you desire to know God’s truth, search the scriptures daily.
