Eternal Security?

1 John 3:6 Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not: whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him, neither known Him.


...I know, way to pick a subject so highly controversial, right?
My only response is that it shouldn't be. Along with every other difference in doctrinal beliefs, there should be no controversy over what the bible states plainly. The bible is plain. There is no private interpretation (2 Peter 1:20)

I got into a conversation about this with one of my friends, and it's been strong on my heart ever since. I don't know that any of this will change anyone's minds.. but I pray that everyone who reads this is receptive to the truths in the Word of God. You can't live your life with an "it's okay to live my life however I want to because I'm forgiven" attitude and expect to make it into heaven. It won't happen. You CANNOT willfully commit sin and remain in grace. Yes, I said it.. christians do not have to sin. 1 John 3:9 Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for His seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. There are several places in scripture that God tells people "Go and sin no more". Why would He tell someone to do something if it is impossible? Matthew 5:48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
There is, however, a huge difference between willful and un-willful sin. Working up a lie to tell someone is willful sin, breaking the law by accidentally speeding is not. God does not count un-willful sin to us. James 4:17 Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin. Our knowledge has a lot to do with what is sin to us. But you can't not study to find out what is sin and what is not with the excuse that "if I don't know, then it's not sin". God knows all things, He expects us to get into His word and find these things out. Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me:
It is not to say either that people who have never heard the gospel are going to heaven. That's also false. Why did God tell us to go and tell people about Him if they're already going to heaven because they don't know? I heard this example once: If you have an island that has 1000 people on it, and a missionary goes and preaches to all of them. If 500 accept Jesus and 500 people deny Him, you've just done half of them a major injustice if they were already going to heaven.. because they aren't now that they've denied Him.
People are perishing because of a lack of knowledge.. The bible says that they are without excuse because creation tells us there is a God.

In Romans it says that we should not continue in sin that grace may abound.. Yes, God is a merciful, graceful God. But, in order to be a God of mercy and grace He must be a God of judgment. He is coming back for a pure and spotless bride. A bride with spot and blemish will not do.
We must be careful of taking scripture out of context.

YOU CAN BACKSLIDE

Jam 5:19 Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;
Jam 5:20 Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

1. Verse 19 it says "brethren", in other words, a brother in the Lord. Sinners are by no means "brethren".
2. Why would it even mention erring from the truth if it is impossible to do so?
3. In verse 20 he is now called a "sinner" - after erring from the truth.
4. If he is converted back his soul will be saved from death (hell)

There will by no means be sinners in heaven.

Mat 7:22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Mat 7:23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.

One of the main arguments that someone brought to me was John 3:16 that says whosoever "believes" on Him shall be saved, and John 6:47 that says "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that 'believeth' on me hath everlasting life." . saying that the verses don't say anything about continuing to believe. However, that is taking things out of context. Yes.. you must BELIEVE to be saved. But you must CONTINUE to believe and to take up your cross DAILY and follow Him. You must read the word of God in it's entirety. Compare scripture to scripture! Why would He waste His time warning us against backsliding and falling away if it is impossible to do so??
To take it a notch further, even believing alone isn't enough. The Word of God says in James 2:19 that if you believe that there is one God you do well, the devils believe also... and they TREMBLE. Do you think that there will be any devils in heaven?? Absolutely not!
As you can see in Matthew 7:22-23.. those people, without a doubt, believed in God. They did signs and wonders in His name and He still didn't have intimacy with them, He didn't KNOW them. Many people in this day and age fall into that category. They build mega churches and spend their days "working for the Lord", but in the end, without intimacy with the Lord, He will say that He never knew them.


Heb 10:26 For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,

Doesn't get too much more plain than that...


Heb 3:12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God.

You must walk with the Lord in order to be able to "depart" from Him...


Mat 24:13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

Why would anyone have to "endure to the end" to be saved if you cannot lose your salvation?


1Co 6:9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
1Co 6:10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

It doesn't matter if you "believed" or said a prayer at some point in your life.. if you are living in unrighteousness, you will not inherit the kingdom of God.


1Jo 2:1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:
1Jo 2:2 And He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
1Jo 2:3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.
1Jo 2:4 He that saith, I know Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
1Jo 2:5 But whoso keepeth his word, in him verily is the love of God perfected: hereby know we that we are in Him.
1Jo 2:6 He that saith he abideth in Him ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked.
1Jo 2:7 Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning. The old commandment is the word which ye have heard from the beginning.
1Jo 2:8 Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in Him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth.
1Jo 2:9 He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.
1Jo 2:10 He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.





I pray that you'd consider all that is written here and in the bible. Please don't let doctrine fog your mind. Get into the bible and find out what it says! Study it out! Compare scripture with scripture! and know that this is written 100% in love.

Molding me with every detail..

I've made it a point to only try to write when there's really something on my mind.. I've never been a big fan of thoughtless babbling.

The future scares the living daylights out of me, period. Everything about it..
There's the side of me that knows that all I want for the rest of my life is to be the wife and mother that God wants me to be, and there's the side of me that realizes "Hey, I'm 16 years old, I'm finished with highschool, NOW would be the time to go to beauty school if I'm ever going to do that." Part of me wants to eventually open a business that "makes you beautiful" for your special day. I'd love to do make-up, hair, and nails of wedding parties, your prom, homecoming, or whatever other special event you have in mind. It wouldn't be a huge business, of course, so that I could still be at home with my family most of the time.... kinda just do it as a side thing. . . and then there's the part of me that realizes that there's a huge possibility that I'm going to marry someone who needs me to support HIM 100% in whatever it is that he does if I'm going to be the wife I'm supposed to be. I know that God is the only one who knows my future... if I even have a future. I just pray that He would open the doors that He wants open and close the doors to anything outside of His will. Dad wants me to get into industrial sewing.. and I don't hate it, don't get me wrong.. but I'm very unsure of myself with it. For one, I don't know anything about it! He says that if I just keep doing it I'll figure it out. I can't function that way! I need a class, something, some kind of surety that I know what I'm doing. I keep looking for any sort of classes around here and can't seem to find any as of yet.. Praise the Lord. I know that it'll all work out. I hate being in the phase of not knowing what's next. As much as I trust the Lord, and want to completely just believe I'm going to trip over His purpose for my life.. it's so hard not to think about and try to figure out on my own. *sigh*

My other mind consuming thoughts of the week are not understanding why my life has always been surrounded by people who walk out of my life as quickly as they walk in. I've always had a very stable family, and most things in my life are stable, and I'm very blessed to have that. But I've also lived with more people in my life than well over the average American.. and that part of life is very unstable. You never know who's coming or going, who's going to be around forever and who's going to leave in the matter of days. You never know who you can get close to and trust and who is going to walk out the door in the morning and never look back. Before I go any further I have to say that it's been worth it for the people that made it. The people that did stick around and listen have made a huge difference in my life and I am very grateful for them. There's no price that can be put on their souls and their lives being changed forever.
The easiest thing, and most obvious answer, would of course be to become a hermit and hide all of my feelings, never trust anyone, and wait until they've proven that they aren't going anywhere to open up to them. Well, it's not that easy. I'm an open person, I have nothing to hide. I want to give everyone a chance to know me, and a chance to be the person that's words could make a difference. I believe that I have been that person in the past.. I believe even some of the people that walked out of the door and seemed to have never looked back did. I'm ashamed to say that I've also been a factor in creating the people that left in the past. That's something I can never take back. The burden of that would be far too much for me to bear on my own and is something I must count as a lesson learned and move forward changed. Through His grace I believe He used even those situations to create something inside of me that nothing else could have. To realize the amount of grace that He showed me, and to know that I'm exactly like they are/were apart from His grace has changed me in an unexplainable way.

Wouldn't it be nice if life was the perfect place we all dream of it being? The perfect family, perfect friends, perfect world. But without the bad things, the hard times, how could we ever prove our love for the Lord? Without persecution, without trial, without chastening we'd go through life living for ourselves without a care in the world, not even realizing the amount of people going to hell every day and that YOU AND I are the ones who will make the difference in their eternity. I know without a shadow of a doubt in my mind that God is using every detail of my life to mold me into the person that He wants me to be. He never said it would be easy... but He did promise to never leave us or forsake us.

Thank You Jesus for always being there.



Lord God, I pray that you would give me direction, wisdom, strength, grace, and your agape love for every single person I come in contact with.

Amen.

A shot at an intriguing introduction...

A blog is a place to write out your thoughts, opinions, beliefs, emotions, and whatever random thought you may have. . and that's exactly what I plan to do. So, don't be alarmed when that's what you find here.

To introduce myself,
I'm sixteen years old, I love Jesus Christ with all of my heart, I have amazing parents, my sister is my best friend, my brothers and I don't have quite the relationship we had at one time, but my brother in law plays the big brother role perfectly, and I love my new niece very, very much.
I was home-schooled my whole life, I worked hard at graduating early and accomplished that this year. I love the outdoors, I have a few close friends who are very precious to me, I love to travel, I love bible studies, I love praising the Lord.
I will elaborate on each of those, and much more in the future, but for now.. we'll talk about what's been on my mind lately.

First of all, I am a servant and disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ and He is involved in everything that I do, I don't want this blog to be any exception to that.
He is the single thing in my life that is steady, never changing, ever faithful, and trustworthy of all that I am, particularly my heart.

I realized over the past few days that "being in love" has been an idol to me. I've never dated anyone, kissed anyone, or even held anyone's hand for that matter.. but that didn't change the fact that thoughts of finding that person had engulfed my mind. Don't get me wrong, I don't believe that it's wrong to desire that.. It becomes wrong when it's all you think about.
I realized that I wasn't trusting the Lord with it, I was trying to figure it out in my own mind. God is so much bigger than that.

There are only a few people that I've actually been able to talk to about this. Everyone else automatically spits out "you're still young". Yes, I am young, but what people don't understand is that if I were to be worried about my career, college, or a job, well that would be perfectly okay, right? Well that's not what I want for my life. I understand that society tells you that you won't be happy without those things.. but I won't be happy with them. Those aren't the desires God has given me. Since as far back as I can remember, all I want is to love the Lord with my whole heart, get married to a man who loves the Lord with his whole heart, and have lots of babies and raise them to love the Lord with their whole heart. But that's not okay, right?

Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things will be added unto you- Matthew 6:33

Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart- Psalm 37:4

His word is faithful, and I know that He placed those desires in my heart for a reason. And I know He has a perfect timing for everything. I am still young, and I don't need to be in any kind of hurry.. but that doesn't mean that my heart desires should be any different than they will be years from now. I need to focus on Him, and not worry so much about the future. It's perfectly natural to desire love and affection, but at this point I should much more concerned about HIS love and affection. Which brings me to the subject of waiting....

In this day and age for a 16 year old to have never had a boyfriend is a strange, unusual thing.
Some people have the misconception that it's because of my father.. but that couldn't be more wrong. Yes, I was raised to not date.. but my parents never forced that on us. All three of my older siblings dated, and second to God, I credit them for why I chose not to. All three of them ended up with their hearts broken at some point, which made me realize that what my parents taught us was so true. If you completely trust the Lord with your future soul-mate, and keep Him first, you won't ever have to experience heart break in that form! In my case, being a girl, I am submitted to my dad as my spiritual authority. God has set him in my life to be my head and my covering. Before it's time for me to be with anyone, God will reveal to my dad who my Mr. Right is. You might think that's crazy, but I've seen it happen. If I step out from under that covering and try to find Mr. Right on my own, that's when I open myself up to heart break.

When I do find Mr. Right, I want to be able to give him my whole heart.. not little bitty piece of it that are left over from previous relationships. I want him to know that he was worth the wait, and that there's no one else that ever made me feel the way I'm going to feel with him, that there was never anyone else that was worthy of holding my heart, that I kept myself pure for him, and that I saved my first kiss for him to have forever. *smile* In Jesus' name.

So the main purpose of this post is to say that from now on.. I'm waiting entirely on the Lord, trusting entirely in His timing, and not letting my desires turn in to idols in Jesus' name.


The end.