Subjects related to Eternal Salvation
To hear the gospel and to reject it means that the speaker is not responsible for the unbeliever’s guilt and condemnation before God, “Your blood (guilt) is on your own head.” “But when they resisted and blasphemed, he shook out his garments and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am clean. From now on I will go to the Gentiles” (Acts 18:6).
A prideful rejecting response to the gospel reveals an impenitent stiff-necked heart.
4 Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?
5 But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, 6 who WILL RENDER TO EACH PERSON ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS: 7 to those who by perseverance in doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, eternal life; 8 but to those who are selfishly ambitious and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, wrath and indignation.
9 There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek,
10 but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 11 For there is no partiality with God (Rom 2:1-11).
To reject the gospel is to despise God’s testimony concerning His Son. Scripture states that unbelief in the gospel constitutes calling God a liar. How absurd that men carefully guard their own reputations, but slander God’s reputation—showing that they have no fear of God. They will be judged eternally.
9 If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater; for the testimony of God is this, that He has testified concerning His Son.
10 The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God
has made Him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning His Son (1 Jn 5:9-10).
The lives of the unborn are humans with eternal souls who are created in the image and likeness of God. How inane to reject the free mercy of God in Christ and think that there will be no reckoning for taking lives.
8 But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully, 9 realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers
10 and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary
to sound teaching, 11 according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted (1 Tim 1:8-11).
Those who have heard a clear proclamation of the gospel and reject it have multiplied their guilt and will face far greater condemnation.
26 For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a
sacrifice for sins,
27 but a terrifying expectation of judgment and THE FURY OF A FIRE WHICH WILL CONSUME THE
ADVERSARIES. 28 Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three
witnesses.
29 How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled underfoot the Son of
God, and has regarded as unclean the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?
30 For we know Him who said, “VENGEANCE IS MINE, I WILL REPAY.” And again, “THE LORD WILL JUDGE
HIS PEOPLE.” 31 It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb 10:26-31).
There is no greater folly than despising God’s authoritative infallible self-revelation of Himself in Holy Scripture by demanding that God be ‘loving’ but not holy. God will not deny Himself in order to accommodate Himself to the fancy of impenitent sinners.
12 Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble, 13 and make straight paths for your feet, so that the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint, but
rather be healed.
14 Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification/holiness without which no one will see the Lord (Heb
12:12-14) (see also 2 Tim 2:11-13).
It is the height of foolishness to reject the free grace of God. To do so may be likened to treating one’s eternal soul like dirt. As the hymn writer penned, “How dread are Thine eternal years.” The truth of God’s eternal existence is a withering thought to the skeptic. Doubters have a misplaced hope that at death they will be annihilated. Scripture states that all shall exist as long as God does.
25 “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?” (Lu 9:25).
Scripture is so clear that the love and grace of God comes by means of the satisfaction of divine wrath at the cross of Christ. Therefore it is a fool’s errand to search for a merciful God anywhere other than in a crucified and risen Savior.
24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;
25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His
righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; 26 for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the
justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus (Rom 3:24-26).
It is a wonderful mercy to have one’s conscience speak loudly now when it is ‘educated’ by the Ten Commandments. For the Ten Commandments tell us what we owe God. And they declare to us our sins. The conscience of every man will speak at maximum volume on Judgment Day. In answer to the question, “In this life, how does God show His love and grace?” The answer is: by showing men the seriousness of their sin—for God only pours out His grace where men agree with what God says about their sin. If the divine diagnosis is rejected, so is the divine cure (grace). Men sear, and scar their consciences so that they will not be bothered by the just accusations they produce. They won’t be able to quiet their conscience on the Last Day.
1 But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons,
2 by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron (1 Tim 4:1-2).
16 on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus.
On Judgment Day, the consciences of the lost will speak at fever pitch.
8 “If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it from you; it is better for you to enter life crippled or lame, than to have two hands or two feet and be cast into the eternal fire.
9 “If your eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it from you. It is better for you to enter life with one eye, than to have two eyes and be cast into the fiery hell (Mt 18:8-9).
13 “Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in
that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
14 “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Mt 22:13).
41 “Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which
has been prepared for the devil and his angels (Mt 25:41).
The natural mind is carnal and foolish—it engages in futile thinking. It is disastrous to say that God and heaven cannot be proven. I am reminded that one of the astronauts who landed on the moon said God is not here. The other astronaut looked back at our blue planet and praised God for His goodness in suspending our floating menagerie in space. If you set about to prove gravity, you would select experiments which would demonstrate it. So also, if one is looking for proofs for the existence of the God of the Bible, one would list the kinds of data which give evidence of His existence.
To reject the countless facts which give evidence of God is to demonstrate a blind faith commitment to atheism. 1000’s of volumes have been written which document the proofs for the existence of God. To never open a single one of these texts reveals a heart at war with God—and a will that is dead set on remaining an entrenched enemy of Almighty God. The volumes written about God’s existence are not written solely by theologians—many of these books are written by historians, archaeologists, scientists, physicians, and lawyers. To refuse to read even one of these is to equate ignorance with bliss when Scripture states that it is deserving of judgment.
17 So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in
the futility of their mind, 18 being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in
them, because of the hardness of their heart;
19 and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind
of impurity with greediness (Eph 4:17-19).