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e Eternal
Security of the
Believer
By Henry Allan Ironside
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e Eternal Security of the Believer
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Contents
Foreword ........................................................................7
Can a Believer Ever Be Lost? ..........................................9
An Address by Dr. H. A. Ironside in the D. L. Moody Memorial
Church .................................................................................9
Eternal Security: Its Meaning ....................................................10
e Sheep of Christ ...................................................................12
Christ’s One Oering ................................................................13
What of Future Sin? ................................................................... 15
e Spirit’s Perseverance ............................................................16
Experience and Faith ................................................................. 17
New Creation ............................................................................18
e Two Adams .........................................................................19
Eternal Life Possessed Now .......................................................20
His Sheep Follow Him ..............................................................21
A Dangerous Doctrine? .............................................................. 22
Justied by Faith ........................................................................23
Objections .................................................................................24
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Foreword
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Foreword
This pamphlet consists of an address delivered in the D. L.
Moody Memorial Church on a Lord’s Day morning and the
substance of two Bible Hours at the Friday Lecture Meeng
when Quesons were submied and were answered from
the plaorm. Careful eding might properly have eliminated
everything that looks like repeon. But inasmuch as it is
by constant re-armaon that truth nds lodgment in the
mind and heart, I have not pruned the answers as much as I
otherwise might have done. Let me say that my object was
not controversy nor the besng of an opponent, but rather
the edicaon and enlightenment of the people of God, that
the knowledge of the truth might deliver from legality and
give true liberty.
— H. A. IRONSIDE.
Chicago, IL April 24, 1934.
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Can a Believer Ever Be Lost?
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Can a Believer Ever Be Lost?
An Address by Dr. H. A. Ironside in the D.
L. Moody Memorial Church
IT has been announced that I will speak to you on a subject
which has occasioned a good deal of controversy among
the people of God. I want to take as a starng-point — not
exactly as a text, because we shall be looking at a good many
scriptures — Romans 8:38, 39: “For I am persuaded that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalies, nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height,
nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate
us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
This is the inspired answer to the queson of verse 35: “Who
shall separate us from the love of Christ?” That is, once we
are Chrisans, once we know the love of Christ, once we have
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been jused by faith, who is there, what power is there,
that can separate from the love of Christ? And the answer,
how full, how clear, not a shadow, not a doubt, not a queson
le, when the apostle says that neither death nor life shall
separate! Can you think of anything which is neither included
in death nor in life? Neither death nor life shall separate!
Then, no unseen powers can separate the believer from
Christ, “Neither angels, nor principalies, nor powers.”
These terms are used again and again in the New Testament,
parcularly in the Epistles, for angelic hosts, good and evil.
When our Saviour rose from the dead He spoiled principalies
and powers, that is, He defeated all the, hosts of evil led by
Satan; and so we may take it that the angels referred to here
are good angels, and the principalies and powers are possibly
evil angels. But there is nothing that good angels would do,
and nothing that evil angels can do, which will result in the
separaon of the believer from Christ. And then further,
he says, “Neither things present nor things to come.” Again
let me put the queson, Can you think of any experience
through which a believer might ever go which is neither a
thing present nor a thing to come? And the Holy Ghost says
that neither things present nor things to come shall be able to
separate us from the love of Christ. As though that were not
enough, He speaks in a more general way when He says that
neither “height nor depth (nothing in heaven, nothing in hell),
nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from
the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” It looks to
me as though we are prey safe if we are believers in the Lord
Jesus Christ.
Eternal Security: Its Meaning
When we speak of the eternal security of the believer, what
do we mean? We mean that once a poor sinner has been
Can a Believer Ever Be Lost?
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regenerated by the Word and the Spirit of God, once he has
received a new life and a new nature, has been made partaker
of the divine nature, once he has been jused from every
charge before the throne of God, it is absolutely impossible
that that man should ever again be a lost soul. Having said
that, let me say what we do not mean when we speak of
the eternal security of the believer. We do not mean that it
necessarily follows that if one professes to be saved, if he
comes out to the front in a meeng, shakes the preacher’s
hand, and says he accepts the Lord Jesus Christ as his Saviour,
that that peon is eternally safe. It does not mean that if one
joins a church or makes a profession of faith, is bapzed,
becomes a communicant, takes an interest in Chrisan work,
that that person is forever secure. It does not mean that
because one manifests certain gis and exercises these gis
in Chrisan tesmony, that that person is necessarily eternally
secure.
Our Lord Jesus Christ said to the people of His day, as
recorded in Mahew 7:21-23: “Not everyone that saith unto
Me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but
he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven. Many
will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied
in Thy name? and in Thy name have cast out devils? and
in Thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I
profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that
work iniquity.” Such people then may have been very acve
in what is called Chrisan work — they have preached, they
have cast out demons, that is, their inuence has been such
that men and women have found deliverance from satanic
power through their ministraons in the name of Jesus, they
have professed with their lips, they have accomplished many
wonderful works, but they are found in that day among
the lost, and when they plead their great acvity and their
earnestness in Chrisan tesmony, the Lord says to them, “I
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never knew you.” Noce, He does not say to them. “I used to
know you, but you have forfeited My favor and I do not know
you any longer.” He says, “I never knew you.”
e Sheep of Christ
You remember how He speaks of His own in John 10:27-30:
“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. I and
My Father are one.” Of His own He says, “I know them.” Of
these others, in spite of all their acvity, in spite of all their
accomplishments, He says in the day of judgment, “I never
knew you.” That is a very solemn thing. That answers a
queson that is frequently put to us. I do not know how many
mes I have had individuals come to me with a hypothecal
case like this: “Suppose a man who joined the church, who
pressed to be saved, who for a number of years was a very
acve Chrisan worker, perhaps a Sunday School teacher,
perhaps an elder or a deacon in the church, maybe a minister;
but aer some years of apparent consistent Chrisan living
and helpfulness in tesmony he turns his back on it all,
returns to the world, and uerly repudiates Chrisanity and
now denies in toto the gospel he once professed. How does
that square with your doctrine of the eternal security of the
believer?” That does not touch the maer at all. The apostle
John tells us how we are to understand a case like that. He
says in the second chapter and the nineteenth verse of his rst
Epistle, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for
if they had been of us, they would no doubt have connued
with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest
that they were not all of us,” or literally, “that they were not
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altogether of us.” That is, it is possible to do all the things
that I have spoken of and yet never be regenerated. It is quite
possible to join a church, to make a Chrisan profession; it is
quite possible to observe the Chrisan ordinances, to teach
and to preach, and yet never be born again. If one teaches
and preaches the truth, it will produce good results, and will
do men good whether the teacher or the preacher be real
or not, for it is the truth that God uses. Of course He can use
the truth to beer advantage when it is proclaimed by a holy
man living to the glory of God than when it is proclaimed by a
hypocrite. Nevertheless, God uses His truth regardless of who
may proclaim it, and that explains how people may do mighty
works in the name of Christ and yet never be born again.
Christ’s One Oering
When we say that the believer in the Lord Jesus is eternally
secure, we base it upon a number of lines of scriptural
tesmony. In the rst place, we rest it upon the perfecon of
Christ’s one oering upon the cross. Personally, I never can
understand how thoughul people, taught by the Holy Spirit
of God, can carefully read the Epistle to the Hebrews and
not see that throughout that Epistle the writer is contrasng
the many sacrices oered under law with the one sacrice
of our Lord Jesus Christ. That to which he parcularly calls
aenon is this: under law every me an Israelite sinned, he
needed a new sin oering, and every year the naon had to
celebrate the great day of atonement when a new oering
was presented to God for the people. Why? Because those
sacrices could never take away sin, they simply covered sin
for the me being. But we are told in the tenth chapter of
Hebrews that when the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world
and oered Himself without spot to God, the eect of His
sacrice was eternal. Verse 14 makes this clear: “For by one
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oering He hath perfected forever them that are sanced.”
Perfected for how long? “Oh,” says somebody, “as long as they
are faithful.” No, that is not what it says. “He hath perfected
forever.” Why? Because the sacrice is all-ecacious.
I am sure my brethren who deny the doctrine of the eternal
security of the believer do not realize that in so doing they
are pung a slight upon the nished work of Christ, they are
reducing the sacrice of Christ praccally to the level of the
oerings of bulls and goats in the Old Testament dispensaon.
I am sure they do not mean to do that, for they love their Lord
just as truly as, I trust I love Him, and they do not want to
dishonor Him. But they are afraid that this doctrine will lead
people to be careless about their lives, and therefore they
stress the possibility of a man losing his salvaon aer he has
once been jused by faith. But they do not pursue that to its
logical conclusion, they do not see that it is a praccal denial
of the nished work of our Lord Jesus Christ. We are saved
eternally because the sacrice of Christ abides.
When I came to the Lord Jesus Christ and put my trust in
Him, not only were all my sins up to the day of my conversion
forgiven, but all my sins were put away for eternity. When a
young Chrisan, I was taught something like this: I thought
when I was converted that all my sins, from the me of
dawning accountability up to that night when I put my trust
in the Lord Jesus, were put away, and now God had given me
a new start, and if I could only keep the record clean to the
end of my life, I would get to heaven; but if I did not keep it
clean, I ceased to be a Chrisan and I had to get converted all
over again. Every me this happened the past was under the
blood, but I had to keep the record clean for the future. What
a God-dishonoring view of the atonement of Christ that is! If
only those of my sins that were commied up to the moment
of my conversion were put away by the atoning blood of
Jesus, what possible way would there be by which sins I have
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confessed aer that could be dealt with? The only ground on
which God could forgive sin is that Jesus seled for all upon
the cross, and when I trust Him, all that He has done goes
down to my account.
What of Future Sin?
A lady came to me one day and said, “I do not get you there. I
can quite understand that Christ died for the sins I commied
up to the night of my conversion, but do you mean to tell me
that Christ died for my future sins?”
I said, “How many of your sins were in the past when Christ
died on the cross?”
She looked puzzled for a moment, and then the light broke in,
and she said, “How foolish I have been! Of course they were
all future when Jesus died for me. I had not commied any of
them.”
God saw all your sins, and He laid upon Jesus all your iniquity,
and therefore, when you trusted Him, you were jused
freely from all things. Do you say, “Does it make no dierence
then if a believer sins?” That is another queson, and it
would take a whole evening to go into that, but here is the
point — the moment you trust the Lord Jesus as your Saviour,
your responsibility as a sinner having to do with the God of
judgment is ended for eternity, but that same moment your
responsibility as a child having to do with a Father in heaven
begins. Now if as a child you should sin against your Father,
God will have to deal with you about that, but as a Father and
not as a Judge. That is a line of truth that stands by itself, and
does not contradict what I am now teaching. It explains some
things that bewilder people when this doctrine is brought
before them.
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e Spirit’s Perseverance
In the second place, we base the doctrine of the eternal
security of the believer upon the perseverance and
omnipotent power of the Holy Spirit of God. Look at the rst
chapter of the Epistle to the Philippians. Wring to these
saints, the apostle says, when he thanks them for their
fellowship in the gospel from the rst day unl now, “Being
condent of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good
work in you will perform it unl the day of Jesus Christ.” Do
you see that? Who began the good work in you if you are
a believer in the Lord Jesus? The Holy Spirit of God. It was
He who convicted you of sin, it was He who led you to put
your trust in Christ, it was He who through the Word gave
you the witness that you were saved, it is He who has been
conforming you to Christ since you rst trusted the Lord
Jesus. Having thus taken you up in grace, the Holy Spirit has
a denite purpose in view. He is going eventually to conform
you fully to the image of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He never
begins a work that He does not intend to nish. “Being
condent of this very thing, that He which hath begun a
good work in you will perform it unl the day of Jesus Christ.”
If when you were a poor sinner the Holy Spirit had power
sucient to break down your opposion to God and to bring
to an end your unbelief and rebellion, do you think for one
moment that He does not have power enough to subdue your
will as a believer and to carry on to compleon the work that
He began?
People say, “I see you believe in that old Bapst doctrine
of ‘Once in grace, always in grace.’” Or another says, “I
understand you hold that old Presbyterian idea of ‘The nal
perseverance of the saints.’” I do not know why this should
be called either Bapst or Presbyterian, only to the extent
that Bapsts and Presbyterians agree with the Book, and
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the Word of God clearly shows that once God takes us up
in grace nothing can separate us from the love of Christ,
so that evidently the expression, “Once in grace, always in
grace,” is a perfectly correct one. But, on the other hand,
I am not so enthusiasc about the other expression, “The
perseverance of the saints.” I believe in it, I believe that all
saints, all really belonging to God, will persevere to the end,
for the Book tells me, “He that shall endure unto the end, the
same shall be saved” (Ma. 24:13), and if a man starts out
and makes a profession but gives it all up, he will never be
saved, because he was never born again to begin with, he was
never truly changed by grace divine. On the other hand, the
reason he endures to the end is not because of any parcular
perseverance of his own. What I believe in, and what the
Word of God clearly teaches, is the perseverance of the Holy
Spirit. When He begins a work, He never gives up unl it is
completed. That is our condence.
Experience and Faith
Forty-three years ago the Spirit of God in grace led me to trust
the Lord Jesus Christ. I have had many up-and-downs since
then, as the old folks used to sing in a colored camp meeng I
aended:
“I am sometimes up and sometimes down,
But still my soul am heavenly bound.”
I have had varied experiences, but the wonderful thing is this,
the Holy Spirit of God has never given me up; and if at mes I
have been wayward and willful and did not immediately bow
before God and repent of my waywardness and willfulness,
then I found I had to come under the rod, my Father’s rod,
and He whipped me into subjecon unl I came to the place
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where I was ready to confess my failure and be restored to
fellowship with Him. But I was just as truly His child while
geng a good whipping as I was when the eects of it had
restored me to fellowship. Your child does not cease to be
your child when you have him over your knee and are using
the slipper on him. It is because he is your child, and because
you want him to grow up to be a well-behaved boy, that you
do that. And so we believe in the perseverance of the Holy
Spirit of God, that having begun the work He will carry it on to
compleon.
New Creation
In the third place, we base the doctrine of the eternal security
of the believer upon the fact of the new creaon. In the h
chapter of second Corinthians, verse seventeen, we read:
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old
things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”
That verse may be rendered like this, “Therefore if any man
be in Christ, this is new creaon; old things have passed away,
and all things have become new.”
What do we mean by new creaon? Just this: we were once in
the place of death, we were once uerly lost and ruined. How
did we get there? Follow me now. It was not by any act of
our own. Do you say, “I did not get into the place of spiritual
death by any act of my own?” No, you did not. Do you say, “I
was not lost because of any act of my own?” No, you were
not. But why were you numbered among the lost? Because
you were born into the world a member of the old creaon of
which Adam the rst was the head, and every child of Adam’s
race comes into the world lost and is under sentence of death.
And so we read in this same chapter in verse 14, “The love of
Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if One died
for all, then were all dead.”
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e Two Adams
Let me try to make that clear. Here is Adam the rst, the head
of the old creaon, and he was placed on trial in the Garden
of Eden. The enre world was represented in him — you were
represented in him, I was represented in him. As the Spirit of
God says of Levi, “He was yet in the loins of his father, when
Melchisedec met him” (Heb. 7:10), so we, every one of us,
were represented there in Adam when the old creaon was
on trial. Adam failed, and God said, “In the day thou eatest
thereof, dying thou shalt die.” As a result of that failure the old
creaon fell down in death, and every person that has ever
been born in the world since that me was born down there;
no one has been born up here, where Adam the rst started,
except our Lord Jesus Christ, and His birth was a supernatural
one. Therefore, as members of the old creaon we were all
dead, all lost; but now see what happened. Our Lord Jesus
Christ came into the world — the wrien Word here speaks
of Him as the living Word — and He stood on this plane of
sinlessness. Adam was created sinless but fell; Jesus came,
the sinless One, conceived of the Holy Ghost, born of a virgin
mother, but He saw men down there in death, and at the
cross He went down into death, down to where man was, and
came up in grace from death. But He did not come up alone,
for God has quickened us together with Christ, so that all who
believe in Him are brought up from that place of death; and as
at one me we were made partakers of Adam’s race so now
we are made partakers of a new creaon. What does God do
for us now? Does He put us where Adam was before and say,
“Now behave yourselves, and you won’t die again”? No, He
puts us up higher than Adam could ever have gone except by
a new and divine creaon. “He hath raised us up together,
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus”
(Eph. 2:6), and because we belong to this new creaon we
can never be lost. You were lost because the head of the old
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creaon failed, and you went down with him. You can never
be lost unless the Head of the new creaon falls, and if He
does you will go down with Him. But, thank God, He remains
on the throne where God Himself has put Him, in token of His
perfect sasfacon in the work He accomplished.
You may have heard of the Irishman who was converted
but was seized with a dreadful fear that someday he might
commit some great sin and lose his soul, that he might be
lost aer all, and he trembled at the thought. He went to a
meeng and heard the words read, “Ye are dead, and your
life is hid with Christ in God.” “Glory to God!” shouted Pat;
“whoever heard of a man drowning with his head that high
above water?” We are linked with Him, we belong to the new
creaon, and that is why we shall never be lost.
Eternal Life Possessed Now
In the last place, we rest the truth of the doctrine of the
eternal security of the believer upon the fact that the believer
is the present possessor of eternal life. It is not merely that if
we are faithful to the end we shall receive eternal life. There
is a sense in which that is true, there is a sense in which our
hope is eternal life. I am a Chrisan now if I believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ; believing on Him I have eternal life, but I
have it in a dying body. I am now waing for the redempon
of the body, and when the Lord Jesus comes the second me
He shall change this body of my humiliaon and make it like
unto the body of His glory. Then I shall have received eternal
life in all its fullness, spirit, soul, and body enrely conformed
to Christ. In that sense I am hoping for eternal life. But over,
and over, and over again, Scripture rings the changes on the
fact that every believer is at the present me in possession of
eternal life. “As Moses lied up the serpent in the wilderness,
even so must the Son of Man be lied up; that whosoever
Can a Believer Ever Be Lost?
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believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal life”
(John 3:14,15). Adam’s life was forfeitable life, he lost his life
because of sin. Eternal life is non-forfeitable life, otherwise
it would not be eternal. “For God so loved the world, that
He gave His only begoen Son, that whosoever believeth in
Him should not perish, but have everlasng life” (John 3:16).
Everlasng life is life that lasts forever, and we have it now.
“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasng life: and he
that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of
God abideth on him” (John 3:36). “Verily, verily, I say unto you,
He that heareth My word, and believeth on Him that sent Me,
hath everlasng life, and shall not come into condemnaon;
but is passed from death unto life” (John 5:24).
His Sheep Follow Him
I have purposely le this point unl last because people
generally take it for granted it will be the rst passage used in
taking up this subject. In John 10, reading from verse 27, we
are told, “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they
follow Me.” Noce these three things. It maers not what
profession a man makes, if he does not hear the voice of the
Son of God he is not a Chrisan, and therefore the Saviour
does not know him as His own. No maer what profession
he may make, if he does not follow the Lord Jesus Christ he
is only a sham and a fraud and a hypocrite. He may follow for
a lile while outwardly, like those of whom the apostle Peter
speaks who walk in the way of righteousness and then turn
from it. “But it is happened unto them according to the true
proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the
sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire” (2 Peter
2:22). If that dog had ever been regenerated and become a
sheep, if that sow had ever been changed and become a lamb,
neither would have gone back to the lth; but, you see, the
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dog was always a dog, and the sow was always a sow. They
were just whitewashed, not washed white, they were never
regenerated, and so went back to the old things. But the
sheep of Christ are dierent. “They follow Me,” Jesus says.
Be careful. Do not profess to be one of His sheep if you do
not follow Him. It is the test of reality. There are many people
who tell us, “At such and such a me I was converted, I went
forward, I signed a card.” You can do all of these things and be
lost forever. What you need is a new birth, and when you are
born again, you get a new life, and when you receive a new
life, you love to follow Jesus, and if you do not, you are not a
Chrisan. Take that home. Examine your own foundaons a
bit.
A Dangerous Doctrine?
People say, “If you preach this doctrine of the eternal security
of the believer, men will say, ‘Well, then it doesn’t make
any dierence what I do, I will get to heaven anyway.’” It
makes a tremendous dierence what you do. If you do not
behave yourself, it shows that you are not a real Chrisan.
I know that a real Chrisan may fail, but the dierence can
be seen in Peter and Judas. Peter failed, and failed terribly,
but he was genuine, and one look from Jesus sent him out
weeping bierly; his heart was broken to think that he had
so dishonored his Lord. But Judas companied with the Lord
almost three-and-a-half years, and was a devil all the me;
he was a thief, and was seeking his own interest. He was even
made the treasurer of that company, and he held the bag, but
we read, “He bare away what was put therein” (John 12:6),
as this has been literally translated. At last remorse overtook
him, not genuine repentance, and what was the result? He
went and hanged himself. He was never a child of God. There
is a great dierence, you see, between a Chrisan and a false
Can a Believer Ever Be Lost?
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professor.
Justied by Faith
“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow
Me: and I give unto them eternal life.” Do you believe it? I
do not understand how people can read a passage like that
and then talk about a Chrisan losing his life. It would not be
eternal if it could be lost. “And they shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of My hand.” The original is
very strong here. In the English a double negave makes an
armave, but in Greek it only strengthens a declaraon,
“They shall never, no, never, perish.” It is impossible, it is
unthinkable, that one who has eternal life shall ever perish.
“My Father, which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no
man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.” Here I
am, a poor lost sinner, but the Lord in grace picks me up and
saves me, and I am in His hand. And now the Father puts His
hand around too, and I am in the hand of the Father and of
the Son, and the devil himself cannot get me unless he can
loosen those hands. Could you think of any greater security
than to be in the hands of the Father and of the Son? “Never
perish” — “eternal life” — what wondrous words are these! Do
not be afraid of God’s truth. As well be afraid of the beginning
of the gospel that God can freely forgive and jusfy a guilty
sinner by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. People try to put
guards around that truth and say, “Yes, you are jused by
faith if you have enough good works to add to it.” That is not
true; it is by faith alone, and good works spring from that.
When you know you have eternal life, you will nd your heart
so lled with love to Christ that you will try to live for His glory.
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Objections
There will be certain passages coming up in the minds of
dierent ones, and they will say, “What he has said may sound
logical enough, but what about this scripture and that?” Let
me say, there is no possible scripture that will come to your
mind that the present speaker has not considered carefully
over and over again. I have not me in one address to go into
all these, but I can assure you that having examined them all
with the greatest degree of care, I have never been able to
nd one that can set aside this: “Neither death, nor life, nor
angels, nor principalies, nor powers, nor things present, nor
things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature,
shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in
Christ Jesus our Lord.” If you have a clear, denite, posive
scripture, do not allow some passage that is perplexing, that
is dicult of interpretaon, that seems somewhat ambiguous,
to keep you from believing the posive statement, “He that
believeth hath everlasng life.” It is because I have a salvaon
like this to oer to men, it is because God has sent me to
proclaim a salvaon like this to sinners, that I have condence
in inving people to come to Jesus, for I know if they get in
living touch with my Saviour He will make them His forever.
On two Friday evenings following opportunity was given for
objectors to bring in their quesons. These are taken up in
detail in the pages that follow.
Objections Answered
25
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Objections Answered
I recently received from a gentleman a tract entled, “All
About the Eternal Security Doctrine.” He is afraid that this
doctrine may have a tendency to make people careless about
their lives. I can sympathize with him in that for this reason:
I was a Chrisan worker in an organizaon that believed in
what is commonly called the Arminian view, that is, that when
a person gets converted he has a good start for heaven, and
then it is up to him to keep on going. As my old instructor
used to say, “Geng to heaven is like riding a bicycle; if I stop,
I will fall o.” I believed that thoroughly, so thoroughly that
when people spoke to me about being eternally saved I used
to say, “That is a doctrine of the evil one; that would mislead
people and lead folks to become careless,” unl I had a rather
rude awakening.
I found our halls were thronged by people who were geng
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converted over again every few weeks. It seemed as though
that old hymn, “Ye Must Be Born Again,” should really be
sung, “Ye must Be Born Again, and Again, and Again.” That
puzzled me, for I never read of anything like it in the Bible.
Then I found that the falling away doctrine had a tendency to
make people very careless indeed. Let me give you a concrete
example. A young man in whom I was quite interested had
been addicted to a certain sin in his unconverted days. Aer
he professed conversion he turned from that parcular sin,
but he confessed to me privately that he had gone out in
the darkness of the night when no one knew where he was,
and had fallen into the same sin many mes. “How can you
do it?” I asked him. “Well,” he said, “I always make up my
mind that I will commit the sin, and then get converted again
when I come home.” I saw from that how dangerous was the
doctrine of being saved today and lost tomorrow. The last
me I saw that young man, he said to me, “It’s no use; this sin
has such a grip on me I cannot stand it.” “Don’t yield,” I said;
“let me call in several of the others and let us pray with you.”
So four or ve of us knelt and prayed very earnestly, but he
rose again and clenched his sts, for he was in great agony,
and said, “It’s no use. I am going out to sin, but I am coming
back to get converted aerward.” I never saw him again, and
I do not know what became of him. That, you see, was one
eect of this doctrine that a person loses his salvaon when
he sins, but can come back again and get converted any me
he desires. Certainly the Word of God teaches nothing like
that. You can see that the Arminian view can be used to turn
the grace of God into lasciviousness. It is possible for the other
view to be misused also. But I want you to see that the misuse
of any doctrine does not in itself prove the teaching is wrong.
We need denite Scripture upon which to base our faith. If
people have no conscience toward God, they can misuse any
doctrine in the Bible. But what we want to get at is this: Are
the objecons brought against the doctrine of Eternal Security
Objections Answered
27
really tenable?
Ques. 1. — “Is not man an absolutely free moral agent?” as
one objector insists. He says, “We can quote no scripture on
uncondional eternal security, because there is none.”
I do not know what he means, but of course there is no
eternal security that is not based on personal faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ; but this writer goes on to say, “When a
man is saved, he is on God’s altar to live or die, for service or
sacrice, and neither the devil nor demons can pull him o
so long as he chooses by God’s grace to keep himself in that
place.”
The fact of the maer is that man is not an “absolutely free
moral agent.” In his unsaved state he is the slave of sin “led
by the devil capve at his will.” When regenerated he is the
servant of Christ, delighng in holiness and in-dwelt by the
Spirit of the living God. I was not saved by placing my all on
the altar. I was saved when I trusted Christ who gave Himself
as the oering for my sin. I am not keeping saved by my
surrendered life. I am “kept by the power of God.” The same
grace that saved is the grace that keeps.
I do not simply “choose” to keep myself in the place where I
am secure. God has chosen me, and I say Amen to His choice.
But if it were possible for me to choose to abandon Christ,
would I not perish? Yet the Word tells me Christ’s sheep shall
never perish. Let us look again at the words of the Lord Jesus
in John 10:27-29: “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.”
I wish you would look at that 27th verse. Who is a sheep of
Christ? One who hears His voice and follows Him. If a man
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says, “I am a Chrisan,” but does not hear the voice of the
Good Shepherd, and does not follow Him, that man is a
hypocrite; he is not a Chrisan. Jesus says, “My sheep hear
My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me.” Noce the
expression, “I know them.” I pointed out in my former address
that in Mahew 7:22, 23, the Lord Jesus says, “Many will
say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in
Thy name? and in Thy name have cast out devils? and in Thy
name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess
unto them, I never knew you: depart from Me, ye that work
iniquity.” Observe, He never says, according to Scripture, to
any soul in the day of judgment, “I used to know you, but I do
not know you now.” He says, “I never knew you.” That ought
to clear up the whole queson. He says of His sheep, “My
sheep hear My voice, and I know them.” Therefore, if one has
ever been a sheep of Christ, the Lord Jesus knows him. Now
if by some strange metamorphosis that sheep of Christ was
changed into a goat, one of the devil’s goats, and appeared
at the day of judgment among the goats, Jesus could not say
to that goat, “I never knew you.” He would have to say, “I
used to know you, bu. I do not know you now.” But He says,
“I never knew you,” because He gives His sheep eternal life.
What is eternal life? One asks, “If the spiritual life of Adam
was condional, how can the life of a believer be secure?
Adam must have been eternal in nature.” This shows how
lile well-meaning people disnguish between the life that
God gave to Adam by creaon and the life that He gives to
us by regeneraon. Adam’s life was simply natural life and
he forfeited that when he sinned, but God gives to believers
eternal life, and that can never be forfeited. It would not be
eternal life if it could. So He says, “I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish.” He puts no condions
around that promise, “They shall never perish.” The word
“perish” is in the middle voice, so that if rendered literally
in English, you would really have to make two words of it,
Objections Answered
29
because we do not have a middle voice. The words “perish”
and “destroy” are the same in Greek. “I give unto them
eternal life, and they shall never destroy themselves.”
Sheep so easily destroy themselves. I was going over the
desert when out among the Indians, and as we passed a
bridge over a deep chasm, we heard the piable bleang of
a lamb. We got out and went to the edge of the bridge, and
saw the lamb about y feet down on a lile ledge. It was a
sheer descent of nearly two hundred feet to the creek below
that. We looked to see whether there was any possible way
to get down there and could not nd any. That lamb had been
eang, and had come to the edge and had looked down.
There was that lile ledge all green, and so down he went
and ate all the green that was there before he found that
he could not get back. We tried to lasso him, but were not
expert enough to do that. We looked up, and already there
were three great buzzards ying around, just waing for the
me when the lile animal would give up. That lamb was
destroying himself. Jesus says, “My sheep will never destroy
themselves. I give unto them eternal life and they shall never
perish” — in the middle voice, “never perish themselves.” Why
not? Because they have the Holy Spirit dwelling in them.
The Word of God says, “Being condent of this very thing,
that He who hath begun a good work in you will perform it
unl the day of Jesus Christ.” Jesus rst says, “I give unto them
eternal life,” and then, “They shall never perish, neither shall
any man pluck them out of My hand.” Some may say, “Well,
I know a devil cannot pluck me out, no angel would want to,
and man could not, but I might pluck myself out.” Then you
would perish, would you not? And He says, “They shall never
perish,” before He tells you, “Neither shall any pluck them
out of My hand.” Is man an absolutely free moral agent? He
was when God created him, but is he now? Is the sinner a
free moral agent? What does Scripture say? “Ye are led by
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the devil capve at his will.” What! A man who is led by the
devil capve at his will, a free agent! “Know ye not, that he
to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his slaves ye
are?” (Rom. 6:16). Man is a slave to sin and Satan; he is not
free. But now the gospel comes to the man, and he does have
the power of decision, and when he decides for Christ he gets
eternal life with all that that implies, and that life is the same
life that is in the blessed Son of God. It is communicated to
him, and now he is led capve in the chains of love to the
Saviour’s feet, and he does not want to be a free agent. He is
glad to be a bondman, as Paul puts it, of Jesus Christ.
Ques. 2. — What about Mahew 24:13? “But he that shall
endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” Weymouth
says, “He who stands rm unto the end.”
The writer of this queson recognizes that primarily this refers
to the great Tribulaon, but it is a principle that I believe
every preacher of the Word should insist on. There is no use
in people professing conversion, going forward, raising their
hands, going to an inquiry room, joining the church, geng
bapzed, taking communion, teaching a Sunday School class,
doing missionary work, giving their money for Christ’s work
and going on like this for years, and then by-and-by driing
away, turning from it all, denying the Lord that bought them,
refusing absolutely the authority of Jesus Christ, and yet
professing to be saved. It is endurance that proves the reality
of a work of grace within the soul. That is the dierence
between one who is merely reformed by the teaching of
Chrisanity and one who has been born again. You see this
very clearly when you contrast Peter and Judas.
Peter slipped and sinned grievously, but in spite of it all he
endured to the end. Jesus said, “I have prayed for thee that
thy faith fail not,” and though his outward life for a brief
period was not what it should be, his faith remained, and
Objections Answered
31
Jesus restored him, and he went on to the end of his life unl
crucied for his Saviour. Judas was one of the chosen, he was
with the apostolic band but never was regenerated, and so
when he sinned and sold his Lord, he turned away an apostate
and died a suicide. Jesus said of him long before, “Have not
I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?” not, “One of
you is in danger of becoming a devil,” but “One of you is a
devil.” And we are told, “Judas by transgression fell, that he
might go to his own place” (Acts 1:25). Peter was a backslider,
Judas was an apostate, and there is a great dierence
between the two. If a man says, “I am saved,” let him prove it
by going on. That is why I say we should not be afraid of the
doctrine of the eternal security of the believer. Some say, “But
I knew a man who was a wonderful Chrisan, and now he has
given it all up and says he is sll saved.” He is only deceiving
himself. The next me you see him you tell him that the Bible
says, “He that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be
saved.” There is no use your carrying on a profession if your
life does not prove it to be real. Men can misuse any doctrine.
Ques. 3. — What about the scripture found in John 8:31?
“Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on Him, If ye
connue in My word, then are ye My disciples indeed.” Is not
the condion for permanent discipleship, “If ye connue in
My word?”
Certainly. Every man who knows the truth of eternal security
believes it. There is no use for a person to profess to be a
disciple of Jesus if he does not connue. It is this that proves
there is a genuine work of the Spirit of God in his soul.
Ques. 4. — What about John 6:66? — “From that me many of
His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him.”
That has happened all down through the centuries. Jesus
disnguishes between a disciple and “a disciple indeed,” or
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between one who is only a disciple and one who is a true
believer. The Greek word translated “disciple” means “a
pupil,” or “a learner.” There were many who up to a certain
point learned of Jesus, and they were learning more and more
every day as they listened to Him. But when He declared,
“Whoso eateth My esh, and drinketh My blood, hath eternal
life” (John 6:54), they said, “That is too much for us; we are
not going on with this man,” and they went back. It was not
a queson there of whether people were born again and
lost, but whether they who had been numbered among the
learners would go on learning and let Him be their teacher, or
whether they would refuse further instrucon and turn back.
We are not told that even those who turned back never again
returned.
Ques. 5. — John 6:67, “Will ye also go away?” What about this
queson?
The queson and the answer bring out the very thing I am
speaking of. He turned now to the apostles, that lile group
who had accompanied Him so long, and said, “Will ye also go
away?” and Peter said what every truly converted soul always
says, “Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of
eternal life” (John 6:68). If you are really born again, that is
always the answer. I remember reasoning on this subject with
a dear good brother for something like two hours one day,
and he was insisng that a man could take himself out of the
Lord’s hand. I said, “Why do you keep insisng on this? Are
you sure that you are saved?”
He said, “Absolutely.”
“How long?”
“Forty years.”
“And you have been kept for forty years? Do you want to take
Objections Answered
33
yourself out of the Lord’s hand that you are talking like that?”
“Certainly not.”
“Well,” I said, “you are beer than your creed.”
That is just the point; if a man is born again, he never wants to
take himself out of Christ’s hand even if he could. Christ alone
is the One who sases the soul.
Ques. 6. — How about 2 Thessalonians 2:3? — “Let no man
deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come,
except there come a falling away rst, and that man of sin be
revealed, the son of perdion.”
The word translated “falling away” is “apostasy” in the
original. That has nothing to do with the queson of individual
salvaon. It does not touch this doctrine. Can you not see
that it is a prophecy of what is happening all about us at
the present me? Recently we were told that seventy-ve
per cent of the ministers in the Church Federaon in the
city of Chicago signed a quesonnaire saying that they did
not believe in some of the great fundamental truths of the
Bible. There you have apostasy. Does that mean that these
ministers were all Chrisans once and now are not saved?
My dear friends, I am afraid the whole trouble is that most
of them have never been born again at all. They do not know
anything of regenerang grace, and therefore are quite
ready to apostaze from the doctrines held sacred by the
great evangelical denominaons. I remember when a certain
preacher came out with a blatant aack on the doctrine of
blood atonement. It shocked a lot of people who had been
reading his books, and they said, “Isn’t it strange that a man
once such a ne Chrisan now denies the blood of Christ?”
I sat down and read every one of his books, and found that
he never menoned in any of them the blood of Christ or
Christ’s death on the cross, excepng in one when he spoke
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of the example of humiliaon Jesus set by going to the cross.
But never one other reference to the death, the blood, or
the atonement. Later he stated: “They charge me with giving
up the doctrine of blood atonement; I never believed it.” He
showed that he was simply an apostate. These things had no
place in his heart or life. The apostasy is coming, it is coming
fast; the great professing church is going into it, but not one
born again person will ever bow to the anchrist.
Ques. 7. — What about Hebrews 12:14? — “Follow peace with
all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the
Lord.”
That is exactly what we stand for. Any one who says, “I am
a Chrisan,” and does not follow peace and holiness will
never see the Lord. But I remember how that used to trouble
me. When a young Chrisan, I was taught that when I was
converted all my sins up to that moment were put away, and
then it was as though God said, “I have wiped o the past and
have put you back where Adam was before he fell: if you can
keep the record clear from now to the end, you will be saved,
and you will get to heaven.” I started out and soon began to
fail, and then they said to me, “The trouble with you is you
have not got holiness yet. If you get that you will be able
to live the right kind of a life.” I said, “What is this blessing
of holiness?” and was told, “When God saved you, He only
jused you.” — Only jused you? — “He forgave your past
sin, but now you have to get sanced, and that means you
must have all your inbred sin rooted out, and you will get true
holiness.” I thought, “But it didn’t work very well with Adam,”
and it rather bothered me. Yet they assured me that was the
thing, and so I went in for it and for six years I struggled.
1
1 I have taken this whole subject up much more fully in one of
my earlier books, “HOLINESS: THE FALSE AND THE
TRUE.” Same publishers.
Objections Answered
35
I was working on a text that is not in the Bible, “Without
holiness no man shall see the Lord.” I heard many sermons
preached on it, and somemes I preached on it myself. I had
a large red banner with that text in white leers, and I tried
to get holiness, and somemes I thought I had it, and then
something would go wrong, and I would have to try to get
it all over again. I shall never forget the rst me I read it,
“Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no
man shall see the Lord.” I thought it said, “Without holiness
it is impossible to see God.” I thought I had to get perfect
holiness in this life, but what it says there is, if you do not
follow holiness you will not see the Lord. Every Chrisan
follows holiness.
A man who says, “I am a Chrisan,” and does not follow
holiness, is either self-deceived or a hypocrite. We maintain
this with all our hearts.
Ques. 8. — What about Romans 6:16? — “Know ye not, that to
whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are
to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience
unto righteousness?”
I have already spoken of that. Romans 6 is like the book of
Exodus. When the children of Israel were in Egypt they obeyed
Pharaoh because they had to; when they were brought to
God in the wilderness, Pharaoh’s power was broken and they
became the servants of God. We, in our unsaved days, were
servants to sin; now, as Chrisans, we are servants of God and
we are to walk before God in holiness and righteousness.
Ques. 9. — Ezekiel 18:24: “But when the righteous turneth
away from his righteousness, and commieth iniquity, and
doth according to all the abominaons that the wicked man
doeth, shall he live?”
Is it not strange for anyone in this dispensaon of grace to
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quote a passage like that, as though it had anything to do with
the queson of the soul’s salvaon? Go back and read Ezekiel
18. Of what is it treang? We read in the twenty-rst verse, “If
the wicked will turn from all his sins that he hath commied,
and keep all My statutes, and do that which is lawful and
right, he shall surely live, he shall not die.” Is that grace? No,
that is law. That is just the quintessence of law. Do you believe
that if a wicked man turns from his wickedness he will live?
If this is true, why did Jesus die? Would you preach that to
sinners? Would you have me stand up and say, “You wicked
people, you have been doing wickedness; you start in tonight
to do righteousness and you will live” — would you have me
preach that? I would be deliberately deceiving people if I told
them that. But you see here God was tesng people under
law and said, “The man that doeth these things shall live … But
when the righteous turneth away from his righteousness,
and commieth iniquity, and doeth according to all the
abominaons that the wicked man doeth, shall he live? All
his righteousness that he hath done shall not be menoned
in his trespass that he hath trespassed, and in his sin that he
hath sinned, in them shall he die.” And what has happened?
Not one man ever connued in all the things that are wrien
in the book of the law to do them. Therefore, they were all
under sentence of death. How then were they to be saved? By
turning over a new leaf? Oh, no; but by confessing that they
had no righteousness. If they had, it would only be lthy rags.
But now they nd all their righteousness in the Lord Jesus
Christ, “who of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness,
sanccaon, and redempon.” Do not ever quote Ezekiel
18 as though it were gospel. It is law. And then remember
the “life” spoken of in Ezekiel is not eternal life in Christ. It is
life here on earth prolonged under the divine government,
because of obedience, or cut short because of sin.
Ques. 10. — What about 2 Peter 2:20 to 22? — “For if aer
Objections Answered
37
they have escaped the polluons of the world through the
knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again
entangled therein, and overcome, the laer end is worse with
them than the beginning. For it had been beer for them not
to have known the way of righteousness, than, aer they have
known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto
them. But it is happened unto them according to the true
proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the
sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.”
Does it say, “But it is happened unto them according to the
true proverb, The sheep is turned to its own vomit again?”
No, it does not. It says, “The dog is turned to his own vomit
again.” How many of these dogs there are! They escape the
polluon of the world temporarily by the knowledge that
comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. If you were brought
up in a Chrisan home and taught the knowledge of the
Lord Jesus Christ from your youth, you escaped a great deal
of the polluon of the world. But aer you have known all
these things, you can turn aside; you can take your own
way into the world and live in its lth and polluons. What
does that prove? That you used to be a Chrisan and are not
now? — that you used to be one of Christ’s sheep but are no
longer? Oh, no. What then? It proves that, “The dog has gone
back to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed to
her wallowing in the mire.” The remarkable thing about this
doctrine of the eternal security of the believer is that many of
the greatest men of God who have ever lived have believed
in it. C. H. Spurgeon, D. L. Moody, Dr. R. A. Torrey, Dr. A. C.
Dixon, and scores of others whom we revere, believed in it. C.
H. Spurgeon said very beaufully, “If this dog had ever been
born again and goen a sheep’s nature, it never would have
gone back to its own vomit; and if this sow had ever been
regenerated and had the heart of a lamb put in it, it never
would have gone back to its wallowing in the mire.” It is not a
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queson of a sheep of Christ perishing. The devil has a lot of
washed sows, but they are not, and never have been, Christ’s
sheep.
Ques. 11. — Now we come to the crucial text, Hebrews 6:4-6.
Watch this carefully. See if I read it correctly. “For it is quite
possible for those who were once enlightened, and have
tasted of the heavenly gi, and were made partakers of the
Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and
the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to
renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to
themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open
shame.” Is that what it says? You believe that a man can be
once enlightened, made a partaker or the Holy Ghost, can
taste the good word of God and the powers of the world
to come, but fall away and then repent; don’t you? That is
what all the folk believe who do not believe in the eternal
security of the believer. What are you going to do with your
backslider? If backsliding and apostasy are the same, don’t
you see this passage is the worst possible passage in all the
Bible for their favorite doctrine?
If those who hold that a roan can be saved over and over
again will ponder this passage I am sure they will see how
fatally it knifes their theory.
This is the way it reads: “For it is impossible for those who
were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly
gi, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have
tasted of the good word of God, and the powers of the world
to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again unto
repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of
God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.” If this passage
teaches that a man once saved can be lost again, then it also
teaches that if that man is lost again, he can never repent
Objections Answered
39
and be saved. In other words, if that passage teaches that a
man once saved can be lost again, it teaches that if you have
ever been saved and you are now lost, you have a through
cket for hell, and there is no turning back. You are checked
right through. But what is the real queson here? It is almost
impossible to explain it in a minute or two, for you need to
study the enre h and sixth chapters of Hebrews together.
2
The apostle is speaking to people who have the Old Testament
and have been intellectually convinced that Jesus is the
Messiah but who are exposed to persecuon if they confess
His Name. Even if not genuine, they know that Jesus is the
Messiah, and they must have felt the power and seen the
evidence of His authority in the miracles wrought. Yet they
can turn their backs upon it all and go back to Judaism, and
go into the synagogue again and say, “We do not believe
Jesus Christ is the Messiah, the Son of God; we refuse the
authority of this Man. He should be crucied.” “They crucify
to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open
shame.” The apostle says, “Do not try to do anything there;
you cannot, for they have gone too far. They are apostate.” It
proves that they are not real Chrisans. In verse 9 we read,
“But, beloved, we are persuaded beer things of you, and
things that accompany salvaon, though we thus speak.” That
is, you could have all these things and not have salvaon. You
say, “I don’t think so.” But look at it, “It is impossible for those
who were once enlightened.” What does that mean? Born
again? No one could listen to a gospel address without being
enlightened. “The entrance of Thy words giveth light, it giveth
understanding unto the simple” (Psa. 119:130).
“And have tasted of the heavenly gi.” It is one thing to taste;
it is another thing to eat. Many a person has gone that far and
never been saved. The angel said to Ezekiel, “Son of man, eat
2 May I refer the inquiring reader to my book, “STUDIES IN
THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS.” Same publishers.
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this roll.” But the angel saw that Ezekiel had only tasted it, so
he commanded, “Son of man, cause thy belly to eat it.” It was
in his mouth, and if his head had been cut o all the truth
would be gone, but “God desires truth in the inward parts.”
“And were made partakers of the Holy Ghost.” They were
neither sealed, nor indwelt, nor bapzed, nor lled with the
Spirit. He does not use one of the terms that refer to the
Spirit’s great oces, but says, “And were made partakers of
the Holy Ghost.” Did you ever see a man in a meeng where
the Spirit of God was working in power, and have you ever
gone over and talked to him and said, “Don’t you want to
come to Christ?” And he has answered, “I know I ought to
come, I can feel the power of the Spirit of God in this meeng.
I know this thing is right and I ought to yield, but I don’t
want to, and I won’t.” And he goes away resisng the Spirit
although he was a partaker. So these people described in
Hebrews 6 had been in this way outwardly acquainted with
Chrisanity, but they now denied it all. For such there could
be no repentance.
Now in order to prove that this is the correct interpretaon
of the passage, let me draw your aenon to Hebrews 6:7-
9: “For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh o
upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is
dressed, receiveth blessing from God: but that which beareth
thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose
end is to be burned. But, beloved, we are persuaded beer
things of you, and things that accompany salvaon, though
we thus speak.” Noce in the rst place, all these things he
speaks of in verse 4 and 5 might be true of a man and yet he
would not have salvaon. But he says, as it were, “Though we
have given you this warning, we are persuaded beer things
of you; you have gone farther than these apostates ever did,
you have been saved; and so do not think we are confounding
you with people like these.” He uses this lile parable to make
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clear what he means. Here are two pieces of grass growing
side by side, we will say, just separated by a fence. The earth
is the same, the same sun shines on them both, the same kind
of rainfall waters them both. When the me of harvest comes,
one of these plots brings forth herbs, but the other only
thorns and briers. What is he teaching here? This is a message
to the Jews, trying to make them see the reality of Christ’s
Messiahship and His fulllment of all the types of old. These
two plots of ground are two men, they are the hearts of two
men. We may think of them in this way to make it all more
graphic. They grow up side by side, they both are taught the
Bible, they both go to the same synagogue, both wait for the
Messiah, both go down and listen to John the Bapst preach,
perhaps both were bapzed by John the Bapst, confessing
their sins. John’s bapsm was not salvaon, it was just looking
forward to the coming of a Saviour. Both of them hear the
Lord Jesus, both of them see Him do His works of power,
both are in that crowd watching when He dies, both are there
when the throngs go out to see the open tomb, both are near
when He ascends to heaven, both see the mighty work of the
Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, both of them moved in and
out among the apostles, and outwardly you could not see any
dierence between them. But by-and-by persecuon breaks
out. One of them is arrested, and they say to him, “Deny Jesus
Christ, or you will die.”
He says, “I cannot deny Him; He is my Saviour.” “Then you will
die.”
“I am ready to die, but I cannot deny Him.”
The other one is arrested and they say, “You must deny Christ
or die.”
He says, “I will deny Him rather than die. I will go back and be
a good Jew again rather than die.”
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“Come out here, then.”
They had a terrible way of taking him back. I remember
reading how in such a case, they took him to an unclean place
where a man slew a sow, and this one going back to Judaism,
in order to prove his denial, spits on the blood of the sow and
says, “So count I the blood of Jesus the Nazarene.” And then
they purify him and take him back. Could any real believer in
Jesus do that? What made the dierence between the two?
Those plots of ground had the same rain, the same sunshine,
but there were dierent crops. What was the dierence? One
of them had the good seed and brought forth good fruit, the
other did not have the good seed and brought forth thorns
and briers. These two men were both familiar with the truth,
but one received the incorrupble seed, the Word of life, and
brought forth fruit unto God. The other has never received the
good seed, and the day comes when he is an apostate.
If you will keep in mind the dierence between an apostate
and a backslider, it will save you a lot of trouble over many
scriptures. The apostate knows all about Chrisanity, but
never has been a real Chrisan. The backslider is a person
who has known Christ, who did love Him, but became cold in
his soul, lost out in his spiritual life. There is not a Chrisan
who has not oen been guilty of backsliding. That is why we
need the Lord as our Advocate to restore our souls. When
backslidden, it is not our union with Him that is destroyed,
but it is our communion. You may say, “Why are you so sure
that a real Chrisan does not apostaze?” Because God says
so in His Word. 1 John 2:18: “Lile children, it is the last me:
and as ye have heard that anchrist shall come, even now are
there many anchrists; whereby we know that it is the last
me.” Anchrist means “opposed to Christ.” The apostate is
always a man opposed to Christ. A man says, “I have tried it
all, and there is nothing in it,” and so denounces Christ. “They
Objections Answered
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went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had
been of us, they would no doubt have connued with us: but
they went out, that they might be made manifest that they
were not all of us.” The words, “no doubt,” are in italics, and
really cast a doubt. Leave those words out for they do not
belong in the Greek text, and read it, “They went out from
us, but they were not of us: for if they had been of us, they
would have connued with us.” And then he adds, “They
went out, that they might be made manifest that they were
not altogether — that is the literal Tendering — of us.” In other
words, they were with us in profession, in outward fellowship,
but not altogether of us, because they had never really been
born of God. This explains the tenth chapter of Hebrews also
which is the next passage brought up here as an objecon.
Ques. 12. — Explain Hebrews 10:28, 29: “He that despised
Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be
thought worthy, who hath trodden underfoot the Son of God,
and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he
was sanced, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto
the Spirit of grace?” People are troubled here, for they say,
“Well, this man was surely a Chrisan, because it says that he
was sanced.”
That does not prove that he was necessarily a Chrisan.
The whole naon of Israel was sanced by the blood of
the covenant; in a certain sense the whole world has been
sanced by the blood of the cross. If it were not for that
blood shed on Calvary’s cross the whole world would be
doomed to eternal judgment, but because Jesus died for
the enre world God says, “Now, I can deal with all men on
the ground of the blood of the cross,” and, as we oen put
it, the great queson between God and man today is not
primarily the sin queson. Why? Because the blood of Christ
answers for sin. What is the great queson? It is the Son
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queson: — How are you treang God’s Son who died to save
you? Christ has died for all men, His blood is shed for the
salvaon of all men, and it will avail for every sinner in all the
world if they trust Him. See John 3:18, 19.
Here is this Hebrew who has followed along to a certain point,
and now the queson comes, “Will you confess this Christ as
your one great Sin Oering no maer what it means?” And he
answers, “No; I cannot do that. I am going back to the temple.
There is a sin oering there, and I will not have to suer as I
may if I confess Jesus Christ.” But he cannot do that. God does
not accept that anymore, “There remaineth no more sacrice
for sins.” “If we sin willfully aer that we have received the
knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrice for
sins.” “There remaineth no other sacrice for sins” is the true
meaning. This sacrice at the altar was commanded by God.
He said, “If you sin, you must bring a sacrice, and I will accept
you.” “The life of the esh is in the blood: and I have given it
to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls:
for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul”
(Lev. 17:11). “All right,” this Jew says, “I have a sin oering.”
But he has met Jesus Christ or heard of Him as the great Sin
Oering, he knows that God accepted Him and raised Him
from the dead; he has all this knowledge, but having it all
he is afraid to come out denitely and confess Christ as his
Saviour. He says, “I do not need this Sin Oering, I will go back
and be content with the sin oering of the temple.” Before
Jesus came that was acceptable, because it pointed to Him,
but now He has come. If you reject Him, there remains no
other oering. This passage, you see, has nothing to do with a
real Chrisan turning from Christ, but with a man thoroughly
instructed who refuses to accept Him. And how many people
there are, not only among the Jews but in Christendom, who
are refusing this Sin Oering.
Ques. 13. — The next passage brought up is Luke 9:61,62: “And
Objections Answered
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another also said, Lord, I will follow Thee; but let me rst go
bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. And Jesus
said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and
looking back, is t for the kingdom of God.”
What a terrible thing it would be if this were the way into
heaven! How many thousands of earnest Chrisan people
there are who have allowed what they thought was their
responsibility to their friends to keep them from fully
following Christ. Suppose they went to heaven only on the
ground of fully following Him. You see these Jews were
looking for the kingdom, and many said, “I will follow Thee,
but my friends have a claim on me.” “No,” the Lord says; “I
must come rst. No man, having put his hand to the plough,
and looking back, is t for the kingdom of God.” That is the
test of discipleship. But it is necessary to disnguish between
salvaon by grace and reward for faithful discipleship. The
rewards are connected with the kingdom. No maer how
faithful I may be as a Chrisan, it does not give me any beer
place in heaven than if I were taken there the moment I
was saved. Suppose the very instant you were converted
you dropped dead; would you have gone to heaven? Yes;
you would have gone there on the ground of God’s delight
in the work of His Son. Suppose you were converted y
years ago. There have been ups-and-downs in your life; but
you have been saved all those years. Where would you go
if you died suddenly? To heaven. On what ground? On the
ground of God’s delight in the work of His Son. There is not
a bit of change in y years. “But,” you say, “I have been
a wonderfully faithful Chrisan.” Have you, indeed? I am
surprised that you should think so. The more we serve Him,
the more most of us feel how unfaithful we have been. But
you insist, “I have been a very faithful Chrisan.” Does that
make you any more t for heaven than you were the moment
you trusted Jesus? You ask, “Does faithfulness as a disciple
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go for nothing?” It goes for a great deal, but it has no saving
merit. You have a place in the Father’s house on the ground of
pure grace, but the Father’s house is not the only thing before
us, there is also the kingdom of God. “Then shall the righteous
shine forth in the kingdom of their Father.” And here there are
dierent rewards according to the measure of faithfulness in
this life.
3
Here was one to whom the Lord said, “I want you to follow
Me to Africa or India,” and he said, “O Lord, suer me rst to
go and bury my father. I have an old father here, and cannot
bear to leave him as long as he lives. Aer he is dead, I am
willing to follow Thee.” And the Lord says, “Let the dead bury
their dead.” Of course, if he had the responsibility of providing
for his father, that would be a dierent thing. Because that
man has not the faith and courage to make that break, does
he cease to be a Chrisan? He may stay at home, he may
be of great value and great use, but when he comes to the
judgment-seat of Christ there is a reward he might have had
that he will not have, because he did not go the whole way
with the Lord Jesus Christ. If going the whole way entled
men to heaven, none of us would ever get there. But as we
go, as far as we understand, the whole way, He is going to
reward us. If people could learn to see the dierence between
salvaon by grace and reward for service, this queson would
sele itself. From this point on, most of these objecons really
have to do with this very fact.
Ques. 14. — Take the next one, Hebrews 3:12-14: “Take heed,
brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief,
in deparng from the living God. But exhort one another daily,
while it is called To-day; lest any of you be hardened through
the deceiulness of sin. For we are made partakers of Christ,
if we hold the beginning of our condence steadfast unto
3 May I refer to another of my booklets, “Salvation and Reward.”
Same publishers.
Objections Answered
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the end.” That is one of the “if” verses. Another one is found
in 1 Corinthians 15:1, 2: “Moreover, brethren, I declare unto
you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have
received, and wherein ye stand; by which also ye are saved, if
ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have
believed in vain.” Another one is found in Colossians 1:21-
23: “And you, that were someme alienated and enemies in
your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in
the body of His esh through death, to present you holy and
unblameable and unreproveable in His sight: if ye connue in
the faith grounded and seled, and be not moved away from
the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was
preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof
I Paul am made a minister.” I might add others to these, but
here are three “ifs.”
What does the Spirit of God mean by bringing these “ifs” in?
In every one of these instances He is addressing bodies of
people. I stand here to address you as a body of people. If
I were to ask everybody who professes to be a Chrisan to
stand, I suppose nearly everybody would rise. Would that
prove that you were all Chrisans? It would show that you
profess to be Chrisans. What would prove that you really
are? “If ye connue in the faith grounded and seled, and be
not moved away from the hope of the gospel.” You profess
to have received the gospel; you are saved if you keep in
memory what has been preached unto you. If you do not, it
just shows that there is no reality.
The faith here is not the faith by which you are saved, it is
not the faith by which you believe; but it is that which you
believe. Jude says, “Earnestly contend for the faith which was
once delivered unto the saints” (Jude 3). That is the body of
Chrisan doctrine, and, if a real Chrisan, you will stand for
that Chrisan doctrine to the end, but if not, you may become
a Mormon, or a Chrisan Scienst, or a Theosophist, or
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something like that. Then you simply show there is no reality.
It is a very easy thing to say, “I am saved;” it is another thing to
prove it.
Ques. 15. — What of 2 Peter 3:17? — “Ye therefore, beloved,
seeing ye know these things before, beware lest ye also, being
led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own
steadfastness.”
We come back to what we were speaking of a few minutes
ago. There is always a possibility of a real Chrisan falling, and
we need to be warned again and again. How many we have
known who at one me had a bright Chrisan tesmony but
fell. They were not watchful, they were not prayerful, and
they stumbled and fell. Does that mean they are lost? No; not
if really born again. If born again, they have received eternal
life; and if people thus fall, that is where the restoring work
of the Spirit of God comes in. David fell in a most terrible way,
but says, “He restoreth my soul;” and somemes in restoring
His people’s souls God has to put them through very bier
experiences. He loves them too much to let them be happy
when away from Him.
Ques. 16. — Explain this passage — “Who concerning the truth
have erred, saying that the resurrecon is past already; and
overthrow the faith of some” (2 Tim. 2:18). A writer says, “We
see here the possibility of having our faith overthrown.”
That is not what Paul is talking about. He is speaking of the
faith. Again you must make the disncon. Our faith is that
by which we believe. We believe God; that is faith. But we
believe the truth that God has revealed to us, and that truth is
the faith, and that is what has been overthrown in the mind of
the professed believer, in this instance. That is the same thing
as you get in 1 Timothy 5:15: “For some are already turned
aside aer Satan.” Some real Chrisans do that, but what a
Objections Answered
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blessed thing to know the Lord goes aer them and never
gives them up.
Ques. 17. — May we not let the things of God slip away from
us? — “Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to
the things which we have heard, lest at any me we should let
them slip” (Heb. 2:1), or, in other words, “Lest at any me we
should dri away from them.”
This is the same warning again. You have listened to precious
ministry from men of God who have preached the Word to
you. You have had such instrucon as many never have had.
You will be terribly guilty if you dri away from it. You need
to “connue in the things which you have learned.” But if we
were all to lose our salvaon every me we dried into some
erroneous thing, how serious it would be! Is there anyone
here who has never done a lile bit of driing?
If sin will separate me from Christ, how much sin? How can
I ever be sure how much sin? Is there a Chrisan here who
has not sinned today? Is it not a fact that every one of us sins
in thought, or word, or in deed, probably every day of our
lives? Is there ever a night that you can kneel before God and
say, “Lord, I thank Thee that I have not sinned in thought or
word or deed today?” I am sure no honest Chrisan can say
that. How far do you have to sin in order to break the link
that binds you to Christ? You never could be sure that you
are saved from one day to another, and you would not leave
any room for the restoring work of God, if your salvaon
depended upon your personal faithfulness.
Ques. 18. — What about such a scripture as this? — “Be thou
faithful unto death and I will give thee a crown of life?” (Rev.
2:10). How can you say that a man is saved for eternity when
the Lord says you must be faithful to the end?
A crown of life is not salvaon, it is reward. There are ve
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crowns: the incorrupble crown for faithfully running the
course; the crown of rejoicing for winning souls; the crown of
righteousness for those who love His appearing; the crown
of life for those who suer for Christ; the crown of glory for
those who feed the sheep and lambs of Christ’s ock. I might
lose all of those crowns and yet not lose my salvaon. The
Word says, “If a man’s work shall be burned … he himself shall
be saved; yet so as by re” (1 Cor. 3:15). But I do not want to
be saved that way. I want to win the crown of life. “Be thou
faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life.”
Ques. 19. — Explain Hebrews 10:37-39: “For yet a lile while,
and He that shall come will come, and will not tarry … .. If any
man draw back, My soul shall have no pleasure in him.”
Look at the next verse, “But we (Who? Real Chrisans) are
not of them who draw back unto perdion; but of them that
believe to the saving of the soul.” If a person has believed
to the saving of the soul, there is no danger of his “drawing
back unto perdion.” It is a terrible thing to be intellectually
convinced and stop there.
Ques. 20. — Now I am referred to Revelaon 3:15, 16, where
the Lord speaking to the church at Laodicea says, “I know thy
works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert
cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither
cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of My mouth.”
Is this an individual who has once been saved and is so no
longer? The Lord is talking to a church. Did you ever see a
church like the one at Laodicea, a church neither hot nor cold,
one where you could not tell whether it was for Christ or
against Him? And then the Lord says to that church, “Because
you are just lukewarm — there is profession — but you are
neither hot or cold, I will spue thee out of My mouth. I won’t
own you as a church at all.” That does not say that there may
Objections Answered
51
not be individuals in the church who are children of God, just
as in the church at Ephesus. He said to them, “If you do not
repent, I will remove your candlesck.” A candle, you know, is
to give light.
Every me I go down town I pass a church that D. L. Moody
used to belong to. It was an evangelisc center in the city in
his day, but today it is a very center of Modernism, and the
Gospel is never preached there. Every me I look at it I think
of the me Moody was there and it stood rmly for the truth,
and I say, “Their candlesck is removed.” There may be some
true Chrisans in that church, some of the dear old people
who were in it years ago, and maybe their membership is sll
there. It does not say that they are not Chrisans because the
church as such has lost its witness for Christ.
Ques. 21. — Here is a verse I am surprised to nd used to
prove the “falling away” doctrine. “If the righteous scarcely
be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?”
(1 Peter 4:18).
What has that to do with the queson? What is Peter saying?
“The me is come that judgment must begin at the house of
God: and if it rst begin at us, what shall the end be of them
that obey not the gospel of God?” (1 Peter 4:17). I suppose
that God’s children have faults. I know they have to be judged
for their faults by the Father in correcon, and God will deal
very solemnly and seriously with them about their failures.
There would be no need of judgment if they were all perfect
Chrisans, but if God deals with His own people in this way,
and if the righteous be saved through diculty, “where shall
the ungodly and the sinner appear?” That has nothing to
do with the queson of whether the Chrisan is saved for
eternity or not.
Ques. 22. — John 15:1-6 is the next passage quesoned.
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This chapter is not discussing the queson of eternal life
but of fruit-bearing. There are a great many believers who
bear very lile fruit for God, but all bear some fruit for Him.
There are many people in the Vine (and the Vine speaks of
profession here on earth) who bear no fruit for Him, and will
eventually be cut out altogether when Jesus comes. There
will be no place with Him because there is no union with
Him. There are no natural branches in the living Vine. We are
graed in by faith. I do not know much about graing, but I
do know that it is one thing to put a gra in, and it is another
thing for a gra to strike. It is one thing for a person to be
outwardly linked with Him, and quite another for that person
to have life in Christ. What is the test that proves whether he
is really in the Vine? If he bears fruit. All who have life bear
some fruit for God. If there is no fruit, you can be sure there is
no life, no real union with Christ.
Ques. 23. — Will any Chrisan who passes away with
unconfessed sin have an opportunity to make things right
aer death? Is the judgment-seat of Christ the me when
all misunderstandings and discords among Chrisans will be
made right?
It is quesonable if any Chrisan ever died who did not
have some unconfessed sin to his record. While sin might be
confessed in a general way, yet who of us has ever denitely
confessed all his sins? But the precious blood of Christ
answers for every sin a believer has ever commied. At the
judgment-seat of Christ the Lord will go over the enre life
since regeneraon, giving His mind about everything, and the
believer will then for the rst me see each detail in the light
of God’s innite holiness. Everything there will be dealt with
so that the believer’s failures will never be referred to again
for all eternity.
Ques. 24. — Is there any dierence between the book oi life
Objections Answered
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and the Lamb’s book of life?
Yes, the book of life is the book of the living. It is the record
too of profession. From this book names may be bloed
out. The Lamb’s book of life is the record of the eternal
purpose of God. Names inscribed there are wrien from the
foundaon of the world. In other words, one book speaks of
responsibility, the other of pure grace.
No Chrisan will ever have his name bloed out of the
Lamb’s book of life, for all such have eternal life — which is
unforfeitable and everlasng.
