Is the Perseverance of the Saints Biblical?
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When you hear the phrase, the perseverance of the saints, does it seem to imply a lifetime of hard work? As if the term were a sort of Winston Churchill battle cry for Christians— “Never, never give up!” Some prefer to call this doctrine the preservation of the saints. Regardless of what you call it, this all-important doctrine answers the question, “Can believers have an assurance of their salvation?” But what is this doctrine? And is it biblical?
What Is the Perseverance of the Saints?
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints affirms that God protects and preserves Christians—His saints (“holy ones”)—for eternity and causes their faith to persevere to the end when He calls them home. He has reserved every Christian’s salvation for them in heaven according to His great mercy and by His almighty power and grace. They receive an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and will never fade away—not by their own efforts or ability to live sin-free, but as a gift from their Savior (1 Peter 1:3-9). Such an inheritance can never be lost nor taken away. God secures it in heaven forever.
God will not fail to preserve His children, however imperfectly we obey Him as we battle our old sin nature and the temptations of Satan and this world (Romans 5:8-9). Nothing, not even our sinfulness, can separate believers from His love (Romans 8:38-39). We suffer God’s displeasure when we sin, but He’ll never cast us out or erase our name from the Book of Life (1 John 5:18).
From beginning to end, salvation is a work only the Lord can do—and He will do it. He who cannot lie and never fails made this promise of our eternal salvation long before time began (Titus 1:2, Hebrews 6:13-20).
Is This a Biblical Concept?
While the term perseverance of the saints doesn’t appear in the Bible, God explicitly teaches this doctrine throughout Scripture. We’ll look at several examples in this article. When opposition to this doctrine began to form, the respected theologian Augustine responded. Around 428 or 429 A.D, he wrote in his Treatise on the Gift of Perseverance that perseverance isn’t a work of man, but a gift given by God to His children to empower them to persevere in faithfulness to Christ to the end of their life.
What Does the Bible Say about the Perseverance of the Saints?
If we were to examine all the biblical support for this doctrine, we’d fill a book. In this article, we’ll look at twelve passages that either directly or indirectly teach this doctrine.
1. John 10:27–30 —If we want to know what the Bible says about this vital doctrine, we can find no better place to start than with Jesus’ own words: “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, 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. I and the Father are one” (John 10:27–30 NASB95, emphasis mine).
Each of Jesus’ statements about His sheep (true Christians) is final—they’re neither provisional nor conditional statements. What (and who) the Father gives to the Son, no one can take away—or prevent Him from keeping. No one. Likewise, Christ doesn’t offer an option that He hopes will last. He gives life that is eternal. This life isn’t based on the believer but on Him. Christ promised that His sheep will never perish, and He delivers what He promises. His every word proves true. He’s a shield to all who take refuge in Him (Proverbs 30:5).
To suggest that Christ is unable to keep forever those God has given Him is to claim mankind’s free will is greater than Christ’s power to keep someone secure in Him. That He and His Father are actually not “greater than all.” If a person can break free and rip from Christ what God has given Him (the salvation of Christians) we must then believe that no matter how much Christ desires to save His sheep, He’s powerless to protect and keep them secure. What kind of Savior is this?
The real issue isn’t man’s power and whether we can hold onto our own salvation. The true issue is that Christ has declared eternal life is a gift of grace He gives us. Christians will never perish because His word—and His gift—stand firm.
2. John 17:11-26 — Jesus receives everything He prays for because He never does anything by His own initiative. He only does His Father’s will (John 5:19, 30). When He prayed in John 17 for His disciples and all who would believe in Him, we can rest in the assurance that God answered Him, “Yes.”
Among many things, Jesus prayed, “Keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are” (John 17:11, emphasis mine). The original Hebrew word for “keep” means “to guard, preserve, or to keep one in the state in which he is.” Jesus prayed for God to hold Christians in the state of salvation in which He placed them.
Jesus ended His powerful prayer with these words, “I have made Your name known to them, and will make it known, so that the love with which You loved Me may be in them, and I in them” (John 17:26, emphasis mine).
Jesus will keep making God’s name known to His children so that the never-ending, never-fading love that God has for Him will also be in His children. Our actions cannot destroy or remove such a love. No power can overwhelm Christ’s intentions or God’s love (Romans 8:38-39).
3. Romans 8:29-30 (emphasis mine)— “For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren; and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.”
Paul laid out the five links of redemption in what many call the golden chain of redemption. From before time began, God foreknew every person who’d receive salvation and predestined them for redemption and conformity to Christ. At the right time, He calls them to Himself for salvation. When God calls, they will come and receive justification—God will accredit Christ’s righteousness to them. When Christ returns, God will glorify all His children—set them free from all sin and death in bodies that are imperishable and incorruptible. Not a single link in this golden chain depends on man to do the work or to stay faithful. God does it all.
4.Ephesians 1:3-12 (emphasis mine)— Paul declares the security of our salvation because God predestined us to adoption according to “the kind intention of His [God’s] will, to the praise of the glory of His grace, which He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved.” How can our salvation bring praise to the glory of His salvation if we can lose it with one sin—or even a mountain of sin? The quality of our salvation is “according to the riches of His grace which He lavished on us,” not according to our ability not to sin.
5. Ephesians 1:13-14 (emphasis mine)— “In Him [Christ]…having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory.”
Christians are God’s possession. He bought us with Christ’s blood and gives us His Holy Spirit as His down payment of what He guarantees we’ll receive when Christ returns—the fulfillment of righteousness, peace, and joy. Until then, we enjoy only a partial fulfillment through Christ’s indwelling Spirit (Romans 14:17).
Jesus promised the Holy Spirit would live in Christians—not come and go based on our behavior. We can “grieve” and “quench” the Holy Spirit (make Him sorrowful over our actions), but we can’t force Him out or drive Him away (Ephesians 4:30, 1 Thessalonians 5:19). What God has sealed, no power in heaven or earth can break—not even God, because He doesn’t make mistakes or change His mind (Psalm 18:30, Numbers 23:19). When He seals someone in Christ, they’re sealed forever.
6. Ephesians 2:8-9 (emphasis mine) — “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
Salvation is not a reward we can earn or un-earn. It’s a gift given by God by His grace. This truth is the heart of the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints. If there’s even one thing that we must do at any point to earn or keep our salvation, it ceases to be a gift and becomes an earned wage or reward (Romans 4:4)—and we would have something to boast about. “Look what I’ve done! I’ve kept myself saved.” But if our persevering in the faith is by God’s power alone from start to finish, we only have Christ to boast in and about—as it should be (1 Corinthians 1:30-31). Our persevering isn’t the means of securing our salvation. It’s the outward proof that we’re truly saved.
7. Philippians 1:6 (emphasis mine)— “For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6 NASB95).
What God begins He finishes. What God requires He empowers. When He declares someone His child, He doesn’t abandon them or change His mind because the person has fallen into sin (Numbers 23:19, James 1:17). Sin breaks our fellowship with God, but not our relationship. God draws His children into repentance at the right time and restores them into fellowship with Him. He is the One who equips us with everything we need to do His will and works in us that which pleases Him. He also offers forgiveness when we blow it. (Hebrews 13:20-21, 1 John 1:9).
8.Philippians 2:13 (emphasis mine)— “for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.”
God is the One who gives us the desire to obey Him and the power to do what pleases Him. Without His Spirit at work in us, we’d never be able to work out in our lives what He has worked into us—our salvation and the good works He created us to do.
9. Colossians 2:13-14 (emphasis mine)— “When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.”
We’re all born dead in our sins, but those who have believed in Christ have been made alive forever in Him. He won’t take our life away from us if we fall into sin—even serious sin. He’s forgiven all our transgressions. Our past, present, and future debt has been canceled and taken away as far as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12). God calls us to live holy (1 Peter 1:15-17), but He will never hold our sins against us again (Hebrews 8:12).
10.2 Timothy 2:12-13 (emphasis mine) — “If we endure, we will also reign with Him; If we deny Him, He also will deny us; If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself.”
In Paul’s letter to Timothy, he compared believers (those who “endure”) with unbelievers (those who “deny” Christ). He also compared our faithlessness with Christ’s faithfulness. We will be faithless at times, and we may even deny Christ like Peter because of our sinful nature, but Christ is sinless and cannot deny Himself. He has placed us in Him.
People who profess the name of Christ but whose hearts are far from Him are Christian in name only. In reality, they’ve denied the full truth of who Christ is in their hearts. They don’t belong to Him. Therefore, in His divine faithfulness, He secures everyone He saves and denies everyone who denies Him.
11. Hebrews 7:25 (emphasis mine)— “Therefore He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
The writer of Hebrews declared the power of Christ to save His children forever—not temporarily or provisionally. He also noted Christ intercedes for us. Jesus’ intercession is perfect. The possibility that God would reject His prayers doesn’t exist.
When Christ prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane and asked God “if it be possible” that God remove the cup from Him, He didn’t ask God to spare Him from the cross. The whole reason He came to earth was to die on the cross and rise again. Instead, Christ’s request displayed His anguish over the price He’d pay when He drank the cup of God’s wrath for sin. He didn’t wait for God to answer Him before He immediately prayed, “yet not as I will, but as You will” (Matthew 26:39 NASB95).
12.1 John 5:11-13 (emphasis mine)— “And the testimony is this, that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life. These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.”
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints declares what John wrote—that we may know we have eternal life, not continually wonder if we’ve done something to lose our salvation. That we can rest in the truth that God has given us eternal life, not loaned it to us until we blow it or until we choose to trade it in.
Is the Perseverance of the Saints the Same as Once Saved, Always Saved?
Perhaps you’ve heard the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints summed up as: Once saved, always saved. The following clarification to this over-simplified, but true, expression gives us a more accurate statement: Once saved, always saved—as long as you’re truly saved. Many believe they’re saved when the tragic reality is that they’re not.
Professing to be a Christian isn’t the same as being a Christian. The way of salvation is more than repeating a prayer, walking an aisle, or “inviting Jesus into your heart.” Salvation comes by God’s grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone as we respond with full surrender to the gospel.
Surrender that leads to salvation means that a person first and foremost acknowledges they’re a helpless sinner. They agree with God that they’re guilty before Him and have no hope of being saved from sin’s penalty apart from Christ redeeming them. It’s believing that only through His death and resurrection will the penalty for their sin be paid and His holiness accredited to them. Salvation also requires repentance—turning away from sin. Those who repent and believe will be saved and sealed for eternity by the Holy Spirit. He indwells them and establishes them in Him forever.
God’s Spirit doesn’t release them if they displease Him and then saves and seals them yet again after they’ve repented. Nowhere in the Bible does God teach that man can be saved more than once. Nor is there any example in the Bible of such a teaching.
In the Old Testament, the Israelites had to continually bring offerings because the sacrifice of bulls and goats could never take away sin (Hebrews 10:4). But Jesus, the Lamb of God was the final sacrifice. He took away the sin of His children once and for all (John 1:29, 1 Peter 3:18). “It is finished” (John 19:30).
Marks of a True Christian
No true Christian will be perfect on this side of heaven, but we’ll display spiritual “marks” of our salvation. We grow in Christlikeness over time. For many, our growth first appears as mere “seedlings” with little fruit (Gal. 5:22-23). But as God’s Word works in our hearts and His Spirit conforms us into Christ’s image, evidence of our salvation grows. Some of the outward signs include the following:
1. A growing love of God’s Word, which results in consistent reading and studying the Bible.
2. A growing desire to obey God, which results in a holier and more contented life.
3. A growing hatred of sin, which results in quicker repentance and more faithful avoidance of sin.
4. A growing desire to be with other believers, which results in active involvement in the church.
If there’s little to no fruit in your life and your sin grieves your heart, consider this a sign that God’s Spirit is drawing you because, without Christ, we’re spiritually dead and spiritually dead people don’t care about God (Romans 3:10-17). Repent and believe in the Gospel (Mark 1:15).
Can You Ever Lose Your Salvation?
Are Christians free to sin at will because God will never cast us away? The apostle Paul answered this question. “By no means!” (Romans 6:15 ESV). God indeed calls Christians to persevere in the faith, but He’s the one who gives us the power to do what He commands (Philippians 2:13, Hebrews 13:20-21). Apart from Christ, we can do nothing. In Christ, His abiding love will never let us go (John 15:1-8).
The prophet Jonah rebelled against the Lord, but instead of destroying him, God taught him this powerful truth: “Salvation is from the Lord” (Jonah 2:9). Just as Jonah was unable to save himself from the sea or the belly of the big fish, we are unable to save ourselves. Salvation comes from the Lord because it belongs to Him—not us. (Psalm 3:8, 62:1) We can’t lose what never belonged to us in the first place.
Christ Will Hold Us Fast
God holds His children firmly in His hands. No one can snatch us out—and we can’t jump out either (John 10:28-29). Just as we had nothing to do with our natural birth, we contribute nothing to our salvation or its outcome. It’s a gift of God’s grace alone. Salvation is not Christ plus our perseverance.
Christians will persevere, but because of our sinful nature, we will fail and fall (perhaps as deeply as or more deeply than Jonah and Peter), but Christ intercedes for us. His prayers will not fail. God will always pull us back into repentance and godliness after the trial has served His good purposes to test our faith and develop perseverance (James 1:2-4). The work of grace God does in the heart of believers moves us toward Christlikeness, not away from it. His Spirit’s indwelling power—the same power that raised Jesus from the dead—guarantees we’ll persevere. He cannot and will not fail us. He will hold us fast and keep us “blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:8).
Can Believers Have Assurance of Their Salvation?
I’ll end this article with the apostle Paul’s closing words to the Thessalonians. Writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, he encouraged the church with the same assurance Peter offers every believer about the end result of our faith—the assurance of the salvation of our souls (1 Peter 1:3-9).
“For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, so that whether we are awake or asleep, we will live together with Him…Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be preserved complete, without blame at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass” (1 Thessalonians 5:9-10, 23-24 NASB95).
It is finished. Christ will do it. Amen.
Photo credit: Unsplash/gift_habeshaw
She’s a member of the Revive Our Hearts ministry writing team and enjoys answering your questions about the Bible and the Christian life on her YouTube channel and website JeanWilund.com. Connect with her also on Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest.