This a repost prompted by a similar issue that TCR is dealing with at his blog in this post: What Sin(s) may a Christian Die in and Still be Saved? My post dovetails with the issues he is broaching, albeit from somewhat of a pastoral perspective. The point is, is that salvation revolves around God’s faithfulness for His kids; not our ability or performance by which we somehow hold on to Him (or “prove” our salvation, or such some nonsense!).
I am quite certain that there are many people in the church today, because of bad teaching and theology, who struggle with issues surrounding assurance of salvation. In fact this is not a new phenomenon, but is as ancient as the rambunctious Apostle, Peter. Remember the emphasis of the “Last Supper,” and Jesus’ prediction that one of His disciples would deny any relationship to, or knowledge of Himself. And we all know what happened, Peter most certainly denied any knowledge of or relationship with Jesus (see Mk. 14:66-72, amongst the other synoptics and the Gospel of John); and of course his response was one of sheer horror, and remorse. I think at that moment, and the immediate time following this incident, Peter was most unassured that he would have any further part in the “Kingdom of God.”
But you see, his relationship with Jesus was not dependent on his faithfulness to any kind of commitment or “covenant” that he may have made with God, and His Son; oh no, rather the relationship was completely dependent on Yahweh’s covenant faithfulness to His people (in fact all of humanity, objectively speaking). Let’s go back to the Old Testament for a moment to further substantiate Yahweh’s faithfulness, indeed Jesus’ faithfulness to humanity. In fact there are so many examples of this throughout the Old Testament, that we have our pick, so to speak; lets quickly look at Ezekiel 36 verses 22-32 (click on citation for full text). Here we come across Yahweh speaking to Israel, and coming to them in a time of great, great, sustained unfaithfulness, on their part. He admonishes them, and makes clear His intention to bring judgment on them (per the Levitic curses, Lev. 26; Deut. 28–30); but, and this is the hopeful part, He shows Himself faithful to them, inspite of their unfaithfulness to Him. In fact He promises to bless them beyond belief, at His initiation, and because of who He is, in Himself, inspite of their own unbelief and outright disobedience. Let’s just get a sampling of Yahweh’s staggering, and gracious nature towards an unbelieving people:
Therefore say to the house of Israel, ‘Thus says the Lord God, ‘It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for My holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you went. 23. I will vindicate the holiness of My great name which has been profaned among the nations, which you have profaned in their midst. The then nations will know that I am the LORD, declares the Lord God, when I prove Myself holy among you in their sight. 24. For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land. 25. Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols. 26. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. . . . (Ez. 36:22-26ff)
Notice the “I–you” pattern, in the section above; this pattern continues on through verse 32 of this chapter another seven times. This is an important pattern, and is used for emphasis in this passage. It is a movement, a unilateral one, where Yahweh is seen to be the One who is always faithful, and does everything because of His love (which we know defines His nature as Father loving Son, Son loving Father, and Holy Spirit loving both bringing communion amongst the three); which we creatures partake of as He showers us with His surplus and super-abundance. So then, when we come to Peter and Jesus we should not be surprised that Jesus responds just as graciously to a fearful Peter, cowering in remorse and sheer angst of soul. Notice the response, and special notice paid to Peter in Mark 16:7 (this is the angel’s message, just after Jesus has resurrected):
. . . But go, tell His disciples and Peter, He is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see Him, just as He told you. . . .
and Paul in his first epistle Corinthians also makes this special distinction of Peter:
. . . and that He appeared to Cephas [Peter], then to the twelve. 6. After that He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom remain until now, but some have fallen asleep; . . . (I Cor. 15:5, 6)
The point to take away from this, is that even though Peter denied Him, Jesus remained faithful in His love for Peter. This is illustrated by the pin-pointed pursuit by God to single out a desperate despairing Peter. The LORD pursues us, and He keeps us as His, no matter what. This relationship between Peter and Jesus was presupposed by who Jesus was (in relationship to the Father and Holy Spirit), and is for us; instead of who Peter (and we are) was and is for Jesus.
What this incident further illustrates is that “assurance of salvation” is not even a scriptural category. In other words, we don’t see this ever communicated as a viable situation in the scriptures. The scriptures presuppose Yahweh’s faithfulness, as well as humanities’ unfaithfulness; which is the point of the cross. It is the cross that reverses the curse and the subsequent doom and gloom of humanities’ fallen situation. Our response to the Father, is firmly located in Jesus’ response to the Father on the cross, “. . . Father into thy hands I commit my spirit. . . .” It is not until much later, within church history that “assurance of salvation” becomes a doctrinal “pastoral” category. The next post will further touch on the system of theology (esp. as developed in English Puritanism) that brought us this deplorable teaching on “assurance.”
Stand firm today in the confidence that it is not our faithfulness, but His faithfulness, and LIFE, that is the source of our confidence and hope!
And Judas?
This is about Peter? π
I suppose my take on Judas would be to label his situation as vocational. I’m not one to see “choosing” in relation to God through an a priori causal and determinist metaphysic π .
Just that I agree with your assessment and conclusions about Peter. I’ve so argued before.
Just wanted to know your take on Judas. I still haven’t been satified with the explanations out there. Merely “vocational”? I don’t know about that. It seems to me that he was also called by Jesus. And neither do I venture the a priori causal and determinist metaphysic/i>. Something else must be afoot. π
I’m not saying that he wasn’t “called” by Jesus, but that we shouldn’t think (as Classic Calvinist) that Judas is ipso facto now as the “son of perdition” representative of the reprobate. I think “vocational” works (just like the way I would interpret “Israel” in Rom 9–11, although I do think that there is an remnant of ethnic Jews in that context who will be saved etc) for Judas. We don’t have much else to go on from any of the context. He certainly was “destroyed” physically, and thus the son of perdition; but I don’t take that automatically to mean that he was eternally destroyed. I’m holding out hope that he was “saved,” and that his response to what he did to Jesus reflects a heart that broke. Classic Calvinists of course interpret that one way, but I reject their grid; so I obviously reject their conclusions and rather fatalistic/Stoic assumptions on Judas as a “type scene” or some such thing.
Judas is not easy.
Barth seems to take the vocational route with Judas. He is representative of the unbelieving Jews, and thus reprobate. However, that does not necessarily reflect on his personal destiny. A denial is a denial, be it Peter’s or Judas’. The grace is all God’s. In the past I have preached that the sin against the Holy Spirit is to reject the revelation of Christ, and the forgiveness found in him. That’s our daily walk, and all manner of sins will be forgiven, except that. But at the point of committing that sin, one doesn’t care anymore anyway. Logic would try to clearly distinguish between A and Not A, but it’s not that easy.
SG,
I agree with you on Barth, in fact I got my “category” there from Barth’s reading of Israel; which I became even more aware of as I recently read David Gibson’s: Reading the Decree: Exegesis, Election and Christology in Calvin and Barth.
And I also agree with what you’ve preached, in the past, for seminary, I wrote an exegetical paper on Matthew that argued the same thing. Great minds π . . .
Some semi-connected thoughts:
Good comments on Peter, and also on Judas. I don’t think we can say conclusively whether or not Judas turned back to Christ. It is left open, and we are left with an angst that is irresolvable in a purely intellectual sense.
We are confronted with a sobering mystery in the fact that some turn away from the unconditional love of Christ. But some do. And we do know that to be away from the presence of the Lord is not a good place to be by any stretch of the imagination. We should tremble when contemplating reality apart from Him.
I don’t think assurance comes by way of knowing in some theoretical manner that we can’t fall away. I think assurance comes through communion with Christ. It is the actual experience of the love of the Father shed abroad in Christ that casts away fear of judgment, not knowing about it from afar.
I’d say that Christ is our assurance, and the way to grow assurance is to get to know Him more deeply. “Abide in Me” He says (John 15). Love Him by keeping His commandments and you will enter into His love and He will show Himself to you (John 14:21).
Of course, God is unbelievably persistent and patient. But we are not to presume upon that kindness. It’s meant to lead to repentance (Rom. 2:4). We are called to “continue in his kindness,” which is open to all and is pressing in on all. Yet if we don’t, we too will be cut off (Rom.11:22). Joyful and sobering at the same time.
Tension!
Hey Dan,
I’m not so sure that the context, per Judas, requires that we believe that “perdition” should be understood in a metaphysical sense; i.e. in the sense that perdition equals Judas’ damnation to hell. I know that this is the usual Calvinist illustration for how God’s causation works in relation to His choice in election/reprobation, but I don’t buy that approach (I’m not saying that that’s what you’re saying, per se π ).
With faithfulness, as an Evangelical Calvinist, and more, as a simple Christian, I would ground all of the faithfulness and continuance in kindness to be grounded in Christ’s Spirit created vicarious humanity. Let’s hope that to be the case, if not we are all in big trouble; because none of us continue in anything that resembles faithfulness to God except through the Spirit’s work of binding us to Christ (of a certain kind of imperishable seed). Obviously I take it that at the point or ingression of appropriating personal salvation (or becoming united to Christ by Spirit breathed faith), that we are united to Him forever and that nothing can separate us from that kind of love (Rom 8.37ff), not even ourselves. His love and grace is all to encompassing. I also think we might need to consider the context of the passages you quote a bit further (like Rom. 2, is that referring to justification or Rom. 11 isn’t this referring to “vocation” and not “eternal salvation?” etc. questions like that). Thanks for the feedback, Dan. Blessings.