While Scripture repeatedly
emphasizes that those who are truly born again will persevere to the end and
will certainly have eternal life in heaven with God, there are other passages
that speak of the necessity of continuing in faith throughout life. They make
us realize that what Peter said in 1 Peter 1:5 is true, namely, that God does
not guard us apart from our faith,
but only by working through our faith
so that he enables us to continue to believe in him. In this way, those who
continue to trust in Christ gain assurance that God is working in them and
guarding them.
One example of this kind of
passage is John 8:31–32: “Jesus then said to the Jews who had believed in him,
“If you continue in my word you are
truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you
free.” ’ Jesus is here giving a warning that one evidence of genuine faith
is continuing in his word, that is, continuing to believe what he says and
living a life of obedience to his commands. Similarly, Jesus says, “He who endures to the end will be saved”
(Matt. 10:22), as a means of warning people not to fall away in times of
persecution.
Paul says to the Colossian
Christians that Christ has reconciled them to God, “in order to present you
holy and blameless and irreproachable before him, provided that you continue in the faith stable and steadfast, not
shifting from the hope of the gospel which you heard” (Col. 1:22–23). It is
only natural that Paul and the other New Testament writers would speak this
way, for they are addressing groups of people who profess to be Christians,
without being able to know the actual state of every person’s heart. There may
have been people at Colossae who had joined in the fellowship of the church,
and perhaps even professed that they had faith in Christ and had been baptized
into membership of the church, but who never had true saving faith. How is Paul
to distinguish such people from true believers? How can he avoid giving them
false assurance, assurance that they will be saved eternally when in fact they
will not, unless they come to true repentance and faith? Paul knows that those
whose faith is not real will eventually fall away from participation in the
fellowship of the church. Therefore he tells his readers that they will
ultimately be saved, “provided that you
continue in the faith” (Col. 1:23). Those who continue show thereby that
they are genuine believers. But those who do not continue in the faith show
that there was no genuine faith in their hearts in the first place.
A similar emphasis is seen in
Hebrews 3:14 (NASB): “For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our
assurance firm to the end.” This verse provides an excellent perspective on
the doctrine of perseverance. How do we know if “we have become partakers of
Christ”? How do we know if this being joined to Christ has happened to us at
some time in the past? One way in which we know that we have come to genuine
faith in Christ is if we continue in faith until the end of our lives.
Attention to the context of
Hebrews 3:14 will keep us from using this and other similar passages in a
pastorally inappropriate way. We must remember that there are other evidences
elsewhere in Scripture that give Christians assurance of salvation, so we should not think that assurance that we
belong to Christ is impossible until we die. However, continuing in faith
is the one means of assurance that is named here by the author of Hebrews. He
mentions this to warn his readers that they should not fall away from Christ,
because he is writing to a situation where such a warning is needed. The
beginning of that section, just two verses earlier, said, “Take care, brethren,
lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall
away from the living God” (Heb. 3:12). In fact, in all of the passages where
continuing to believe in Christ to the end of our lives is mentioned as one
indication of genuine faith, the purpose is never to make those who are
presently trusting in Christ worry that some time in the future they might fall
away (and we should never use these passages that way either, for that would be
to give wrongful cause for worry in a way that Scripture does not intend).
Rather, the purpose is always to warn
those who are thinking of falling away or have fallen away that if they do
this it is a strong indication that they were never saved in the first place.
Thus, the necessity for continuing in faith should just be used as a warning
against falling away, a warning that those who fall away give evidence that
their faith was never real.
John clearly states that when people fall away from fellowship with the church and from belief in Christ they thereby show that their faith was not real in the first place and that they were never part of the true body of Christ. Speaking of people who have left the fellowship of believers, John says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out, that it might be plain that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19). John says that those who have departed showed by their actions that they “were not of us—that they were not truly born again.”
John clearly states that when people fall away from fellowship with the church and from belief in Christ they thereby show that their faith was not real in the first place and that they were never part of the true body of Christ. Speaking of people who have left the fellowship of believers, John says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out, that it might be plain that they all are not of us” (1 John 2:19). John says that those who have departed showed by their actions that they “were not of us—that they were not truly born again.”
Grudem, Wayne A. Systematic Theology: An Introduction to Biblical Doctrine. Leicester, England; Grand Rapids, MI: Inter-Varsity Press; Zondervan Pub. House, 2004.
