To Be Assured

To be assured of one’ salvation is very critical because if you believe that you have been eternally saved by the works of Jesus Christ you can get about doing His Will for your life and not trying to save yourself.

Assurance is a matter of experience and relates to personal confidence in present salvation. It has nothing to do with eternal security, it is closely related to sanctification. Assurance is a matter of what one believes at a given time concerning his/her personal salvation.

This is a primary reason why satan has designed a tremendous plan to thwart the plan of God.

Assurance of salvation depends upon three major aspects of experience:

Understanding of the completeness of the salvation provided in Jesus Christ

The confirming testimony of Christian experience

Acceptance by faith of biblical promises of salvation

We must understand that salvation is a work of man for God but a work of God for man. Because of this we can know that we can trust HIM. Once it is understood that salvation is a gift which cannot be earned, cannot be obtained by human effort and cannot be deserved and is available as a gift of God to all who will receive it by faith, a proper basis for assurance of salvation is provided and the question resolves itself into the issue of whether one has really trusted in Christ.

Because Christ indwells the believer, the believer is appointed to judge himself as to whether he is in the faith (2 Cor 13.5). We should not and are not left to our own misguided feelings and imagination as to the precise manner in which the indwelling Christ will be manifested, as it is clearly defined in Scripture.

The Christian who is in the Word will be:

Protected against the assumption that fleshly emotionalism is of God (hmph-ph-ph-ph)

An example of spiritual reality toward which all who are save should ceaselessly strive.

A carnal Christian is as saved as the spiritual Christian, explain. However, the new life in Christ will:

Acknowledge that God the Father is our Heavenly Father, look at Matthew 11.27

Will discover a new reality in prayer which leads to assurance

A new ability to understand Scripture

A new sense of sin

A new love is realized for the unsaved

The manifestation of the character of Christ

An increased consciousness of salvation through faith in Christ.

Accepting the Bible as the truth and promise of God toward man is essential and this in one of the reasons there are so many attacks on it. Watch out for terms that are used too loosely i.e. belief in some parts and not all

Doubting whether one has really committed himself to faith in Christ and the promises of God is destructive.

Doubting the faithfulness of God is also fatal to assurance.

Assurance of salvation depends upon understanding the nature of God’s complete salvation for those who put their trust in Christ.