To Be Least

      My fear is that many people when they hear the idea that you can not lose your salvation once you have received it will grow dormant, cease to grow and turn back to their sinful ways. If eternal life is definite, then what will make us keep living according to God's will?

26If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. 28Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. 29How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? 30For we know him who said, "It is mine to avenge; I will repay," and again, "The Lord will judge his people.' 31It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. (Heb. 10:26-31)

      Look closely at these scriptures. The first reference to losing your promise of salvation is talking not about a casual knowledge, but an in depth personal knowledge that they have received. They have become Christians. However, even more convincing to me is the talk about the man who "who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace?" Notice that it says the blood of the covenant that sanctified him. He was sanctified by the blood of Jesus. He received Christ into his life at one point! He committed sin, he disregarded the Son of God. Obviously looking at the context this was not one action, this was deliberate sin continuously.

      With this idea in mind lets look in the prophetic book of Revelation where John writes to the church in Ephesus.

4Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love. 5Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. (Rev. 2:4)

      These are Christians who have fallen, they need to repent and turn away from their sinful ways by doing what they used to do as practicing Christians. However, if they do not repent God will remove the church, or "lampstand" (Rev. 1:20). What makes a church a true church of God? The presence of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit enters us when we become Christians. This church if they do not repent will cease to become a church, cease to be indwelled with the Holy Spirit. Does this not apply to the church of today? Is it truly possible that if we keep on sinning, forsake our "first love" and do not repent the Holy Spirit can leave us?

"Now it is God who has made us for this very purpose and has given us the Spirit as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come." (2 Cor. 5:5)

Now it is God who makes both us and you stand firm in Christ. He anointed us, 22set his seal of ownership on us, and put his Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come. (2 Cor. 1:22)

      The Holy Spirit guarantees what is to come. What is to come? Eternal life with our God in heaven is what is to come. So if the Holy Spirit is removed, so is the guarantees which we have as long as we have the Holy Spirit in us.

May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people.