Status Updates From Salvation (Theology for the...

Christians must persevere in holiness if they are to be finally saved. Salvation is by faith, not by pursuing holiness. But true saving faith ‘works’; it produces good works [Gal 5:6]. . . . Salvation is not based on works, but true salvation results in good works [Eph 2:8-10].

The Bible teaches that making an initial profession of faith in Christ is insufficient. True believers persevere to the end in trusting Jesus. . . . Saving faith involves more than an initial profession; it also involves perseverance to the end [Col 1:21-23]. (292-293)

God’s preservation of his saints is correlative to their perseverance. Because he keeps them, they continue in the faith. This underscores divine sovereignty in salvation. Scripture also teaches genuine human responsibility, and this means that believers must persevere to be finally saved. Every part of the NT teaches the necessity of perseverance for final salvation [Mt 24:13; Acts 14:21-22; Heb 10:36; Rev 14:12].

[The] warnings are *prospective*, admonishing believers about the danger of falling away. . . The retrospective texts, however, clarify that those who fell away were never truly believers in Jesus Christ.

[We] find warnings and admonitions repeatedly that threaten believers with final judgment if they fall away. Such warnings aren’t the exception but the rule...The warnings, however, don’t cancel the promises of final salvation. Final salvation is given to those who heed the warnings, to those who take them seriously, for the warnings are the means God uses to preserve his elect from eternal harm.

The warning passages in the NT are *prospective*, warning believers about the future consequences that would occur if they fell away. It is crucial to understand, however, that we also find *retrospective* texts that look back on those who have fallen away [Matt 7:21-23; 1 Cor 11:19; 2 Tim 2:18-19; 1 John 2:19]. . . . Looking back *retrospectively*, we see that those who departed never truly knew God.

There are actually a number of examples of warnings functioning in this way in the NT [Mark 13:21-23, 37; Jude 1, 21, 24-25]. Believers are to pray for deliverance from Satan as the evil one (Matt 6:13), but God promises they will be delivered from the evil one (2 Thess 3:3). Why should we pray if the Lord promises to protect us from the evil one? The answer is that our prayers are the means God uses to preserve us.

[We] would argue that the warnings [in Hebrews] are a means by which the elect are preserved until the end and are always effective in the lives of true Christians.

Hebrews is famous for its warning passages, and admonitions permeate the letter . . . We must remember that Hebrews is a sermon, an exhortation (13:2), with one main point: its hearers/readers should not fall away. It is thus vital to see that, since the letter has one main point, the warnings all make the same point. The warnings in the letter should be read synoptically; they mutually inform one another.

The warning, as noted earlier, is deadly serious but it doesn’t negate one whit the promises of assurance. The warning becomes the means by which those who truly belong to God are preserved and kept until the end.

Warnings like these [Matt 10:22; 33; Jn 15:4-5; 2 Tim 2:12] are the means by which genuine believers are kept from committing apostasy. By taking the warning seriously, believers are kept from falling away.

Justification and adoption are both pictures of salvation from the courtroom. Justification is in the criminal division; adoption is in the family court. Both are by God’s grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. Justification is God’s declaring believers righteous by imputing Christ’s righteousness to them, while adoption is the Father’s welcoming believers into his family as his loved children.

Justification...is never alone, and believing sinners are not merely justified. Simultaneously believers are regenerated, declared righteous, adopted into God’s family, set apart as God’s saints for a lifetime of growth in holiness... So, although justification itself does not involve moral transformation, no one is justified who is not also transformed by God’s grace in regeneration and progressive sanctification.

When God unites believers to Christ, they gain all of his spiritual benefits.

True faith expresses itself in works, in a changed life, and God declares that those whose lives are changed are righteous—yet their works aren’t the basis of their righteousness but the evidence of their new life with God.

We see that the works are fruit of faith, a consequence of new life in the Spirit…although works are necessary for justification, they are not a necessary basis but a necessary fruit and evidence. They are the result of the Spirit’s work, not the autonomous contribution of human beings. Works can’t be the basis for justification…but good works signify that new life has dawned.

Genuine faith is a living and active thing and will inevitably produce results in one’s life... Genuine faith is completed, brought to fitting fruition, by works [Jas 2:23]. (181-182)

A “claiming” faith, a “saying” faith, an “assenting” faith without any accompanying works isn’t a saving faith. . . Genuine faith is transforming [Jas 2:22].

[In Rom 3:25-26] we see that God has set forth his Son as a “propitiation”. . . as the mercy seat. This word has to do with the satisfaction and appeasement of God’s wrath. At the same time the word also has the idea of “expiation,” the wiping away or erasing of sin.

What does [Jesus’s obedience in Rom 5:12-19 & Phil 2:8] have to do with imputation? When the Spirit unites us savingly to Christ, God credits to us Jesus’s entire obedience, his whole righteous life. When we are united to Christ, we receive the whole Christ, all of who he is, and that means his righteousness is given to us as believers.

So, what does it mean to say that God’s verdict is effective? It means that sinners who trust in Jesus Christ for salvation are truly righteous before God. Still, their righteousness lies not in themselves but in Jesus Christ crucified and risen. Our justification is the result of the Spirit’s uniting us to Christ, who is our righteousness. . . . We are truly righteous in Christ—all that Christ is belongs to us.

Faith alone saves, but the faith that saves is bound up with repentance, for repentance is faith in action, faith with clothes on.

Repentance is fundamentally relational; it means we turn back to God, and the result of that repentance is good works. Good works are inseparable from repentance, but they should be distinguished from it. The relational nature of repentance should be emphasized, since when we repent we turn back to the Lord, and thus we turn away from sin. (130-131)

Our salvation is tied to God’s glory, God’s love, God’s plan, Christ’s death, the Spirit’s work, the gospel message, and our faith in Christ. Our faith does not save us; God saves us through Christ. But our faith receives what God has done for us in Christ. We are never the source, ground, or cause of our salvation; God is. . . . We are not the cause, but we are active as we receive salvation through faith.

Jesus’s death and resurrection are the only antidotes to the poison of sin. They saved us once and for all from sin’s penalty (Rom 8:1). When Christ returns, his death and resurrection will save us from sin’s very presence (v.5; 1 These 5:19-20).

Salvation means confessing that Jesus is Lord and believing that God raised him from the dead [Rom 9-10]. Saving faith includes repentance (2 Cor 7:10), for there is no true faith without turning to the Lord and a change in life. . . . Saving faith produces good works (Jas 2:14), which aren’t the basis of salvation but its necessary fruit.