Monday, January 27, 2014

It Is Finished!

I heard a pastor on the radio this morning say “if you don’t feel remorse the instant you commit a sin, then I have to wonder if you are truly a child of God.” This is false teaching.

It is an obvious and irrefutable fact that everyone is different in some, perhaps many, respects. Not everyone will feel remorse for sin immediately. Sometimes, remorse comes later. It may come in an hour or a few hours. It may come the next day. It is patently false to assert that every believer will feel remorse for sin immediately. There is no Biblical basis for such an assertion. It is false teaching.

When a pastor says “if you don’t do X, then you are not truly saved”, his listeners may naturally begin to think “since I want to be truly saved, then I must do X”. Now the pastor has added something to the gospel. X might actually be a good thing to do, but doing it does not contribute to the completion of our salvation and doing it does not cleanse us of the sin we just committed. There is nothing we can do that has any ability to cleanse us of our sins. What can wash away my sin? NOTHING!

…but the blood of Jesus.

Doing X cannot undo or cleanse us of our most recent sin. It cannot make us right in God’s eyes again. There is no such thing as being made right in God’s eyes again. The one and only thing that ever made us right in God’s eyes in the first place has made us right in God’s eyes forever. Our salvation can never be lost. Therefore, it can never be restored.

We are finished being saved. There is nothing else we must do to be saved. We already have victory in Jesus. We can do ourselves a tremendous disservice if we neglect to further explore, comprehend, and embrace the extent and magnitude of the victory that Jesus has won for us. But, it is already complete. Not only is there nothing that we can do, but also there is nothing left to do. Our salvation is complete. We are finished being saved.