So, once saved always saved? I want to hear your opinion! I don't want this to become a debate, I just want to hear your opinion! This thread is for Christians! Just to clarify: Do you believe that, once a person becomes truly saved, they will stay saved despite the acts they may do or things they may say?

I personally do, but I'm interested to hear your opinion!

I think this phrase has been abused by those who misunderstood it. I prefer the term "Perseverance of the Saints."

A believer cannot lose salvation. They never earned it, worked for it, pulled strings for it. Salvation is given to them. It is given because they surrendered and put their faith to God, knowing that nothing that they can do can earn salvation, but God's grace is given to those who want it. And God promises that "he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ." (Philippians 1:6)

However, there are people who think they are Christians because they "once prayed the prayer," "came to the alter" or something of the sorts and say that they are saved because they did this thing once, without truly become born again. They use this phrase to say "look, I prayed the Sinner's prayer, so I'm good to go. Once saved always saved." when they actually were not saved to begin with. That's why you sometimes see people who say that they were Christians but left, is because they were never born again to begin with. Whether they were living a lie or lying to others, they were never saved but false converts.

play4fun : I definitely agree with you. I meant to get the point across that I was talking about true believers. Once someone truly becomes saved, do you believe they will stay saved? That would have been a better way to put it. I'll edit the OP.
Singelli : Interested in commenting?

mrfe : Oh no, there was nothing wrong about your first post. I'm saying that there are people who would think that just because some people twisted the meaning a bit, or even use it as an excuse.

Only your faith can save you. And only God can see in your heart and soul and decide. A preacer or a priest can tell you you are saved and shout all the hallelujahs they want, but God is the only one who can truly see how weak and corrupt and worthless you truly are. And so there are you to remain until the end of your dying days. Christ might save you but it will not be for the amount of prayers or the times you have been to church. Or how much you spend reading the bible. If you have no faith you will be damned. When your time comes your heart and soul cannot betray you and your name will either be written in the book of life (highly unlikely) or not.

Thats how I was thaught.

So no, I dont think so. People claming to be saved to me are like the kids who claimed to have seen R-rated movies and we the other kids belived because we didnt know any better.

I do not believe that once you are saved, you are always saved.  The reasons for this go beyond the scope of a simple conversation for me, however, so I'll spare all the details and merely provide you with some scripture that has led me to my beliefs.

First, you have Matthew 7:21.  I'm sure you're familiar with it.  "Not every one that says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father which is in heaven."

The scripture continues, and Jesus mentions that people will prophesy, cast out devils, and do works in the Lord's name, but Jesus will still say "I never knew you."

There's also Isaiah 55:6 and John 8:24, which talk about dying in your sins and the fact that you can cause God to turn His ear away from you. 

Christians aren't perfect people.  Like everyone, they are tempted to sin.  Just because I've claimed a relationship with Christ does not mean I can avoid these feelings, and it does not mean I successfully deter them every time.  If I continue to 'make mistakes', I fall out of mistakes and into a sinful lifestyle.  God's patience IS exhaustible, and Christians aren't exempt from being a cause of it.

Singelli :
Very good points Signelli!

Also remember:

Isaiah 64:6

But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

Again, I'm not trying to turn this into a debate, but I wanted to show this article to you all. I found that it supported the OSAS side. I thought it was well written, and very helpful.
Singelli :
Brigand :
play4fun : I'm summoning those who've responded already.

mrfe :

It was a nice and reassuring article to say the least.

Singelli : So I don't understand why you are quoting those verses...those verses do not go against the idea of once saved always saved.

What was more confusing was quoting Isaiah 55:6 and John 8:24. The Isaiah one I have no idea what you are trying to say, and John 8:24: If you look at the context, it is talking about if someone does not believe who Jesus is, hence, before they were saved: "if you do not believe that I am he..."

The article mrfe linked mentioned this as well: When we are saved, we are a new creation with new desires. When we were sinners, we love the things that God hates, we have a heart of stone. But when we repent and put our faith in Jesus, we are saved and God regenerates our heart. The evil things that we used to love we now hate. We would be sorrowful of our sins and we will not willfully sin. Do Christians still sin? Yes, because we are still in our faulty flesh, but we would not willfully sin and the old is gone, the new has come.

And that is what Matthew 7 was talking about. Because there are people who think they are saved, who think they are doing God's work, but they were never born again, never truly receive God's forgiveness, and they would live in sin instead of struggling and fighting against it. To them, Jesus will say "I never knew you" because they were never saved in the first place. But to the saved, God promises forgiveness of sins (past, present, and future), to be called Children of God, regeneration and sanctification.

Brigand : I don't understand why you are quoting Isaiah 64:6. It's just saying that we are all sinners, and that verse specifically talks about how bad sinners we are, but that is before someone is saved.






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tRIUNE : I hope you don't mind my summon, but I was wondering if you'd be interested in giving your opinion.

I believe you can lose your salvation if you backslide in your walk with the Lord, but I also believe if you are truly saved that the Lord will draw you back to him if you do happen to backslide.

There are a few scriptures in the Bible that say He will never leave you nor forsake you, but that doesn't mean we can't forsake Him if we wanted to.

Yes, I believe you are saved only once and noone can take  that salvation from you. This is called Perseverance of the Saints, like play4fun said. The Bible repeatedly supports this.  For instance, Jesus said talking about his sheep( the believers) , '' And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand. (John 10:28-29)

Salvation is not something we earned that it should be taken away from us when we do something wrong. If that was the case, we would be talking about a works salvation, thinking that ''maybe if I do this, I will keep my salvation''. There's nothing we can do to earn it . It is by grace alone that we are saved (Ephesians 2:8). God gave it to us freely, and nothing can take it away from us. God does not lie, neither does he fails to do what he promises. If he said, ''You will not perish'', He meant it! 

''In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, 14 who[a] is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.'' (Ephesians 1:13-14)

Do you think God would take away His seal? Isn't the word guarantee enough to make us understand that nothing will ever make him change his mind? God claims his possession , because he bought us with the Blood of his Son. 

Disregard me, I'm a douchebag.

I recently saw an excerpt of a sermon by Mark Driscoll talking about Ephesians 2 and salvation. I don't think it could be said any better.

play4fun :

I don`t believe people stop sinning after they are saved nor their evil deeds become more acceptable once they accept Christ. Born again serial killer (sorry for the blunt example) is still a serial killer who has broken a commandment. Your sins might be forgiven but you will never stop being a sinner. And you and me everyone else, are born to sin and in sin we shall all also die.

I'm not sure why I am posting in this, as it can only cause debate, and also my view has been expressed by others, but here I go anyway.

I believe that the scriptures undeniably teach that you can be truly saved, and end up lost in the end. Here are some Biblical references: Galatians 5:4 " Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace". But doubtless, that one will be denied by many. When speaking to the church (those who are already saved) the writer of Hebrews said "Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it" (Hebrews 4:1). Also, in Romans 11:21, when the Apostle Paul was speaking to those who he refers to as already being "graffed in" (added to God's church) Be not highminded, but fear: For if God spared not the natural branches (Jews) take heed lest he also spare not thee" (Romans 11:20, 21). That last quote only included the last part of verse 20, by the way. Jesus also told a church of born again believers "Remember therefor from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick (Church) out of his place (The candlesticks were in His hand), except thou repent.". (Revelation 2:5) As far as that goes, why would a saint ever need to repent, if they stood no chance of being lost? And why did the Apostles warn us to "Take heed, lest we fall" and tell us that we would reap our reward IF we fainted not? I could list many more references, but I don't wish to anger or offend anyone by going on too much. I respect those who disagree, every bit as much as I respect those who agree with me on this. And as far as I can tell, it doesn't really matter at all if we can be lost after we are initially saved or not, so long as we keep living for God to the best of our knowledge. What we should worry about, is how God wants us to live for him. I do sincerely apologize if anyone was offended by my statements, and I hope there are no hard feelings. If anyone would like to speak with me concerning this, feel free to pm me, but I will not post here again, since, as I said, I don't want to spark a debate.

Brigand : "I don`t believe people stop sinning after they are saved nor their evil deeds become more acceptable once they accept Christ. "

Right, no one is saying that. However, a Christian does not LIVE a lifestyle of sin. When someone is born again, their hearts are renewed and they are sanctified through Christ. The evidence that someone is saved is when they bear fruit. Christians still sin, but they won't fall into sin or not care if they sin or not. When Christians are saved, the evidence of their salvation is that they continued to persevere in their faith. When your works don't match up with your faith, your faith is a dead faith. It means you never really had faith in the first place.

Simply put, someone who was living in sin, like a serial killer, and later become saved, will not live in sin anymore. They would not love nor enjoy sin. We still suffer bodily curse of sin because we are still in our earthly bodies, but God's work is done in our lives that we are continually being more and more like God and more and more hate sin.

But back to this topic. People can get this notion that eternal life starts when a Christian dies. This is not true. Eternal life starts when you get saved. It is at that point where it is promised "NOTHING will separate us from the love of God"...that we will be "heirs" and "children of God." Salvation is not something that we earned. It is given by God. The question now comes down to whether someone is truly converted. The Bible warns constantly of those who say that there are those who claim that they are of Christ, when in fact they were never saved. Christ made it clear how you can tell if they are of Christ or not. It is based on their fruit. A good tree does not bear bad fruit.

Eirinn :

Too bad you dont want to debate on a forum meant for discussion. But still I will comment: a very good bunch of quotes related to the topic and some pretty good words of your own.

I guess my own point was that being "saved" is not some get out of jail for free- card you can use and flaunt for your own purposes. Being saved or born again does not make you free of sin. One should not be fooled to be too prideful or vain.

And for you Erinn. Dont be afraid to take part of the discussions. We all try to be respectful here.

Brigand : Thank you for the kind words, Brigand. I do appreciate the open mindedness you've shown me in this thread, and that there was no insult, attack, or sarcasm in your reply to my post. I'm cool with discussions, but I don't want to risk it becoming heated. I figure all I can do is offer my view, and kindly leave it at that. If one accepts it, that's great. If not, I have no right or reason to try to keep pushing it on them. It's too bad not all people meet another's opinion the way you just did. You've earned my respect with that, man, even if we don't always agree on everything. As for what you just said, I agree with the large majority. I don't believe we have sin in us once we are forgiven, but I do believe we have a sinful nature and strong tendencies to sin still, and so we are no better than anyone else, and are still prone to sin. "None is righteous. No, not one." And as I believe it was you that said, our righteousness is like filthy rags. Any true righteousness is all in Jesus.