SALVATION IS BY GRACE, NOT BY WORKS.

 Every person is guilty of sin, condemned by God, and needs to be saved.  No one is worthy of salvation. Romans 3:10-12  “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away; they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one. Romans 3:23   For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. There is nothing we can do to earn salvation.  God only accepts the perfect work of our Lord on the cross on our behalf.  Even our best human efforts are rejected by God:

Isaiah 64:6   For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are as filthy rags. The harder we work for salvation, the farther away it gets. Romans 4:4 5    Now to one who works, his wage is not reckoned   as grace, but as debt. But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness. Good works are rejected by God as the means of gaining or maintaining salvation. Titus 3:5  Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us.

Romans 3:21-24  But now a righteousness from God, apart from the law has been made known,  to which the Law and the prophets testify. 

This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.  There is no difference, for all have sinned and  fall short of the glory of God, and   are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ. Salvation is received non-meritoriously by depending on Jesus Christ.  It is not the strength or the endurance of our faith but  the object of our faith, Jesus Christ, that receives  all the credit.

WE CAN DO NOTHING to gain salvation,  and  WE CAN DO NOTHING to lose it. Those who do not believe this are being misled. The idea that Christ did His part on the cross and now we must do our part by maintaining a certain level of morality or goodness in order to get to heaven is not the truth of the Bible but a lie from Satan Morality or keeping the Ten Commandments cannot save!    Christ made a wasted trip to the cross if we can get to heaven by being moral. In fact, hell will be full of good, moral people who have depended on themselves rather than Christ for salvation. 

Salvation is a gift from God. Just because salvation is free does not mean that it came without a price tag.  The cost was tremendous!   Jesus Christ paid for it in full by dying in our place on the cross.  He was our substitute, taking the judgment for our sins on His own perfect body.  That was His gift to us.  A gift is free. It is either accepted or rejected, but it is never earned. 

If salvation could be earned, it would not be a gift.  It would be payment that we deserve for something we did. Scripture makes it clear; salvation is a gift, no strings attached. God will not freely give a gift and then take it back. To do so would be completely out of character for Him.

Romans 6:23   For the wages of sin is death but the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Ephesians 2:8-9   For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourself, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.

“Grace” is receiving something we do not earn or deserve.  Wouldn’t you agree that it is foolish to work for something that is free?  Anyone who trusts in his own works and ability is in effect saying that Christ’s atonement was not good enough. He ignores what Christ said as he hung on the cross before he died:   John 19:30   . . .

it is finished! Salvation was completed, the gift was purchased, nothing can be added to it, and nothing can be taken from it. We either accept the gift by believing in Jesus Christ or reject it by trying to work for it. Eternal life is a permanent gift.  “Eternal” means infinite duration, everlasting, perpetual, endless, and something impossible to lose. There is not one account in the entire Bible where anyone received the gift of eternal life and then lost it.

Those who believe they must work for salvation will stand before Jesus Christ at the Great White Throne Judgment (Rev. 20:11-15).  Their sins, which were already judged on the cross, will not be mentioned.  Since they rejected Christ’s perfect work on the cross as the only way into heaven, they will have to  rely on their own works to get in.  They will find that only Christ’s work is acceptable to God. Therefore, they will be cast into the Lake of Fire.

SALVATION   RESTS   ON  GOD’S  POWER  AND  HIS   PROMISES.  NOT   OURS Our salvation endures because its security depends on God, not on us.  What a relief! What great news!  

I Peter 1:3-5   Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to obtain an inheritance which is imperishable and undefiled and will not fade away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last  time. Jude 24   Now unto Him [Jesus Christ] who is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory [God the Father] with exceeding joy.

John 10:28  I give eternal life to them, and they shall never perish; and no one shall snatch them out of My hand.  Romans 8:35 & 38-39    Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?  Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness or peril, or sword?  For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord .

There is no sin, no power and no person that can cause us to lose our salvation.    Even if we change our mind and renounce Christ, we cannot lose our salvation. The gift of eternal life is permanent no matter how much our faith may waver.

I Timothy 2:11-12   if we endure [suffering] we shall also reign with Him; if we deny Him; He also will  deny us [rewards];  if we are faithless [turn away from Him], He remains faithful [He does not take back the free gift]  for He cannot deny Himself [His promise of eternal life still stands]. Our weakness does not diminish God’s strength. Our failures do not revoke His promises.

BELIEVERS   ARE CHILDREN   OF   GOD Romans  8:16  The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: Galatians 3:26   For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. A believer’s relationship with his heavenly Father is similar to the one with his earthly father.

Our confidence is strengthened by knowing that our spiritual relationship cannot be broken any more than our physical one can be. There is nothing a child or his father can do to sever their physical relationship, and there is nothing a believer or God can do to sever their spiritual relationship.  It is permanent! The Bible never speaks of any child of God being disowned or disinherited.

 BELIEVERS  ARE   NOT CONDEMNED Romans 8:1   There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.  John 3:18   He that believes on Him is not condemned; but he that does not believe is condemned already because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. John 5:24  

Truly, truly I say unto you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and shall not come into condemnation, but has passed out of death into life. It is impossible for believers to come under  condemnation because they have gone from spiritual death to spiritual life. They possess  eternal life because they were born again the moment they believed in Jesus Christ.

Believers still sin after they are saved, but they are not condemned for their sins.  Why?  Because Christ was condemned for these sins on the cross.  It would be unjust for God to condemn us for the sins for which Christ has already been judged. Does this mean that there are no consequences for our sins?  Of course not.  Believers suffer divine discipline when they sin.  Our heavenly Father disciplines His children, but He does not condemn them.  There is a difference between divine discipline, which is temporary suffering, and condemnation, which is eternal death.

JR Cherreguine Bible Doctrine Ministries

   J. R. Cherreguine Bible Doctrine Ministries