John 10:28-30
28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish—ever! No one will snatch them out of My hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 The Father and I are one.”
The definition of eternal life is found in John 10:28 which states, “they will never perish.” The reason is given in verse 29, Jesus declares that all believers are safe in the hands of God the Father and no one is able to snatch them away from God, meaning to trick, convince to leave the truth, lure away through worldly lust and pleasures, trials, hardship and so forth. No human or fallen angel will have the strength to convince you to leave the Lord by any means.
Paul was convinced of this by the Holy Spirit, in Romans 8:33-39 it says, 33 Who can bring an accusation against God’s elect? God is the One who justifies. 34 Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is the One who died, but even more, has been raised; He also is at the right hand of God and intercedes for us.
35 Who can separate us from the love of Christ?
Can affliction or anguish or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36 As it is written: Because of You we are being put to death all day long; we are counted as sheep to be slaughtered.
37 No, in all these things we are more than victorious
through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that not even death or life, angels or rulers, things present or things to come, hostile powers,
39 height or depth, or any other created thing will have the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord!
Here, some think that the phrase “love of God” in verse 39 is a general term that means God loves us all, believers and nonbelievers. That interpretation is incorrect in this context because it’s talking about Christians. According to Jude 1:21 which says, keep yourselves in the love of God, expecting the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ for eternal life.
“Keep yourselves” means to be obedient to the Word of God which a true believer who has the Holy Spirit will be kept in right standing with the Lord as seen in Jude 1:24 which says, 24 Now to Him who is able to protect you from stumbling and to make you stand in the presence of His glory, blameless and with great joy, 25 to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, power, and authority before all time, now and forever. Amen. The phrase “love of God” refers to a person that’s born again. The word “expecting” here means that we can trust Jesus’ promises found in scripture that we can expect on the day of our death to be with Him forever.
The promises are found in these verses:
Titus 1:1-2
1 Paul, a slave of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, to build up the faith of God’s elect and their knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness, 2 in the hope of eternal life that God, who cannot lie, promised before time began.
1 John 2:25
And this is the promise that He Himself made to us: eternal life. (Clearly, it isn’t eternal if you can lose it)
John 6:37-40
37 Everyone the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me. 39 This is the will of Him who sent Me: that I should lose none of those He has given Me but should raise them up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of My Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”
Matthew 24:13
But he who endures to the end shall be saved.
Who are the ones who endure to the end? The answer is found in Philippians 1:6 that says, ” I am sure of this, that He who started a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.” The believers will endure to the end because they are empowered to do so by the Spirit of God who indwells them and keeps them safe.
1 John 3:6,9
6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.
9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God.
A person that’s truly born again is a changed man/woman and their desires are now for the will of God. How can a person revert back to something that they are not? It’s like vomiting and somehow you take delight in scooping that same vomit into your plate.
1 John 5:18
We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him.
The reason we cannot abandon God is He has sealed us with the promise of His Spirit who will transform us into the image of Christ, keeping us from living a continuous sinful lifestyle and protecting us from falling away through the enticement of the evil one. The Holy Spirit lives in us to make sure we continue in the righteousness of God through various discipline and convictions to bring us to repentance.
1 John 2:19
19 They went out from us, but they did not belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us. However, they went out so that it might be made clear that none of them belongs to us.
Those who claimed to have been followers of Jesus Christ and yet apostatized were never saved in the first place as also seen in Matthew 7:22-23 which says, 22 On that day many will say to Me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, drive out demons in Your name, and do many miracles in Your name?’ 23 Then I will announce to them, ‘I never knew you! Depart from Me, you lawbreakers!’
As you can see Jesus never knew them, in other words, they never had a relationship with Jesus Christ, they were never saved as evident with fruits of unholiness. A person who claims to be a Christian but lives like the world without repenting is an unregenerated person and void of any evidence that the Spirit of God dwells in them.
Spiritual Minefield 
Clearly, you’re no Arminian.
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I’m no Calvinist either.
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Amen good use of Scripture
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Thanks…I love the scriptures. I try to let the scripture interpret scripture. I appreciate you taking the time to read it. 🙂
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=)
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Thank you for this. A very balanced presentation. Indeed, the Father will never let us go. One verse that struck me though: “Keep yourselves in the love of God….” (Jude 1:21). Some people think repeating after someone the “sinners prayer” will magically save them from eternal salvation; but the evidence/fruit of the Holy Spirit reveals who is truly God’s and who never ever was.
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Thank you for your comment munyingnying :). I agree with you that the sinner’s prayer doesn’t save anyone but faith in Jesus Christ is what saves a person. If the person believed in Jesus Christ by the conviction of the Holy Spirit before he did the sinners prayer, he was saved, not because of the prayer but because of faith in Jesus. Some can confess faith in Jesus and not truly have believed and are not saved. In the same way, some say the sinner’s prayer and never had really believed in Christ and are not saved.
Just because the person says a sinners prayer or confesses belief in Christ does not make them a Christian, without true saving faith that person will not be saved. True saving faith will be evident by their change in behavior and character to be Christ-like. Regardless if the person says the sinners prayer or just says that they believed in Jesus as Lord and Savior, time will truly tell if the Holy Spirit resides in their hearts because those who are truly His will produce fruit.
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Interesting you brought up the “Sinner’s prayer”. I actually happen to have one on my ABOUT page. When I prayed my own, which no one gave me the format, the Holy Spirit was doing the work of convicting me and I was brought to a pivotal moment in my life were I had to surrender my way of doing things.
You say, “Some people think repeating after someone the ‘sinner’s prayer’ will magically save them from eternal salvation,” maybe lead them to salvation, not save them ‘from’ it. Also, as Spaniard mentioned, it is not the prayer itself that makes one saved, but the choice attached to them deciding that they acknowledge they want to give their lives to follow Christ. By making their decision, it only shows they have faith that spurred them into the decision. If you didn’t have faith in Jesus to begin with, you won’t ask him to be your savior.
Ultimately, no one knows the person’s heart but God, and time is the revealer if true conversion ever occured as evidenced by their fruit as Jesus mentioned in Luke 6:44 “For each tree is known by its own fruit.” People assume it is the prayer that saves them, but people need to remember it is their faith in God’s promise to “Call on Him” for salvation as evidence of their faith.
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Amen 🙂
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Hi Caeli, I meant “eternal damnation”–sorry for the mistake.
True, no one knows the person’s heart but God. Sometimes I wonder, when churches/mission groups announce staticstics of “how many people came to the Lord” resulting from their one-off crusade/event–how accurate could that be? For many years I thought I was a Christian (despite my rebellion against God)–until He broke me, over and over again and I was down on my knees, finally acknowledging His lordship.
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“Eternal damnation” I meant–sorry for the mistake.
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@munyingnying – You can question the validity of the statistic, but in that arena, only God knows. Of course we will not have the full knowledge of how a person lives after the fact they have come to the altar but Jesus did give us a clear outline how to distinguish those who truly belong to Him by lining up their profession of faith, how they live their lives and theology with Scripture.
For those we will never see again, we can take their profession at face value but it is NOT our job to generalize and question their salvation unless they give us a reason to, i.e. expressing a continual lifestyle of sin with no repentance whatsoever, an outward expression of what’s truly in their heart (out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, in blogging’s case, write) through foul language in a casual manner, expressing their adherence to theology that clearly contradicts what is revealed to us in Scripture.
It is good indeed that you have come to the Lord, and that is His desire, for EVERYONE to come to repentance. Our job is to sow the seed and proclaim the salvation that we ourselves have obtained through grace by faith; the result, we leave up to God
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Well said.
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True, there is only one Judge, Jesus Christ. We plant, we water, but only God makes the seed grow. God bless you, sister.
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Amen
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Lots of people forget that the salvation is given to all by the Grace of God but that people should repent and live according to God’s Law, enduring until the end.
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Thank you for your comment. I’m not sure what you mean by God’s Law, if you are suggesting that we are still under the Law of Moses or if you are referring to the Law of the Spirit as found in the New Testament.
I would agree with you that salvation is by grace, no doubt about that (Ephesians 2:8-9).
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God’s Law are His commandments to which no end came.
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Thank you for your reply. Okay, so you are saying, correct me if I’m wrong, that we are still to adhere to the Old testament Laws? For example, keeping the Sabbath, the dietary law, etc. Is that your position?
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Not all 613 Old Testament Laws. Several laws are made reduntant, but others we still have to keep. Like worshipping only One True God Who is One, not making any image of this God or other gods, not bowing down or praying in front of images and statues, honouring parents and respecting nature (see the Golden rule of Love, which entails also not lying, not robbing, not calling names etc.)
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I would agree that as believers in the one true God, Jesus Christ, we are to live as He did and be transformed into the image of Christ. And to live according to God’s standards (Godly morals).
You still haven’t answered my question. And if you did, it hasn’t been clear to me. Do you believe that believers in Jesus Christ are under the mosaic law by keeping the sabbath, dietary law, and other such laws found in Exodus through Deuteronomy?
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The one true God is not Jesus Christ, but the God of Jesus Christ and his apostle, the Elohim Hashem Jehovah. Jesus Christ is the son of God, the son of man who had put his own will aside to do the Will of God and who offered himself as a ransom for all sins, giving himself as a lamb of God to his heavenly Father, the God of Israel.
The sent one from God, Jesus Christ, has liberated mankind from the Mosaic Laws, so we do not have to keep to the Mosaic Laws any more, but we still may not tell lies, not cheat, not kill etc. There are still a lot of Laws of God to which we should keep.
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You seem to sit in your stomach with the Sabbath. Every day is a Day of God. Therefore you can serve God each day of the week and you may bring a service (or Mass if you want) each day of the week. We are also not limited on the seventh day of the week or on the Sabbath or on the Sunday to not use electricity or not do any work. You may work on any day as long as you take your rest regularly. By the way for each person the seventh day of his life would be another day than the sabbath, the same as for the seventh year, or sabbath year of a piece of land, when it should be left alone.
Concerning dietary laws, also there each person is at his own liberty to eat whatever he or she wants. But for killing animals this should still be done respectfully, the same for using the vegetables or fruits.
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So, you don’t believe that Jesus is God. You sound like a Unitarian. Is that correct? If you are one, then please explain to me John 17:5, where Jesus said, “5 And now, Father, glorify Me in Your presence with the glory I had with You before the world existed.”
The verse says that Jesus existed with the Father before the creation of the world.
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Thank you for your comment.
I wanted to get a straight answer so I could understand accurately where you were coming from. It seemed that you took the stance of the Hebrew Roots Movement when you said, one has to keep the Law.
I think we both can appreciate when other folks don’t misunderstand our position. I think you would agree with that.
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Thank you for your comment. I couldn’t allow the whole comment you sent because it was the size of a post. If you want to write like a post, I would suggest doing it on your own blog. I allowed what I will respond to.
You quoting from the Jehovah’s Witness Bible translation, which is false doesn’t help you at all.
Bijbelvorsers said, “Why you make life so difficult for yourself”
No sir, I do not make life difficult. I’m here for the truth and Jesus is the truth. Jesus is God and I will show you where in the Scriptures He clearly says it. You are believing in another gospel like Galatians 1:8-9 warns us about.
Bijbelvorsers said, “The verse you want some information of our viewpoint is: (#Jo 17:5) “And now, 0 Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.”
This verse does nowhere say Jesus is God or the other way round that God would be Jesus.”
Of course, it does, no one can give glory to a creature who is created. All glory is for God alone so if Jesus receives glory like the Father that tells you He is God.
Satan who is a created being (fallen angel) asked Jesus to worship him, Jesus quoted Scripture which said, 10 “Away from Me, Satan!” Jesus declared. “For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’” -Matthew 4:10
Jesus quoted a passage that clearly says that only God can be worshiped. No created being can be worshiped like God. I will show you a good angel saying the same thing.
Revelation 22:8-9
8 And I am John, who heard and saw these things. And when I had heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had shown me these things. 9 But he said to me, “Do not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God!”
Look at the passages above, how clear can that be. John bowed down to worship the angel, most likely because of his splendor and everything the angel showed him. What was the angel’s response? He made it crystal clear that only God gets worship. No created being is to be worshiped. You, Bijbelvorsers, worship a false Jesus who is a man, but I worship God in the person of Jesus Christ.
John 1:1
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Who is the Word? Verse 14 says, “The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”
So, how does John 1:1 reads: In the beginning was the Word [Jesus], and the Word [Jesus] was with God, and the Word [Jesus] was God.
It clearly says that Jesus was God, that is letting Scripture interpret Scripture in context.
How about verse 3 which says, “Through Him all things were made, and without Him nothing was made that has been made.”
How can Jesus create the universe if like you said was just a man? In Isaiah 44:24, Yahweh said “24 Thus says the LORD, your Redeemer who formed you from the womb: “I am the LORD, who has made all things, who alone stretched out the heavens, who by Myself spread out the earth”
As you can see, only God created the universe without any help, all by Himself, yet in John 1:3, it says Jesus created all things. It also says in Colossians 1:16 that Jesus created all things.
I could go on and on but for the sake of time and length of the comment, I will stop here.
You quoted John 14:6 which is a wonderful verse that shows that Jesus is God if you keep reading down on the Chapter it says that Jesus and the Father are the same.
You are not going to the right Jesus, you are believing in a false Jesus that cannot save you from your sins. Jesus said in John 8:24 “That is why I told you that you would die in your sins. For unless you believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.” If you don’t believe that He is who He claimed to be, then you will die in your sins. Repent and believe in who Jesus claimed to be and that is God.
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