SAFE AND SECURE

Introduction

-There is a story about a newly converted Christian who, in great distress, visited Watchman Nee, that great spiritual saint of the 20th century. The man said to Watchman Nee, “No matter how hard I try, I simply cannot seem to be faithful to my Lord. I think I’m losing my salvation.”

Watchman Nee replied, “Do you see this dog here? He is my dog. He is house-trained; he never makes a mess; he is obedient; he is a pure delight to me. On the other hand, out in the kitchen I have my baby son. He makes a mess, he throws his food around, he fouls his clothes, he is a total and complete mess. But who is going to inherit my kingdom? Who is going to inherit all I possess? Not my dog; my son is my heir

“You are Jesus Christ’s heir, not because you are perfect, not because you are clean, not because you are religious, not because you are obedient, but because it is for you that He died. You are secure by means of His grace, not by means of your perfection.”

-There are many Christians who think that because of their imperfections that either God is constantly angry with them, or even that they could lose their salvation. But it is exactly because we are imperfect, unclean, sinful human beings that Jesus Christ died. And just because we are saved doesn’t mean that we ever become sinless on this earth.

~Yes, over time, as we grow in Christ we sin less, but we never become sinless. If we ever did, we stop needing Christ, wouldn’t we?

-But we never stop needing Christ. And because we are in Christ when we come to a saving faith in Him, we can know without a shadow of a doubt that we are safe and secure in Him for all of eternity.

-There are many Christians who, with every ebb and flow of their emotions and circumstances, waffle back and forth between whether or not they are saved, and it drives them mad.

~Imagine this scenario:

Imagine a child who didn’t know from day to day whether or not he was a member of the family. If he was good one day, he was in, if he was bad, then he was out. One day his father loved him, the next day, he didn’t. I tell you that child would be an emotional and psychological wreck.

~But the fact is, for our earthly families, regardless of your behavior, you are always going to be a member of the family, and there is nothing you or they can do about it. No matter what my kids say or do or feel, they will always be a part of the family. How much more so, then, for our heavenly family?

-There are a lot of people with a lot of doubts about their status with God. But if you have truly been born again in Jesus Christ by coming to Him through faith and repentance, you are saved and part of God’s family, and so your status is safe and secure.

-What we learn in today’s passage is that true, born-again believing Christians have the blessed assurance of security in the eternal life that has been gifted to them by Christ. And so, I want to lead you today to understand and live in light of that assurance.

John 10:22–42 ESV

22 At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, 23 and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon. 24 So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, “How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” 25 Jesus answered them, “I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me, 26 but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep. 27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. 28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.” 31 The Jews picked up stones again to stone him. 32 Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?” 33 The Jews answered him, “It is not for a good work that we are going to stone you but for blasphemy, because you, being a man, make yourself God.” 34 Jesus answered them, “Is it not written in your Law, ‘I said, you are gods’? 35 If he called them gods to whom the word of God came—and Scripture cannot be broken— 36 do you say of him whom the Father consecrated and sent into the world, ‘You are blaspheming,’ because I said, ‘I am the Son of God’? 37 If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; 38 but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” 39 Again they sought to arrest him, but he escaped from their hands. 40 He went away again across the Jordan to the place where John had been baptizing at first, and there he remained. 41 And many came to him. And they said, “John did no sign, but everything that John said about this man was true.” 42 And many believed in him there.

-The focus or impetus for our lesson today comes especially from vv. 27-30:

27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.

28 I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand.

29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand.

30 I and the Father are one."

-This whole chapter Jesus has used the metaphor of Him being the Good Shepherd and those who believe upon Him being His sheep. And in these verses, He tells us that those who belong to Him are eternally secure in their status with Him:

Again, it has nothing to do with the sheep’s ability to act right, but it has everything to do with the nature, power, and work of the Shepherd.

-Theologically, this is called the doctrine of ETERNAL SECURITY. You have heard it stated in different ways. It is known by some as the PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS, or in slang terms ONCE SAVED ALWAYS SAVED. But I believe that the term ETERNAL SECURITY is the most biblically accurate for what we see in our passage.

In his works, Miles Stanford explains eternal security this way:

The believer rests eternally secure in the risen Lord Jesus Christ on the foundation of His finished work on the Cross and His faithful presence on our behalf at the right hand of God. He rejoices that his life is safely “hid with Christ in God.”

-Wayne Grudem, who is more Calvinistic, uses the term perseverance of the saints, and defines it this way:

The perseverance of the saints means that all those who are truly born again will be kept by God’s power and will persevere as Christians until the end of their lives, and that only those who persevere until the end have been truly born again.

-David Anderson puts it more in everyday language:

Once you believe, you can never be lost; you can never go to hell. Christ will always be your Savior. You can nail down your eternal destiny once and for all so you never have to worry about it.

-So, if I were to summarize what Christ is saying in this passage, and what the theologians are defining:

Eternal Security is the Christian doctrine that a genuine, born-again believer in Jesus Christ is secure in their eternal status with God based on the foundation of Christ’s finished work on the cross.

-Now, there are some who deny eternal security—who say that you can lose your salvation. Some of them say that the doctrine leads to license and sin. But as one person put it, this is as absurd as saying that because we have Blue Cross/Blue Shield insurance, we will chew on razor blades or guzzle hydrochloric acid.

-They think that if people think they can’t lose their salvation they will do whatever they want. Adrian Rogers responded that Christians actually can do whatever they want. The difference is that once they are born-again, what they want to do changes and aligns itself with Scripture and God’s will.

-Scripture is replete with passages that confirm the doctrine of eternal security:

~ Romans 8:38-39

38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

{Nothing means nothing can separate…}

~Philippians 1:6

6 And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

{Jesus will see it through; it’s not up to us or our power}

~Hebrews 10:14

14 For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

{It doesn’t say that Christians are perfected unless they sin—they are perfected for ALL TIME}

-Therefore, the Scripture gives assurance to the Christian that God will keep him or her forever.

-However, this does not mean that anybody who has made some sort of profession of faith is saved, because we know that without fruit being born in someone’s life from their faith that they do not truly belong to the Lord.

-There’s a story about D. L. Moody, as he was walking down a street in Chicago, a drunk guy walked up to him and said, “Hey, aren’t you Mr. Moody? I’m one of your converts.” To which Moody quickly replied, “You must be one of my converts, because you sure aren’t one of the Lord’s.”

-Just because you walk an aisle, say a prayer, and get baptized doesn’t make you a Christian. That’s why Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13:5

5 Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?-- unless indeed you fail to meet the test!

-But if your profession of faith is genuine and you bear fruit, no matter how small, then you are secure in the Lord, and need not doubt your salvation—He will bring you through to end

-Let me spend 10 or 15 minutes explaining three reasons that Jesus gives that we are eternally secure in Him:

I) We have eternal security because of Jesus’ essential nature

-The Jews have about had it with trying to figure out who Jesus is, although He has made it abundantly clear if they would just listen and accept what it was He was saying.

-They encircle Him like a mob and want Him to just straight out tell them who He is. Jesus points to His works, His words, and His teachings because they all are a testimony to His identity.

-But the problem is not that Jesus wasn’t clear enough about His identity, the problem is their heart—they don’t want Him to be who He is. They are hard-hearted and would rather cling to their sin.

-Jesus makes it plain—He and the Father are one. He is the Messiah. He is God the Son.

~And they understand completely what He is claiming because they then pick up stones to stone Him for blasphemy.

~Jesus claims, and actually is, of the same nature as God the Father—the Trinity is real; God is One God with three personalities, and Jesus is God the Son, completely and utterly God. And since Jesus is completely and utterly God, then He cannot lie because it is impossible for God to lie.

-And Jesus says that He gives His sheep eternal life. He cannot lie, so He must truly give eternal life. If eternal life could be taken away, then it wouldn’t be eternal life, it would be temporary life. But eternal means eternal both in quantity and quality.

-With this He says that the sheep with eternal life will NEVER perish. It does not say they will not perish unless they sin really bad or really tick me off, then they will perish.

~It does not say that as long as they can keep every commandment I give absolutely perfectly then they will not perish.

~It says THEY WILL NOT PERISH—period, end of story, true believers in Christ will not spiritually perish for eternity, rather they will have spiritual life for eternity

-This is coming from the God who does not lie—when you believe in Jesus Christ, submitting yourself to Him, trusting in His death and resurrection for your life, you will not eternally perish—you have been given life that cannot be taken away. You are safe and secure in Christ because of who He is.

II) We have eternal security because of Jesus’ extreme power

-Jesus says no one will be able to snatch the sheep out of His hands and no one will be able to snatch them out of the hands of the Father. The Son and the Father are One.

-If you think of the sheep and shepherd metaphor that Jesus has been using, the sheep had a lot of dangerous predators that were after them. The Judean wilderness had lions and wolves and bears that would try to snatch a sheep away from the shepherd to make the sheep their dinner. The shepherd would have to constantly watch and constantly defend the sheep against such enemies.

-Jesus is saying the sheep (who are His people) are safe in His hands because there is not a single enemy out there that can steal their souls away from Him.

~Why? Because Jesus is God and there is no one and nothing that can even remotely come close to the power that He possesses. I mean, my goodness, He created an entire universe by His Word. Everything else that exists outside of God is a mere creation. There is nothing more powerful than God—that is why we say He is omnipotent=He has all power.

-I remind you of what Paul said in Romans 8:38-39 that I read earlier—nothing can separate you from Christ. There is no enemy that can take you out of His hands. Not Satan. Not a demon. Not even death.

-You are secure because the One who holds onto your eternal soul is the most powerful being that there is and ever will be. Who is going to take you from Him—NOBODY!

-Yet, you still get some smart alecks who believe you can lose your salvation who say: Yeah, but you can jump out of His hands.

~First, are you telling me that we are more powerful than Jesus that we can snatch ourselves out of His hands?

~Second, are you telling me that our sin is more powerful than Jesus that it can snatch us out of His hands?

I don’t think so, snowflake.

-But what about people who seem to fall away from Jesus. Here’s what I say:

~Anybody is capable of going through seasons of backsliding from Christ, but if you are truly born-again you will always come back to Him. ALWAYS

~If someone seems to fall away from the faith and never comes back and never had any real fruit to begin with, then they were never truly a believer. They were never truly saved. They weren’t safe and secure in the hands of Jesus because they never were really in His hands.

-Jesus has the power to back up the claim that no one and nothing can take us out of His hands.

III) We have eternal security because of Jesus’ effective work

-Jesus’ death on the cross covered all sins past, present, and future for those who believe on Him

~1 Peter 3:18

18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God

-If Jesus’ death on the cross didn’t take care of all of our sins but only some of our sin, then Jesus would have to die over and over again to keep covering our sin

~But the Bible clearly states that Jesus died once, and all sin is forgiven for the believer—as far as the east is from the west our sins are taken from us

-Jesus cried out from the cross IT IS FINISHED, which means THE DEBT IS PAID IN FULL; if it wasn’t enough to cover even future sins of believers, then He lied—He should have said instead IT IS PARTIALLY FINISHED or THE DEBT IS PAID IN HALF. But He didn’t. It is paid in full.

-If you think you can lose your salvation, let me ask you: How many sins does it take? One? Then we’re all lost. Or how bad does the sin have to be? Is there a sin that Jesus’ blood doesn’t cover? As John MacArthur says: If you could lose your salvation, you would.

~If it were left up to you, you’d bomb it all the time—but our security is in Jesus, not ourselves

-Harry Ironside said that some people view salvation as pictured if Noah were offering to put a peg on the outside of the ark telling people, “If you just hang on through the storm, you’ll be saved.” But salvation is not dependent on our holding on to God, our salvation is dependent on God holding onto us. And He will.

Conclusion

-But maybe there are some here who are not in Christ’s hands because you’ve never believed in Him…

-Maybe there are some Christians who need assurance of salvation—come pray at the altar or come talk to me…

-Maybe you know someone who needs salvation and you want to come to the altar and pray for them…

-Or maybe you’re looking for a church home that preaches the gospel truth…