ETERNAL SECURITY
There are many misunderstandings concerning eternal
security.
One is
due to
1. A false concept of the term "faith".
Traditionally popular evangelicalism often equals "faith" with a decision to follow Christ. Kierkegaard likened this kind of concept of faith, when speaking of Abraham's journey to mount Morija in "Fear and Trembling" with certain Christians of his time who would have preferred a hunting horse instead of the mule Abraham used. They want to storm mount Morija, do the Isaac-sacrificing-bit and zoom down again. Abraham however is riding slowly, he has a struggle to undergo, he is in a long process and in fact he becomes, without noticing it himself, a type of God the father Himself, in his willingness to sacrifice his own son. This is what faith really is about according to Kierkegaard - a long process during which we die to our selves and become like Christ without bragging about it. This view can be sustained further by Phil. 3, 9-12:
and be found in Him; not
having my own righteousness, which is of the Law, but through the faith of
Christ, the righteousness of God by faith, that I may know Him and the power of
His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being made conformable
to His death; if by any means I might attain to the resurrection of the dead. Not
as though I had already attained, either were already perfect, but I am
pressing on, if I may lay hold of that for which I also was taken hold of by
Christ Jesus.
Many evangelicals introduce a
new “law” here – the law of “having followed points 1 to 4 of evangelism tract
no. 123”. Now they struggle as to whether or not such a candidate can be
brainwashed into accepting eternal security or not. But in fact they have not
lead that candidate to true faith – only to a HUMAN LAW of one particular way
of accepting faith. Romans 10, 9 stands valid: Because if you confess the
Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead,
you shall be saved. But this “confession” and “believing in one’s heart” is
not only a one-time decision but a long walk as well. For some people it can
mean that they really confess Christ, like the one of the two criminals did who
were crucified together with Christ, and then that’s it for them. But for
others the being-crucified-together-with-Christ-part can take much longer. For
many victims of superficial evangelism points 1 to 4 of the evangelism tract can
in fact become a law of one’s OWN righteousness. I have accepted Christ
on that and that date, so I am saved and that’s it. None has a right to
question that. But this is a completely unbiblical view. It is not my OWN steps-one-to-four-faith,
not my OWN experience, not MY conversion, not MY pilgrimages to spiritual
counselling and anointing and so on but
“the faith OF CHRIST” and “the righteousness of GOD by faith” (Phil 3, see
above) which saves, not any kind of 1-2-3-faith. In other words, eternal
security is attainable, but only as long as I am seeing to it that I am crucified
together with Christ.
Note also how Paul introduces some kind of dialectical (i.e. both-and-kind-of)
thinking in the above quoted passage from Phil. 3 – he says “I was taken hold
of by Christ Jesus” and yet mentions his own effort “… if I may lay hold of
that….”. There is a both-and: Paul is
responsible to do his part, yet he humbly maintains that the whole thing is
only due to the fact that Christ did his part first, namely taking hold of him
when he actually was against Christ. “… if by any means I might attain to the resurrection
of the dead…” is humble irony, in fact Paul is giving us a 100% sure way to
attain to the resurrection of the dead: Namely being made conformable to Christ’s
death and suffer together with Christ. Only this, says Paul, will make someone “know
Him” and only this will “impart the power of His resurrection”. The reason why
Paul so hesitantly says “… if by any means I might attain to the resurrection
of the dead…” is that he wants to avoid yet another trap for the religious
flesh of man, namely to take these very things and boast about them in a
fleshly manner. Yes, we humans are able to even boast about having fellowship
with Christ’s sufferings and becoming conformed to His death. Paul is therefore
dying to his legal right to boast about this, as it were, for the sake to avoid
possible fleshly-religious misunderstandings here. Becoming conformed to Christ’s
death and having fellowship with His sufferings could again be misinterpreted
as something static, just as “faith”, while in fact these things are movements,
growth processes, pilgrimages along a long and narrow way which most forsake
for a broader way which leads to damnation. Yet there is 100% security if one
really is on that way, but he will not boast about it, just as Abraham did not
even notice that he became a type of God the Father on mount Morija. This is a
seeming paradox, a dialectic truth, that those who boast about 100% eternal
security do not have it but are in fact on the broad way and in their flesh,
while those who keep on dying in Christ and continue to suffer with Him in
truth and reality are 100% secure – but do not blow a trumpet in front of them
because of that. Or, as the Reformed evangelist Kohlbrügge ironically said: “Those
who are ‘elected’ are not elected and those who are ‘not elected’ are elected!”.
This leads us to the second misunderstanding concerning eternal security,
namely
2. A confusion of God’s perspective with man’s perspective.
Often times the Bible takes God’s
perspective and God knows of course, who is elected from eternity while at
other times it adopts a human perspective (while this is of course still 100% divinely
inspired like all the rest) where we are put before our responsibilities
concerning discipleship, following Christ, building the Church, fighting the
good fight and sanctification without which none will come to see God. This kind of coin with two sides can be seen
in verses like the above and other such as Phil. 2, 12 and 13:
Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, cultivate your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who works in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.
So
here you have both God and the Christian “working”. Or 2. Tim.2, 19:
Nevertheless the foundation
of God stands sure, having this seal: "The Lord knew those who are
His." And, "Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from
iniquity!"
Here
you have the “inscriptions” on the respective sides of the coin.
3. A confusion of security in the
flesh with security in the Holy Spirit.
Calvin
alludes to 1. Cor. 10, 12 and Rom. 11, 20 in his Institutions in part III, chapter
24 and point 7 stating that Paul does not warn Christians about any kind of security,
but only of a fleshly security which leads to being puffed up, despising others,
cancelling humility and honour before God and forgetting God’s grace. This is
not the popular 1-2-3-type of “Calvinism”.
If
one is dead to any kind of fleshly security, the only one who is able to impart
security will be the Holy Spirit and this impartation of security is so
delicate and intimate that the believer will be careful to not talk about it very
much. Bonhoeffer said he felt that the name of God took on a false taste when
he mentioned it in the presence of Christians while he could talk freely about
God with unbelievers. This is because the Holy Spirit refrains from taking God
for granted (which is always the underlying danger when Christians talk about
God with each other), the Holy Spirit is afraid of “eternal security” to be thrown before the pigs, while that very
100% security which only the Holy Spirit can impart makes one ready to give an
account of the hope that the Christian has.
4. A one-sided understanding of
Romans 9, 16:
So then it is not of the one
willing, nor of the one running, but of God, the One showing mercy.
Arminius
points out in his “Analysis of Romans IX” (page 501 in Vol.3 of Nichols’ edition)
that not any kind of running and willing can be meant here. He writes: “For
when man’s will and running are opposed to God’s mercy, it is certain that he
(Paul) means that endeavour and running by which man hopes that he will obtain
righteousness and salvation WITHOUT THE MERCY OF GOD. But such is the attempt
and running of those who strive after righteousness and salvation by the works
of the law. And when “mercy” is opposed by turns to “willing” and “running,” it
is plain that that means of attaining
righteousness and life is marked out by those opposites of mercy, which has the greatest affinity to mercy, namely, faith in
Christ the Mediator. “ (capitals and parenthesis mine).
In other words, Romans 9, 16 cannot
be used to defend a static view of eternal security. Striving towards the
eternal goal with one’s “willing and running” is not that kind of “willing or
running” with which Paul discredits the Judaizers’ performing religious
horse-races but “faith in Christ the Mediator” as Arminius says. Christ has DONE
something in us, we ARE dead in Him, but this is not static, but leads to GROWTH,
i.e. a process (see Col. 2, 10-19). Faith is not merely a static taking-for-granted what Christ has done
(although this should be the starting-point), but leads to the only “willing and
running” God can approve of, namely a “running” into the death of Christ, which
is the only religious act God does not find nauseating but instead is demanding
of the disciple of Christ. For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. (Phil.
1, 21).
5. Memorizing John 3, 16 and forgetting 1. John 3,
16.
By this we have known the
love of God, because He laid down His life for us. And we ought to lay down our
lives for the brothers. (1. Jn. 3,
16).
Kierkegaard said: “New Testament
Christianity is to suffer for the doctrine of Christ at the hands of men.” A
Christian who is not willing to lay down his life for the sake of the true
universal church (not any apostate local church), i.e. for the furtherance of
the truth, should not take “eternal security” for granted. “Running” into the death
of Christ is not a quietistic act, where one retreats from the world and takes
refuge in a spiritual ghetto. According to Christianity the term “world” is not
that part of humanity which per chance happens to not be enrolled on any church
membership list. “World” is that part of humanity which is not willing and
running into the death of Christ and being dead in Christ means to get shouted
at by angry pharisees, get spit at by vulgar Roman soldiers and become betrayed
by Judas and denied by Peter. Christ did not die immediately after the Last
Supper. There was Gethsemane, Judas kiss, the Sanhedrin, Pilate, the carrying
of the cross, the nails, the vinegar, etc.
Eternal security is to be fought
for, while at the same time no man can have it merely by human efforts. It is
Christ faith which He sovereignly imparts onto whom he thinks fit, it is Christ’s
death which we die, it is Christ’s sufferings, not our own, it is Christ’s power
of resurrection, not our ingenuity, stamina or stick-to-it-ness and it is God’s
righteousness, not our own. Eternal security is not “cheap grace” (Bonhoeffer).
Eternal security is only “secure” when it is anchored in the only thing which
could take the devil’s power and overcome death: Namely Christ’s way of
suffering and dying.
Yet
today we have many Christians who claim to have “eternal security” while never
standing up for anything and always following the majority instead of Christ.
They commit the folly of deeming themselves eternally secure after having
undergone a change of idols, replacing their former secular idols with a
deus-ex-machina-Jesus, the automat Jesus, who is there to grant them everything
they wish. When challenged to commit an act for the sake of the love for the
truth, or for the love for persecuted brothers, they find a pious excuse. The
more upright ones among those seduced by contemporary forms of such happiness-gospels
are denying eternal security because they are frank enough to admit that they
do not have it. However, eternal security can be attained to, however, as shown
in this essay, it is something quite different from what Christians all to
often are being taught.