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Eternal Security

Increase Your Faith

Increase Your Faith

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Reading time: 3 minutes

“I’m not sure I have enough faith to make it through this.”

“Increase our faith!” (Luke 17:5).

“I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24).

When you go through a personal crisis your faith is tested. Your friends might say, “just have more faith.” Taken as a cliché, it’s not only not helpful, it can be annoying. But as you’ll see, where you focus makes all the difference.

Seek Genuine Faith

Just have more faith is all about your effort–as in you’re not trying hard enough. If you hear “have more faith” and groan or feel even more discouraged, you’re focusing on a powerless effort devoid of God. You might feel cynical: Why should I try if it feels like God has abandoned me? But this won’t be fruitful because your focus is on yourself.

Now, let’s consider Have faith in God which is all about God. It’s genuine because God is the focal point. Genuine faith looks, sees, believes, and trusts. It’s not about how hard you’re trying.

For it is my Father’s will that all who see his Son and believe in him should have eternal life. I will raise them up at the last day.

John 6:40 NLT

This shifts the focus from what is impossible for us to do, to what is possible for God to do. The ability to believe connects us to God, giving us eternal life. God intentionally divides people into two groups (consider John 10:1-16 and Matthew 25:31-46). The only significant difference between the two is that God’s people undergo a transformation from spiritual death to spiritual life made possible by seeing and believing. Being born again forever changes a person. That’s what it means to have eternal life.

Your primary work is to believe in God. This means something different than “have more faith,” which is useless when it lacks belief. With genuine faith, you believe and are able to walk forward in the power of what you believe (see James 2:14-26 for more on this).

Jesus told them, “This is the only work God wants from you: Believe in the one he has sent.”

John 6:29 NLT

Belief Comes From God

God is at work in believing process.

God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God.

Ephesians 2:8 NLT

For no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them to me, and at the last day I will raise them up. “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes has eternal life.

John 6:44, 47 NLT

The power is in the believing. What should you believe? Your primary work is to believe God is who He says He is. God is good. God is your source of eternal life.

How to Increase Your Faith

I want more faith, don’t you? You can’t run a marathon or even to your street corner without food. Likewise, you can’t finish a spiritual race without a vibrant faith.

To strengthen your faith, you feed on God’s words. You meditate on God’s truth. You consume God’s words and allow them to become a part of you. How positive and hopeful you are depends on how much you reinforce your belief in the Good News about Christ.

So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ.

Romans 10:17 NLT

If you’re a believer, then you have faith already, but for it to do you much good, you have to exercise it regularly. Get your running clothes out of the closet and put them on.

Take the time throughout your day to be aware of your belief: I have faith. I believe. I can see and hear God. God is real. God is my help. I trust God. Then move forward confidently with all you have going on in your life. God is with you.

For more on increasing your faith, consider:
Faith as Spiritual Vision
www.desiringgod.org
www.crosswalk.com
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Last updated 08/20/2023

Jesus Will Never Reject His Children

Jesus Will Never Reject His Children

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How would it change your life if you knew that Jesus will never reject a believer like you? Life is hard with many difficult situations to endure (death, pain, suffering). God asks us to believe He is perfect love despite sometimes allowing terrible circumstances. Real faith is required to look beyond life’s negative events and see God’s love.

Fortunately for us, God gives us His Holy Spirit, enabling us to see God by faith. He makes profound promises about His relationship with us. If you are a believer, uncertainty and rejection die with your belief in Jesus’s death and resurrection. Certainty and acceptance are possible as faith sees the reality of God’s kingdom in the present moment, even though it isn’t fully realized, yet.

Never Rejected, No, Never

Jesus explains the kind of salvation he offers in John 10.

My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

John 10:27-29 ESV

In the clause “and they shall never perish” John uses the double negative with the aorist subjunctive, which is a very emphatic way of declaring that something will not happen in the future. Jesus is categorically excluding the slightest chance of an apostasy by his sheep. A literal translation would be something like, “They shall not, repeat, shall not ever perish in the slightest.”

Christian Theology, M. J. Erickson, Baker Book House, 1985, pg. 992

This kind of assurance is truly Good News. The Gospel, without such security, would be a different gospel than the Bible teaches. Can you imagine believing you will be in heaven today, but tomorrow fearing God’s eternal wrath believing you have been ejected from God’s family? Then with repentence the next day believing you will be in heaven? Then rejected again when you sin? The Bible says this is impossible because Jesus’s death was sufficient for all time (past, present, future). If it lacks the power to keep a person saved, Jesus would need to die all over again (Hebrews 6:4-6). Thankfully, God is all powerful rendering such worries unwarranted.

Never Rejected, But Doubting

Even with such direct statements of eternal security, believers must contend with the spiritual forces of fear and doubt. God would have us strengthen our trust in Him against these principalities and powers.

What might cause someone to doubt their salvation? It’s typically a sin. It’s hard to face when we do something cruel to someone else. The guilt can cause us to believe God will reject us. Jesus’s sacrifice means there is no longer condemnation for believers. Such forgiveness can seem to be too generous to believe, but that is the Good News of the Gospel! When this wonderful generosity is accepted with humility, it creates a heart response of gratefulness rather than a desire to sin more (Romans 5:20–6:3).

What about when someone sins against us? We might learn (come to believe) that we are not worth being saved. Present-day experiences can trigger memories of events that were intensely harmful. Following are some situations that might dig up the past:

  • Being lied to
  • Being ignored
  • Being interrupted
  • Waiting (uncertainty)
  • Being teased
  • Being criticized
  • Invasion of personal space

What do these have in common? They all can communicate insignificance (some directly and some more subtly):

  • Being lied to -> can’t trust or be trusted
  • Being ignored -> not worth the time or engagement
  • Being interrupted -> voice is not important or worth hearing
  • Waiting (uncertainty) -> don’t deserve good things
  • Being teased -> inferior
  • Being criticized -> defective
  • Invasion of personal space -> don’t have a valuable self that is worth protecting

These will likely cause everyone some distress, but people who have experienced abuse might recall the deep distress of older abuse. Some people have become resilient enough to overcome the negative experiences. The difference has to do with a person’s self-image. The weaker the self-image, the easier it is to allow negative spiritual forces to overwhelm with falsehood, intensifying the pain to crushing levels.

The combination of (1) significant past negative treatment (2) current triggering negative treatment, and (3) preying spiritual forces can be enough to cause people to question their status before God.

But as we have seen, Jesus is emphatic that believers are securely His. The song Love Still Bids You Welcome captures this well. Even though we sin, God holds onto us with a grip that does not slip. Anyone who has tasted God’s goodness would never want to let go of God, but even so because of our weakness, we must rely on God’s strength.

He will not cast you out. Whoever enters in will forever dwell with Him. A believer cannot be rejected by God; he or she is a child of God forever.

Learn more about God’s goodness amidst tragedy.
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The Mind-Blowing Good News Gospel

The Mind-Blowing Good News Gospel

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What is the Good News of the Gospel? Those who believe God raised Jesus Christ from the dead and testify to this publicly will be saved (have the assurance of eternal life). The Good News is nothing short of astonishing. When it is considered at face value, it should sound unbelievable. Can I really have freedom for free? Believing (having faith) doesn’t cost us anything, but it cost Jesus His life.

If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is by believing in your heart that you are made right with God, and it is by openly declaring your faith that you are saved.

Romans 10:9-10 NLT

Good News is Permanent

Believers have eternal life. Eternal life is unending because God transforms us from spiritual death to spiritual life. Eternal life starts the day you first believed. Christ’s work on the cross cuts away our sin and forever destroys the record of our sin. Christ living in believers provides them the hopeful assurance of sharing in His glory (Colossians 1:27; 3:3-4).

You were dead because of your sins and because your sinful nature was not yet cut away. Then God made you alive with Christ, for he forgave all our sins. He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross.

Colossians 2:13-14 NLT

Good News is Complete

God forgives all our sins, not some. All includes past, present, and future sins. If it didn’t include future sins, Christ would need to be crucified again. It would mean that His death was not sufficient. But Christ has defeated death once and for all time. He has forever changed how believers relate to God. We have a new relationship with God as friends, not enemies. This new relationship is based on love, not fear.

This includes you who were once far away from God. You were his enemies, separated from him by your evil thoughts and actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his own presence, and you are holy and blameless as you stand before him without a single fault.

Colossians 1:21-22 NLT

Good News is Faith-Based

Having been reconciled with God, we are close to God. We can approach Him with boldness. We have no need for fear, doubt, or uncertainty. We can know with full assurance that we are blameless. This has nothing to do with our efforts, but only with Christ’s effort on our behalf. We must fully place our trust in Christ for salvation. There is no room for the belief that our effort in any way has the power to save. To consider other options is to deviate from the Gospel message found in the Bible.

But you must continue to believe this truth and stand firmly in it. Don’t drift away from the assurance you received when you heard the Good News.

Colossians 1:23 NLT

Did any of us earn the right to be saved? No. Was there anything we could do to persuade God to save us? No. It is only because of Christ’s initiative and plan to defeat death that being reconciled to Him is possible. Once a person becomes aware of God’s goodness, love, and mercy, there would be no reason to give that up. There is no better love, no higher power to run to. Once saved and adopted into the family of God, there isn’t anything a believer can do to become unsaved. The gift of salvation is that amazing.

More about eternal security.
More on understanding Colossians 1:23
How Paul supports eternal security in Colossians
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Suffer For The Right Reasons

Suffer For The Right Reasons

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God works out everything for the good of those who love Him. But in the midst of suffering, those words from Romans 8:28 can feel trite. God wants us not to repay evil for evil. The person that can achieve this will demonstrate that God is real (1 Peter 3:15). That’s because the ability to respond to evil with kindness can only come from God.

However, the right response doesn’t always mean continuing to allow someone to take advantage of you. There are times when it makes sense to move out of harm’s way and times when God calls us to suffer for His purposes.

Appropriate Suffering Advances God’s Kingdom

When God expects us to endure suffering, there is always a purpose with eternal consequences. Enduring hardship for the right reasons allows God’s purposes to come to fruition. Because of sin, we live in a world where doing the right thing often results in suffering:

  • we don’t feel better and might even feel worse
  • we don’t get what we want and might even feel miserable
  • our immediate living (on this earth) might seem unproductive (by this world’s definition)

Jesus has an extremely difficult teaching for us. God’s kingdom is more important than any happiness or satisfaction you can derive from this life.

There are many different paths people can walk on in life. But there is only one kind of path that takes you to a desirable destination. It is the path of suffering and growth. This path is undesirable because it is difficult to walk. Choosing this path is counter-intuitive. It’s the right path, but it will feel wrong because it’s impossible to walk it without suffering.

The other paths appear much more desirable and are much easier to walk. In fact, there may even lead to a long period of ease and pleasure. But there is a catch: the journey is easy, but the destination is undesirable. What good is an easy path if it only takes you to an accursed destination?

Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Matthew 7:13-14 NIV

Needless Suffering Only Contributes to Evil

Hopefully, I have made the case that suffering is necessary and natural some of the time–when it is directly connected to keeping your faith in Jesus and your witness to Him.

Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

Matthew 5:11-12 NIV

But there are probably even more ways we all suffer needlessly. There is no reason to allow suffering to continue in any of the following circumstances.

  • The suffering does not advance God’s purposes
  • The adversity only harms or confuses the person being hurt (such as when a child is abused). The person does not have the capacity to endure the suffering without loss of personal integrity.
  • Pure evil is causing the torment, so there is no way that tolerating it will soften a heart.

In any of these kinds of situations, do all that you can to prevent or stop the suffering. Don’t embrace pain if you don’t have to. God’s will is not to suffer needlessly. But it is God’s will that you walk the path that leads to life, which often involves some heartache to accomplish God’s kingdom work.

For it is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.

1 Peter 3:17 NIV

Finally, remember that even though the right path has many difficulties and obstacles, it is still the only sane path (all other paths lead to destruction), and God guarantees that once you start on the path, you will reach the glorious destination (heaven).

The righteous person may have many troubles, but the LORD delivers him from them all;

Psalm 34:19 NIV

Read more about avoiding needless suffering.
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How To Grow More Confident

How To Grow More Confident

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Who wants to be confident? Everybody does That’s because possessing confidence means you have resilience, reliability, and strength. We are all familiar with what its opposite involves: self-doubt, insecurity, and discouragement. The cost of a lack of confidence is high.

So, why aren’t more people brimming over with confidence? Because it comes with a price. Are you willing to endure whatever it takes to gain this sense of peace and security?

To become strong, you first need to be more fully in touch with the ways you are weak. How aware are you of how you are doing emotionally? Fortunately, there is a shortcut to finding and building your endurance and confidence.

Listen To Your Body To Grow Confident

When I go running for more than a few minutes, my focus changes. As fatigue sets in, I have to motivate myself to keep going. I become more aware of the finish line. How much farther do I have to go? Will I be able to make it without stopping?

Fatigue can result in discouragement or you can allow it to produce a determination to keep going. When I become fatigued while running, it’s nearly impossible not to notice the strain on my body. But what is more interesting is how my physical health and my emotional health are linked.

God made our brains to store similar experiences together. Running triggers my brain to focus on the theme of whatever is desperately concerning me. When my body protests because of the physical strain, my brain brings my most serious emotional concerns into my awareness. I become flooded with what matters most to me. The thoughts can be obstacles on my path to a life well-lived.

Test Your Limits To Grow Confident

To grow in endurance, you have to test your limits. The testing identifies weak areas that need strengthening. Growth is stressful, usually requiring an upfront investment for a future payoff. Growth costs you your immediate state of relaxation.

When we can trust God with this process, the value of the reward far exceeds the stress.

Therefore, since we have been made right in God’s sight by faith, we have peace with God because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done for us. Because of our faith, Christ has brought us into this place of undeserved privilege where we now stand, and we confidently and joyfully look forward to sharing God’s glory.

We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.

Romans 5:1-5 NLT

God is saying your problems and trials lead to a satisfying, secure, and confident hope. The development of character is the proof of your salvation–your entrance into heaven and eternal life. Furthermore, a heart full of love has no room for fear.

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

1 John 4:18 NIV

The next time you want to feel better, try wearing yourself out exercising (or whatever works for you). Then note what surfaces in your mind. That could be an area of weakness that God is working on so you can feel more confident.

We can see life as a painful struggle, but God sees it as endurance training. And endurance results in many good things such as peace, confidence, and character.

Read more about confidence.
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Last Edited 2023/01/29

Perspective Matters More Than You Think

Perspective Matters More Than You Think

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Jesus reveals the ultimate perspective on life with His statement “…seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you” (Matthew 6:33 ESV). A perspective is one view from one particular person. No one (except Jesus) can see life with absolute clarity. Everyone lives with lies–distortions in the lens of perspective.

Perspective Determines Life Direction

The Christian life is a state of mind–a battle for what is real. People can’t control what happens to them, but they can exercise their perspective like they would a muscle. Then can train to identify and believe what is true over what is false.

You might be thinking ignorance is bliss or what I don’t know can’t hurt me. But those are deceptive statements. What we don’t know has hurt us, is hurting us, and will hurt us. A blind person will have trouble avoiding hazards. When people don’t know they have cancer and believe they are healthy, it is all the more devastating when they must come face to face with the truth.

Your perspective on what life is makes all the difference in how your life will turn out. How would you feel if, while running a race, you find out you’ve been running in the wrong direction for most of it? Make no mistake, life is like a race. There is a finish line and there is only one way to get there. You must run your own race on the path God has set before you. It’s different from anyone else’s path, but God chose your path when He created you as you are.

The battle for seeing reality (what is true from God’s perspective) will never be over in this life. But you can continue to shift the balance from more deceived to more enlightened. In fact, that should be everyone’s primary purpose. But choosing the enlightened path is much harder than it looks.

Perspective Determines Eternity’s Direction

Everyone wants to be enlightened, but the path of wisdom runs in a different direction than the path of comfort in this immediate, material life. I don’t think there is any scripture that can better make this point than the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man from Luke 16.

“But Abraham said to him, ‘Son, remember that during your lifetime you had everything you wanted, and Lazarus had nothing. So now he is here being comforted, and you are in anguish. And besides, there is a great chasm separating us. No one can cross over to you from here, and no one can cross over to us from there.’

“Then the rich man said, ‘Please, Father Abraham, at least send him to my father’s home. For I have five brothers, and I want him to warn them so they don’t end up in this place of torment.’ “But Abraham said, ‘Moses and the prophets have warned them. Your brothers can read what they wrote.’

“The rich man replied, ‘No, Father Abraham! But if someone is sent to them from the dead, then they will repent of their sins and turn to God.’ “But Abraham said, ‘If they won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, they won’t be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.’”

Luke 16:25-31 NLT

Are you able to see the differences in how Lazarus and the Rich Man perceive life both before and after death? If you can see it enough to choose God’s kingdom over your immediate comfort, then there is hope for you! If you can’t see it yet, consider reading Mark 10:17-27 for more inspiration.

The first, and perhaps most important, step is to be able to see clearly. Then we can work on taking the appropriate actions. If we try to act before we understand, we can end up a long way down a path that leads to nowhere.

A comfortable life today provides no clue as to what eternity will be like.

More about gaining awareness of God’s Kingdom.
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