Security of Salvation

Remember, we looked at the, in terms of the assurance of salvation, that's sort of our conditional aspect. We're walking by faith, where security is really the body of truth that looks at what scripture says about, can a person be eternally saved? So we'll look at that today. And actually there's, as you notice in the book, there's differing views on that. And at the very end, I have a chart that kind of talks about that.

I don't know, it's been my experience, I'm not sure about your experience, but my experience in reading through Scripture, the more you look at Scripture, the more verses you look at, the more you study it, the more I become convinced that you can be assured of your salvation.

Scripture teaches that, that God is the one that's maintaining your salvation, not you. You've exercised faith in terms of that, but he's the one that's maintaining it. And I think that's an important thing. People can be very upset and very tossed to and fro, as Scripture says, because they're not assured that they're really saved. Or somehow they've been saved and something's happened and that's changed.

So let's look at the first So I have a couple of statements from Dr. Schaefer here in terms of eternal security, the doctrine that comprehends the idea of continuation of salvation, that you are saved and that's going to continue on. As we're going to see, there are just many, many passages that talk about how salvation has started and God is going to maintain it. He's not going to be thwarted in his purpose. So the question is, can a person who is saved ever be lost? jump out of the hand of God? Can they remove themselves? That's really the question. And it's not talking about people. This is not talking about coming to know the Lord. This is talking about once you have become a believer, can that state change?

And Dr. Schaeffer, in the book, he offers 12 undertakings for the child of God. He has them divided, and you'll see the next page, between God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. which I think are really excellent, but I was looking back on some stuff I had, and I found this one writer had 26 arguments for eternal security, and actually included the 12 from Dr. Schaeffer, but he had more beyond that.

I think there's just a tremendous number of verses and passages. In fact, actually one author, His view was that almost every part of the New Testament has something to say about eternal security. There isn't a part you can find that does not address that either indirectly or directly. So it's something that is addressed a lot.

And then the last chart actually, Dr. Schaeffer, one of his other writings, had kind of categorized, you know, in that first section of the book there's like about 50 some verses that are verses that people have questioned about eternal security. And basically, there's a rebuttal to that.

And I'm not going to probably have a chance to go through that, but if there are particular verses that have bothered you over the years, Hal actually has answered some of those in certain cases. And, you know, we probably won't cover it today, but come and talk with us and we'll talk about those verses, or maybe if there's interest we can talk about each one. But I think if you look at them carefully, there's an answer for each one of those verses. He hasn't left us without an answer for those verses, and you don't have to...

I think it's consistent with the rest of Scripture, properly looked at. Okay, so what we'll talk about today are going to be the 12 aspects of God's undertaking for the child of God in terms of what does Scripture say about a person once being saved, will he continue to be saved? And as you're going to notice as we go through these, there's a section on the Father, on the Son, and on the Holy Spirit. These are doctrines and concepts in terms of salvation that we've talked about before, or maybe you're very familiar with. But I'd like you to look, as we go through these verses, I'd like you to look at the verses as we go through and think about them in the context, does this verse tell me something about the security or the emphatic nature of the way it's stated? In many cases it's stated that it's irrevocably, I hate that word, cannot be changed. It's unchangeable, what God has done. If He saved a person, that state cannot be changed.

So we're going to look through the the purpose of God, the power of God, the love of God. And then one tremendous thing is its influence. In John 17, boy, that's just a wonderful, wonderful prayer the Lord Jesus prays. And it's something I would commend you to read and study. There's a lot to be gained from just looking at that passage of Scripture.

And then very familiar concepts in terms of the death, resurrection, and the Lord Jesus' ministry in heaven as intercessor and advocate, or look at that. And in terms of the Holy Spirit, the regeneration, indwelling, baptism, and sealing. So all those are things we've kind of touched on before, but we're going to look at them kind of in the light of how can I look at these passages? What do they tell me about the security of the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ?

All right. So I approximately have two of these per chart. Two things to look at. So the first two are the purpose of God and the power of God. So in terms of salvation, these first three verses here are very familiar verses. I'm trying to highlight the sections where I spoke to the fact about our eternal security. So, the Lord talks off with these wonderful... This is his purpose.

John 3.16 really is stating his purpose. His purpose was, he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

And one thing neat about that, in fact, you'll notice in John 3.16 and in John 5.24, It says, but have eternal life in John 3.16 and then down in John 5.24. He who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life.

The context of those, that's a present reality. That's a present condition of the believer right now. Eternal life starts when you believe. It's not something that you have to wait for. I'm going to get eternal life when I go to be with the Lord. I have eternal life now. And that's kind of the the tense of the verb in the original language, that you have eternal life. It's a present reality right now.

It's not something you're waiting for. So that in and of itself gives us this assurance that if I have it now, is God going to somehow take it away? There's no verses that talk about Him removing your salvation. He started it. He's going to continue it. So that's part of the aspect we want to see as we go through here. A couple of things just to kind of look at. It's whoever, in John 3, it's whoever believes or basically it's everyone. Everyone who places their trust. It's not, well, some that place their trust, there might be an issue. It's everyone who places their trust has this present eternal life.

One thing that's just kind of a little observation there, the only begotten Son, that speaks of the Lord Jesus as the uniquely begotten. It's the idea of uniqueness, not... Unique is the idea being conveyed, and the begotten kind of gets in, well, he came into being at a certain time, he wasn't eternally present from all eternity. So it's uniquely begotten.

Then down in John 5.24, Once again, it talks about this eternal life and does not come into judgment. And we're going to look at that in a little bit in terms of judgment. We'll see some other passages on that.

I'm sorry. Sure. Right. In which case? Well... I mean, I know people that say that one time they were believers and they don't believe that anymore. What does that mean? Yeah. And actually, that's a very real possibility in a believer's life. That a time will come when, if you think about, I love Hal's picture of the man and the little little switch there he has, basically. A person can walk contrary to what he is. He can walk in the flesh. I think that's, to my mind, that's the best explanation. A person can say, you know, I don't believe anymore.

But what's tremendous is, God says that he continues to be faithful. He says when we're not faithful, he remains faithful. I mean, it's just For every situation you can think of, God has it covered. He has a plan that's covered. If we are faithless, that's a key point. Who's maintaining our salvation? If that's not settled in your mind, if you're somehow holding on to your salvation, if you're the key element in your salvation, I think that's incorrect view of Scripture. It's God that's maintaining your salvation. If you see that from Scripture, I think you're on a path to security and understanding I'm secure in Him. If you see somehow that you have to hang on to it, you have to do something, continue to do something, then... Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, again... I don't know. Okay.

A couple of weeks ago we looked at the fact that the word believe or faith are very much the same word and even idea of trust. So, you know, true faith is really realizing that you're not able to do it. God is able to do it. That's what true faith is. It's not, you know, faith is believing in a person. The person of Christ. So, I think having a proper definition of faith and what faith is. And we've all heard over the years many analogies to what faith is. Are you really trusting God for that? Do you see that He's the one that can do it? If you see yourself somehow involved in that, you're going to... And hopefully as we go through some of these verses, you'll see that.

But the thing I was pointing out in that one particular case there, the fact of having eternal life is really a present... Talking about the present condition, we have it right now. It's not something we're waiting for. We have it right at this moment, the moment you believe.

And then in John 5, 24, just a critical point to see that before you were saved, God said that we were dead in trespasses and sins. You passed out of death into life. And that life is the life of the Lord Jesus. It's His life. At the point of your salvation, right.

And then John 6.37, All that the Father gives me will come to me.

You know, what we're going to kind of see here and we're going to get into next week is this idea, and this is another tough one, is that our being chosen and elected and predestined to be believers. And we're going to talk about that a lot next week. But this is all that the Father gives me, talking about the Lord Jesus, talking about His Father gives me, will come to me. So that's basically speaking of our being chosen and elected.

But what's tremendous is, and the one who comes to me, the last part of that verse is going to speak about our present condition of salvation. Is God going to get tired of us? Or is he going to get saying, well, you're just not measuring up, you're just not cutting the mustard here anymore. Is he going to give up on us?

And the last half of 37 says, and the one who comes to me I will certainly not cast out. And actually I like, another rendering is, what's neat is, okay, if you look at the original language here, the idea of certainly not is trying to express this, It's a double negative in the Greek and actually can be rendered positively not. He will positively not cast you out. So it's saying that it's another assurance of his salvation. It's a sure thing. It cannot be changed.

And to emphasize that, the original language has a double negative. And there's another one coming up here in a little bit too that has another double negative in it. And you can't quite, certainly not doesn't quite convey to me quite the double negative. I don't know. It doesn't quite come across as strongly, but it is. It's there. What else?

Okay, so that's kind of the purpose of God. God's purpose is that we believe, and once we believe, we are eternally secure. We have eternal life the moment we believe, and he certainly will not cast us out. He will positively not cast us out. We are his forever. So that's God's purpose in terms of our salvation, now His power.

I was kind of thinking, you know, boy, with all the, you know, every time you open a newspaper these days, there's some other tragedy or difficulty or, you know, now we're into these things with, you know, nightclubs and things being on fire, all kinds of things. And I was kind of thinking, what are the things that men, including believers, what are the things that we fear and maybe we shouldn't? I mean, you know, just... Can you give me some things that might, you know...

Like today, getting here, was there anything that kind of bothered you driving here today? I mean, this isn't a real difficult question. What's that, Marilyn? The other driver is okay. Not myself, the other driver. That's good, I like that. So, you know, men are concerned that something's going to happen And that flows into, I think, eternal security. Something's going to happen. I'm going to wake up one morning and say, you know, I don't believe this anymore. Like I think Marilyn said, I just don't believe this anymore. This is not true. It doesn't really apply to me anymore. They put it in the shelf and put it aside.

Is that going to thwart God's purpose in our life? If a person has truly believed, is that going to change what he's done? And I think when we look at the power, we're going to see, especially the last verse, we're going to see that there's nothing that once God has started a work in you, there's nothing that's going to deter Him. And that's what God's Word is all about, assuring us that we have an eternal salvation.

I jumped ahead there a little bit, but let's go back to John 10.29. In fact, let's look at that for a second. A couple of verses prior to that I'd like to look at.

And I hope when we come out of all this, we have a lot of pages to go through, a lot of verses. I hope you come away with that God's Word really does tell me that I can know that I am saved. I mean, that's the desire of all this whole chapter and this whole group of verses, that you come away and say, yes, it does say that I'm eternally saved. So that's what I'm hoping with all these verses that we see. So I was going to ask if somebody could read Just about three verses here. In John 10, 27, 28, and 29.

Harry, thanks. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My father who has given them to me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of my father's hands. Thanks, Harry. That's great. So, in the context here, he's talking about my sheep. And basically, I believe he's talking about believers. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.

And I give them eternal life. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. And what's neat is, and they shall never perish, in the original, this is another double negative. It basically can be rendered, and they shall positively not perish. So to emphasize the fact that once a person is believed and they will not perish, they shall positively not perish.

And we're going to see that. And as I looked through these verses, I found I looked a little bit closer, a little bit deeper, and looked at aids here and there to help you. Every verse sort of had an additional aspect that really kind of nailed it down. It said, hey, that's the secure thing. That's a positive thing. They shall positively not perish. And then to top it off, and he says this twice in verse 28, and no one shall snatch them out of my hand.

And then it comes down to this verse, And he says, he talks about his power, and my father, who has given them to me, here's talking about our election, or being chosen, is greater than all. And that's the idea, it's a comparative term. It's mega in the Greek, and it's a comparative. He's greater, he's not just mega, he's greater than mega. He's mega plus. So he's greater than mega, And no one is able to snatch them out of my hand.

And it kind of has the idea of force, that somebody's going to come along and try to pull us away. And some people are concerned that Satan's going to somehow pull them away. And he says, no, no one is able to snatch them out of my hand. Even the believer himself. And exactly right. Marilyn, you stole my straight. Fantastic. That's good. That's exciting, because you've been to this verse before. That's wonderful. That's wonderful.

Even the believer himself. In fact, we're going to see that down here we'll be able to separate, I'm jumping ahead, but that's, we can't even separate ourselves from God. I mean, that just boggles my mind, you know. All this list of things there, and the bottom line is, we can't even separate ourselves, we can't even do it to ourselves. People always think, well, I'm going to do something, I'm going to, I'm going to do something that's going to change that. No, you can't do it. God's Word is so firm, so secure, so adamant about the fact that no one is able to snatch Him out of my hand, not even ourselves. I mean, it's incredible. Actually, the idea of snatch is to seize, to seize him out of his hand. Something else I wanted to say about that. Okay, so let's just go through this list here. So he says, you know, once again, there are ten things there if you count them up, ten things. Death, life, angels, principalities, things present, things to come, powers, heights, depths, or any other creative things. So, if all those things didn't quite convince you, he says, well, on top of that, anything that's creative can't do it.

And then, we'll be able to separate us, including ourselves, from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. There's nothing else out there that can do it. And this is what I mean when you start looking at these verses and looking at the thrust of God's Word. I don't see how you come to any other conclusion He has started it, he has begun the good work, he started it, and he's maintaining it and he's carrying it through to the end. Any other thoughts? There's only two of the twelve. We're probably not going to do too well here. Okay, so that's the purpose of God and the power of God. Okay. God's love. This one little section could be a whole quarter on class in the love of God. Just a couple of verses.

God's love started when we didn't really care about Him, as it says in Romans 5.8.

But God demonstrated His own love toward us. And while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. And that we're demonstrated, if you look it up and study it a little bit, it's the idea He's constantly proving, and here's this eternal security, He's constantly demonstrating His own love toward us. Constantly proving His own love toward us. And He died on He died for us, and it's actually the idea that He died for us and on behalf of us, which we have looked at before, I think, a little bit.

And then you come down to Ephesians 1-4, in His love. Actually, if you look carefully there, in His love is actually part of verse 4, but it seems to fit better. I think in my Bible, actually, it was a period. It says, Ephesians 4, in love is at the very end of that verse, and then it says, in love, He predestined us to the adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to Himself according to the kind intention of His will. That idea of kind intention of His will, that would seem good in His heart's desire. It was His heart's desire that we be His adopted children, that we be adopted sons. And He did that in His love. And it was His will. Can God's will be thwarted?

Okay, I'll kind of make that short. I kind of wanted to kind of jump into John 17, and you might want to just turn there because I want us to refer to a couple of things in John 17. And like I mentioned before, John 17 is just a really rich section on seeing, if you think about it, we're able to look at the relationship between the Father and the Son. This is one of the places in Scripture that we see this God the Father and God the Son. And the Son is talking to the Father about what the Father has done, what the Father's plans are, what His purposes are. And it's a unique part of Scripture.

So, if you look at the... in John 17 there, He talks about asking on their behalf. So, you've got to kind of jump back up to see what He's talking about here. In verse 6, he says, I have manifested your name to the men whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word.

So it seems like in the immediate context, he's talking about the disciples, but as you read through it, you're going to see he's going to talk about all believers. At the very end, he's going to talk about all those who would believe me through their words. So he's talking in the immediate context about the disciples, but it has application to all believers. So he goes through and he talks about this, how he's able to keep and to hold and to maintain these people, and none of them perish.

And he comes down here, he says, I'm no longer in the world, and yet they themselves are in the world, the disciples, believers and I come to you Holy Father keep them in your name while I was with them I was keeping them in your name which you had given me and I guarded them and not one of them perished but the son of perdition so the scripture would be fulfilled so the Lord Jesus kind of gives his track record if you will he says I didn't lose one and he says the one that did fall away what that was already that was already And this is tough. It was already planned. That was already God's purpose. So, he says he didn't lose one.

And then he goes on to say, I do not ask to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. So, here's a verse that says that he's keeping us from the evil one, but to keep them from the evil one. So, is the son's prayer going to be ignored by the father? Is the father going to say, That's not a worthy prayer? I don't think so.

I think what we see here is that that prayer is answered and that's the purpose and the plan of the Son and the Father. And it says, I do not ask on behalf of these alone, but for those who believe in me through their word. So that's to include the believers, all believers. So this is just a really neat picture of of what God has done, His purpose and His plan, and how He's able to keep and to maintain the believer safe in this world.

Okay. Let me just go back. So what we've done is, just to kind of show you where we're at, we've gone through the first four, in terms of the Father's work of salvation, the purpose, the power, the love, and the influence of the prayer of the Son on the Father. So now we're going to look at the work of the Son. Okay, so I have a question before we start out here. It's probably a quick question.

I don't know. I've been around hell too long. Has Christ paid for all your sins? Is there a sin waiting out there that's going to put you over the edge and that's going to be it? Are you sure there's just one out there that's going to do it? Maybe on the way home, like Marilyn said, the other driver will run into you and you'll get mad at him. I don't know. Anyway, I think you guys know the answer.

So, actually, the first verse tells us about that. And he himself is the propitiation or the satisfaction for our sins and not for ours only but for those of the whole world. So the Lord Jesus, when he died on the cross, his sacrifice satisfied God's demands in terms of our sins. So sins really, if you think about it, are really no longer the issue anymore. Sins are not the issue.

It's whether we believe and trust that that is the case, that he has paid for our sins. That's really the issue. You're not asking believers to clean up their act. You're asking them to trust that that Christ has already done that. He's already paid for their sins.

And the whole focus here is that we're hanging our hat totally upon the Lord Jesus. We're totally depending upon the fact that His sacrifice was sufficient to propitiate, to satisfy the righteous demands. If Christ was deficient in any way, then we would have we'd have an issue. But Scripture said He was not. He was the perfect Son of God. So we're hanging our hat entirely upon His death on the cross is entirely upon His merit and who He is.

And with that in view, then all condemnation is removed. We're no longer under condemnation. There is now, therefore, no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. And this is how I tell you about being judged. He who believes in Him is not judged. He who does not believe has been judged already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. So we're no longer under judgment. No one has to fear judgment.

And people are all upset about that. Well, what happens? I'm going to be judged by God because I did this or that. It's not to say that if a believer does commit a sin, that he's not going to pay for that in terms of, you know, of this world. If he steals, he may go to jail. But he's not... Christ has taken our judgment. He's paid for our sins. There are consequences in terms of fellowship, communion with the Lord, but not in terms of our eternal salvation. And then Romans 8, 1.

There is therefore now no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus. One thing, if you have a little note in there, in the original, there's not even one little bit. There's not one little, you cannot find one little bit of content, not even a teeny-eensy bit. I say to the kids, eensy-weensy, none, zero, nada, none there.

Oh, actually, just back in John 3.18, not judged could be rendered not being judged.

He who believes in Him is not being judged. Presently is another present situation, not presently being judged. Because Christ has taken our judgment. We're not under judgment, not presently being judged and will not be judged. So His death is a guarantee, again, of our security in Him. Okay, let's go down to the resurrection. Okay. There's really two things. Have you thought about...

This is a ridiculous question, but what's a free gift? What's a free gift? Everybody today is, you know, Somebody says, I have a free gift for you. You're always waiting for the other foot to drop. Well, it's not really free, right? It's like, they call you up on the phone, I have a free subscription to so-and-so. Well, you wait for the rest of the story. What's the rest of the story? Is it really free? Well, this is truly a free gift. For the wages of sin of death, but the free gift of God is eternal life.

And this is where, this is so important to see this, It's free, we don't have to... If we add something to it, that's no longer free. If we add some little thing, well, Lord, I've done this additional thing and that really got me into your... and we're totally secure now. I did something else that negates a free gift. A free gift is free. And we don't want to negate that or lessen that. It's a free gift of God. So, again, that's another pillar of our It's security in Him. It's free. He's done it. And it's, you know, it's in Christ Jesus. It's a free gift of God. It's eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

Yeah. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. A gift... Right. Free gift? That's a good point. Well, actually, you know, it's funny. All these words I look up and it's always the word that I did not, but I will. Let me look at that. No, I understand what you're saying. Well, it could be, it could very well be, I wish I had my wreath with me. Sometimes that's for emphasis. I mean, you're absolutely right.

A gift is not always free, right? I mean, you don't think of if I come to the party and they give you a gift to your birthday party and they say, well, here's the bill for it. You think, what kind of gift is that? And your bill along with a gift, right? I don't think that's too much of a gift.

And so what you're pointing out is that and it could be I'm kind of winging it here. I have so many verses on this page, I can't even see it after a while. Actually, that's the rendering in the New American Standard, free gift of God. They probably try to bring out the original language. Does somebody have another rendering in their Bible? size free gift. Yeah, that's a good point. So you have the King James or NIV or what does the NIV say? Okay, that's a real good point. Okay. All right. And let me see here this.

Now, why you have free gift and you know, OK, well, Ryan hasn't. He has a new the updated. Someone else have updated guys have updated American standard. I think I'm pretty sure it's free, free gift there. I want to see him now. Yeah, OK. All right. Well, I'll look at that and see how that comes out. So it looks like that we have NIV and King James have just gift, and then American Standard has free gift.

So there must be something else in the original that would allow you to do that. And it makes me think about this. The Greek is wonderful in terms of being able to emphasize things. And maybe there is some little treasure in there that we haven't dug out yet. So anyway, that's good. That's good. OK.

Then the second part of this here is that the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and this is just so important, in terms of when Christ was raised from the dead, the believer was raised from the dead, this wonderful union that we have with the Lord Jesus and his death and his burial and his resurrection.

You start looking at that and you say, well, I've come into a union with the eternal Son of God. If I've done that, I don't have anything to worry about. How can I lose that? How can I be taken out of that? I've come into this union. I'm now in Christ. There's another whole set of verses that talk about this wonderful union. Well, there's another pillar for being eternally secure.

It says, having been buried with him in baptism. This word buried, buried and raised, it's co-buried. We were co-buried with him in baptism. in which you have been co-raised up with him through your faith in the working of God who raised him from the dead. So it's co-buried, co-raised, and in 3.1 it's therefore you have been co-raised up with Christ. So you're in this union with Christ.

And it talks about baptism. We're going to get to that in a little bit here. But remember baptism? you know, there's water baptism, right? In water baptism, you go into the water, right? And then you come out of the water, right? If you don't, you're in trouble, right? You come out of the water, okay?

Well, what's neat, what's just really tremendous, and I just thank Hal, every time I listen to that, this is made five, six, seven, eight years ago, I listened to tapes from Holly Hills before I came here, and how it would teach on baptism, You know, baptism, like in Romans there, Romans 6, talks about we're immersed into Christ, and the Greek is, and never taken out, never removed.

I tell you, for me, that just, I said, hey, I don't have to worry. I'm never taken out. I'm never removed. So that's spiritual baptism. We're immersed into Christ and never, ever taken out. Another wonderful verse, another one for pillar and knowing our security with him.

Oh yeah, a neat thing in Colossians 3.1, Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above.

Does that kind of catch your eye? I don't know, maybe I've been looking at these verses too long. Keep seeking the things above. What things above should we be seeking? What do you think that's telling us about keep seeking the things above? Did we talk about some verses in past days about things?

We talked about the Holy Spirit. I'm kind of answering the question here. What kind of occurred to me was that keep seeking the things above, that's the things of Christ because remember the Holy Spirit, He's going to take of Him, take of the things of Christ and show it unto us So that caught my eye, keep seeking the things above, the things of Christ, to know Him. So I thought it kind of tied in with those verses that talk about the ministry of the Holy Spirit in terms of taking the things of Christ and showing it to us.

Okay, so let's go on. So the last two, in terms of the Son, are his intercession in heaven and his advocacy in heaven. Right. Two things that are above. That's right, they're both. And that's his... People say, what's the Lord Jesus doing right now? He's seated at the right hand of the Father, and this is the Lord Jesus' ministry right now. And both of those ministries are focused on us. 24-7. 24-7.

So intercession, if you read the verses about intercession, they talk about the believer's frailty, just like Meryl was saying. We're fickled. We have fickled faith. We exercise faith, but we're fickled. So he says, I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. Eclipsed. Wiest has it, your faith may not be totally eclipsed. But what's neat is, that verse there kind of talks about, I think, our walk, our condition. I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail, and when you have turned again, strengthen your brother.

And it's the idea of when you have returned to your original position. I kind of think of Hal's little picture. You're out of fellowship. You're walking in the flesh. you know, you're a mess. And then you say, wait a minute, where am I? What's going on here? I'm saved. I don't have to... I can trust him for this. Maybe it's some awful thing that's happened in your life.

It says, when you once turn again, strengthen your brother. You encourage your brother, basically. So that kind of talks about our... I'm going to skip over the middle verse, but the Luke 22, 32 talks about, I believe, our conditional aspect. He's praying for us in terms of that. Interceding for us.

And then he comes down, He talks about Hebrews 7.25, our position.

He says it right here. Therefore he is able to save forever those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for us. He is able to save forever. And that save forever, he is able to be saving completely and forever. It's done. He can save us completely and forever. And He's continually making intercession for us. He's continually praying for us. Because He knows the weakness of our flesh.

And then the advocacy part really talks about sin. The believer does sin. But it tells us the wonderful news. I am writing these things to you. so that you may not sin. He doesn't want us to sin. And if anyone sins, and I've always heard people talk about that, and it's sort of like, if anyone sins, and he will, it's not in the original, but I mean, I just, when I see that, I always, my mind always, and if anyone sins, and he will, because in 1 John it tells us, we say we have no sin, we're, sin nature, we're a liar. So, we will sin.

If anyone sins, but the wonderful news is, we have an advocate. a defense attorney with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. The defense attorney is one who pleads our cause constantly. And what's neat is the idea of both in advocate with the Father now appears in the presence of God for us. It's this idea that the Lord Jesus and the Father are face-to-face.

In the original language they're face-to-face. It's not like they're far apart. They're face-to-face, in close contact, and he's pleading his case before the Father. It's like you would with a friend. You would talk about, you know, one-on-one, face-to-face.

For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence, face-to-face, for us. So it's incredible. The Son of God is there in heaven right now, interceding for us, and he's our defense attorney, pleading our case before him. Right, exactly. And I think that's what the Lord wants us.

He wants us to relax. I mean, you say, well, how can I relax? I've got Iraq, I've got a shuttle of astronauts, I've got clubs burning up, You know, just wait for the next thing. What's going to happen tomorrow? I mean, it's incredible. But he wants us, like you say... Right. Okay, we haven't got the Holy Spirit yet, but... Anyway, let's just see if I can... So, let's just go back here. Maybe I'll just talk about these. I might show you one here. Let's see, which one do I want to show?

Okay, under the Holy Spirit, there are four aspects. His regeneration, His indwelling, His baptism and His sealing. And if you go through each one of those, you get these wonderful encouragements. In terms of regeneration, you must be born again. And actually, Let's go just a little bit more quickly here. Here's another whole set of verses. Think about being born again. We just talked about the fact that that which is born of flesh is flesh, that which is born of the Spirit is Spirit.

We've had a new birth. Is God going to undo that? not maintain that we were born again? Is that reversible? He asked, when the Lord came to Nicodemus, Nicodemus said, I can't be born again, I can't happen, I can't go back to my mother's womb, that's an impossibility. Well, can the spiritual birth, can that be undone? It cannot. It cannot be undone.

That's kind of the bottom line. And we have this wonderful divine nature, this new nature in Christ. Is God going to somehow remove that new nature? He has granted us precious and magnificent promises that you may become partakers of divine nature. He's not going to undo that. He can't. It's permanent. It's a permanent possession. The Spirit's indwelling. The kind of thing that you want to come away with from the Spirit's indwelling. And some people, you know, somehow think, well, they're kind of back in the Old Testament mode where the Spirit would come for a season. Well, it tells us right, these verses tell us, Romans 8 and 9.

However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit, he does not belong to Him. So the Spirit is given to us as a permanent possession, never to be removed. So there's another pillar in that. And it says He's in you. Your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you. You're not a believer if you don't have the Holy Spirit.

He's not going to be removed. And then we talked about baptism. We've been baptized into Christ and all those wonderful verses about being in Christ, in Christ, in Christ, never to be removed, never to be taken out. And then sealing. If that wasn't enough, He's going to seal us until the day of redemption, until we go to be with Him. We're sealed and the idea of sealing speaks of ownership, security and destination. He owns us, we're secure and we're destined to go to be with Him. Okay.

And then lastly, like I said, if there's some verses in here, you know, go through these verses if you haven't, you know, may some have bothered you over the years, you know, but I thought Dr. Schaffer did a great job. This wasn't in the book, but it was some of his other writings. He kind of, he took all those verses and he kind of categorized them.

Some are, are dispensationally misapplied. They're talking about the end times and they're really, and people apply them to the church age. Some talk about false teachers. Some relate to moral reformation. Some talk about fruits. The one at the bottom, Hal has a chart on Galatians 5.4, which is really good about falling from grace to the law. Some people say, I fall from grace, I'm lost. So, these have been problem verses and people have developed, you know, there's people that have as part of their tenets a conditional salvation. Like I said, I don't see how they got there. But they looked at these verses and said, I'm going to focus on these verses and not upon the rest of the Word of God, it seems like. So look at those, if you have questions about those. OK.

All right, let's pray then. Dear Father, we thank you so much, Lord. We thank you for your Word, Father. Thank you that it's secure, that you're secure, Lord, that nothing can separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. We thank you for that. We ask it in His name. Amen.