No tags yet.
Unconditional Security
To begin, you need to feel the tension that exists between passages on the topic of eternal security. This tension is precisely why there is such a diversity of views. Each side has a bag full of texts that they go to, but the question is how we reconcile all of these texts, and if that reconciliation seems artificial, forced, or desperate in any way. Again, from my perspective every one of the traditional positions seem artificial or forced at certain points, but the Molinistic view does not.
So let’s start with the ‘unconditional security’ view. Here are some verses that are commonly appealed to in this view in no particular order.
39 This is the will of him who sent me: that I should lose none of those he has given me but should raise them up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of my Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in him will have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.
John 6:39-40
27 My sheep hear my voice, I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all. No one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.
John 10:27-29
13 And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14 who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.
Ephesians 1:13-14
30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.
Ephesians 4:30
6 I am sure of this, that he who started a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.
Philippians 1:6
…as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ, 8 who will sustain you to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 1:7b-8
12 For this reason I also suffer these things, but I am not ashamed; for I know whom I have believed and I am convinced that He is able to guard what I have entrusted to Him until that day.
2 Timothy 1:12
13 If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.
2 Tim 2:13
18 The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.
2 Timothy 4:18
2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith...
Hebrews 12:2
29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 30 And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.
Romans 8:29-30
23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord…For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.
Romans 6:23; 11:29
9 Everyone who has been born of God does not sin, because his seed remains in him; he is not able to sin, because he has been born of God.
1 John 3:9
19 They went out from us, but they did not belong to us; for if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us. However, they went out so that it might be made clear that none of them belongs to us.
1 John 2:19
24 Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of his glory with great joy,
Jude 1:24
This is by no means is an exhaustive list for the unconditional security view, though I think it is a good representative sampling. Space does not allow me to provide a point-counterpoint commentary on each of the passages I have cited, though I have personally compiled such a document. If you are interested in going deeper, I would be happy to share it. Shoot me an email. What I will do here is give a brief summary, offer general responses from a conditional security perspective, and give my final assessment on these verses.
I hope it is fairly obvious why an advocate of unconditional security would cite these texts. A straightforward reading gives the impression that once a person has believed in Christ, they cannot be lost. Based on these verses, when we believe in Christ, we become God’s possession, and he guarantees our salvation by giving us his Holy Spirit as a down payment (Eph 1:13-14; 4:30). When given the Holy Spirit, we have been born again, becoming a child of God (Rom 8:15-16). And as a child of God, his “seed” (our new godly nature produced by the Holy Spirit) remains in us, keeping us from an unrepentant sinful lifestyle, including the sin of apostasy (1 John 3:9). It is because of this “seed” that we are said to be a new creation (2 Cor 5:17), precisely because we have a new godly nature. The point of 1 John 3:9 is that those who have believed, have been fathered by God, and if fathered by him, they have been given his “seed” that keeps them from sinning, including the sin of apostasy. This is why Jesus is said to be the perfecter of our faith (Heb 12:2). If our faith fails, then can we really say that Jesus perfects it?
God also promises that our salvation will be completed, sustained to the end by Him, and we will be blameless before him (1 Cor 1:7b-8; Phil 1:6; 2 Tim 4:18). If a true believer loses their salvation, then it just isn’t true that the Lord brings them safely to his heavenly kingdom (2 Tim 4:18). If a believer falls away, then it is false that God carries on to completion the good work he began in that individual (Phil 1:6). If believers fall away then it is false that God sustained them to the end, guiltless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Cor 1:7b-8). Similarly, what confidence, what comfort, encouragement or hope can one find in a verse like Jude 1:24 if you think that believers will stumble, fall away, and be not blameless but guilty on judgement day? To the contrary, it seems that what God starts he will finish- from foreknowledge to glorification (Rom 8:29-30). It is an unbroken chain. Once the process is started, it will be finished. If someone loses their salvation in the middle, then it goes against this text. This conclusion fits nicely with John’s point, that if someone does walk away from the faith, then they were never a believer to begin with, otherwise they would not have walked away (1 John 2:19).
Now, what might the believer in conditional security say in response to some of these passages? I want to start with what I call the “equivocal texts.” By that I mean texts that to me, can fit with either interpretation (conditional or unconditional security). In the case of John 6:39-40, they would say that God is also not willing that any should perish but all come to repentance (2 Pet 3:9; 2 Tim 2:4). People still perish though. Similarly, people still fall away. I think this is a fair rebuttal, but not a refutation. If God’s will on one matter is not accomplished, it does not necessarily mean that his will on another matter will not be accomplished.
How about John 10:27-29? They would say that there is a condition that must be met, namely that one must listen and follow Jesus’ voice in order to be one of his sheep. If someone ceases to follow him, then they cease to be one of his sheep. The reply from the believer in unconditional security is that the verse says “they will never perish” in reference to the sheep. If someone who once was a sheep ends up perishing, then it would seem to make Jesus’ promise untrue. That individual could say, “I was one of his sheep, and I perished. He said his sheep would never perish though.” I see both sides to this one, so again I am willing concede that it is equivocal, though personally I think the unconditional security advocate has a stronger point here.
So what about 2 Tim 2:13? Again, I can see this verse going either way, because it is immediately preceded by the statement, “if we endure we will also reign with Him, if we deny Him, he will deny us.” Lastly, how about Romans 6:23 in conjunction with Romans 11:29? The advocate of conditional security would say that the statement about gifts being irrevocable applies only to Israel in context, and therefore is not a general principle. The advocate of unconditional security would say that the theme of the gift of salvation by faith is prevalent throughout the entire book of Romans, and since both statements are by the same author in the same book with a common theme, it is justifiable to connect these verses. Both sides make fair points.
To be as objective as I possibly can, I have put some of the verses commonly cited in support of unconditional security in the category of “equivocal.” But what about the other verses I listed? Those to me, are significantly stronger. And it is on these verses that I feel the conditional security interpretation feels forced and artificial. They have imposed their view on the text rather than derive their view from it. Their interpretation of what I consider the stronger verses in support of unconditional security, is that those texts assume the condition of continued faith in Christ, even if it does not explicitly mention it. To get a sense of that interpretation, read back through verses like Phil 1:6, 1 Cor 1:7b-8, 2 Tim 1:12, Jude 1:24, etc., and add the phrase “if we continue in the faith” to the end of each one. This leads them to read the promises of perseverance as a promise of God’s faithfulness, but not ours.
One problem I have with this interpretation is that it reads something into the text that is not actually stated, and in the stronger verses I mentioned, it appears to run counter to their plain meaning. Again, I think their view has to be imposed on the text, rather than derived from it, and it doesn’t fit well. Let me give some examples. Take Jude 1:24 first. This is a promise that God is able to keep one from falling in such a way that would cost them heaven. But wouldn’t that kind of fall be an accurate description of apostasy? Yes! So I conclude that God is able to keep one from apostatizing. Now if we understand God’s will to be such that he desires no one to perish (2 Pet 3:9), and he is able to keep up from apostatizing, then we are saying that God is both able and willing to keep us from apostatizing. The text does not say how God does this, but I think it is a fair conclusion that he is able and willing to do it.
A second consideration with Jude 1:24 is that adding the condition of continuing in the faith to the verse only makes it sound contradictory, or at the very least empties it of any encouragement, which would have been Jude’s point in writing it. On the conditional security view, it would be fair to read it something like “Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling unless you stumble…” Similarly, Philippians 1:6 would be contradictory if a true believer falls away, because his salvation, which God began, was not completed. I will not rehearse again the arguments I gave above about the stronger verses in support of unconditional security. It just seems that their interpretation does not fit well, and actually runs counter to the plain meaning of these verses. Apparently, a true believer’s faith will not be perfected though Jesus says it will. Apparently, the good work that is started in a true believer will not be carried to completion though God says it will. Apparently, God’s chain of redemption can be broken, despite his foreknowledge. Apparently, some people’s old sinful natures will overwhelm their new nature.
My final objection has to do with the justification for reinterpreting these texts. The advocate of CS reads these promise passages in light of all the warning passages. To them, the warning passages are so clear, they feel forced to reject the plain meaning of the promise passages and substitute a conditional one. That justification for reading this particular set of texts in light of the other particular set is invalid if the sets are not categorically the same. And as I will argue later, I think the two sets of texts are in different categories. To interpret one in light of the other is to conflate possibilities with actualities. In a more philosophically rigorous sense, they confuse propositions that are modal (what can happen) with propositions that are de facto (what will happen). Be patient, I will elaborate on this when I present the Molinist perspective.
To sum up then, I think there are a handful of texts that strongly support the position of unconditional security for the reasons I have outlined above. Typically, at this point a believer in unconditional security will say “There! I have shown you that it is impossible to lose one’s salvation.” And the believer in conditional security will then open his bag of texts to show that it is indeed possible. So to those texts we now turn.