Common Questions & Answers
There are few more confusing
topics, when Protestants and Catholics sit down to talk, than salvation. It
goes beyond the standard question posed by Fundamentalists: "Have you been
saved?" What the question also means is: "Don’t you wish you
had the assurance of salvation?" Evangelicals and Fundamentalists
think they do have such an absolute assurance.
All they have to do, at just one
point in their lives, is "accept Christ as their personal Savior,"
and it’s done. They might well live exemplary lives thereafter, but
living well is not crucial and definitely does not affect their salvation.
Kenneth E. Hagin,
a well-known Pentecostal televangelist from the "Word Faith" wing of
Protestantism, asserts that this assurance of salvation comes through being
"born again": "Unless one is born anew, he cannot see the
According to Hagin,
there are many things that this new birth is not. "The new birth is not:
confirmation, church membership, water baptism, the taking of sacraments,
observing religious duties, an intellectual reception of Christianity,
orthodoxy of faith, going to church, saying prayers, reading the Bible, being
moral, being cultured or refined, doing good deeds, doing your best, nor any of
the many other things some men are trusting in to save them." Those who
have obtained the new birth "did the one thing necessary: they accepted
Jesus Christ as personal Savior by repenting and turning to God with the whole
heart as a little child." That one act of the will, he explains, is all
they needed to do. But is this true? Does the Bible support this concept?
Scripture teaches that one’s
final salvation depends on the state of the soul at death. As Jesus himself
tells us, "He who endures to the end will be saved" (Matt. 24:13; cf.
25:31–46). One who dies in the state of friendship with God (the state of
grace) will go to heaven. The one who dies in a state of enmity and rebellion
against God (the state of mortal sin) will go to hell.
For many Fundamentalists and
Evangelicals it makes no difference—as far as salvation is
concerned—how you live or end your life. You can heed the altar call at
church, announce that you’ve accepted Jesus as your personal Savior, and,
so long as you really believe it, you’re set. From that point on there is
nothing you can do, no sin you can commit, no matter how heinous, that will forfeit your salvation. You can’t
undo your salvation, even if you wanted to.
Does this sound too good to be
true? Yes, but nevertheless, it is something many Protestants claim. Take a
look at what Wilson Ewin, the author of a booklet
called There is Therefore Now No Condemnation, says. He writes that
"the person who places his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and his blood
shed at
"To deny the assurance of
salvation would be to deny Christ’s perfect redemption," argues Ewin, and this is something he can say only because he
confuses the redemption that Christ accomplished for us objectively with our
individual appropriation of that redemption. The truth is that in one sense we
are all redeemed by Christ’s death on the cross—Christians, Jews,
Muslims, even animists in the darkest forests (1 Tim. 2:6, 4:10, 1 John 2:2)—but
our individual appropriation of what Christ provided is contingent on our
response.
Certainly, Christ did die on the
cross once for all and has entered into the holy place in heaven to appear
before God on our behalf. Christ has abundantly provided for our salvation, but
that does not mean that there is no process by which this is applied to us as
individuals. Obviously, there is, or we would have been saved and justified
from all eternity, with no need to repent or have faith or anything else. We
would have been born "saved," with no need to be born again.
Since we were not, since it is necessary for those who hear the gospel to
repent and embrace it, there is a time at which we come to be reconciled to
God. And if so, then we, like Adam and Eve, can become unreconciled
with God and, like the prodigal son, need to come back and be reconciled again
with God, after having left his family.
You Can’t Lose Heaven?
Ewin says that "no wrong act or sinful deed can ever affect the
believer’s salvation. The sinner did nothing to merit God’s grace
and likewise he can do nothing to demerit grace. True, sinful conduct always
lessens one’s fellowship with Christ, limits his contribution to
God’s work and can result in serious disciplinary action by the Holy Spirit."
One problem with this argument is
that this is not even how things work in everyday life. If another person gives
us something as a grace—as a gift—and even if we did nothing to
deserve it (though frequently gifts are given based on our having pleased the
one bestowing the gift), it in no way follows that our actions are irrelevant
to whether or not we keep the gift. We can lose it in all kinds of ways. We can
misplace it, destroy it, give it to someone else, take
it back to the store. We may even forfeit something we were given by later
displeasing the one who gave it—as when a person has been appointed to a
special position but is later stripped of that position on account of
mismanagement.
The argument fares no better when
one turns to Scripture, for one finds that Adam and Eve, who received
God’s grace in a manner just as unmerited as anyone today, most
definitely did demerit it—and lost grace not only for themselves
but for us as well (cf. also Rom. 11:17-24). While the idea that what is is received without merit cannot be lost by demerit may
have a kind of poetic charm for some, it does not stand up when compared with
the way things really work—either in the everyday world or in the Bible.
Regarding the issue of whether
Christians have an "absolute" assurance of salvation, regardless of
their actions, consider this warning Paul gave: "See then the kindness and
the severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s
kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you too
will be cut off" (Rom. 11:22; see also Heb. 10:26–29, 2 Pet.
2:20–21).
Can You Know?
Related to the issue of whether
one can lose one’s salvation is the question of whether one can know with
complete certainty that one is in a state of salvation. This is a related, but
still distinct issue. Even if one could not lose one’s salvation, one
still might not be sure whether one ever had salvation. Similarly, even if one
could be sure that one is now in a state of salvation, one might be able
to fall from grace in the future. The "knowability"
of salvation is a different question than the "loseability"
of salvation.
From the Radio Bible Class
listeners can obtain a booklet called Can
Anyone Really Know for Sure? The anonymous author says the "Lord Jesus
wanted his followers to be so sure of their salvation that they would rejoice
more in the expectation of heaven than in victories on earth. ‘These
things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that
you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue to believe
in the name of the Son of God (1 John 5:13).’"
Places where Scripture speaks of
our ability to know that we are abiding in grace are important and must be
taken seriously. But they do not promise that we will be protected from
self-deception on this matter. Even the author of Can Anyone Really Know for
Sure? admits that there is a false assurance:
"The New Testament teaches us that genuine assurance is possible and
desirable, but it also warns us that we can be deceived through a false
assurance. Jesus declared: ‘Not everyone who says to me, "Lord,
Lord" shall enter the kingdom of heaven’ (Matt. 7:21)."
Sometimes Fundamentalists portray
Catholics as if they must every moment be in terror of losing their salvation
since Catholics recognize that it is possible to lose salvation through mortal
sin. Fundamentalists then hold out the idea that, rather than living every
moment in terror, they can have a calm, assured knowledge that they will, in
fact, be saved, and that nothing will ever be able to change this fact.
But this portrayal is in error.
Catholics do not live lives of mortal terror concerning salvation. True,
salvation can be lost through mortal sin, but such sins are by nature grave
ones, and not the kind that a person living the Christian life is going to slip
into committing on the spur of the moment, without deliberate thought and
consent. Neither does the Catholic Church teach that one cannot have an
assurance of salvation. This is true both of present and future salvation.
One can be confident of
one’s present salvation. This is one of the chief reasons why God gave us
the sacraments—to provide visible assurances that he is invisibly providing
us with his grace. And one can be confident that one has not thrown away that
grace by simply examining one’s life and seeing whether one has committed
mortal sin. Indeed, the tests that John sets forth in his first epistle to help
us know whether we are abiding in grace are, in essence, tests of whether we
are dwelling in grave sin. For example, "By this it may be seen who are
the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not do
right is not of God, nor he who does not love his brother" (1 John 3:10),
"If any one says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a
liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God
whom he has not seen" (1 John 4:20), "For this is the love of God,
that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome" (1
John 5:3).
Likewise, by looking at the course
of one’s life in grace and the resolution of one’s heart to keep
following God, one can also have an assurance of future salvation. It is this
Paul speaks of when he writes to the Philippians and says, "And I am sure
that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of
Jesus Christ" (Phil. 1:6). This is not a promise for all Christians, or
even necessarily all in the church at
There are many saintly men and
women who have long lived the Christian life and whose characters are marked
with profound spiritual joy and peace. Such individuals can look forward with
confidence to their reception in heaven.
Such an individual was Paul,
writing at the end of his life, "I have fought the good fight, I have
finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth
there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the
righteous judge, will award to me on that Day" (2 Tim. 4:7-8). But earlier
in life, even Paul did not claim an infallible assurance, either of his present
justification or of his remaining in grace in the future. Concerning his
present state, he wrote, "I am not aware of anything against myself, but I
am not thereby justified [Gk., dedikaiomai].
It is the Lord who judges me" (1 Cor. 4:4).
Concerning his remaining life, Paul was frank in admitting that even he could
fall away: "I pummel my body and subdue it, lest after preaching to others
I myself should be disqualified" (1 Cor. 9:27). Of course, for a spiritual giant such as Paul,
it would be quite unexpected and out of character for him to fall from
God’s grace. Nevertheless, he points out that, however much confidence in
his own salvation he may be warranted in feeling, even he cannot be infallibly
sure either of his own present state or of his future course.
The same is true of us. We can, if
our lives display a pattern of perseverance and spiritual fruit, have not only
a confidence in our present state of grace but also of our future perseverance
with God. Yet we cannot have an infallible certitude of our own salvation, as
many Protestants will admit. There is the possibility of self-deception (cf.
Matt. 7:22-23). As Jeremiah expressed it, "The heart is
deceitful above all things, and desperately corrupt; who can understand
it?" (Jer. 17:9). There is also the possibility
of falling from grace through mortal sin, and even of falling away from the
faith entirely, for as Jesus told us, there are those who "believe for a
while and in time of temptation fall away" (Luke 8:13). It is in the light
of these warnings and admonitions that we must understand Scripture’s
positive statements concerning our ability to know and have confidence in our
salvation. Assurance we may have; infallible certitude we may not.
For example, Philippians 2:12
says, "Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only
as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling." This is not the language of self-confident assurance.
Our salvation is something that remains to be worked out.
What To Say
"Are you saved?" asks
the Fundamentalist. The Catholic should reply: "As the Bible says, I am
already saved (Rom. 8:24, Eph. 2:5–8), but I’m also being
saved (1 Cor. 1:8, 2 Cor.
2:15, Phil. 2:12), and I have the hope that I will be saved (Rom.
5:9–10, 1 Cor. 3:12–15). Like the apostle Paul I am working out my salvation in fear and
trembling (Phil. 2:12), with hopeful confidence in the promises of Christ (
[This section quoted from: Catholic Answers,
“Assurance of Salvation?” (
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