Saved for all Time
July 6, 2025, Morning Service
Immanuel Baptist Church, Wagoner, OK
Rick Boyne
Message Point: True believers are eternally secure in Christ, not because of their grip on Him—but because of His grip on them. Yet Scripture calls us to examine our faith and persevere as proof of genuine salvation.
Focus Passage: John 10:27–29
Supplemental Passage: These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. (1 John 5:13 NASB)
Introduction: Harry Ironside stated that salvation was like Noah inviting a pagan in his day to place his trust in God's Word and come in to the ark. Some view salvation like Noah offering to put a peg on the outside of the ark. "If you just hang on through the storm, you'll be saved." Salvation is not dependent on our holding on to God, but on our being securely held by and in Christ. Source Unknown.
I. Salvation Is the Work of God, Not Man
a. Jesus doesn't say temporary life—He says eternal life.
b. "He who began a good work among you will complete it by the day of Christ Jesus." Philippians 1:63
c. "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not a result of works, so that no one may boast." Ephesians 2:8-9
d. John 10 affirms both Jesus' and the Father’s protection over the believer.
e. Salvation is not maintained by our power but by God's grace.
II. Not Everyone Who Claims Faith Has Genuine Faith
a. "They went out from us, but they were not really of us; for if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, so that it would be shown that they all are not of us." 1 John 2:19
b. And He *said to them, "Do you not understand this parable? How will you understand all the parables? "The sower sows the word. "These are the ones who are beside the road where the word is sown; and when they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown in them. "In a similar way these are the ones on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy; and they have no firm root in themselves, but are only temporary; then, when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately they fall away. "And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word, but the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful. "And those are the ones on whom seed was sown on the good soil; and they hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold." (Mark 4:13-20 NASB)
c. Some may appear saved but fall away, revealing their faith was never real.
d. "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter. "Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' "And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.' (Matthew 7:21-23 NASB)
e. External profession without inward transformation is not salvation. Knowing about Jesus or doing religious things is not the same as trusting Him fully.
III. God Preserves His People, and His People Persevere
a. “For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold firmly the beginning of our assurance firm until the end.” Hebrews 3:14
b. "But the one who endures to the end, he will be saved. (Matthew 24:13 NASB)
c. Perseverance doesn’t earn salvation—it proves salvation.
d. Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, and to make you stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (Jude 1:24-25 NASB)
Application/Call to Obedience: Your salvation is something God does. You cannot save yourself, neither can you lose it. You cannot lose what you did not earn.
“Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?” (2 Corinthians 13:5 NASB)
The Bible says, “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.” (Romans 10:9-10 NASB)
