Can We Lose Our Salvation?

Understanding the Bible correctly, especially its context and realising that God has dispensed the revelation of His plan progressively over history, can clarify this issue.

 

What’s often missing in this debate is the understanding of dispensations—the periods in which God progressively revealed His will to humanity. The 66 books of the Bible were given by divine inspiration over thousands of years. Later revelations continued to either replace or clarify earlier revelations.

 

It is evident, even with minimal bible study, that God operates differently across different timeframes in Scripture. For instance, what God instructed the nation of Israel to do in the wilderness or what He told Noah, Moses, or King David is not always for us to do today.

 

For example, Isaiah 20:2 states:

At the same time the LORD spoke by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, ‘Go, and remove the sackcloth from your body, and take your sandals off your feet.’ And he did so, walking naked and barefoot.

 

Clearly, this was a specific instruction to Isaiah, not a directive for us today. Yet, many Christians overlook such specific instructions and assume that if it’s in the Bible, it automatically applies to us today. This creates confusion and error.

 

We must understand what the Bible teaches about salvation and how God’s plan unfolds over different periods. No one living before the dispensation of the Body of Christ had the complete Word of God as we do today. It should be, and it is, easy for us to recognise Gods dealings with man and how they’ve changed over time.

It’s not that God changes, He doesn’t, but the methods which He deals with mankind do definitely change from age to age. This method of Bible study is explained in 2 Timothy 2:15 as “rightly dividing the word of truth.”

When we rightly divide the Word, we gain a clearer understanding of the Bible and we see why salvation, once received, is eternal.

 

It should be that all Christians are saved, and all saved people are Christians, but this is not always the case and most of us realise this.

If we ask most professing Christians what makes them believe they’re saved, their answers often involve works, behaviour, or moral standards, but these are not what salvation is according to Scripture.

 

Many misunderstandings arise from misinterpreting biblical texts or taking verses out of context. The key to understanding salvation’s permanence lies in understanding Scripture within its dispensational context, or rightly dividing it.

 

We should ask: What was the last thing God revealed about salvation? Did it replace, enhance, or change what was previously known?

When we do this, we see that salvation, once genuinely received, is eternal and can’t be lost.

 

As we said, the Bible appears to support both the “Once Saved, Always Saved” and the “You Can Lose Your Salvation” viewpoints. For example, John 10:28-29 strengthens the “Once Saved, Always Saved” view, and we read:

And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.

 

On the other hand, much of the Bible suggests that salvation can be lost or never received while a person is still alive.

Every Christian, and even many non-Christians, believe that after death, our eternal destination—heaven or hell—is fixed and unchangeable.

The dispute about losing salvation concerns the period between being saved and dying physically. See the simple timeline image below.

 

We’re born into this world, and one day we believed the Gospel—that Christ died for our sins, according to scripture, was buried, and rose again the third day according to scripture (that’s 1 Corinthians 15:1-4). At that moment, we were saved.

Then we continue living in this body here on earth and we struggle, we fail and we sin, and sometimes we lose faith.

 

So, can these struggles cause us to lose the salvation that we received when we believed?

To answer this, we must understand what salvation is according to the Bible.

If we ask, “Can I lose my salvation?” we reveal a lack of understanding about salvation. Why? Because it’s not about what “I” did; it’s about what Christ did!

 

As 1 Corinthians 1:17-18 states:

For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.

 

Paul was sent by Jesus Christ to preach the gospel, not to baptize or perform rituals. His focus was solely on Christ and Him crucified—the Gospel.

Why? Because the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Paul, in Romans 1:16 states:

For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

 

Salvation is not about us. We can’t do a thing to earn or orchestrate it. God accomplished it through Christ. When we say “I” lost it, we mistakenly assume control over something we neither earned or deserved and neither can we do anything to keep it. That’s what  grace is.

Ephesians 2:8-9:

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

 

Salvation is not a reward for our good works or even a reward for our faith. Faith is the medium that enables us to believe, not a work deserving a reward. That faith is not even inherently ours! It comes when hearing the word, Romans 10:17,

So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. 

 

Titus 3:5 clarifies this:

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us.

 

Romans 4:5 adds:

But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.

 

Salvation isn’t physical, at least not while we’re here on earth in our earthly body, it’s a spiritual mercy—a forgiveness of sin undeserved and given by God. It’s not ours to lose; it’s God’s gift. How do you lose that?

When we say, “I” lost “my” salvation we’re failing to realise that it’s not me that’s in charge of getting it or keeping it and it’s not “mine” to begin with.

Romans 1:16 reiterates that salvation is God’s power, not ours.

Titus 2:11 says:

For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men.

Grace is what God does and what He gives.

 

Salvation’s not membership into a club or recognition of earthly achievements. Some interpret passages like Jesus’s parable of the talents in Matthew 25:23 where He says “Well done, good and faithful servant” as salvation, but salvation is found in God alone. To be saved is to know God and align with His truth and will.

 

Salvation is not ours; it’s God’s. If we view it as a reward for our behaviour or our faith, we’ve misunderstood salvation and it may even mean we’re not saved to begin with.

We can’t even choose salvation without first hearing God’s word. Our choice to believe is a response to that word.

 

The Gospel is the only power of God unto salvation.

If we doubt our salvation, it may indicate we were never saved. Salvation is by grace through faith in Christ’s finished work. If we don’t trust in Christ’s work, well, we can’t lose what we never had.

We’ve got to know whether or not we’re saved. If salvation never happened, we’re lost, eternally.

Every one of us have been there. Everyone who’s now saved was lost before that.

 

The question of losing salvation stems from the sin, failure, and doubt we all experience after we’re saved.

Let’s deal with the question of sin.

Romans 3:10 says:

There is none righteous, no, not one.

 

Sin has plagued the world since the fall of man and it separates us from God’s holiness, righteousness, joy, peace, and love.

Now, it’s not that God can’t be in the presence of sin as many people believe. That’s a myth.

God became incarnate and dwelt among sinners. God’s not a sinner, but if He couldn’t be in the presence of sin, you and I can’t be saved.

 

God is holy and perfectly righteous and without sin, and because of that, our sin separates us in judgment, meaning we deserve judgment from a holy, perfectly righteous God. We don’t compare to Him, we come short of His glory.

So we can see why people would ask, “If someone is saved and they sin afterward, even a terrible, extreme, repeated sin, how can they still be saved. Surely they’ll lose their salvation”.

 

Now, sin is a serious issue and we can’t diminish it in any way, but the good news is that God has provided a way to save sinners from sin!

That’s why he didn’t just kill Adam and Eve and start over again after they sinned. He always intended to provide a way of saving sinners, which tells us that sin’s not a problem for God even though it’s in contrast to His righteousness and holiness and must be dealt with.

He’s always given us the realisation that we’re all sinners right back when He gave the law through Moses, but He also provided sacrifices and ways to deal with that sin.

We know that it’s not sin that condemned Israel in the past, or us today, but the lack of faith required to believe God and His remedy for sin.

Mankind’s lack of faith in God and what He’s done has always been the problem.

Hebrews 11:6,

But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. 

 

God’s dealt with sin in such a way that goes far beyond human comprehension and displays His perfect wisdom.

His perfect righteousness and His perfect justice is satisfied completely while still achieving what He intended in the beginning, that man would live eternally in perfect unity with Him, free from the penalty, the power and the presence of sin.

 

Every one of us ever born of Adam has sinned.

Romans 3:23 states:

For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.

 

Sin demands punishment. God’s perfect righteousness demands that, and that punishment is death, as Romans 6:23 explains:

For the wages of sin is death.

 

God, in His perfect righteousness, can’t bypass judgment for some people and force punishment on others. That would make Him unjust.

His solution was to send His only begotten, perfect, sinless Son to die for sinners as the perfect sacrifice for sin.

Romans 3:21-27 teaches that Christ’s shed blood is a propitiation, which means an appeasement, or atoning for all sin, and, through faith in His shed blood, Christ Jesus becomes the payment, the atonement for sin for all time.

That happened 2,000 years ago.

 

Sin separates us from God and we’re all corrupt, no matter how good we try to be. But God provides a way to save sinners.

Romans 6:23 concludes:

For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

 

No one can be saved without Jesus Christ’s death on the cross and His resurrection.

Salvation comes when a person hears God’s offer of salvation through the Gospel, which is God’s Word about salvation, His power to salvation, as we’ve already talked about. The person hears that word and believes it and is instantly saved.

God’s way of saving us from the consequences of sin is not by us being good or doing right.

To prove this, He gave a perfect, holy, righteous law to a nation He created, saying, “Do this and live.” Most of the Bible records that nation’s failure to keep the law.

Even with prophets, a law showing righteousness, and other helps, sin dwells in us, and we cannot maintain our own righteousness.

 

God’s way to save us from sin is not for us to stop sinning or to do good. That is not the Gospel that saves. History and the Bible show that man can’t stop sinning, no matter how hard he tries. Jeremiah 17:9 confirms this:

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

 

God provided salvation through a sacrifice—His sinless Son, Jesus Christ, and His resurrection. This is the Gospel. Man hears it and believes it. Faith is the only requirement. Whether we believe or not, the Gospel is the power of God to salvation.

 

Salvation is not escaping the punishment for sin.

The price must still be paid, but instead of us paying the punishment of eternal death, Jesus Christ paid it for us.

Being sinless and perfect, He wasn’t entitled to death. He chose to die in our place, receiving the wages for sin that we deserved. His unjust death could not hold Him eternally, and He rose on the third day, as prophesied.

 

When we believe the Gospel, we’re freed from the law that requires our death because Christ paid that price. We’re saved from the penalty of sin (death) and the power of sin to condemn us.

Romans 8:1 states:

There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

 

One day, we’ll also be saved from the presence of sin, which we’re not free from today. This understanding was not always clear in Scripture.

 

So if we refer to the timeline image below, we have the beginning, where God made Adam and Eve and sin entered into God’s creation.

We had to learn the lesson of sin’s corruption and God’s provision  for salvation from that sin through the cross. We learn it through the Bible, through the ages of God intervening in humanity and introducing revelation knowledge piece by piece with each treasure trove of revelation either replacing or adding to what was known before.

 

Now, how can we say God saved us from sin if we still sin?

Well, salvation from sin doesn’t mean the elimination of all sin in this life.

God promises perfection, glory, cleansing, righteousness, and holiness, but we don’t see that yet in this world.

In the timespan between our trusting the Gospel and our physical death we still sin.

If we think we don’t sin, we need to go back to the law in the first five books of the Bible or to Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount to see our sin, even as saved individuals.

 

In Romans 7:17-25, Paul shares his own experience with sin after salvation. In verse 19, he says:

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

 

Paul acknowledges that sin remains in him, even though it’s been forgiven through Christ’s cross. Sin will not be removed until our glorification after our physical death. Until then, Paul, like us, contends with sin in the flesh.

Romans 7:18 states:

For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.

 

Paul wants to do good but he can’t always do it. Romans 7:19 reiterates:

For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.

 

This struggle is familiar to all of us. Only the self-deceived would claim they have no problem with sin.

When we trust the Gospel for salvation and sin continues in us, it raises questions like what are the consequences and the effect of our sin after our salvation? Am I no longer saved? Will sin nullify God’s promise?

 

In Galatians 1:4, Paul says we live in a present evil world. Even though Christ died for our sins and we accept and trust in that we continue to live in this world, within the presence of evil.

 

The Corinthians had many sins, and yet Paul never questioned their salvation because of that sin.

The Galatians, however, tried to live in self-righteousness, and Paul questioned their salvation. The issue is not sin after salvation but whether works are viewed as earning salvation, which may indicate a lack of true salvation.

 

In Romans 7:21-24, Paul concludes:

I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

 

Some theologians argue that Paul is describing his pre-salvation state, believing that once saved, a person no longer struggles with sin. However, the truth is that Paul is speaking of his struggle with sin after believing the Gospel, and it’s a struggle shared by all who’re saved.

 

God dispensed grace after His provision for salvation at the cross. This dispensation of grace, given to Paul and, through Paul, to the world, ensures that grace abounds over all sin.

Romans 5:20-21 states:

Moreover the law entered, that the offence might abound. But where sin abounded, grace did much more abound: That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord.

 

Eternal life is only possible because grace covers all sins.

Without this grace, no human could be saved, and Christ’s sacrifice would have been in vain.

Ephesians 3:2 highlights this dispensation, this dispensing of grace by God. It says:

…The dispensation of the grace of God which is given me (that’s Paul) to you-ward.

 

This final revelation, given through Paul, supersedes previous teachings on salvation, emphasising that grace abounds over all sins—past, present, and future.

If we fail to understand this dispensation of grace, we may easily focus solely on our sin, leading to doubts about our salvation.

The revelation of the mystery of grace shows us who we are in Christ Jesus.

 

The Bible teaches both that salvation cannot be lost and that it can be lost through continued sin and without Paul’s epistles, we’d only see a conditional standing with God, requiring good works and sinlessness to maintain salvation.

However, salvation can’t be lost in today’s dispensation because of God’s grace. Today, God dispenses grace to all sinners who believe the Gospel.

 

Romans 5:8 reminds us:

But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

 

See, Christ died for us while we were sinners, not after we stopped sinning.

Believers may fail in their faith, but salvation is not about our success. It’s about Christ’s finished work.

Even the Thessalonians, who were praised by Paul, lacked perfection in their faith.

1 Thessalonians 3:10 Paul states:

Night and day praying exceedingly that we might see your face, and might perfect that which is lacking in your faith?

 

Faith is not about future events but about trusting in Christ’s past work to save us now.

If salvation were future, it could be lost. But salvation is based on Christ’s finished work, not our efforts.

We’re saved by grace through faith in Christ’s completed work, not by our works or our future expectations.

 

Now, the book of James was written by one of the apostles of the Lord and addresses faith and works in chapter 2.

We notice that the book of James doesn’t mention the cross of Christ at all and is directed to the twelve tribes of Israel, as stated in James 1:1:

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.

 

James is writing before the revelation of the mystery given to Paul. He’s writing in the time, the age, of the preaching of the gospel of the kingdom, not the gospel of God’s free grace to all who believe.

By the time of James’s writing, Jewish communities, especially those who believed that Jesus Christ was the promised Messiah, were scattered widely across the Roman Empire due to many factors not least the persecutions of Paul prior to his salvation and other Jewish sects and leaders.

James is still preaching the same gospel of the kingdom that the Jewish apostles taught and that Jesus Himself taught during His earthly ministry.

That gospel was that the Messiah had come and God’s long given promise of an earthly kingdom was now at hand.

That gospel, the gospel of the kingdom, absolutely required faith PLUS works.

However, under the terms of the New Covenant, as outlined by Jeremiah 31:31 and Hebrews  chapter 8, the Holy Spirit, who was given according to prophesy in Acts chapter 2, would, put God’s laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts. They wouldn’t think of or desire anything else.

Hebrews 8:10-11

For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. 

 

It was only after the constant, continual rejection of the Messiah, God’s word and the Holy Spirit that God set aside Israel in blindness and, through the revelation to Paul, showed a mystery that was never prophesied, never before revealed to mankind.

Romans 16:25 -26,

Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began, But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith:

 

That mystery was free salvation to all, Jew and Gentile (there would be no racial or national difference).

Rom 10:12-13,

For there is no difference between the Jew and the Greek: for the same Lord over all is rich unto all that call upon him. 

For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. 

 

The mystery reveal to Paul included the creation of a new creature, the Body of Christ.

Romans 12:5

So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.

1 Corinthians 12:27,

Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular. 

 

So James is one place where there’s controversy about faith and works. It says in James 2:14:

What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?

 

James answers no, faith alone can’t save.

This challenges the belief that salvation is by faith alone, without works, especially when a person overlooks the weight of Paul’s epistles that support salvation by faith alone.

James 2:10 states:

For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.

 

This verse emphasises the impossibility of achieving righteousness through the law, through works, on one hand while seemingly saying we need works on the other. In other words it’s impossible for us to keep the law by our works but equally impossible to be saved without them.

So salvation is impossible then? Is this a contradiction in the Bible?

 

To understand James 2:14, we must consider what we’ve just explained about James and we also must consider verses 15-16:

If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?

 

The point is not about good works but the lack of profit in faith that does nothing. Verse 17 states:

Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

 

Faith without works is dead. Verse 18 continues:

Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.

 

Notice the emphasis on “my works.” James’s argument is about demonstrating faith through my works, not Christ’s finished work.

 

Verse 19 clarifies:

Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.

 

See, just the belief that there’s one God can’t save.

Even devils recognise God but they’re not saved.

James speaks truth but within a different dispensation.

He’s addressing Israel under the law.

James’s teaching highlights the need for a great work to save us—a work only Christ could accomplish on the cross.

 

James was not offering the gospel message given to Paul. That gospel wasn’t given to James.

The completed Bible as we have today didn’t exist at the time. James didn’t preach trust in Christ’s finished work on the cross, His death, and resurrection to save us from our sins without the law and Israel. Instead, he spoke truth about faith and works, emphasizing the need for a work too great for humans to achieve.

 

Does faith require our work or is it simply trust in Christ’s finished work?

This question is crucial to understanding salvation. If we believe our works contribute to salvation, even partially, we misunderstand the gospel.

Trusting that Christ died for our sins, while believing that works are also necessary, undermines the gospel of grace. Salvation is by grace alone, through faith in Christ’s completed work.

 

Salvation is not something we receive after death; it’s offered now. We can possess it now because the work is already done.

Trusting God to save us in the future implies uncertainty, as anything could happen to prevent us from receiving it. Salvation is a present reality, secured by Christ’s finished work.

 

So, where does the idea of trusting God for future salvation come from?

The Bible!

Much of the Bible, especially before Paul, speaks of God’s promises to save in the future if a person trusts Him. Trusting God involves obedience, as faith without action shows a lack of trust in Him as Lord and Savior.

Hebrews 11:6

But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him. 

 

Future salvation is an ongoing theme throughout scripture both up to Christ’s revelation of the mystery of the dispensation of grace to Paul and after the dispensation of grace has ended, and that future salvation is tied to covenants.

A covenant is a mutual promise between God and individuals, requiring fulfillment by both parties. Until it’s fulfilled, the covenant remains active.

For example, God’s covenant with David promised his seed would sit on the throne, but this hadn’t occurred yet. Similarly, God’s promises to Eve, Abraham, and others were future-oriented, awaiting fulfillment.

Faith is the difference between those who believe God keeps His promises from those who doubt that He does. Trusting God’s future actions relies on covenants and promises.

 

Biblical language like “enter in” reflects hope for future salvation, as seen in Matthew 7:14:

Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.

 

Jesus also said in Matthew 24:13,

But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

 

This language emphasises the need for enduring faith and obedience to “enter in” after physical death.

Salvation is promised but not yet received, like Israel’s wilderness journey.

They were promised the land but didn’t enter it due to the lack of trust and obedience.

The book of Hebrews, written to Israel, discusses conditional and future salvation.

Hebrews 4:1 warns,

Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.

 

Hebrews 4:11 adds,

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

 

See how faith and endurance are essential to enter into God’s rest.

Hebrews 4:16 encourages seeking grace and help from God during this journey.

Hebrews 12:14 states,

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.

 

Israel’s covenants and promises remain unfulfilled, requiring endurance and faith in future salvation.

However, in contrast, in the age we live in today, faith in our already  complete salvation looks back to the event of Christ’s sacrifice on the cross.

Ephesians 1:13 says,

In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise.

 

Salvation has already been purchased and offered freely to those who believe.

Then it says we’re sealed with the Holy Spirit.

This provision for salvation is all in the past, not the future. Christ did the work, rose from the dead, and revealed the gospel of salvation, which was preached to us.

We believed in what Christ accomplished and were sealed with the Holy Spirit at the moment of belief.

We’re not waiting for the Holy Spirit or Jesus’ return to save us, as salvation was completed during His first coming. Those who’re saved have already received atonement.

 

2 Corinthians 5:17 declares,

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

 

This transformation occurs the moment we believe.

The grace of God has appeared, granting us salvation as a current possession, not a future one.

The Bible proclaims that salvation is a finished work.

This completed salvation is unique to Paul’s epistles.

When we first believed in Christ’s death, resurrection, and role as Savior, God’s grace saved us through His work, not ours.

 

At that moment we believed, we received forgiveness for all sins, redemption through His blood, reconciliation with God, regeneration, and justification.

Christ’s righteousness was imputed to us, or pass to our account, granting us a position in His body and heavenly places.

The Holy Spirit indwells us, making us His temple. These realities are not based on feelings but on faith.

 

Salvation can’t be lost because the work’s already done.

We’re reconciled, regenerated, justified, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit.

By faith, we trusted the gospel, and God transformed us. This transformation is irreversible, because it’s God’s work, not ours.

 

Salvation is about who we are in Christ, not our behaviour. Christ’s blood forgave our sins, redeemed us, and reconciled us to God. Salvation is complete and can’t be undone.

Confusion arises when people associate salvation with works of the law.

Many passages used to argue that we can lose salvation come from Israel’s law and covenants, not Paul’s epistles, through which Christ revealed the dispensation of God’s grace, present salvation.

 

Christ hasn’t returned yet to reign in righteousness, and national Israel’s promises are still unfulfilled.

Salvation today is by faith through God’s grace, revealed to Paul as a new pattern for saving sinners.

The Bible, and Paul, absolutely teaches good works, but those works they neither to earn or keep salvation. The gospel of grace accounts for sin and failure, unlike the many teachings focused on persevering to the end.

 

Paul’s experience, as described in 1 Timothy 1:12-16, demonstrates God’s abundant grace.

Despite being a blasphemer and persecutor, Paul obtained mercy and became a pattern for believers.

God saves sinners, justifying the ungodly through faith in Christ’s work.

 

This dispensation of grace emphasises God’s amazing, unlimited grace by offering salvation to all. While judgment will come, today is the time of salvation for everyone.

 

Romans chapter 6 teaches that when we trust Christ, and we believe the gospel, the spirit baptises us into Christ, which means we’re baptised into the death of Christ.

We’re crucified with Christ as Galatians 2:20 tells us.

Romans 6:5-8 also makes this clear,

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 

For he that is dead is freed from sin. 

Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.

 

Our old man is dead. It was the old man that made us condemned and lost and now it’s dead.

We were dead spiritually, condemned in sin to eternal death, and then, when we trusted Christ’s finished work on the cross, His cross became our cross and our old man was crucified, found guilty, condemned, convicted, and put to death.

How is it that I still live?

We’re a new man in Christ.

That killer, the old man, is dead and has paid the penalty of sin, which is death. Our wages for sin have already been paid by death. The old man was killed in Jesus Christ on the cross.

No matter what we do, we can’t raise that killer back from the dead. We’ve been made a new creature in Christ Jesus. That new creature is the Body of Christ and that’s the main subject of this great mystery that Paul repeatedly talks about through his 13 epistles.

It’s  mystery that was not known since the foundation of the world until Christ revealed it to Paul.

 

Look what Paul says in Romans 8:3-4.

For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.

 

We’re dead to the law.

The righteousness of the law is now fulfilled in us who walk after the spiritual, new man in the body of Christ.

Romans 7:5 talks more about this,

For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death. 

 

Has Christ come yet? Is the kingdom already set up on earth? Are we all dead in heaven? No, of course not.

Yet Paul says Romans 7:6,

But now (hear the word “now”) we are delivered from the law, that being dead (that’s the old man) wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

 

That’s because a dead man’s not subject to the law, is he?

Our old man died. That means the law has no power to condemn us anymore because the debt to sin is paid in full.

So, here we are, a saved person, crucified with Christ, alive in Christ, and we sin. We break God’s law. Does that law have the power to condemn us? Not anymore it doesn’t.

That’s what Paul’s saying here. Because of Christ, we’re dead to the law. We serve now in newness of the spirit.

The Holy Spirit’s given and our spirit’s been quickened or made alive. Can we kill our quickened, alive spirit?

We can’t! Just as we couldn’t make it alive in the first place.

These are God’s doing.

We simply said, “I want to be saved. I receive your offer of salvation and I believe that Christ did everything necessary to save me.”

He did it. It’s not anything we did.

Our faith didn’t do it. Our faith was activated when we simply heard the word of God and then we believed it and trusted it.

The body of Christ, that we’re now in since we believed, is not under the law.

If we’re not under the law, we can’t be condemned and killed by it. Our sin has no power to condemn us.

People tend to fear sin and ungodliness and losing salvation because of it. But Christ dealt with all that!

There shouldn’t be any question about the law and sin being able to condemn us because of our failure to do right.

But there is a worry about this. Look at Romans 11:6.

And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.

 

If we make our salvation something that’s earned or kept by our good works, it’s not of grace, is it? And that’s a problem because that’s not the gospel that saved us.

The Galatians fell into this very situation.

They heard the gospel that saved them. They trusted. At least that’s what Paul thought. Then, after they were saved, they started thinking that their good works could get them things that Christ already gave them. And Paul asks, “Did you actually trust what I told you or did you not? I’m afraid that you totally missed Christ.”

This is why we find some of the most liberating statements relating to the assurance of salvation in the epistle to the Galatians.

They were trying to do good works. The Galatians weren’t being accused of sin. They’re being accused of trying to do good works to earn God’s favour.

Look at Galatians 5:4,

Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace.

 

Many people bring up this passage to show how you can fall from grace and the Bible does say that.

What’s the conditions to fall from grace in Galatians 5:4? Is it our sin? No!

Is it because we’ve lost faith or lacking in faith or need strengthened faith?

No!

What’s the condition that’s in place for Paul to say that if this happens, you’re fallen from grace?

Christ has become of no effect unto you. Whosoever of you are what? Justified by the law. What’s it mean “justified by the law”?

It means you do it and you say, “Look, I’ve done it all. I’m not guilty. I’ve kept the law.”

Paul says, “If that’s you, you’re falling from grace.” That’s really not a conversation about losing salvation. Usually, it’s about sinners, seeing themselves as self-righteous people believing their justification comes from their own good works and good behaviour. If this is the case you’re fallen from grace. Is this saying that if I do good works, I’m not saved anymore?

No way! Good works is what we’re ordained to do.

It’s saying that if we think that’s what justifies us and that’s what keeps us we should re learn the gospel.

We’re justified by Christ, by faith, not by works, not by  trying to keep the law which no one can ever do.

We’re not under the law in this dispensation and Paul’s the only one that teaches us that.

Everywhere else in the Bible, Israel is under a law program, either the old covenant or the new covenant, which is the law written in their hearts.

 

In Galatians 2:16, Paul confronts Peter, a Jew who taught law-keeping despite believing in Jesus.

Paul declares that no one is justified by works of the law, but by the faith of Christ—“for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.”

Grace, not law, saves us, and it can’t be undone by sin.

Galatians 2:19-21 explains that through the law, we died to the law to live unto God.

I am crucified with Christ… yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.” If righteousness comes by the law, then Christ died in vain.

 

Paul’s frustration isn’t about sin but about seeking justification through works. Salvation is in Christ, not ourselves.

He took us out of our old man and placed us in Him. We can’t lose salvation because it’s entirely Christ’s doing.

By the dispensation of grace, salvation is offered to all—Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free. If we trust Christ’s finished work, we’re saved—even knowing we’ll sin afterward.

“Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound” (Romans 5:20).