Can You Lose Your Salvation?

John 5:24

24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.

This verse should be enough to answer that question. 

But, because some people still are in doubt, or convinced that you can lose your salvation, I'll elaborate, using scripture.

Let's start with the defenition of eternal (or everlasting):

John 10:28

28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

Some people think Jesus is talking about others, but in fact, this includes you. Not even you can pluck yourself out of Jesus's hand.

John 6:37

37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.

Jesus is saying here that if any person comes to him, which is believing on Him and receiving his sacrifice and free gift of salvation, He will in no wise cast them out; whatever they do. No wise means no wise, whatsoever. He is not speaing hypothetically here, He is speaking the cold hard truth. Once you're His, He will not cast you out. When you get saved you become part of His body, casting you out would be as if Jesus cut off his own limb (2 Timothy 2:13).

Aside from these two scriptures, there are 30 scriptures mentioning the gift of eternal or everlasting life alone! The list can be found here.


So.. what if I do sin?

Jesus died for all our sins. That means our sins past, present, and future. He already took the punishment for all of them, so there shouldn't be a reason to think He will still account those to you by taking away your salvation. 

And even if you do sin, and you feel horrible about it, you can ask God for forgiveness and He will forgive you:

1 John 1:9

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

He is faithful, because He said He would forgive us if we ask, and just, because Jesus already paid for our sin, and there's no reason for him to still hold our sins against us.

Aside from that, nothing in existence can take us away from God once we are His:

Romans 8:38-39

38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Nothing can seperate us from Him. Not even us.

Now, there are some scriptures that seems to suggest that we do need to work to "keep" ourselves saved. But I will show you that this most certainly isn't the case. These are, what I would call, "scripture pairs," of which Lordship Salvationists use only the first half to prove that we have to work to keep our salvation. 


1. Doing the will of the Father

Matthew 12:50

For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.

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John 6:39-40

39 And this is the Father's will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.

40 And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.

2. Overcoming the world

Revelation 21:7

He that overcometh shall inherit all things; and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.

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1 John 5:5

Who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God?

3. Keeping His commandments

Revelation 14:12

Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.

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1 John 3:22-24

22 And whatsoever we ask, we receive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in his sight.

23 And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.

24 And he that keepeth his commandments dwelleth in him, and he in him. And hereby we know that he abideth in us, by the Spirit which he hath given us.

Here we can see how important it is to allow scripture to interpret scripture, and to never take just one scripture by itself without a clear biblical defenition or explanation. But, as we know Lordship Salvationists, they just want to prove to God (actually themselves) how committed they are to being a good saint, showing "good behavior," which will only send you to hell. They are appealing to their own pride and using works, and God is very clear about how He feels about that:

Ephesians 2:8-9

8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Let's compare Jesus to a lifeguard. You are drowing at sea, and the lifeguard comes to rescue you. He saves you and pulls you on his raft, but only on one condition. You need to keep still and be completely quiet for the whole journey back, and the moment you say something or make any sound, he will throw you back in the water to drown. How cruel is that? Do you really think God treats us this way? Sitting up there in heaven, eagerly waiting for a reason to throw us in hell? 

If you truly believe that, I have to tell you that you're wrong. 

Exodus 34:6-7

6 And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,

7 Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, (...)

God is a good, loving God, whoms will it is that nobody perishes, because He loves us. He created us to be loved by Him, and for us to love Him back. he sacrificed Himself so we can do that. By making salvation completely about belief and not at all about our behavior, He shows how much He wants us to be with Him. He made it as easy as possible for us to choose Him, without the ability to go back into damnation, even if we wanted to. And all that without taking away our free will. 

This is why we don't need to worry anymore, as soon as we get saved. We can't be good enough to earn it, or bad enough to lose it. We can rest, because keeping our salvation has nothing to do with us:

Hebrews 4:9-11

9 There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God.

10 For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his.

11 Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.

The reason we have to labour to enter into that rest, is because resting in Jesus' finished work on the cross is against our nature. We are used to working for something we want to earn, but salvation is not something you earn. And if you can't lose it, you can't earn it, because salvation doesn't depend on you. It is something you receive freely through faith. And to God, faith is not about the one who believes, but about the one who is believed in. 

Jesus was and is fully capable of taking care of your sins and washing them away, so what's stopping you from putting your trust in Him? He did it 2000 years ago, long before you were born. Nonetheless, He did it with you in mind. 

Rest in that, and you will receive everlasting life.