salvation Archives - Page 4 of 6

People often ask me if I believe in “Once Saved, Always Saved.” They want to know if “Once Saved, Always Saved”is biblical.

I say “No, but I do believe in eternal security.” Once Saved, always Saved is not biblical, but eternal security is biblical.

Is that confusing? Well, let me explain…

Eternal Security and Once Saved, Always Saved

Most people think that eternal security and “Once Saved, Always Saved” are the same thing. They are not. To see this, let us begin with a basic definition of each.

Eternal Security is the belief that once a person has eternal life, they have it forever, no matter what.

Once Saved, Always Saved is the belief that once a person has salvation, they have it forever, no matter what.

Do you see the difference? The only difference between the two definitions is that the first talks about eternal life while the second talks about salvation. Since many Christians think that these two terms are synonymous, they don’t really see much of a difference between eternal security and “once saved, always saved.”

The problem, however, is with the word “salvation” itself.

The Word “Salvation”

As I point out in my online course, The Gospel Dictionary, the word “salvation” very rarely (if ever) is exactly equivalent in Scripture to the term “eternal life.”

The salvation word family (save, saved, salvation, etc.) means “deliverance” and the context determines what kind of deliverance is in view. Deliverance can be from sickness, premature death, enemies, demons, disappointment from God, and a wide variety of other negative experiences (cf. Matt 8:25; 9:22; Mark 5:34; 13:20; Luke 8:48; 23:35; John 12:27; 1 Tim 2:15; 2 Tim 4:18; Jas 5:15; Jude 5).

As such, most forms of “salvation” in the Bible have various conditions attached to them. If a person does not fulfill these conditions, they will not be delivered (or saved) from the negative consequences that follow.

Yet while failing to fulfill the conditions for salvation from sickness, enemies, or premature death might result in experiencing these bad events in life, such things have nothing whatsoever to do with a person’s eternal destiny or their possession of eternal life.

What this means is that as long as the word “saved” is incorrectly equated with eternal life, the concept of “once saved, always saved” can easily be refuted by pointing out the many places in the Bible where people can lose their “salvation” because they don’t obey God or fulfill the conditions of “salvation.”

But once we understand that the salvation word family almost never (if ever) refers to eternal life, the numerous passages that show various conditions for salvation gain theological clarity.

Let us consider a few examples.

James 1:21 and Once Saved, Always Saved

According to James 1:21, people can save their souls by laying aside filthiness and wickedness, and receiving with meekness the implanted word.

If we think that the word “save” in James 1:21 means receiving eternal life, then James 1:21 is teaching that in order to receive and keep eternal life, we must get rid of sin and build our lives upon Scripture. If we do not get rid of sin and if we fail to follow Scripture, then we will not save our souls. In this understanding, there can be no such thing as eternal security.

When, however, we understand that the word “save” means “deliver” and we also recognize that the word “soul” does not refer to the eternal aspect of a person but rather to the life-giving principle within a person, the phrase “save the soul” is best understood as “deliver the life” from premature death (cf. Jas 5:20). This idea fits best in the context as well, where James calls his readers to get rid of sin and become doers of the word rather than hearers only (Jas 1:21-22).

The way to avoid the damaging and destructive consequences of sin in the life of the believer is simply to avoid sin and follow the teachings of Scripture. If you do this, you will deliver your life from the destruction of sin and a premature physical death.

1 Peter 3:21 and Once Saved, Always Saved

Another example is found in 1 Peter 3:21. Here we learn that baptism saves us. So if we think that “saves us” means we receive eternal life, then the clear conclusion is that baptism is a requirement for gaining or keeping our eternal life. If we do not get baptized, then we do not have eternal life.

It is much better, however, to recognize that the word “save” means deliver, and so when Peter writes that baptism saves us, he is saying that baptism delivers us. What does it deliver us from? In the context, Noah and his family were “saved through water” (3:20), which does not mean that the ark gave them eternal life, but that they did not drown in the flood and were delivered from the wickedness and rebellious ways of the people who lived at the time of the flood.

Peter says the same thing can happen to us today (4:3-4) if we live in light of the resurrection. Is Peter telling us how to receive eternal life? No, he is inviting us to avoid the flood of sin and death that comes from lewdness, lust, drunken revelries, and abominable idolatries. Such sins drown out our lives, and we can avoid drowning in sin by recognizing that through baptism (outer water baptism represents the inner reality of Spirit baptism) we have died to sin in Jesus Christ.

Baptism reminds us that we are not slaves to sin but can live free from it. Living this way does not help us earn or keep our eternal life, but it does help us escape the pain and suffering caused by sin.

1 Timothy 4:16 and Once Saved, Always Saved

Then there is 1 Timothy 4:16. According to this text, our salvation is dependent upon how we live our lives and what sort of doctrine we teach and believe. If we fail to take heed of our lives and our doctrine, then we will not be saved.

If the word “saved” refers to eternal life, then Paul is telling Timothy that in order to receive eternal life, he needs to have Godly behavior and beliefs. In other words, keeping eternal life depends on living the right way and believing all the right things. What a scary thought!

If, however, we look in the context, we see a different truth emerge. Paul knows that Timothy feels inadequate to be an elder in the church at Ephesus because he is so young. Paul says that Timothy’s age will not matter if Timothy can give an example to the other Christians in proper behavior and conduct (4:12). If Timothy watches his life and doctrine closely, he will be saved (delivered) from people looking down on him or ignoring him because of his youthfulness.

Salvation is Conditional Upon Good Works. Eternal life is Not.

All of these texts, and numerous others in Scripture, clearly reveal that salvation is conditional upon how we live our lives and what we believe. So if we think that the word “salvation” refers to “eternal life,” then the clear teaching of Scripture is that receiving and keeping eternal life is conditional about believing the right things and behaving in the right way. This is why I say that “once saved, always saved” is not a biblical teaching.

However, eternal security is biblical.

Once we come to understand that the salvation word family almost never (if ever) explicitly refers to eternal life but instead refers to some sort of deliverance from the calamities of life such as danger, suffering, sickness, and premature death, or to some sort of negative experience at the Judgment Seat of Christ, we can readily teach along with Scripture that salvation is conditional upon what we believe and how we behave.

This does not mean, however, that eternal security is also false. Quite to the contrary, there are numerous reasons to believe and teach the biblical truth of eternal security, all of which I cover in my online course.

Want to learn more about the gospel? Take my new course, "The Gospel According to Scripture."

The entire course is free for those who join my online Discipleship group here on RedeemingGod.com. I can't wait to see you inside the course!

3 Keys to Understanding Romans 9

By Jeremy Myers

28 Comments

Romans 9 has been a battleground text for centuries. Calvinists and Arminians have hotly debated this passage since the days of the Reformation.

Since I am neither a Calvinist nor an Arminian, I want to offer my perspective on Romans 9 over the course of the next few posts so that people who are trying to understand what Paul is saying in Romans 9 about election, Esau, Pharaoh, and the potter and the clay. Note that all of these posts are drawn from the longer explanation in my book The Re-Justification of God.

When it comes to understanding Romans 9, there are three keys which I have found helpful in explaining what Paul is teaching in this text. Let us look briefly below at each of these three keys to understanding Romans 9.

1. Salvation in Romans

To begin with, we must recognize that “salvation” in Scripture rarely refers to receiving eternal life. “Salvation” does not mean “forgiveness of sins so we can go to heaven when we die.” The word simply means “deliverance,” and the context must determine what sort of deliverance is in view.

Most often, the deliverance is some sort of physical deliverance from enemies, storms, and sickness, or from some of the temporal consequences of sin (cf. Matt 8:25; 9:22; Mark 5:34; 13:20; Luke 8:48; 23:35; John 12:27; 1 Tim 2:15; 2 Tim 4:18; Jas 5:15; Jude 5; See “save, saving” in Vine’s Expository Dictionary, p. 547). This understanding of “salvation” is especially true in Romans.

Most of the uses of “salvation” in Romans are in connection with wrath. It is not wrong to say that “salvation in Romans” is deliverance from wrath (Hodges, Romans).

So what is wrath?

Just as salvation does not refer to entrance into heaven, wrath does not refer to eternity in hell. Nor is wrath from God.

Though an imaginary objector to Paul does occasionally speak of “God’s wrath” in Romans, Paul does not understand wrath this way. For Paul, “wrath” is what happens to people (both believers and unbelievers) when they stray from God’s guidelines for proper living.

Today, we would speak of “consequences.” While someone today might say that a destroyed marriage is the consequence of adultery, Paul might argue that a destroyed marriage is the “wrath” of adultery. And as all who have experienced the damaging and destructive consequences of sin know, the fall-out from sinful choices often feels like wrath. Sin brings metaphorical earthquakes, hailstorms, raging fires, and flash floods into our lives, leaving behind large swaths of destruction. What better word to describe this than “wrath”?

So in Romans, salvation is deliverance from the devastating consequences of sin. This is the first key to understanding Romans 9.

2. Election is to Service

The second key to understanding Romans 9 is to see that “election” is not to eternal life, but to service. Just as God elected Israel to serve His purposes in the world, so also, God chose the Church for similar purposes. This understanding of election greatly helps us understand some notoriously difficult texts in Romans 9–11.

For example, Paul writes in Romans 11:17-21 that the elect branches were cut off so that non-elect branches could be grafted in, which in turn will lead to the elect-which-became-non-elect to be re-grafted back in and become re-elect. If Paul is referring to eternal life when he speaks of election, none of this makes any sense. How can a people or a nation whom God elected “to eternal life” before the foundation of the world go from being elect to non-elect and then re-elect?

However, this makes perfect sense when we recognize that election is not to eternal life but to service. God wants to bless the world through His people, and if one group of people fails in this God-given task, then God will simply find someone else to do it while He continues to lead the first group to fulfill His overarching purposes—albeit in different ways than originally intended. If this second group also fails, they too will be moved into an alternative role in accomplishing God’s will (Rom 11:17-21).

If necessary, God could raise up a people for Himself from rocks (Matt 3:9). In this way, when Paul writes about branches being cut off so others can be grated in which will lead to the cut off branches being grafted back in again, he is not talking about people losing and regaining eternal life, but about losing and re-gaining places of privilege and purpose in God’s plan for this world.

God’s plan of redemption started with Israel, shifted to the Gentiles, and eventually will reincorporate Israel so that “of Him and through Him and to Him are all things” (Rom 11:36).

This idea really helps us understand Romans 9. Election is to service, so that God can elect even people like Esau and Pharaoh to service, and this has nothing whatsoever to do with their eternal destiny.

3. Election is Corporate AND Individual

The third and final key to understanding Romans 9 is that election is both corporate and individual.

There is a long-standing debate about election, regarding whether Paul is talking about corporate election or individual election. That is, when Paul writes about the election of Israel, or God’s choice of Jacob over Esau, is Paul talking about the individuals within Israel, and the individual destinies of Jacob and Esau, or is Paul referring instead to the national and corporate destinies of Israel (which came from Jacob) and Edom (which came from Esau)?

Usually, the battle lines over this debate are determined by whether a person is a Calvinist or not. As Calvinists believe and teach the individual election of certain people to eternal life, they are more likely to understand and explain Romans 9 in this light. Those who do not hold to Calvinism tend to interpret Romans 9 as teaching corporate election. Henry Halley, author of Halley’s Bible Handbook, is one such writer:

Paul is not discussing the predestination of individuals to salvation or condemnation, but is asserting God’s absolute sovereignty in the choice and management of nations for world functions (Halley’s Bible Handbook, 527).

So which is it? Is Paul talking about individual election or corporate election?

I believe that in Romans 9 Paul is teaching both corporate and individual election.

Since it is the purposes of God that determine who gets elected and to what form of service they are elected, then it is God who decides when He needs to call individuals and when He needs to call nations or groups of people to perform certain tasks.

Of course, even when election is corporate, it is true that God’s purpose for that group of people is carried out by individuals within the group, and so in this sense, we can say that even corporate election has an individual aspect.

On the other hand, the benefit to corporate election is that even if some individuals within the corporate identity do not contribute to fulfill the purpose of the corporate entity, there will be some within the group that will fulfill their purpose, thus accomplishing God’s purpose in election.

With these three keys before us, the difficult chapter of Romans 9 becomes much less difficult. If you want to read more, you can get my book, The Re-Justification of God.

If you want to read more about Calvinism, check out other posts in this blog series: Words of Calvinism and the Word of God.

Romans 8:28-30 and the “Golden Chain of Salvation”

By Jeremy Myers

26 Comments

Yesterday we considered the problem with the Calvinistic ordo salutis in Romans 8:28-30.

I suggested that there is a different way of understanding this text in light of Paul’s overall argument. We consider this alternative today.

The “Golden Chain” of Romans 8:28-30

The first thing to consider is the “golden chain” which begins with the foreknowledge of God and ends with glorification.

Through repeated use of the plural pronoun “whom” (Gk., ous), all those whom God foreknew are also those who arrive at glorification. That is, the same group which is identified by the “whom” in Romans 8:29 seem to be the exact same group which reach glorification in Romans 8:30.

Most Calvinists would agree with this, and say that this proves that God has some sort of eternal divine foreknowledge of all things. But note what happens when we apply this sort of foreknowledge to Romans 8:29-30.

All those whom God foreknew (which is everybody and everything), are also those who are predestined, called, justified, and glorified. Understanding God’s foreknowledge in Romans 8:29-30 as encompassing all people leads to the inevitable conclusion that all people will be glorified. But if only a certain group of people out of all humanity will be glorified, then this leads us backward through the “golden chain” to see that God’s foreknowledge is also limited to a certain group of people.

In other words, we must either say that this verse teaches universalism, or that we have misunderstood the terms and logic Paul uses in this text. I vote for the latter.

Greg Boyd is exactly right when he says this about Romans 8:28-30:

If Paul is using the term proginōskō (lit., “to know before”) in a cognitive sense—that is, to say that God possessed certain information ahead of time—then far from implying that God foreknows everything, this text would actually be denying that God foreknows everything.

… It is more likely that Paul is using the term know in the customary Semitic sense of affection rather than in a merely cognitive sense. To “know” someone is to love that one. So to “foreknow” someone means to love that one ahead of time. Three chapters later Paul refers to Israel as “[God’s] people whom he foreknew” (Rom 11:2). If this is in fact its meaning in 8:29, then Paul is simply claiming that God loved the church before he called them just as he loved Israel before he called them.

… What God loved ahead of time (ultimately from the foundation of the world) was the bride of Christ, the body of Christ, the church considered as a corporate whole (Boyd, Satan and the Problem of Evil, 118. Such a view is not without significant lexical challenges, however. See Olson, Beyond Calvinism and Arminianism, 152-173).

Whatever foreknowledge Paul is talking about, he is not referring to some sort of exhaustive, all-encompassing knowledge of all events and all people from before all time, for this would lead to the conclusion that all those whom God foreknows will end up in glorification.

Paul’s Golden Chain in Romans 8:28-30

So what is Paul saying?

First, we must remember that in Scripture, and especially in Pauline theology, Jesus Christ is the ultimate elect one, and individual people become elect, not through an eternal divine decree from God, but by joining with Christ by faith.

In other words, God does not predestine or elect people to be in Christ; no, God elects Jesus, and by default, all who join with Jesus by faith also become elect as members of the “body of Christ.”

Second, we must also recall that election is not to eternal life, but to service.

God does not choose, out of the mass of humanity, some to spend eternity with Him in heaven, while all others are destined for eternal suffering in hell. This is not the biblical teaching of election.

Instead, election is to service, and God chooses some out of the mass of humanity to serve Him or perform certain tasks to accomplish His will in human history.

While He sometimes chooses unregenerate individuals for this purpose (such as King Cyrus, Judas, and a few others), all who are in Jesus Christ automatically become “elect” in Christ. That is, all who become members of the body of Christ are also elected or chosen by God to serve God’s purposes in this world.

These two points help us understand what Paul is saying in Romans 8:28-30.

Note that when Paul introduces the idea of God’s calling in Romans 8:28, he says that this calling is “according to His purpose.” And what is God’s purpose? In Romans 8:29, Paul states that those whom God foreknew, He predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son.

This calling of God is a calling upon believers to serve God’s purposes. Since all who are called are also justified, Paul cannot be referring to some sort of general call of the gospel to the world, but rather to a calling of God to believers to serve Him and come into conformity to Jesus Christ, “that He might be the firstborn among many brethren” (Romans 8:29).

We can see this more clearly if we include some elements in Paul’s “golden chain” which he left out.

For example, though Scripture includes proclaiming the gospel, human faith, Spiritual regeneration, and sanctification into the theological chain of events which contribute to the “salvation package,” Paul makes no mention of these.

Why not?

Maybe it was because he understood these other terms to be synonyms with the terms he did mention, or maybe it was because Paul’s list of terms places an emphasis on God’s role in salvation.

If we were to include these other four terms inside Paul’s chain of events, the list would look like this: Foreknowledge, predestination, proclaiming the gospel, faith, regeneration, calling, justification, faithfulness, sanctification, glorification.

Note that in this list, regeneration, calling, and justification are simultaneous events which follow faith but precede sanctification (cf. Jude 1). When a person responds to the gospel in faith, God regenerates them to new life, calls them to a specific purpose, and declares them righteous in His sight.

I do not, of course, want to add words to what Paul is saying. He included the terms he did because he wanted to make a specific point to his readers.

In Romans 8, Paul’s emphasis is on God’s part in the plan of salvation. There is nothing in Romans 8:28-30 about a human’s responsibility to believe in Jesus or to walk by faith for sanctification.

Paul is emphasizing God’s role while ignoring man’s role, but this does not mean that mankind has no role.

In the overall scheme of redemption, God alone is the one who foreknows what He will do, takes steps to make sure it happens, calls believers to a greater purpose in service to Him, justifies those who believe, and glorifies for eternity all whom He justified.

In Romans 8:28-30, Paul is not talking about an eternal decree from eternity past about to whom He would give eternal life, but rather, God’s plan from eternity past to bring those who believe in Jesus into conformity to the image of Jesus Christ, which does not fully occur until glorification (cf. Eph 1:4; 4:1; 5:27; Col 1:22-23).

This fits with everything we have seen about election so far. In Romans 8:28-30, Paul is saying nothing about God’s predestination of some to eternal life.

Instead, Paul is saying that God decided in eternity past to make sure that everyone and anyone who joins His family by faith will finally and ultimately be brought into conformity to Jesus Christ at their glorification.

Foreknowledge is not God’s plan from all eternity about whom to give eternal life. It is simply God’s plan about what to do with those who believed.

Since election is to service, God’s foreknowledge does not include the election of individuals to eternal life. God’s predestination is His commitment to carry out His plan. “And what is God’s plan? To bring all who have responded to God’s initiative with love to salvation, to eternal bliss” (Pilch, Cultural World of the Apostles, 91).

The Context of Romans 8:28-30

This understanding of Romans 8:28-30 fits perfectly within the broader context of Romans 8 as well.

In this section of Romans, Paul is writing to Christians who are facing severe testing and trials as a result of their faith in Jesus (cf. Romans 8:17-18).

But Paul wants to encourage his readers by telling them that the suffering they face will result in glory, and that absolutely nothing can separate them from God’s love or God’s purpose in their lives (Romans 8:31-39).

In light of this, the foreknowledge of God takes on a special intimacy and mercy for all who are part of the people of God. Paul’s point in Romans 8 is that God determined from eternity past to bring us to glorification despite our many weaknesses and failures.

God elected and predetermined a destiny for his people in full knowledge of what they were, what they would be without his intervention, and, most significantly, what they would become as a result of his grace on their behalf (Klein, The New Chosen People, 164).

In this way, there is great encouragement in Paul’s words.

Many of the people to whom he is writing (just like many people today), were struggling with feelings of inadequacy, guilt, failure, fear, and doubt. Paul wanted them to know that God knew all about these things from eternity past, and it didn’t stop Him from initiating His plan to rescue and redeem the world, and since God predestined such a plan, He will take care of everything necessary to bring it to completion, which will result in our glorification (cf. Romans 8:31-39).

Ultimately, the whole discussion about the ordo salutis in Romans 8 leads the student of Scripture in the wrong direction about Paul’s point. Paul is not so concerned with laying down a guideline about what happens in which order. He is not intent on describing each individual step in God’s plan of salvation.

Instead, Paul’s only point in writing Romans 8:28-30 is to encourage Christians that no matter what happens to them, God is with them, will not abandon them, and just as He has had them in mind since before the foundation of the world, He will not abandon them to the trials and testing they are facing.

If God is the only one who could bring a charge against them, but He will not do so, and instead, delivered His own Son up for us all (Romans 8:31-34), then we can be sure that absolutely nothing will separate us from the love of God (Romans 8:35-39). If God is for us, who can condemn us? Jesus could. But rather than condemn us, Jesus intercedes for us!

This is an astounding message from Paul which all believers need to hear.

[Paul] is speaking to Christians, about Christians, and to reassure them of God’s love for them and God’s desire for them to cooperate with his Spirit in working for good and in overcoming all tribulation (Marston and Forster, God’s Strategy in Human History, 245).

In Romans 8, Paul is not laying out some sort of mysterious outworking of God’s divine decree, but is describing in great detail the height, breadth, width, and depth of God’s love for His people.

He loves us, has always loved us, and will always love us. He set the plan of redemption in place, and He will bring it to completion. This is Paul’s point in Romans 8.

If you want to read more about Calvinism, check out other posts in this blog series: Words of Calvinism and the Word of God.

What is your experience with study bibles?

By Jeremy Myers

29 Comments

I am not a huge fan of study Bibles. I have used several throughout my life, however. I began with the Thompson Chain Reference Bible, then moved to the Life Application Bible, and spent some time with the Ryrie Study Bible, before finally using the Nelson’s Study Bible for several years. Today I use an unmarked wide-margin Bible for most of my Bible reading and Bible study.

I don’t use Study Bible’s Any Longer

There are two reasons I don’t have much interest in study Bibles any longer.

First, I have had too many encounters with Christians who cannot seem to differentiate between what the Bible says and what is written in the notes of their preferred study Bible. I cannot tell you how many times I have had to point out to people that the notes in their study Bible are just someone’s interpretation or understanding of what the Bible means, are not actually “God’s infallible Word.” This common experience has soured me from recommending Study Bibles.

The second reason I have stopped recommending or using study Bibles is related to the first. I firmly believe that God wants to teach each one of us how to read and understand the Bible. I believe the one of the primary ways the Holy Spirit speaks to us is through Scripture. But I also believe that we stifle God’s whisperings to us by turning too quickly to Bible commentaries, Bible studies from other Christians, and the notes in our study Bibles.

When we study a difficult (or “easy” – though is there truly such a thing?) text in Scripture and want to know what it means, we too quickly turn to what others have written about this passage, thereby short-circuiting anything that God might have wanted to teach us through the illuminating work of the Holy Spirit.

The Proper Place for Study Bibles

This does not mean there is no place for Study Bibles. There is. I still use them.

But I think the notes and study aids that are contained in Study Bibles should be used near the end of the Bible study process, rather than at the beginning. If you use a Study Bible as your main Bible, it is too easy, when wrestling with a troublesome text, to simply look down at the notes on the bottom of the page, and in so doing, miss out on the absolute thrill of the “self-discovery” that comes by sweating through the text and praying for understanding.

The Evangelism Study Bible

So it was with some trepidation that I sat down to read through a lot of the notes in the recently-released “Evangelism Study Bible” by Larry Moyer and EvanTell.

And as expected, I am still not a big fan of Study Bibles.

However, IF you are engaged in a lot of personal evangelism or crusade evangelism, I do highly recommend the notes in this study Bible to help you understand the free offer of eternal life in the Bible.

I respect Larry Moyer and his emphasis on the freeness and clarity of the Gospel message about eternal life. I respect his stance on eternal security. I like how he emphasizes that eternal life is the free gift of God to all who believe in Jesus for it.

I wish the notes would have been more clear about the biblical definitions of “salvation” (it rarely refers to eternal life in the Bible), and “repentance” (the notes take the change of mind view; cf. p. 1157).

Overall, the notes in the Evangelism Study Bible are decent, and it contains numerous sidebar studies on various concepts, ideas, and strategies related to evangelism and witnessing. I was not too surprised to see that the notes in the Old Testament were quite sparse. After all, very rarely do evangelists appeal to Old Testament texts, unless it is to Genesis 3 to talk about the sinful condition of humanity.

I also examined several hotly debated gospel and evangelism texts. I was pleased to see that in the notes on Matthew 7:16-20, the reader is informed that the bad fruit in question is the false doctrine of the false teachers. The notes and sidebar section on Hebrews 6 were excellent, as it laid out the various options for how to understand this tricky text (p. 1346), and concluded that however we understand Hebrews 6, it is not talking about someone losing their eternal life.

I was not at all impressed with how the Study Bible dealt with texts like John 15:2 (not a single note whatsoever), James 2 (a terribly weak discussion; almost non-existent), and Matthew 12:31-32. On this last text, the only note was “See Mark 3:28-30.” I went and checked the Mark parallel, and while the explanation was decent, it was much too short to be very helpful for most people who struggle with questions about the unpardonable sin.

By going here, you can get the notes on Ephesians for free.

So do I recommend the Evangelism Study Bible? Well, if you are looking for a Study Bible that will help you dig deep into the Word of God and understand it’s message, themes, and overall trajectory, this probably isn’t the Study Bible for you.

But if you engage in lots of one-on-one evangelism and large-group evangelism, the Evangelism Study Bible might help provide some clarity to your invitations. If you are trying to understand what the Bible says about the free gift of eternal life, this Study Bible might help you with that as well.

Anyway, what is your experience with study Bibles? Do you love them? Hate them? If you have used them, which ones, what do you recommend, and why?

Words that DO NOT Refer to Eternal life (Part 1): Salvation and Kingdom of Heaven

By Jeremy Myers

22 Comments

One of the reasons people get so confused about the conditions for receiving eternal life is that they equate terms and ideas in the Bible with eternal life which do not refer to eternal life. Ever since the Black Plague swept through Europe, Western Christianity has had an unhealthy preoccupation with what happens to people after they die, and as a result, has often read the Bible through life-after-death colored glasses so that everything seems to be teaching about what happens to people after they die.

The truth is that there is relatively little in the Bible about what happens to people after they die, and most of the terms and ideas in Scripture which we think teach about heaven or the afterlife are actually teaching about how to live our lives here and now on earth. (Interestingly, not even “eternal life” means only life after we die…)

There are very few synonyms for eternal life

Numerous problems arise in the thinking of many Christians from the mistaken belief that the Bible has numerous synonyms for eternal life. It doesn’t. Most often, when the authors of Scripture want to write about eternal life, they use the words “eternal life” (or “everlasting life” in some translations).

However, there are numerous other terms and phrases in the Bible that modern readers often confuse with “eternal life,” and as a result, end up with confused theology as well. Below is a brief description of five of these terms with an explanation of what these terms actually mean.

Saved and salvation.

We have already discussed the words “saved” and “salvation” in previous posts but the misuse of this word as a synonym for eternal life is so prevalent, I thought it would be wise to mention it here again.

When the Bible uses the words “save” or “salvation,” it is almost never talking about eternal life, but is instead referring to some sort of temporal or physical deliverance from sickness, death, enemies, or other calamity.

Sin has disastrous consequences in our life, and when Scripture talks about being saved from sin, it is not referring to deliverance from hell and going to heaven when we die, but about being delivered from the damaging effects of sin in our lives here and now.

Kingdom of Heaven and Kingdom of God.

Many Christians believe that these terms refer to “heaven” itself, and more specifically, when Scripture talks of entering or inheriting the Kingdom, that this refers to going to heaven when we die.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

The Kingdom of Heaven and the Kingdom of God are two terms which refer to the rule and reign of God. God does reign, of course, in heaven, but God also seeks to rule and reign in our lives, and on this earth. This rule and reign of God is accomplished in various ways, but primarily as people start living according to the principles of God’s guidelines for how life is to be lived.

This begins in our own life, and moves outward from there. As such, entering and inheriting the Kingdom of Heaven is not about receiving eternal life or going to heaven when we die, but is concerned with how we live our lives right now on this earth as citizens of God’s Kingdom. If you want to read more on this subject, I strongly recommend How God Became King by N. T. Wright.

In future posts we will look at other terms that are often confused with “eternal life,” so stay tuned!

I believe in eternal security … but not “Once Saved, Always Saved”

Eternal Security and Once Saved, Always Saved

The Word “Salvation”

James 1:21 and Once Saved, Always Saved

1 Peter 3:21 and Once Saved, Always Saved

1 Timothy 4:16 and Once Saved, Always Saved

Salvation is Conditional Upon Good Works. Eternal life is Not.

3 Keys to Understanding Romans 9

1. Salvation in Romans

2. Election is to Service

3. Election is Corporate AND Individual

Romans 8:28-30 and the “Golden Chain of Salvation”

The “Golden Chain” of Romans 8:28-30

Paul’s Golden Chain in Romans 8:28-30

The Context of Romans 8:28-30

What is your experience with study bibles?

I don’t use Study Bible’s Any Longer

The Proper Place for Study Bibles

The Evangelism Study Bible

Words that DO NOT Refer to Eternal life (Part 1): Salvation and Kingdom of Heaven

There are very few synonyms for eternal life

Saved and salvation.

Kingdom of Heaven and Kingdom of God.

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