Lest There Be Doubt

The following is my much mulled over response to doctrinal questions regarding my stance on "eternal security." I don't much prefer the term because I think it does little to convey the depths of beauty found in an invitation to be Jesus' disciple and, frankly, because I'm difficult, a handful really. Nonetheless, I respond below:

"No power of hell, no scheme of man, can ever pluck me from his hand, 'til he returns or calls me home, this is the power of Christ in me."

For me, to consider the question of eternal security is first and foremost to consider the question of justification, the imputation of Christ's righteousness onto lousy sinners such as myself. Ephesians 2:1-10 speaks to the great grace, expansive love, and beautiful mercy as displayed in God's redemption of his creations through his Son's work, not of ours, not the Church's, but alone, Christ's. In taking this passage in, there is no way to get around the old Baptist standard "once saved, always saved" which to this day I think is an awful and trite way of expressing the magnificent redemption as can only be had in the love and sacrifice of Jesus. Suffice it to say, Scripture speaks to eternal security undoubtedly. As a human, I have hesitated around the question because of the following:

1) My sense of justice is skewed. It makes no sense to me that in walking away from something so dear such as Jesus and His way that one does not pay for this somehow. Whether because of apathy, lifestyle, blatant rebellion, a human sense of justice would offer that the concept of "eternal security" is one that simply cannot be--where is the justice? Perhaps some of my struggle here comes from personal experience, never a good place to begin forming one's theology but nonetheless a shaping influence. As a child, a Christian person close to me hurt me deeply and several others too and in all boldness I let them know that I believed they would be going to hell. I did not yell it but calmly stated it as fact; there was no way that I could understand how their wounding actions would not go unpaid for in eternal and determinate ways. A product of one too many revival preachers at my elementary school, a fiery hell seemed to me the best way to seal the judgment deal. Tied to healing from that experience but also to a more Scripturally formed sense of justice, I come to see that we people walking earth will never get God's justice right. Consider Matthew 22:1-14 wherein Jesus describes the wedding feast, a likening unto what God's eternal Kingdom will be. I imagine heaven will be a mix of folks we are all surprised by, that there will be people missing that we were sure were dressed for the wedding feast, there are others there we are sure were not, and a few in between--it will be glorious because it will be the ultimate display of God's sense of justice and not ours. It will be one in which the meaning of eternal security is fully unfolded before our eyes in who we gather alongside with to worship. For temporal times, it seems quite wrong to me. My flesh wants more of myself and others if we are going to follow Jesus; but God asks simply for us and for our being aligned with his ways and justice, not ours.

2) As I Corinthians 1 speaks to, the Gospel and wisdom of God is great folly to those looking on. There is NOTHING about the way God has chosen to call children his that makes sense--it leaves some out, it isn't fair, there is no grading rubric, in the end our works are burned, someone else did all the work for us and we need only respond. Being a person who messes up frequently, who looks in the mirror and sees more often than not all the reasons God can't love or have me as I am, I take this to also be a part of the human experience--that in coming to terms with our issues, fallenness, neuroses, sins, addictions, brokenness, etc.--however one talks about it--our finite minds cannot possibly grasp at the mystery that is grace and the redemption that is LIFE!!! Instead, we use ourselves as excuses for why we cannot possibly come to know and hunger after God rather than see that's never what it was about in the first place. Israelites made sacrifices for purification, Jews followed (follow) rituals, many good people today seek merely an ethic for good/just living; this is never it and cannot be it if we are to take what God offers freely and at his word. Jesus said, "Come unto me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest." In light of the question of eternal security, his invitation is unto himself and into a life of freedom that says candidly "Someone else has my back"--that person being Jesus. As Christians, then, we are pressed into living a life worthy of his calling as I John, James, Ephesians, etc. so openly remind us--to whom much is given much is required. But we (I) must remember that what was given was given freely not to a person that is so good or right but that God decided to extend grace and security to persons who when faced with their inadequacies come to know because of miraculous encounters with Jesus that God's love is larger, his grace is sufficient, his kindness is our cause for repentance and holy adoration.

Yes, then, I believe in eternal security because of the nature of God, the realities of his justice, and the truth and implications of justification in Jesus. Scripture is not always easy to deal with--Jesus says you will know a tree by its fruits, we will be justified and condemned by our words, James says show me faith and I will show you works, God calls for sacrifice in the OT and faith in the NT--and these are not easy to handle. I (we) as Christians want to see all of what is written in Scripture aligned in reality, but we have to recognize that this simply cannot be in a fallen and messed up world. Thus, I rest in knowing and believing the work of Jesus is enough--I like to call it the "great enoughness of Jesus", a lay person's term for all the fancy words theologians give us. Daily I face the question in myself, is he enough, and at the end of the day, I have to believe he is, less because I see it in my life but more because I trust his word and his sacrifice and his desire for me even when the proverbial reflection says "and can it be?"