Saturday or Sunday: Which day should we honour in Sabbath keeping?

The age old question is still as divisive today as it has been through the ages from the time of the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 363), where the Catholic Church transferred the solemnity from Saturday to Sunday.

The reason why people, like the Seventh Day Adventists (SDA’s) and the Jewish Orthodox Church still keep to Saturday as their Sabbath, is found in the Old Testament. We will look at a few of the traditional arguments for both sides, but first, let’s clarify what the common idea or definition of the Sabbath is.

The Sabbath is commonly regarded as the one day a week where we refrain from our daily chores, do no work, and worship God, most commonly within a church building, temple or synagogue. So we see that some groups, such as the Seventh Day Adventists (SDA’s), but not limited to them, view the Sabbath as the day of worship, the day in which Christians should attend church- or worship services. These groups typically teach also that no work is to be done on the Sabbath, but the “day of worship” is more emphasized than the “day of rest”.

As an aside, there’s another question that begs an answer. God commanded the Jews to labour for six days, and on the seventh day to cease from their labours. Now, six days from when? Nowhere de we read that it started on the first day of a specific week, so do we really know the first Sabbath was on the seventh day of the week? Also, from the end of the Sabbath, you counted six days, and then the seventh day is the next Sabbath. Let’s take this argument a little further, according to the law of Moses, every year the day of Nisan 15 was to be a Sabbath. So, when this day fell on the day after the Sabbath, ie the first day of the week, you had to count seven days after the end of the ‘double’ or 48 hour Sabbath, to the next Sabbath. So, how do we conclude that the 7^th day of the week is still the Sabbath?

If we disregard the above mentioned argument, we have to look at the rest of the arguments as they stand.

Ok, so let’s look at them:

1. God made the Sabbath

Genesis 2:2-3: And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

2. God is the one who commanded the keeping of the Sabbath.
Exodus 20:8-11: Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.

3. Jesus customarily worshipped on the Sabbath.
Luke 4:16: And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up for to read.

4. The Ten Commandments were never changed.

Psalms 89:34: My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of my lips.

Luke 16:17: And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail.

5. The Apostles kept the Sabbath.

Act 17:2  And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures,

Act 13:13,14  Now when Paul and his company…………..went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and sat down.
Act 16:13  And on the sabbath we went out of the city by a river side, where prayer was wont to be made; and we sat down, and spake unto the women which resorted thither.
Act 18:4  And he reasoned in the synagogue every sabbath, and persuaded the Jews and the Greeks.

6. How was it changed to Sunday, by whom and why?
It is commonly held that the Sabbath was changed from Saturday to Sunday through a mandate by Constantine in A.D. 321.
The Catholic Church does honour Sunday as the Sabbath, and apart from citing the fact of Christ’s resurrection on the first day of the week, they believe they have divine mission and divine power to make laws binding on the conscience and binding before God. They also cite the verse in Lev 23:36 “For seven days you shall present food offerings to the LORD. On the eighth day you shall hold a holy convocation and present a food offering to the LORD. It is a solemn assembly; you shall not do any ordinary work.” as further proof of the legitimacy of this practice.
It may be what is spoken about in this quote: “We move from the ‘Sabbath’ to the ‘first day after the Sabbath’, from the seventh day to the first day: the dies Domini becomes the dies Christi!... By contrast, the Sabbath’s position as the seventh day of the week suggests for the Lord’s Day a complimentary symbolism, much loved by the Fathers. Sunday is not only the first day, it is also ‘the eighth day’, set within the sevenfold succession of days ...”

- Pope John Paul II, Apostolic Letter, Dies Domini, Vatican, May 31, 1998

Now, let us take a better look at these arguments, and see what scripture tells us.

God made the Sabbath when He rested in Gen 2:2-3?
First of all we must remind ourselves of the fact that God is omnipotent, and cannot tire! So, the fact that He rested is a foreshadowing of a Sabbath law to come. He did not, however, “create” or institute the Sabbath here. If He had, Adam through to Moses would have kept the Sabbath, or would have been under an obligation to keep it. We know from scripture though, that this is not the case.

The Sabbath was instituted for the first time by God in Ex 20:8-11?
Here God’s example in creation is used to explain what God expects of them. In Deuteronomy 5 Moses reviewed the law with the next generation, giving them the commands. We see in verses 12-15 the reason they are commanded to keep the Sabbath. Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee. Six days thou shalt labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the LORD thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the LORD thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day.

Two facts are made very clear here. Firstly, it was a command and a covenant with the nation of Israel, no one else! Secondly, it was to remember or commemorate how God brought them as a nation out from Egypt, how He freed them from slavery!

Note that nowhere is there any mention of worship.

Now, the question of Jesus keeping the Sabbath:
Yes, Jesus did keep the Sabbath, as part of His atoning work was that He not only had to live a perfect life, He had to keep every jot and tittle of the law perfectly! Mat 5:18  For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. Also Luk 16:17  And it is easier for heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail. You see, these two verses have nothing to do with proving the law is still in effect, but everything to do to prove that Christ in His life here on earth fulfilled the whole law, every jot and tittle of it! This means that we do not have to do it anymore, in Him and through Him we are perfect law keepers, but that is a study on its own altogether. The last thing we need to take note of concerning Christ and the Sabbath, is that when we read about Jesus going to the temple on the Sabbath, we do not read anywhere that He went there to worship!

Did the Apostles keep the Sabbath?
The Apostles went to the synagogues on the Sabbath, yes, but what does scripture tell us was their reason? Not for normal worship or as Sabbath keeping (although Paul says in 1 Cor 9:20 And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law; that doesn’t mean he was keeping the Sabbath, he just went there to talk to them on the Sabbath, respecting their customs.

If we look again at all the passages quoted above, Act 17:2 , Act 13:13,14, Act 16:13 and Act 18:4 , we see that it all had to do with evangelism, not legalism!

From Acts 18:6 the Sabbath is never again mentioned in the whole of the New Testament, except in Col 2:16 “Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:” So we see that the rest of the New Testament from Acts 18 onward never suggests adherence to the Sabbath day, in fact, quite the opposite! This means that there is now no obligation for the New Testament reader to keep the Sabbath.

Let’s address the misconception about where Sunday worship originated.
On what day did the early church meet for worship? Scripture never mentions any Sabbath (Saturday) gatherings by believers for fellowship or worship. However, there are clear passages that mention the first day of the week. For instance, Acts 20:7 states that “And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread.” In 1 Corinthians 16:2 Paul urges the Corinthian believers “Upon the first day of the week let every one of you lay by him in store, as God hath prospered him,” Since Paul designates this offering as “service” in 2 Corinthians 9:12, this collection must have been linked with the Sunday worship service of the Christian assembly. Historically Sunday, not Saturday, was the normal meeting day for Christians in the church, and its practice dates back to the first century. So we see it was not by a mandate by Constantine in A.D. 321 that the change took place. The explanation given by Pope John Paul II in his Apostolic Letter of 31 May 1998 is, therefore, also not correct.

If we do not read anywhere of worship being commanded on the Sabbath, when did the Jews worship? When we go back to the Old Testament again, we will see that offerings at the temple happened daily, not on the Sabbath, therefore, EVERY DAY was a day of worship, and the Sabbath was a day of rest.

So, what have we learned so far from scripture?

1.      God didn’t ‘make’ the Sabbath at creation, He rested as an example of and a foreshadowing of the law to come.

2.      There was no Sabbath keeping from creation until the Israelites were already in the desert.

3.      The Sabbath was not created or instituted as a day of corporate worship, but as a day of rest.

4.      The Sabbath was never instituted for the gentiles (us), but only for the Israelites, and with a specific reason, so they could remember God’s salvation from Egypt, a foreshadowing of Christ’s atoning work that would accomplish our own salvation from the slavery of sin.

5.      The New Testament church from Acts onward customarily met on the first day of the week, as a celebration of Christ’s resurrection.

6.      So, adherence to, and keeping the Sabbath, whether on Saturday or Sunday, is not scriptural any more.

This does not mean that it is wrong to set aside one day a week for corporate meetings of the body of believers. It would be wrong however to judge or condemn someone who refuses to be legalistic about it, and who would decide to keep it on a different day as someone else, as we read again in Col 2:16-17 “Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.” We see this idea repeated more than once in the New Testament, for instance in Rom 14:5-6a “One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord;”, and again in Gal 4:9-10 “But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage? Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years.” Also remember the words of Jesus himself when the Pharisees were condemning Jesus’ disciples for plucking corn on a Sabbath as they walked through a corn field. Mark 2:27 “The sabbath was made for man, and not man for the sabbath:”.

The Sabbath is still Saturday, not Sunday, it has never been changed, but the Sabbath is part of the Old Testament Law, and Christians are free from the bondage of the Law. (Gal 4:1-26; Rom 6:14) Sabbath keeping is not required of the Christian, whether Saturday or Sunday. Every day is a day unto the Lord!

The Jewish Sabbath keeping was abolished with the law at the cross as we read in Col 2:14 with Christ “Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross;”.

Now the question comes up, if the Sabbath Day was abolished on the cross, what now?

Jesus Christ is now our Sabbath Rest! But how, you’d ask?

The key to understanding how Jesus is our Sabbath rest is the Hebrew word shâbath, which means to “repose, that is, desist from exertion; or intermission,” (Strong’s Hebrew dictionary, H7673 & H7676). The origin of the Sabbath Day goes back to Creation. After creating the heavens and the earth in six days, God “rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made” (Genesis 2:2). As mentioned before, this doesn’t mean that God was tired and needed a rest. We know that God is omnipotent, literally “all-powerful.” He has all the power in the universe, He never tires, and His most strenuous expenditure of energy does not diminish His power one bit. So, what does it mean that God rested on the seventh day? Simply that He stopped what He was doing. He desisted from His labours. This is important in understanding the establishment of the Sabbath day and the role of Christ as our Sabbath rest.

God used the example of His resting on the seventh day of Creation to establish the principle of the Sabbath day rest for His people. When God gave the Israelites the fourth of His Ten Commandments in Exodus 20:8-11 and again in Deuteronomy 5:12-15, they were told to “remember” the Sabbath day and “keep it holy.” One day out of every seven, they were to rest from their labours and give the same day of rest to their servants and animals. This was not just a physical rest, but a cessation of labouring (exertion). Whatever work they were engaged in was to stop for a full day each week.

The various elements of the Sabbath symbolized the coming of the Messiah, who would provide a permanent rest for His people. Once again the example of resting from our labours comes into play. With the establishment of the Old Testament Law, the Jews were constantly “labouring” to make themselves acceptable to God. Their labours included trying to obey over 600 do’s and don’ts of the ceremonial law, the Temple law, the civil law, etc. Of course they couldn’t possibly keep all those laws, so God provided an array of sin offerings and sacrifices so they could come to Him for forgiveness and restore fellowship with Him, but only temporarily. Just as they began their physical labours after a one-day rest, so, too, did they have to continue to offer sacrifices. Hebrews 10:1 tells us that the law “can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.” But these sacrifices were offered in anticipation of the ultimate sacrifice of Christ on the cross, who ”after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right of God” (Hebrews 10:12). Just as He rested after performing the ultimate sacrifice, He sat down and rested—ceased from His labour of atonement because there was nothing more to be done, ever. Because of what He did, we no longer have to “labour” in law-keeping in order to be justified in the sight of God. Jesus was sent so that we might rest in God and in what He has provided!

Another element of the Sabbath day rest which God instituted as a foreshadowing of our complete rest in Christ is that He blessed it, sanctified it, and made it holy. Here again we see the symbol of Christ as our Sabbath rest—the holy, perfect Son of God who sanctifies and makes holy all who believe in Him.

Jesus can be our Sabbath rest in part because He is “Lord of the Sabbath” (Matthew 12:8). As God incarnate, He decides the true meaning of the Sabbath because He created it, and He is our Sabbath rest in the flesh. When the Pharisees criticized Him for healing on the Sabbath, Jesus reminded them that even they, sinful as they were, would not hesitate to pull a sheep out of a pit on the Sabbath. Because He came to seek and save His sheep who would hear His voice (John 10:3,27) and enter into the Sabbath rest He provided by paying for their sins, He could break the Sabbath rules. He told the Pharisees that people are more important than sheep and the salvation He provided was more important than rules. By saying, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mark 2:27), Jesus was restating the principle that the Sabbath rest was instituted to relieve man of his labours, just as He came to relieve us of our attempting to achieve salvation by our works. We no longer rest for only one day, but forever cease our labouring to attain God’s favour. Jesus is our rest from works now, just as He is the door to heaven, where we will rest in Him forever!

Hebrews 4 is the one passage proclaiming beyond a doubt Jesus as our Sabbath rest. The writer to the Hebrews urges his readers to “enter in” to the Sabbath rest provided by Christ. After three chapters of telling them that Jesus is superior to the angels and that He is our Apostle and High Priest, he pleads with them to not harden their hearts against Him, as their fathers hardened their hearts against God in the wilderness. Because of their unbelief, God denied that generation access to the holy land, saying, “They shall not enter into My rest” (Hebrews 3:11). In the same way, the writer to the Hebrews begs them—and us—not to make the same mistake by rejecting God’s Sabbath rest in Jesus Christ in Hebrews 4:9-11 “There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.”

There is no other Sabbath rest besides Jesus. He alone satisfies the requirements of the Law, and He alone provides the sacrifice that atones for sin. He is God’s plan for us to cease from the labour of our own works. We dare not reject this one-and-only Way of salvation (John 14:6) After all, “How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation”? (Hebrews 2:3)

May God bless you and through His Holy Spirit guide you in all truth!

Saved by Grace.

"The Shack" - It's heresies

Some people have taken exception to my warning against The Shack. I reviewed the book in 2010, and found 13 heresies in it, and no new truths. There may be more that I have missed. Please remember that the writer and the publishers at first promoted this book as truth, it was only later when they were challenged by Christian Scholars that they admitted it was only fiction. There is no way this book can be deemed Christian, because the God portrayed in this book is definitely not the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God that sent His only begotten Son so that we may be saved through HIS doing and dying on the cross. Here follows a list of the heresies as I found them:

1. God the Father was crucified with Jesus.
2. That God is completely limited by His love and He cannot practice justice.
3. On the cross, God forgave all humanity, regardless of whether they repent or not.
4. Hierarchical structures, whether they are in the church or in government, are evil.
5. God will never judge people for their sins.
6. That there is not a hierarchical structure in the Godhead, just a circle of unity.
7. God submits to human choices and wishes.
8. Justice will never take place because of love.
9. There is no such thing as eternal judgement or torment in hell.
10. It doesn’t matter which way you get to Jesus.
11. Jesus is constantly being transformed along with us.
12. There is no need for faith or reconciliation with God because everyone will make it to heaven.
13. The Bible is not true because it reduces God to paper.

Now here's my list of why the above are heresies:

1. Because God's eyes are pure and cannot look upon sin, the Bible says that God would not look upon His own beloved Son as He hung on the Cross, carrying our sins (Habakkuk 1:13; Matthew 27:45).
2. The Bible declares that God's love and His justice are two sides of the same coin — equally a part of the personality and the character of God (Isaiah 61:8; Hosea 2:19).
3. Jesus explained that only those who come to Him will be saved (John 14:6).
4. Our God is a God of order (Job 25:2).
5. The Word of God repeatedly invites people to escape from the judgment of God by believing in Jesus Christ, His Son (Romans 2:16; 2 Timothy 4:1-3).
6. The Bible says that Jesus submitted to the will of the Father. This doesn't mean that one Person is higher or better than the other; just unique. Jesus said, "I came to do the will of Him who sent me. I am here to obey my Father." Jesus also said, "I will send you the Holy Spirit" (John 4:34, 6:44, 14:26, 15:26).
7. Far from God submitting to us, Jesus said, "Narrow is the way that leads to eternal life." We are to submit to Him in all things, for His glory and because of what He has accomplished for us (Matthew 7:13-15).
8. The Bible teaches that when God's love is rejected, and when the offer of salvation and forgiveness is rejected, justice must take place or God has sent Jesus Christ to die on the cross for nothing (Matthew 12:20; Romans 3:25-26).
9. Jesus' own description of hell is vivid ... it cannot be denied (Luke 12:5, 16:23).
10. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one will come to the Father but by me" (John 14:6).
11. Jesus, who dwells in the splendor of heaven, sits at the right hand of God, reigning and ruling the universe. The Bible says, "In Him there is no change, for He is yesterday, today, and forever" (Hebrews 11:12, 13:8; James 1:17).
12. Jesus said, "Only those who believe in me will have eternal life" (John 3:15, 3:36, 5:24, 6:40).
13. The Bible is God-breathed. Sure, there were many men through 1,800 years who put pen to paper (so to speak), each from different professions and different backgrounds, but the Holy Spirit infused their work with God's words. These men were writing the same message from Genesis to Revelation.

Now, I ask you, can you in all good consciense still say I'm on a witch-hunt? That it is just a book, and it could help people in their understanding of God in his Trinity? Can you even say that the author is writing about the same God that we serve? I think not.

God bless!

Saved by Grace.

Like a Truck Driver

Each of us struggle on a daily basis with our problems. We are buffeted from all sides by troubles and heartache. We might have lost our job, our loved one, our health, our possessions, maybe everything! In this way we get caught in a rut, and we struggle to get out. Our circumstances get the better of us. We are irritable, angry; we don’t have time for the people that really matter in our lives, all because we cannot get our attention away from our difficulties.

Most importantly however, our relationship with God suffers! The reason is that we cannot look up to Him anymore, because we are blinded by our own troubles! We lose our perspective on eternity! Leonard Ravenhill, one of the great preachers of our time, once said: ““Oh, I wish that eternity could have been stamped on my eyeballs!” What did he mean by this? He simply meant that, if that were possible, we would be looking at eternity every moment of our lives, and thus not stare at our problems all day. We would be looking at our problems through eternity-tinted glasses!

What is eternity really?

How do we understand it? The answer is, we can’t. We can only hope on it! We can however, get some sort of perspective on it.

Think of it this way, if you start on the equator, and with a ballpoint pen, you draw a line on earth, following the equator, all around the globe, until you get back to the starting point, and the two ends meet. You now have a line without beginning, and without end. See this as representing eternity. Now, if you should make a little dot anywhere on this line, using a fine liner, this dot would then represent our lives on earth, but……. this dot’s size in relation to the whole line, would be infinitely bigger than our earthly existence would be compared to eternity!

How do we keep our eyes on eternity then in spite of our daily burdens?

Because it is my vocation, I like to use the picture of a truck driver. Imagine yourself sitting up there in that big cab like me. The cab represents Jesus. (Jesus in me and me in Him) From my lofty position I can look down at the other traffic rushing about. (the secular world) I’m on my way to a specific destination. When the weather is fine, I’ll open the window to let in the sunshine and the breeze. If it gets too hot, I simply close the window and start the air-conditioner. If I encounter rain, hail, even snow, I crank up the heat to be nice and cosy, all the while still on my journey. None of these things can touch me in my safe cocoon of a cab. All of this represents our daily problems and struggles.

Do they have any influence on my journey?

Of course. I have to slow down, drive more careful, I might arrive later than planned. I might encounter road-closures and detours, but they will be clearly marked for me to follow so that I will meet up with my intended route again.

Do these things deter me from reaching my destination?

No! This is how I view life. It doesn’t matter what life throws at me, as long as my salvation isn’t affected, (and if one is really born again, it CAN’T be affected) it simply doesn’t matter! Whether I fall sick, lose my job, end up in jail, or whatever, it simply doesn’t matter anymore!

This is what Paul meant when he said in Philippians “…forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” This is how believers worldwide are able to withstand persecution, and still stay true to Christ!

Keep your eyes focussed on eternity, on the finishing line!

I invite you all tonight, come, get into Jesus’s cab, and enjoy the journey!

Amen!

Shalom

Savedbygrace

Is it allowed for a divorced Christian to remarry?

Divorce and Remarriage
“Now the Spirit [of God] expressly says that in latter times [the days we live in now] some will DEPART FROM THE FAITH, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies ...FORBIDDING TO MARRY…” (1Timothy 4:1,3).

Whenever we do not understand God's heart in the Scriptures, we have departed from sound doctrine.

This Scripture could not be talking about forbidding to marry in general. In order that we don’t fall into “...sexual immorality, let EACH MAN have his own wife, and let EACH WOMAN have her own husband” (1Corinthians 7:2). “[For] IT IS NOT GOOD THAT MAN SHOULD BE ALONE…” (Genesis 2:18a).

The erroneous doctrine of forbidding one to marry after a divorce has been preached and taught in many churches. It has violated the conscience and hearts of those who’ve been divorced, driving them into a constant state of confusion and negatively impacting their lives. The only way for these people to come out of that confused state is to leave the church, and many have done just that. Not only do they leave the church to remarry, they also need to be able to make the right decision to divorce when it’s necessary in order to save themselves and their families before all is destroyed.
In order to understand that there IS marriage after divorce, we will examine the Scriptures in Matthew 19:3-12 focusing on the usage of the Greek word, apoluo. The Greek word apoluo that’s translated “divorce” or “to put away” is a general word. Its primary usage is: to “send” (apoluo) someone home when it’s getting late.11 When two people are leaving each other there is a “separation.” Apoluo is a separation in general, which does not involve the “legal” aspect of a permanent separation like a divorce. The common usage is seen in the Scripture “When it was evening, His disciples came to Him, saying ‘This is a deserted place, and the hour is already late. SEND (apoluo) the multitudes away, that they may go unto the villages and buy themselves food’” (Matthew 14:15). The Greek word apoluo doesn’t have a legal aspect to it. It’s just a common word that means, “I’m going to go” or, “away from, to separate.” Because of our wrong beliefs about divorce, this key word was purposely translated (incorrectly) so it would not conflict with our beliefs.
When used concerning a marriage it means a separation and NOT a divorce. If a spouse separates intending never to return, then the next step comes into play; the spouse obtains a “certificate of divorce.” This is what the confrontation between Jesus and the Pharisees (the religious lawyers of His day) was about in Matthew 19:3-12. The legal question was, “Do you just separate, OR do you separate AND give a certificate of divorce?” The Greek word used for divorce in these Scriptures means, to “send away” or separate from, NOT a finalized legal divorce.
The lawyers of God’s law tested Jesus. Their motive was to justify when they only separated from their wives and remarried without ever getting a divorce. They asked Him if God accepts a separation to get remarried without a divorce certificate for just any reason. Jesus responded that when a male and female come together in a marriage union, “...they are no longer two BUT ONE…” (Matthew 19:6a). Because the couple is still united, He doesn’t want “man” (the marriage partners) to just separate from each other and get remarried without a divorce. A SEPARATION ALONE DOES NOT BREAK THE MARRIAGE UNION. IT TAKES A CERTIFICATE OF DIVORCE, ALSO. So the question was NOT, “Can a spouse DIVORCE their mate for any reason,” but “Can a spouse get a SEPARATION from their mate for any reason and then remarry while just separated.”
When a husband just leaves his wife for another woman without ever giving her a certificate of divorce, this keeps the wife in limbo. She could not go back to her husband because he doesn’t want her; and she couldn’t “go and become another man’s wife” as Moses commanded because she is not legally divorced (See Deuteronomy 24:1-2). If she did remarry without a legal divorce, she and the man who married her would be committing adultery. This is why Jesus said, “...whoever separates (apoluo) from his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery; and whoever marries her who is [just] separated (apoluo) commits adultery” (Matthew 19:9 My Translation).
Because the Pharisees’ hearts were so hard “They said to Him [Jesus], ‘WHY then did Moses COMMAND to give a certificate of divorce AND to put her away [separate]?’” (Matthew 19:7). They agreed with the part of the law that said that you could leave your wife, but they didn’t understand that it was not right to keep their wives from getting remarried. A spouse with a hardened heart will not give the other spouse a divorce. They will want to control the person. A person who truly loves unconditionally will always give you a way out: an option not to love.
So it is with God; He always gives us the choice to not love Him. As we choose to love Him, it’s true love. At times the reason a marriage isn’t a truly unconditional loving marriage is because the partners feel that there is never a way out, if needed. If the marriage partners knew that there was a godly way to escape from a failing marriage it would give the couple the freedom to “choose to love,” even when it’s not convenient.
Jesus said to them, “Moses, because of the hardness of your hearts, PERMITTED you to divorce [separate from] your wives, but from the beginning IT [being separated without a divorce] WAS NOT SO” (Matthew 19:8). Notice in verse seven that Moses COMMANDED them to give a certificate of divorce AND to separate (put away) their wives. But in verse eight, because their hearts were so hardened against their spouse, Moses PERMITTED them to just separate without the husband giving the wife a certificate of divorce. The reason Moses commanded that a certificate of divorce be given was to guarantee that the wife could get remarried. Simply, Moses commanded to give a certificate of divorce AND to separate. But because of the hardness of their hearts, Moses permitted them to separate only. The permission to separate and remarry without a divorce was limited to sexual immorality. If the wife was unfaithful, the husband could leave without ever being “officially divorced” — by giving her a certificate of divorcement, and go take another woman as his wife. But if there was no sexual immorality involved, the husband could NOT separate from his wife without getting a divorce first. If he didn’t get a divorce and went to live with another woman or got remarried, they were committing adultery.
“Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek to be loosed [for selfish reasons]. Are you loosed [divorced] from a wife? [In my opinion says Paul, the Apostle] do not seek a wife. BUT EVEN IF YOU DO MARRY, YOU HAVE NOT SINNED; and if a virgin marries, she has not sinned” (1Corinthians 7:26-28a). Notice that the “virgin” AND the person “loosed [divorced]” are both put in the same category — they have “not sinned” by getting married. BOTH THE PERSON WHO WAS NEVER MARRIED AND THE PERSON WHO WAS DIVORCED ARE WITHOUT SIN IF THEY MARRY.
Deuteronomy 24:1-4 tells of a situation where a man married a woman and then divorced her. This woman then married another man. The Scriptures go on to state that if the second marriage ends by her husband writing “...her a certificate of divorce ...OR if the latter husband dies…” (Deuteronomy 24:3,4), she could not remarry the first man she divorced because she had already married someone else. Therefore, if our spouse dies, or if we were divorced, we can get married again. Divorce and death are equal before God. The only stipulation in this Scripture is that if this is the second marriage, we cannot go back to the first spouse and remarry them because we married someone else after we divorced them.

The Hebrew word: shalach is the equivalent of the Greek word: apoluo. 

Eternal Salvation?

Can Christians Lose their Salvation?

This is in answer to an email I received from a friend, argueing that a Christian can lose his/her salvation, once saved by Grace!

Your argument:

So, let’s start with your first scripture. (I use the Authorized King James Version throughout in my quotes)

Heb 6:4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,

Heb 6:5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,

Heb 6:6 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.

Heb 6:7 For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:

Heb 6:8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

You argue that this verse shows clearly that the writer is talking about born-again believers. Your reasoning here I believe is flawed. The word in the original Greek is phōtizō, (pronounced fo-tid'-zo), meaning to illuminate or shed light. The word is used only twice in all of the New Testament, and four times in the Old Testament.

Nowhere is it used to indicate anything resembling salvation, justification or rebirth. To say that only born again people can become enlightened, is an assumption, and one that is not supported by scripture! The son of perdition, Judas Iscariot, for instance, was enlightened, and he was never saved! He was destined to be lost since before creation!

According to Matthew Henry’s commentary on the Bible (he is widely respected and regarded as one of the best and most accurate commentators of the Bible), this passage refers to people with “...notional knowledge and common illumination, of which persons may have a great deal, and yet come short of heaven. Balaam was the man whose eyes were opened (Num_24:3), and yet with his eyes opened he went down to utter darkness. (2.) They may taste of the heavenly gift, feel something of the efficacy of the Holy Spirit in his operations upon their souls, causing them to taste something of religion, and yet be like persons in the market, who taste of what they will not come up to the price of, and so but take a taste, and leave it.” (emphasis by me)

We can also better understand this passage when we look at the parable of the sower and the seed in Matthews gospel (which is referred to in verses 7 and 8 in your quote), specifically verse 7, read with verse 22, which gives an explanation of verse 7.

“Mat 13:7 And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them:

Mat 13:22 He also that received seed among the thorns is he that heareth the word; and the care of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becometh unfruitful.”

Verse 20 and 21 also shed some light on this passage: “20 But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it; 21 Yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended.”

Do you see? By hearing the word, he also receives it with joy! That is what the ‘enlightenment’ and ‘partaking’ that is mentioned in Hebrews refer to. Verse 21 then explains it beautifully, in that he has no root ‘in himself’, meaning he is trusting in himself, in his own works, and therefor he finds no root in himself.  So when the first sign of hardship or persecution shows, he is offended, and falls away! Meaning he turns his back on God and the gospel!

What is true salvation?

This now brings me to what I believe is the crux of the matter, namely, what is meant by true salvation? It is in this that you are making the fundamental mistake in your reasoning.

Let us look at what scripture tells us about how to know we are saved. Turn to the first epistle of John.

1John 2:3 “And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.”

1John 2:4 “He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.”

What these two verses tell us is not an imperative, meaning a command to keep the commandments, because then we would be living under law. No, it is telling us it will come naturally, we will WANT to keep the commandments, not to be saved, or to stay saved, but BECAUSE we are already saved, therefore it is a testimony and yardstick by which true salvation can be recognized and measured.

1John 2:9 “He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.”

This is a chilling verse, because especially in the church of today, we see that people are living according to the law in many ways, so, seeming to be saved, but, at the same time we see so much infighting and division and brother-hating going on, in the church, that we have to come to the conclusion that the majority of people in church, even those with their hands in the air come worship time, are not truly saved! Because under the reverent exterior, there is jealousy, anger and hate towards others. This proves the scripture in Matthew 20:16 “So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many be called, but few chosen.”

1John 2:15 “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.”

Here again, we can see that the people who come to church on Sunday, and Monday he/she carries on his/her adulterous affair, or carries on drinking or whatever, is not truly born-again!

1John 2:23 “Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also.”

This means that either he who literally denies Jesus as Son and savior, (like more than a few reformed ministers – NG, Hervormd, Gereformeerd – who are changing their stance on the virgin birth, Christ’s deity etc.) were never really saved to start with, and also those who would not testify by mouth, but also by their lives, that Jesus is Lord and Saviour!

1John 3:6 “Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.”

1John 3:9 “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.”

These two verses are talking about willful sinning, because all humans sin, whether saved or not, we cannot help it. We can sin less, and we repent, so we do not sin willfully once we are saved, because we hate sin, by virtue of the Holy Spirit in us!

1John 3:10 “In this the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.”

Perfect explanation of how to distinguish between truly saved, and seemingly saved.

1John 3:15” Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.”

Once again, no…. hath eternal life abiding in him, so whoever does this, doesn’t have (never had) eternal life!

1John 5:4” For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.”

Meaning a truly saved person has victory over the sin nature! You cannot willfully go back to sinning without the father bringing you back into line!

1Jn 5:13 “These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe on the name of the Son of God.”

You see, John had written this letter to believers who were doubting their salvation, so that they might know and have trust in and piece because of their salvation!

Why would we not know then? The reason is quite simple really. We were (most of us anyway) told that if you said a little prayer, confessing you’re a sinner, asking for forgiveness, and asking Jesus into your heart, that you are saved! This is NOT true! Although I am not saying that you CANNOT be saved in that moment, as God is sovereign, and can do the work of salvation in you any moment He chooses.

What I am saying is, if that is what we are trusting in to prove our salvation, we are sadly mistaken.  Why? Listen again to that…I say a little prayer. I confess, I ask for forgiveness, I ask Jesus into my heart, and on the strength of MY prayer, I believe I am saved! What does Eph 2:8-9 say again?

“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

Not of works, lest any man should boast.”  (emphasis added by me)

I prayed, I asked, My prayer…sounds an awful lot like boasting, doesn’t it?

So if we were saved by GRACE, and not of ourselves, it means we had NOTHING to do with our salvation, or justification as I prefer to think about it.

You see, this belief is based on Rom 10:9 “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.”

It is a misconception however. If you read verse 8 first, it becomes clearer. “But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach;”

Even if we interpret it the way the proponents of the ‘sinners prayer’ interpret it, we still have one obstacle. How do we know that what the person is confessing, is a true belief in his/her heart? We do not even know our own hearts!

Psa 139:23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:

Why does the psalmist ask this? Let’s look at Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”

We do not even know our own hearts! How then can we, or someone else present for that matter, testify that I am saved because of a little prayer prayed? Then a week, a month, two months later, I have fallen back into old habits, or even worse, and I wonder what has happened? When I seek help I am told “It’s ok, you’ve backslid. We all do that. Just look at your bible where you wrote the date of your salvation, when you said your little prayer, and you’ll know that you are saved. It’s ok!”

Let’s get back to Rom 10:9. We have established, via scripture, that our hearts are not trustworthy barometers whereby to measure our faith.  Now for the first part, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus,…”. This is understood by the “sinner’s prayer” proponents to mean to say the words “I believe in you Lord Jesus, and I ask you into my heart” or something similar. It is not. To properly understand this in its context, we have to go back to Matthew 10:32, where Jesus is speaking:

“Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.”

What is Jesus talking about? He is talking about being witnesses for him, to go out and spread the Gospel, to tell people about Him and His atoning work on the cross! So this verse is actually telling us that if we really believe (and remember, even the faith we have are not of or from ourselves, but it is given us by God), we will be witnesses to the world about Him. We will speak the words of life through the power of the Holy Spirit, and by this we will know who are saved. Does this make sense to you?

Let’s go on and see what happens if you seem to be saved outwardly, but the inward working of the Holy Spirit never took place. This brings to mind Matthews 12, where Jesus spoke to the Pharisees, saying:

“…….When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none. Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.”

I believe this is a type of description of an apostate person. This is what a person who ‘falls away’ is called.

You see, true salvation comes through the supernatural working of the Holy Spirit inside a person! Not by a person ‘allowing’ or ‘asking’ God into his/her heart!

3

How does it happen that we get saved?

Let’s see what the word teaches us. We have already read Eph 2:8-9. Let’s look at a few other scriptures:

John 10:28, where Jesus himself says: “And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish,”

John 3:15-18 “That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”

John 6:40 “And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.”

John 6:44 “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.”

John 6:47 “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.”

John 6:65 “And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.”

John 14:6 “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”

Act 16:31 “And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”

Rom 3:24-28 “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;  To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.  Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.”

What do we learn from these passages?

Two things:

1.       Nothing is of us or our works.

2.       Everything is of and by God!

We have no part in our salvation, in the very process of being saved. It is all God! Even though Acts 16:31 says we should believe, this faith comes not from ourselves, but is given us by God the father! Compare John 6:44, 65.

What you must realise is that God the Father has decided before time began (Tit 1:2  In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began;) who was going to be the bride of Christ, in other words who will be saved, so then, He now gives this bride (saved people), to the Son. That is why Jesus says “but he that believeth not is condemned already” because they were not predestined, and also “And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing” (John 6:37) Thus, once we are given to Jesus, we are saved, and HE WILL LOSE NOTHING!

Proof that “Once saved, always saved” is true

This is also referred to as ‘eternal salvation’. Let’s once again turn to the Bible to see what it teaches:

John 3:15 “That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life”.

John 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

John 10:28 “And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. “

John 10:29 “My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand.”

John 6:37 “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.”

John 6:39 “ And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.”

John 6:40 “And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.”

Rom 8:38-39 “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, 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.”

Eph 4:30 “And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.”

Jud 1:24 “Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy”

John10:28-29 says that “neither shall any man” and “no man”, meaning literally NO MAN, not even YOU YOURSELF! Because were you able to do that, one or both of two things would have to be true:

1.       You are mightier than God.

Or

2.       Christ’s atoning work on the cross was not sufficient!

Logical evidence

As with many other scriptural doctrines, the idea of “once saved, always saved” is also supported logically. Eternal security is consistent with everything else the Bible teaches about mankind, and God. Examining the doctrine in relation to the rest of Scripture demonstrates that it is consistent with all other biblically sound teachings. The idea of losing our salvation is not only unscriptural, but it creates monumental problems with other doctrines, including salvation by faith, the sin nature of man, and the purpose of Christ’s sacrifice.

The Bible teaches that man is inherently sinful -- that a sinful nature is a part of all of us.

Rom 3:10 “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:”

This means that even after being saved, every single believer is going to sin from time to time. Thinking that we can live a perfect, sinless life after our salvation is not only unscriptural, but arrogant.

Jas 2:10 “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.”

If we are not eternally secure, this sinning will cause us to lose our salvation, but how much sin is too much? There is no scriptural “yardstick” given to tell us how many or what kind of sins are enough to void our salvation. Without eternal security, the Bible would describe a situation where Christianity is a perpetual game of Russian Roulette; a life in which condemnation and salvation alternate every time we sin and confess, and we never know if we’re saved or not.

Scriptural passages (Ephesians 2:8-9) which we have already read, and

Isa 64:6  “But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.”,

indicate that our attempts at good deeds will never earn us a place in heaven. We cannot make up for our past, present, or future sins by doing good works. A saved believer will, as a natural product of their faith, avoid sin as much as possible, and practice good works

Jas 2:18 “Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works”.

 If “once saved, always saved” is not true, then by necessity we are saved both by our faith and our works. If we can do sinful things, or not do good things

Jas 2:17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

and lose our security, then our good deeds are a part of our salvation. This concept is contradictory to Scripture. It also creates an unliveable scenario where we have to try to do enough good to outweigh our sinful natures. The doctrine of “eternal security” goes hand in hand with the doctrine of “saved by faith alone.” To deny eternal security is to endorse a “faith plus works” salvation system!

Jesus Christ made some powerful statements about morality during His earthly ministry. In those three short years, He talked the talk and walked the walk of the toughest moral and ethical system in human history. Most religions focus on the external actions, but Christ took the concept of sin and holiness to a much deeper level. For example, most religions are satisfied to condemn the physical act of adultery, but Christ said

Matt 5:28 “Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart”

Christ set the bar for holiness at a level all Christians are called to aspire to, but none can ever fully live up to, because of our sin nature. Just as the law of Moses was meant, in part, to demonstrate to Israel how impossible it was for mortal man to obtain the moral perfection of God, the standards of Christ also remind us of how shallow our best efforts at goodness really are. Thankfully, God has always provided a way for us to be forgiven for our shortcomings. Christ’s sacrifice on the cross served the same purpose for all mankind that the sacrificial lambs did for specific families before His ministry. Christ was a sinless, blameless substitute for our sins. The Bible clearly tells us what Christ’s moral expectations are for us. If we lost our salvation every time we fell short of those ideals, then none of us would be saved for more than a few minutes at a time. If that were true, what purpose was there in His death?

Once Saved, Always Saved – The New Creation

Critics of the “once saved, always saved” doctrine, as you yourself have done, claim that it gives Christians a license to sin. They presume that those who believe in eternal security intend to accept salvation, and then continue to willingly sin. This is inaccurate, because anyone who has been truly saved is a new creature:

2Co 5:17 “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.”

 has the conviction of the Holy Spirit:

John 14:26  “But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you.”

1Th 4:8b “…… but God, who hath also given unto us his holy Spirit”.

and now wants to live for Christ.

Someone who continues to willingly and blatantly live in sin has not truly accepted Christ!

1Jn 2:19 “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.”

1Jn 3:6 “Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.”

Jas 1:26 “If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man's religion is vain.”

While this false belief may be held by some, it is not a part of the teachings of any true Christian church.

Rom 3:8 “And not rather, (as we be slanderously reported, and as some affirm that we say,) Let us do evil, that good may come? whose damnation is just.”

A person who willingly, humbly, repents of sin and turns towards the cross, trusting Christ as their Saviour, will be saved (Acts 16:31; John 6:37; John 14:6).

That salvation is once and for all, eternal, and secure. Those who truly trust in Christ are saved once, and saved always!

To conclude then, your further arguments and scenarios all point to works based salvation, i.e. “I’m a born again Christian, I confessed all with heart and soul (which we cannot know anyway), did what the Bible told me to, from Baptism and being anointed with oil on my head, and baptism with the Holy Spirit. I walk the way of Jesus for a while…” This is all legalism, the Bible doesn’t tell you to do these things to get saved, and neither does it state you have to do these things to keep your salvation. They are all the results of salvation! If someone who were ‘Baptised by the Holy Spirit’ falls away, they were never truly baptised. Can you see the shift in thinking that is necessary?

In Revelation where Jesus says “he who overcomes”, He doesn’t mean by our own efforts, because we cannot! It is by His efforts, because we are in Him, and He in us! Once again a product of His saving grace, not an imperative! He is doing all the work, all of the time. All these other things are testimony to our salvation, nothing else!

With Love

Greetings in Christ Jesus, our Lord and Saviour!

Your brother

SavedbyGrace