Once Saved, Always Saved? What Would Have To Happen If A Person Willingly Chooses To Lose Their Salvation

There are two fundamental schools about this have many branches of differing thought. First is the Armenian teaching that believes the believer maintains salvation and can be lost due to sin.

Second is Calvinism, which teaches that salvation can never be lost because it was preordained from the beginning of time, no matter if there is active sin. Both are extreme and have led to way too much division in the Church throughout history.

Jesus said that He came to fulfill all the 613 laws and the words of the Prophets of the Old Testament and that they hang on just one commandment like a door on its hinge - "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Matthew 5:17, 22:37-38; Mark 12:30; Luke 10:27 ESV). He then said that the second royal commandment was precisely the same as the first, "love your neighbor as yourself" (vs. 22:39; James 2:8). When a Born-Again Christian bears another's burdens, they fulfill the Great Commandment - the law of Christ (Galatians 6:2).

If a person willingly chooses to lose their salvation after receiving Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Savior and repenting of their sin, the common-sense, logical reality is that the following would have to occur (Acts 2:38, 16:31; Romans 10:9-10).

God, the Father, would have to:

- ask Jesus, God the Son, to give back His gift of love to Him (John 17:2)

- go back on His promise never to cast them out (John 6:37)

- cut them out of His Will as co-heirs with Jesus (Romans 8:17).

- The person would have to un-drink the water of eternal life given by Jesus so that they will be thirsty again (John 4:14).

God, the Son, Jesus would have to:

- quit as their defense attorney (1 John 2:1)

- no longer protect or keep them safe (John 17:9-12)

- divorce them (Revelation 19:7)

- un-adopt them (Romans 8:23)

- rescind His promise to make them a citizen of Heaven (John 15:16; Ephesians 2:12-13,19)

- make them an un-new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17)

- make them un-near to Him (Ephesians 2:12-13,19)

- un-crucify their old nature (Galatians 2:20)

- blot out their names from the Book of Life (Revelation 3:5)

- un-bury them and un-baptize them so that they will no longer walk in newness of life (Romans 6:4)

- put them back into the world (John 17:16)

- un-circumcise them (Colossians 2:11)

- and un-complete them (Colossians 2:9-10)

- allow death and life, angels and rulers, things present and things to come, powers, height, and depth, and anything else in all creation, to separate them from the love of God found in Him (Romans 8:38-39)

- no longer be their advocate before the Father (1 John 2:1)

- un-buy and refund the payment He made by His blood (Galatians 3:15-17)

- un-predestine them so they can no longer be conformed to His image (Ephesians 1:5; Romans 8:29)

- un-sanctify and un-deliver them from the domain of darkness (1 Corinthians 6:11; Colossians 1:13)

- un-transfer them out of His kingdom, where they were once conditionally sanctified daily (Hebrews 10:14; Romans 8:28-31; Ephesians 1:11)

- un-call, un-justify and un-glorify them (Romans 8:25, 28-31)

- un-cancel all their spiritual debts (Colossians 2:13-14)

- un-seal them (2 Corinthians 1:22, 5:5; Ephesians 1:13, 4:30)

- un-wash and un-forgive them of all their sins (Titus 3:5; 1 Corinthians 6:11)

- re-remember their sins (Hebrews 10:17)

- un-consider them holy and blameless in His sight (Ephesians 1:4, 2:8; Romans 8:9,11:6)

- un-buy and un-born them of God (1 Corinthians 6:20; John 3:7)

- move out from living within them as the new Holy of Holies (1 Corinthians: 6:19-20, 7:23-24; 1 John 2:19, 3:6,9; Romans 8:9)

- rescind and fail to honor His promise never to leave and forsake them (Hebrews 13:5)

- revoke their position of no longer living in His new nature (Romans 8:9)

- go back on and fail to honor His promise never to cast them out (John 6:37)

God, the Holy Spirit, who was given as a guarantee (2 Corinthians 5:5), would have to:

- all the above and:

- un-save them (Ephesians 2:8)

- un-fill them (becoming un-Born-Again) (Colossians 2:9-10)

- un-anoint them (1 John 2:27)

- stop His good work begun in them (Hebrews 13:2)

- fail to honor His promise to keep them from stumbling until the end when Jesus comes again (1 Corinthians 1:8; Philippians 1:6, 2:13; Jude 1:24-25).

To say that an individual could be separated from the love of God or remove themselves from His firm grasp and from His promise NEVER to leave them after He bought and paid for them, and they are His possession, as well as His dwelling place, the Holy of Holies, is at the very least, illogical and intellectually inconsistent. When God makes a promise, He NEVER reneges on or breaks His word.