Once In Grace Always In Grace?

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Hi I_____,
It is good to hear from you again.
As for the doctrine of ‘once in grace always it grace,’ it certainly was not anything the apostles were familiar with. Look at what Paul has to say about this:

1Co 10:12  Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.
1Co 9:27  But I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway.

No, neither Paul nor any of the apostles or writers of the New Testament ever taught anything that appeared to in any way encourage a complacent or self assured spiritual attitude. They one and all taught vigilance and sobriety, and carefulness to always be on guard against the wiles of our flesh and of the great red dragon who preys on the weaknesses of our flesh.

1Pe 5:8  Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:

If you or I think the word “your” is someone else, then what we are saying is that God’s Word is for someone else. But God’s Words are for all of us:

Mat 4:4  But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

There is not the least bit of contradiction is saying that we must be vigilant and yet we can be confident that He who has begun a good work in us will finish it. In truth those two doctrines complement each other. We can be completely confident that a loving Father will see us through the eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, see us through “leaving our first love,” see us through being “carried away into Babylon,” and He will see us through “coming out of Babylon and enduring to the end.” Those who “know God and Jesus Christ,” know that “all things are of God” and that He is “working all things after the counsel of His own will.”
But King Saul and Judas and Alexander the coppersmith and the lake of fire are all part of that plan. So while we have confidence in God’s work in our lives, God has not taken us into His confidence to the extent that we have no need of constant vigilance against our flesh and our Adversary. We are never told any such thing, and we are told repeatedly to be always on our guard and to be ever vigilant, so that just before we are delivered up to physical death we can say with the apostle:

2Ti 4:6  For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand.
2Ti 4:7  I have fought a good fight, I have finished [ my] course, I have kept the faith:
2Ti 4:8  Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day: and not to me only, but unto all them also that love his appearing.

This is right at the end of Paul’s physical life and is a long way from the doctrine of ‘once in grace always in grace.’ In fact this is the verse which precedes these verses:

2Ti 4:2  Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine.
2Ti 4:3  For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
2Ti 4:4  And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
2Ti 4:5  But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry.

How can we “turn away from the truth” if we are incapable of falling away. God knows those who are His, but those who are His never take their election for granted and guard their souls with vigilance.
I hope this helps you to see what God’s Word actually teaches concerning this false and dangerous Babylonian doctrine of ‘once saved always saved.” I will let our Lord Himself have the final words on this false doctrine:

Mat 7:21  Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.

Mat 10:22  And ye shall be hated of all [ men] for my name’s sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.

Your brother in Christ,
Mike

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