Can salvation be lost?

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Cephas

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To add to the question:

Can salvation be lost?

-if yes, how?

-if no, why not?
 
Hi Cephas,

This sounds like a ‘once saved always saved’ question. I don’t believe in predestination. I believe in free will. I don’t pretend to know who will be united, and who will not be, with God in heaven. I hope and pray that I will be. I also pray they you will be. I also don’t believe that any individual is damned before their death. Even the greatest sinner, don’t forget we are all sinners, can be forgiven and reconciled with God.

The way to the Father is through the Son.
 
From a Jim Burnham article on my site…

The Calvinist position is consistent with itself, but is not consistent with human experience or the Scriptures. It cannot be reconciled with the cooperation and resistance of free will, sin and virtue, the possible loss of grace, punishment and reward, and the universality of redemption and grace. Calvin’s God is arbitrary and despotic.

The Catholic position is consistent with itself, with human experience, and with the Scriptures. God’s foreknowledge and foreordination of the elect to heavenly glory includes His universal desire and sufficient grace to save all men, our free cooperation with His grace, good works which truly merit heavenly reward, and the real possibility – during this life of testing and pilgrimage – of rejecting grace and salvation and thus deserving the punishments of hell.

Calvinism and Catholicism Contrasted

Phil P
 
Also take into consideration the difference in beliefs concerning Justification.

Many, if not all, protestants believe that when you are Justified, you are “clothed with the righteousness of Christ” while you, yourself, remain corrupt. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think this is why it makes sense that you can’t lose your salvation in protestant theology. If you are Justified yet still remain corrupt, it doesn’t matter if you sin. Since you are already corrupt, no amount of sin can make you more corrupt…and, consequntely, no amount of good works can make you less corrupt. Either way, if you continue to sin or not, when you come before God, you are corrupt. But since you are “clothed in the righteousness of Christ,” you will be saved.

The Catholic belief is that “Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man.”
–CCC

And, “Justification is a true removal of sin, and not merely having one’s sins ignored or no longer held against the sinner by God.”
–Modern Catholic Dictionary

So in Catholic theology, not only are we clothed in the righteousness of Christ, but we, ourselves, are made right with God. So in protestant theology, the person isn’t actually changed and therefore, once justified, can’t do anything to lose their salvation. A Catholic, on the other hand, once justified, IS changed. So when we commit a mortal sin and change ourselves back to the way we were, we lose our salvation until we are made right with God again.
 
Our state of justification can be lost. The scriptures clearly teach it. For example:

Heb. 10:26- “If we sin deliberately after receiving knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains sacrifice for sins but a fearful prospect of judgment and a flaming fire that is going to consume the adversaries.”

Calvinists will most likely respond that this passage is not talking about true Christians, but those Christians who thought they were saved and never truly were. But the context speaks otherwise. These people the author refers to as “we” were: v. 22 “hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water,” v. 29 and were sanctified by “the blood of the covenant.”
 
PhilVaz-

Thanks for that great link! I have a friend who is more or less a Calvinist and we have had many discussions…but I have never seen anything so clear and consise! I’ll be using that next time for sure.
 
This is good I do not believe it can be lost but we still have our free will, and he loves us enough to let us leave if we choose to. So yes it can be lost but only by choice.
 
You might want to check out the existing thread “John 6:44 and Eternal Security.” There are quite a few posts that cover this topic.
 
I don’t know of any scripture that claims once we accept Christ that we lose our free will. I know a couple of my Protestant friends who speak as if this is the case when talking about once saved always saved. I have found that my Protestant friends who don’t agree with that theology also find the Catholic terminology of “losing salvation” to be difficult to understand as it seems to imply I’m just walking down the road and Poof* my salvation has been lost. I have changed my wording to ‘refusing’ or ‘giving back’ the salvation giving to me by Christ. My Protestant friends have been better able to understand the Catholic teaching with just a little change in terminology. 👍
 
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Cephas:
To add to the question:

Can salvation be lost?

-if yes, how?

-if no, why not?
Click to expand...
It can be lost by your rejection through sin…
 
So man determines his salvation by his free will works. Is anyone planning to tell that to God-face to face- and claim his share of the glory. Don’t bet on it.
 
salvation cannot be lost.

it can be denied (or not accepted). this can even happen once some one has previously accepted it.

salvation is basically living in the truth that we have been reconciled to God. when we live outside of that truth, we deny God’s work in reconciling us and give up the benefits of that truth.

but it is not like i can be walking down the street and just… whoops! i lost my salvation! some one help me find it!

salvation isn’t a contact lens or our wallets. it is a free gift that is ALWAYS available to us because it is the truth of the world’s situation.
 
bengal_fan said:
salvation cannot be lost.

it can be denied (or not accepted). this can even happen once some one has previously accepted it.

salvation is basically living in the truth that we have been reconciled to God. when we live outside of that truth, we deny God’s work in reconciling us and give up the benefits of that truth.

but it is not like i can be walking down the street and just… whoops! i lost my salvation! some one help me find it!

salvation isn’t a contact lens or our wallets. it is a free gift that is ALWAYS available to us because it is the truth of the world’s situation.
Click to expand...
give me an example of an action it would take to lose that salvation…

Denying Christianity?

What about switching denominations to the “wrong” one, yet you still believe in Jesus Christ?

What if I believe Jesus Christ died for our sins yet I kill someone every single week. Will that salvation be taken away from me?
 
PhilVaz said:
From a Jim Burnham article on my site…

The Calvinist position is consistent with itself, but is not consistent with human experience or the Scriptures. It cannot be reconciled with the cooperation and resistance of free will, sin and virtue, the possible loss of grace, punishment and reward, and the universality of redemption and grace. Calvin’s God is arbitrary and despotic.

The Catholic position is consistent with itself, with human experience, and with the Scriptures. God’s foreknowledge and foreordination of the elect to heavenly glory includes His universal desire and sufficient grace to save all men, our free cooperation with His grace, good works which truly merit heavenly reward, and the real possibility – during this life of testing and pilgrimage – of rejecting grace and salvation and thus deserving the punishments of hell.

Calvinism and Catholicism Contrasted

Phil P
Click to expand...
but didn’t Augustine ( Saint Augustine ) teach predestination too ???
a long time before Calvin …😛
 
funkyhorn said:
Also take into consideration the difference in beliefs concerning Justification.

Many, if not all, protestants believe that when you are Justified, you are “clothed with the righteousness of Christ” while you, yourself, remain corrupt. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think this is why it makes sense that you can’t lose your salvation in protestant theology. If you are Justified yet still remain corrupt, it doesn’t matter if you sin. Since you are already corrupt, no amount of sin can make you more corrupt…and, consequntely, no amount of good works can make you less corrupt. Either way, if you continue to sin or not, when you come before God, you are corrupt. But since you are “clothed in the righteousness of Christ,” you will be saved.

=====but yes, in Protestant theology, when a person is justified he or she is also changed : the direction of our life changes, we want to live to God’s glory, we will do “good works”, not to “deserve” heaven, but to please God and because the Holy Spirit, who dwells in every believer, will push us in this direction ; we cannot be satisfied with the kind of life we had before becoming Christians …** so I agree with the passage of the Catholic Catechism you quote just below …

The Catholic belief is that “Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man.”
–CCC

And, “Justification is a true removal of sin, and not merely having one’s sins ignored or no longer held against the sinner by God.”
–Modern Catholic Dictionary

So in Catholic theology, not only are we clothed in the righteousness of Christ, but we, ourselves, are made right with God. So in protestant theology, the person isn’t actually changed and therefore, once justified, can’t do anything to lose their salvation. A Catholic, on the other hand, once justified, IS changed. So when we commit a mortal sin and change ourselves back to the way we were, we lose our salvation until we are made right with God again.
Click to expand...
 
We can “lose” it by disobeying God. We, literally, walk away from Him. Jesus twice said that “he who endures to the end shall be saved.”
 
allischalmers said:
only if God can lie
Click to expand...
John 15:1-9 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vine grower. He takes away every branch in me that does not bear fruit, and everyone that does he prunes so that it bears more fruit.
You are already pruned because of the word that I spoke to you. Remain in me, as I remain in you. Just as a branch cannot bear fruit on its own unless it remains on the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without me you can do nothing. Anyone who does not remain in me will be thrown out like a branch and wither; people will gather them and throw them into a fire and they will be burned…”
Click to expand...
So apparently you can be part of the vine of Jesus and then be cut off if you do not bear fruit.

You may say Catholics lack hope because we are not sure we are going to heaven, but we just take Jesus at his word when he says that we will be judged. Why tell us we are going to be judged if we are already sure we are going to heaven? Is the judgment just for the ones who are not going to heaven? I’d say not, as Paul says:
2 Timothy 4:7-8 “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will award to me on that Day”
Click to expand...
Paul knew that he had kept the faith his whole life, and that means obeying God’s commandments among other things. This is about as much assurance as we can have. On those last days of our lives know that we kept the faith.
 
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