When I was a young child, I would pray the sinner’s prayer every chance I got. I grew up attending a Southern Baptist church every Sunday, so I’ve witnessed many altar calls in my lifetime. As a child, I knew that I had put my faith in Jesus, and I knew that meant I was saved. But I didn’t feel saved. I felt like surely there had to be something more to salvation than just believing in Jesus. So, I kept praying the prayer, hoping that at some point it would click and I could feel assured that I really was saved. I wanted some big, flashy sign to tell me, “Yes, you are saved!”
Assurance of salvation is something that every Christian struggles with at one point or another. We see how sinful we still are, even after repenting and trusting in Jesus, and this causes us to wonder if our salvation experience really worked the first time. These feelings of doubt and insecurity often beg the question, “Once saved, always saved?”
To answer this question, we must go back to a conversation Jesus had with a group of Jews in John 10.
“At that time the Feast of Dedication took place at Jerusalem. It was winter, and Jesus was walking in the temple, in the colonnade of Solomon. So the Jews gathered around him and said to him, ‘How long will you keep us in suspense? If you are the Christ, tell us plainly.” John 10:22-24, ESV
Jesus was walking along a covered walkway in the temple during the Feast of Dedication, which celebrated the rededication of the temple. Jews were gathering in the temple to worship God and hear Scripture read, and seeing Jesus there, they crowded around him, wanting Him to clearly admit whether or not He was the Messiah they had been waiting for their entire lives. Like me, they wanted a big, flashy sign that confirmed, “Yes, this Jesus is the Messiah!”
But Jesus didn’t give it to them. He didn’t tell them point-blank, “Yes, I am the Messiah.” Why? Because He had already told them who He was during His ministry. He had already proven time and time again that He was indeed the Messiah through His actions. And He knew that it didn’t matter what more He said to them. They would never believe He was the Messiah because they were not His sheep.
“Jesus answered them, ‘I told you, and you do not believe. The works that I do in my Father’s name bear witness about me,but you do not believe because you are not among my sheep.” John 10:25-26
Before this conversation, Jesus had just taught His Good Shepherd discourse, where He described Himself as the Good Shepherd who knows and lays down His life for His sheep (John 10:11-15). These sheep are His people, His followers, those who have been chosen—predestined and unconditionally elected—to receive eternal life and forgiveness of sins. Jesus intimately knows and loves those who are His sheep, and His sheep have faith in Him and obey His commands (John 10:27). In this conversation, He goes on to say one more thing about His precious sheep.
“I give them eternal life, 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 10:28-30
No one can snatch the sheep—the chosen people of God—out of His hand. Jesus is God, the self-existent, self-sufficient, almighty, all-powerful, sovereign God of the universe, and in Him, we are secure. He chose us before the foundation of the world to be adopted into His family. He has bestowed eternal life onto each and every person who believes in Him. This new life is eternal, which means it can never end and it can never be taken away from us, even when we fall into sin, even when we don’t feel saved. Once we are saved, we are always saved, and there’s nothing we can do to change that.
What a relief this is! There’s no need for us to pray the sinner’s prayer every chance we get. There’s no need to question whether believing in Jesus as our Lord and Savior is really the only thing we need to do to be saved. There’s no need for us to waste our life worrying about losing our salvation because of our sins and bad habits. We are followers of Christ, the Son of God and the Savior of the world, and He has completely saved us once and for all. Once saved, always saved.
I never got my big, flashy sign. I never heard a voice from heaven or saw writing on the wall that confirmed my salvation. But over the years, my struggles with assurance of salvation have lessened and lessened. I dug into the Word of God and trusted what I read. My relationship with the Lord deepened as I discovered that I am covered with His mercy and grace and that it is this mercy and grace that saves me, not my own good works. I allowed the Holy Spirit to work in and through me and to produce fruit in my life, which confirmed my regeneration and salvation.
I know I am saved, both now and forever, and if you have trusted in Christ as your Lord and Savior, you also can be confident in your salvation, both now and forever.
“In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.” Ephesians 1:11-14
