Salvation Assurance Insurance

[JillianRose]

Hello!!

I would like to think of my Assurance is my Insurance policy of where I am going to go when I die. I don’t understand why I can’t be assured of my own salvation?

Please and Thank you,

Jillian

 

[baltobetsy]

Because you will always have free will and the ability to reject God.

 

[fhansen]

Because you will always have free will and the ability to reject God.

Yep, and only He can know our eternal destiny with 100% assurance. Meanwhile, the grace given us to believe and hope in God already yields a great confidence, which can be increased, but not a “vain confidence”, as Trent calls the position of certain Reformers who believed that their salvation was actually based on this confidence.

 

[Scoobyshme]

Hello!!

I would like to think of my Assurance is my Insurance policy of where I am going to go when I die. I don’t understand why I can’t be assured of my own salvation?

Please and Thank you,

Jillian

Because due to the effects of Original Sin (namely, darkness of intellect and weakness of will), we have a great ability to fool ourselves into believing everything is fine, when it isn’t. Also, what use would it be for Jesus to judge us when we die if we already had assurance? And, as St. Paul says, there would be no room for the theological virtue of hope, if we already knew. We cannot hope for what we already have.

 

[piejesu]

Dear JillianRose,

While the preceding replies are certainly sound in a strict theological sense, don’t let them rain on your parade. For our hope is not the kind of hope that says, “I hope it will happen.” Our hope is in the unchangeable nature of God who is love.

“I give thanks to my God in every remembrance of you, always in all my prayers making supplication for you all, with joy; For your communication in the gospel of Christ from the first day until now. Being confident of this very thing, that he, who hath begun a good work in you, will perfect it unto the day of Christ Jesus.” Phil. 1:3-6

 

[AndrewcBain]

Hi guys,

fhansen wrote, “only He [God] can know our eternal destiny with 100% assurance”.

Hi fhansen. Interested to know what you think of 1 John 5:20…

“And we know that the Son of God has come, and He has given to us an understanding that we may know the true One , and we are in the true One , in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and the life everlasting.”

John says believers know that they ARE in the true One.

Can you call yourself a Christian if you lack the true believer’s assurance?

Scoobyshme wrote, “Because due to the effects of Original Sin (namely, darkness of intellect and weakness of will), we have a great ability to fool ourselves into believing everything is fine, when it isn’t.”

Hi Scoobyshme.

Yes, the heart is deceitful above all things.

But God says “everyone believing is justified” (Acts 13:39).

To doubt God is to imply that he lied in Acts 13:39. To say “I believe, but I might not be justified”, is to call God a liar.

Thanks guys,

Andrew
Cell phone: 812 575 0564

 

[JillianRose]

Next question…Why on Gods green earth would you put your phone number. Are you nuts…?

 

[daCatholicGuard]

Next question…Why on Gods green earth would you put your phone number. …"

Hello Jillian, et al,

That is why I wish this forum allowed you more than 20 minutes to revise your posts. Sometimes we say or do foolish things and can never retract them. (Hopefully, a moderator here can contact him and see if he wants it removed).

BTW, in regards to the general question, I also recall St. Paul saying that we “work out our salvation with fear and trembling.”

I don’t like it either- I wish we had guarantees… but who am I to question God’s Plan- so I guess I just have to live with it; do the best I can to fulfill His Holy Will and have hope in God’s unfathomable Mercy.

Oremus pro invicem,

Sean C. :knight2:

 

[fhansen]

Hi guys,

fhansen wrote, “only He [God] can know our eternal destiny with 100% assurance”.

Hi fhansen. Interested to know what you think of 1 John 5:20…

“And we know that the Son of God has come, and He has given to us an understanding that we may know the true One , and we are in the true One , in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and the life everlasting.”

John says believers know that they ARE in the true One.

Can you call yourself a Christian if you lack the true believer’s assurance?

It’s called honesty.Faith doesn’t remove every last shred of doubt-and that’s what makes it difficult sometimes-we must often step out in that faith, not always having the certainty (that only God has) that we’re not being foolish or just plain wrong. And then He rewards our obedience.

Catholics have assurance but it’s balanced with humility. And this counters what the Council of Trent referred to as the “vain confidence” of the Reformers.

 

[manualman]

Read the gospel accounts where Jesus teaches about the sheep and the goats. The goats seem rather shocked to discover they aren’t sheep, don’t they? Those goats seemed rather assured of their salvation to me…

 

[TimothyH]

But God says “everyone believing is justified” (Acts 13:39).

Andrew, you should know that taking four words out of the entire Bible and drawing conclusions based on them is not how Catholics interpret scriputure.

That small snippet taken out of a single verse is part of a larger discourse Paul gave to Jews in the synagogue about the ability of the Mosaic law to justify humans in God’s eyes vs. the grace of Jesus Christ.

You must know, my brothers, that through him forgiveness of sins is being proclaimed to you, [and] in regard to everything from which you could not be justified - under the law of Moses, in him every believer is justified. (Acts 13:38-39)

I realize that you believe that anyone who has belief in Jesus Christ is justified in God’s eyes. I am not questioning your faith. But I could throw verses back at you which prove that you don’t get into heaven unless you obey God.

Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. (Matthew 7:21)

See what I’m saying? My point is not to debate you or to prove you wrong. My point is to illustrate how Catholics interpert scripture, using all of the Bible and interpreting verses only in their context, and that throwing bible verses at Catholics isn’t going to get you very far here.

-Tim-

 

[JillianRose]

Hello Brothers and Sister!!

Thank you so much!! YOU’RE the best. You don’t know what a blessing this site has been to me. Now the only Assurance I need is to know I am going to make it thru parenting my 5 and 3 year old. LOL

Love,
Jillian

 

[ephesians2]

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to His great mercy, He has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is IMPERISHABLE, UNDEFILED, and UNFADING, kept in heaven for YOU, who by God’s power are being GUARDED THROUGH FAITH FOR A SALVATION READY TO BE REVEALED IN THE LAST TIME." 1 Peter 1

Supreme power, omniscience, omnipotence and sovereignty not only keep the inheritance, but also keep the believer secure. No one can steal the believer’s inheritance and no one can disqualify him/her from receiving it.

“…in all these things we are more than CONQUERORS through Him who loved US. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth,** nor anything else in all creation **, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 8

It seems clear to me that NOTHING can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord. “NOR ANYTHING ELSE IN ALL CREATION” is assurance. Not vain, if God’s Word tells me I can’t be separated from the love of God, I’m assured that I can’t be separated fron the love of God.

How do we know God loves us? “By this we KNOW that we are of the truth and reassure our heart before him; for whenever our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and he knows everything. Beloved if our heart does not condemn us, we have confidence before God; and whatever we ask we receive from him, because we keep his commandments and do what pleases him. And this is his commandment, that we believe in the name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he commanded us. Whoever keeps his commandments abides in God, and God in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit whom he has given us.” 1John3

If God abides in a believer b/c He gave the believer His Spirit and if nothing can seperate the believer from the love of God, then why can’t the believer be confident of his eternal life through Christ his Savior?

“By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment…” “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.”