Related Posts
This objection sounds like this: “If genuine believers cannot lose their salvation and don’t have the actual option of rejecting Christ if they wanted to, after they got saved, then they don’t really have free will anymore.” Such an objection is based on the false assumption that human free will is not influenced by anything, is not bound to neither depends on the inherent nature of the person in any way, which can be either sinful from the first Adam, or righteous from the last Adam, Jesus Christ.
God Himself has complete free will. However, He will never choose to embrace evil or Satan’s ways. He will never even want to do such a thing, His free will is completely bound to His righteous nature. That is how genuine believers are after salvation as well.
The free will of the first Adam was not utterly dependent on his nature before the fall. Why? It’s because even though he had a holy nature inside, he was still capable of committing a sin that could change his nature into darkness: eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Even the free will of lost people before salvation is not entirely dependent on their sinful nature. Why? Because under the influence of the Holy Spirit, and at the hearing of the Gospel message, they can make a decision that will completely recreate them spiritually. However, after salvation, born-again believers become one spirit with the Trinity (1 Corinthians 6:17). Their will is still free but now dependent on the holy nature inside them in regard to eternal salvation.
I heard some believers saying that the reason we have the Holy Spirit in us now is to help us sanctify ourselves so that we can maintain our salvation to the end, and that we should employ His help using our free will, the same way we used our free will to accept salvation and be born again. While it is true that we need the Holy Spirit’s help for sanctification and that our will is involved in this process, it is not true that maintaining our salvation relies entirely on our choice to use the Holy Spirit’s help. Let’s read Romans 4:1-8,
Romans 4:1–8 (NKJV)
1 What then shall we say that Abraham our father has found according to the flesh?
2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.
3 For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.”
4 Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt.
5 But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness,
6 just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works:
7 “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered;
8 Blessed is the man to whom the LORD shall not impute sin.”
Abraham lived in a time when the Law of Moses had not been given yet and the Holy Spirit was not living in him to help him do works of holiness. He did not have any other way of maintaining his salvation or righteousness, except through faith according to the passage above. Moreover, at Verse 6, King David described the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from his works (separated and independent of our good works) and he was referring to the future new creations in Christ. Were Abraham and King David in a better position than us, the believers in Christ? I am asking this because their lives seem to have been much simpler than ours by not having to maintain their righteousness by works. They only had faith and that was enough, and Abraham is the father of the seed of Christ, to whom all believers belong to. So, even though we use our free will to employ the Holy Spirit’s help and strength in doing works of holiness which we need to pursue, these have no value in maintaining our righteousness. They are only a means of releasing more and more God’s inheritance that resides in us, on the outside, and manifesting the gift of righteousness in us in increasing measure. These works will also receive reward in the future life.
Listen / Watch / Download
You can listen to the audio message of this article, watch the video message, or download it in different formats (mp3 / mp4 / pdf) from the following link:
Session 12 – Eternal Security and Free Will (Saved for Eternity) – July 5th, 2024
