I came across this quote from Lewis Sperry Chafer. He contrasts the eternal salvation preached by Jesus with the “transient” salvation believed by Arminians:

“The Arminian’s difficulty is initial. To him salvation is no more than a state of mind, a good intention, a resolution, or an outward manner of life. Such passing or transient verities as these are far removed from the inviolable, divine creation which Christ pressed upon Nicodemus and that which is presented in every New Testament reference to this theme. It may be safely asserted that regeneration, as presented in the Scriptures, is an enduring actuality and the one who questions the eternal continuation of the child of God, questions the process (and its result) by which he becomes a child of God” (Systematic Theology, 3:336).

According to Chafer, Arminians do not believe in New Testament salvation. They do not believe in John 3 salvation. If you don’t believe that the salvation Jesus gives is an “enduring actuality,” then you have not believed that which is “presented in every New Testament reference to this theme.”

When GES preaches the necessity of believing in the eternality of salvation, sometimes people object: “Well I didn’t believe in eternal security when I was born again. You don’t need to believe in that benefit to have it.”

But eternal security is not just one benefit among others. As Chafer says, every conceivable way of presenting salvation includes eternality. Justification, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, reconciliation, pardon, the new birth, life everlasting, the indwelling of the Spirit, heavenly citizenship, etc., are all “enduring actualities.” They are all irrevocable, not “passing or transient.” If someone denies the eternality of salvation, if he only believes in a “passing or transient” salvation, then he does not believe in the salvation Jesus offers.