Repentance and Salvation: A Key Gospel Issue
In his book, Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God (pp. 71-72), J. I. Packer, writes, “It is not enough to believe that only through Christ and His death are sinners justified and accepted, and that one’s own record is sufficient to bring down God’s condemning sentence twenty times over, and that, apart from Christ one […]
Lordship and Salvation
Charles C. Ryrie writes in his book, Balancing the Christian Life (Chicago: Moody Press, 1969), “Enthronement [putting Christ on the throne of my life; making Him Lord of my life; etc.] is not a condition for salvation but rather . . . it should he a consequence of it” (p.179). In support of that contention […]
Absolute Assurance for New Believers? Yes!
By Mike Cocoris How soon after trusting Christ can a person know that he has eternal life? There are two basic answers to that question.1 One view teaches that from the moment of faith a person can have assurance of eternal life. A second view insists that a newborn Christian cannot have immediate assurance of […]
Sexual Sins and the Body of Christ
Dealing with Immorality in the Church Without Altering the Gospel or Undermining Assurance Sexual immorality is rampant today. The seventies and eighties have been an era of free sex. Unfortunately, the problem of sexual immorality did not bypass the body of Christ. Studies show that sexual immorality (e.g., premarital sex, adultery, homosexuality, incest, lusting over […]
A Faith in Christ Alone Which Won’t Save? – John 8:30-32
I recently heard a message by R. C. Sproul on John 8:30-32. The following so caught my attention that I transcribed it: “The Bible knows nothing of a salvation that is so cheap that all one has to do is embrace the idea that Jesus has died on the cross for them without having any […]
Does Hell Await Those Who Fall? — 2 Peter 2:18-22
Last month we considered 2 Peter 1:10-11. This month we will consider another difficult passage in 2 Peter. Recently I received a question from a reader about 2 Peter 2:20-22. He felt that it dealt with unbelievers who knew about the gospel but had never really accepted it in their hearts. My understanding of the […]
A Voice from the Past: Salvation and Assurance
Lewis Sperry Chafer wrote in his 1917 work, Salvation (reprinted by Zondervan 1980), ” From the testimony of Scripture a Christian should know that he is saved . . . Where there is a lack of assurance there is usually an impression that so long as the life is quite imperfect (and how immodest it […]
Is Forgiveness Available to All?
I received a letter from a reader regarding a comment I made in the March Newsletter. I had said regarding the “goats” of the Matthew 25:31-46 judgment, “Since those cast into eternal fire did not believe in Christ, their sins were not covered by His blood and hence they were doomed to eternal damnation (cf. […]
Has This Passage Ever Bothered You? – 2 Peter 1:10 – Assurance Based on Works?
I recently received a request to discuss 2 Peter 1:10. A reader wrote, “It is hard to avoid the conclusion that [based on 2 Peter 1:10] assurance of salvation is to be based upon works . . . Can you shed any light on this matter?” The verse reads: “Therefore, brethren, be all the more […]
Literature Lair
Faith and Saving Faith by Gordon Clark (Jefferson, MD: The Trinity Foundation, 1983) is a weighty book well worth the effort it takes to chew, swallow, and digest its fare. [It is not an easy book to read.] In it Clark argues that saving faith is no different in kind than any other type of […]