By Colleen Tinker
A few months ago we received an email with questions from a person who had recently discovered there were problems with Adventism and had begun the process of learning what the Bible really teaches. Not surprisingly, a wave of questions surfaced. The clear words of Scripture collided with her Adventist proof-texts and deep imprinting, and doubts confused her. Because her questions are so common among those of us who begin to realize that we were deceived, we are sharing them and our answers in this week’s blog.
Q: Please help me understand
I am still uncertain about what my role in sanctification is. I know from reading Scripture that “once saved, always saved” is not Biblical truth. So I don’t understand how I lose my salvation. Does it happen if I don’t believe that Jesus died to save me? To me, that idea means that if I don’t feel absolutely sure that Christ has saved me, then I am lost. This dilemma seems kind of like a catch-22 situation that is particularly hard for us Adventists trained to see things through the grid of the law, as you know. What if Jesus comes back (or I die) on a day I am feeling particularly doubtful or insecure?
Also, Jesus talked about how if I don’t love Him more than my children or family, I am not worthy of Him. I’d like to say that I love Him more, but as I hold my four-month-old baby, I can’t imagine that I can say I love Jesus more than my child, in all honesty. And I don’t really want to find out that I loved my child more than Jesus and am not worthy of Him.
He also says if I love Him, I will keep His commandments. As I understand them, they are to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and to Love your neighbor as yourself. What if I can’t seem to love Him with all my heart, mind, soul, and strength? Does that mean I don’t have salvation? The Bible also says that cowards won’t be in heaven. I feel pretty cowardly. Not that I have been tested…..
Also, I worry that because I feel like Sabbath is a burden and was happy to hear that there is a way out, that fact means I wouldn’t give up everything I want for His name. Maybe I need to keep the burden of Sabbath just to demonstrate that I am willing to sacrifice my happiness for His sake. Maybe my joy at discovering I might not have to keep the Sabbath means I don’t love him as much as I should.
A: God’s sovereignty is our security
I completely understand your questions. I have had to come to terms with similar questions as I’ve shed my Adventist worldview and become grounded in Scripture. You know, the most paradigm-shifting thing I learned after understanding the new covenant and the true gospel of Jesus’ finished work was learning the biblical truth of God’s sovereignty. Adventists are taught that God limits His own power to accommodate our free wills, that He must allow even Satan to do his will and have his way until the universe is convinced that his way is bad, and they all agree that God is fair.
This paradigm is completely unbiblical. In fact, God is sovereign, and our salvation and our sanctification are entirely the work of God. Yes, we learn to obey the Lord and His word after we are born again, but our sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit in us, not something we generate from our own natural heart.
In fact, God’s glory is the ultimate “value” in the universe, as the women’s ministry leader at our church has said. His glory is greater than any other thing, than any other life or cause in the universe. We are here for His glory, not the other way around. The Lord graciously brings us into HIS story when we believe. He doesn’t cautiously enter our lives and help us; He brings us into His life and gives us His work to do, His provision, and He keeps His promises because He is faithful to Himself (2 Tim. 2:13). “My glory I will not give to another,” he says (Is. 48:11).
There is a tension that exists between God’s absolute sovereignty and with our own responsibility to obey when we hear His call to believe. This tension is something that we cannot tear apart or diminish into a formula. The Bible teaches both: that God is sovereign and calls, chooses, elects, and keeps His own, and that we are to believe when we hear Him call and obey Him after we are born again. In fact, Jesus Himself shows us a bit of this reality; as Gary Inrig, our pastor has said, if we get rid of this tension between God’s absolute foreknowledge and sovereignty and our responsibility, we lose the cross. Jesus was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world; He came to die, and He came to reconcile us to God. He knew; the Trinity all knew beforehand that Jesus would die and rise again.
Yet in Gethsemane, Jesus the man begged His Father to let that cup pass from Him if possible. At the same time, He submitted to His Father’s will. That moment was the first time Jesus’ will was different from His Father’s will. As a man, Jesus had to trust His Father when He longed for another outcome. Even though from eternity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit agreed that Jesus would be the Lamb of God who takes away the world’s sin, in that garden as He struggled, He had to trust God when everything in Him wanted a way out.
God’s eternal sovereignty and our responsibility to trust God is a mystery we cannot explain, but because the Bible clearly tells us we are responsible for our choices and also that God is utterly sovereign and in control, we have to believe both. We have freedom and safety and peace when we trust God, like Abraham did (Gen. 15:6). He believed God, and that belief was counted to him for righteousness.
What about sanctification?
As for sanctification—the Lord directs it. It’s important to know, first of all, that the new covenant commands to do good works are only for those who believe. The epistles were written to people who had trusted Jesus and had been born again. They were not written to people who were still unbelievers; they were never given as means to become worthy of salvation or as commands that would keep people saved.
In fact, there are two kinds of statements in the New Testament epistles: the INDICATIVES and the IMPERATIVES. Indicatives are statements of fact: sentences that “indicate” specific things that are true. The “imperatives” are commands, things we are to do, but those imperatives are never given apart from the indicatives that state our true position in Christ once we have believed. I know that sounds a bit confusing, but let me give you an example.
In Colossians 3:1–11, we find examples of these two kinds of statements. Here is the passage:
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. On account of these the wrath of God is coming. In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator. Here there is not Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave, free; but Christ is all, and in all.
The passage begins with an indicative phrase: “If you have been raised up with Christ”. In Greek, this “if” means “since you have”, sort of like “If you’re going to the store, would you please get me some milk?” The sentence assumes that “going to the store” is a fact that is happening. So, this statement in Colossians 3 is the same sort of thing. “Since” we have been raised with Christ assumes the audience to be true believers who have been born again through faith in Jesus. Paul then writes more indicatives in verse 3: “You have died and your life is hidden with Christ is God.”
Now we have the context of this passage: Paul is writing to believers who have died to their old selves and have been raised to new life with Christ in God. He is “indicating” what is true. He has written “indicatives” that describe the reality of his believing audience.
Importantly, these statements tell not only of the readers’ born-again condition but also of their real position: believers are with Christ in God. These are not “maybe” statements; these are indicatives, statements of absolute FACT.
When we trust Christ, these things become facts about us. Being born again of the Spirit and being hidden with Christ in God are not metaphors that depend upon our obedience; they are facts that God does for us at the moment we believe. These new realities are the result of the Father transferring us out of the domain of darkness into the kingdom of the Beloved Son (Col 1:13). These are the things God does when we believe, and we have absolutely no part in these indicatives.
The indicatives of the gospel are entirely the work of God. We cannot do them, and if we cannot do them, we cannot undo them, either. God’s works are sovereign acts of His power and grace.They are real even when we do not “feel” like they are real. If we have trusted Christ, then God’s indicative statements become true about us.
What about those imperatives?
Now, knowing that our position and eternal life are absolutely secure, we can read the imperative statements in the passage. These are not statements telling us how to stay saved; they are statements showing us how to grow. Just as a baby is born to a mother through absolutely no choice or effort of his or her own, so we are born again through absolutely no effort of our own. In fact, a baby has nothing at all to do with when or how it is born.
In the same way, we are born again through no work of our own, and just as your baby cannot go back into being unborn or not your child, so we cannot become unborn-again. What God does is sovereign and eternal. But now, once your baby is born, she is growing. This growth depends upon certain things: eating enough, being changed and loved and stimulated as his awareness develops. It is the same with us as newly-born children of God. We now have to grow, and this growth continues until we die. The imperatives in the epistles are the statements that explain how we grow—but these statements are made to people who are already born again.
Notice some of the imperatives in the passage from Colossians: seek the things that are above; set your mind on things above; put to death what is earthly, and so forth.
The commands assure us that we are eternally secure, hidden with Christ in God, and this position is what makes it possible for us to trust Jesus and honor Him when we are tempted to sin. The reality of our being God’s true children is what makes embracing the imperatives possible. We cannot seek or think about “the things above” if we are not already God’s adopted, born again children hidden with Christ in Him!
Our being born again is the work of God; it is not a result of our deciding to do the right thing. Just as Jesus had to call Lazarus from the grave, He calls us to Himself and brings us to spiritual life (see John 5:25-27). We cannot make ourselves come alive.
Moreover, we are not merely born flawed; we are born dead (see Eph. 2:1-3). We can’t make a free-will choice as spiritually dead people; we can only make choices consistent with our natures. Our natural selves are dead in sin, “by nature children of wrath” (Eph. 2:3). No amount of trying to be good, of praying not to sin, of feeding the poor and visiting the sick can make us come to life spiritually. Only God can make us alive in Christ (Eph. 2:4-10).
Once we become alive, all those New Testament commands become ours. When we trust Jesus, we become alive with the actual life of the risen Christ in us (Rom. 8:11). The Holy Spirit in us makes it possible for us to trust God and to submit to His will as He impresses us with His eternal word.
What do my doubts mean?
We will certainly not always feel close to God, and sometimes we may feel like we don’t love Him as we think we should. The Bible, though, never asks us to examine our feelings but to believe God’s word. If we have truly trusted Christ and His finished work and have repented of our sin, then we are saved and have eternal life. When we are born again, our true Father takes responsibility for our growth. He shows us—one day, one hour at a time—how to honor Him. He Himself shows us how to do “the next right thing”.
We may feel very discouraged or even depressed…especially if we had trauma as children. Being born again doesn’t stop us from having those feelings, but the fact that we are God’s children now gives us the ability to act on God’s promises (which are certain) instead of on our own fears and doubts. I often pray that God will show me what is real and true. I ask Him to plant me in truth and reality and to keep me from deception.
Sometimes when I ask God to show me the next right thing (because I am too discouraged or triggered with my life to be able to know what I should do or how I should think or feel), He will help me see that the very next right thing is literally to get out of bed. Sometimes the next right thing I have to do is to answer my emails! Maybe the next right thing for you will be to feed and change your daughter and to tell her how much you love her and what a wonderful gift from God she is.
Our obedience to God requires our willingness to act, but our willingness and our action both come from being submitted to God’s faithful promises and direction. His word literally informs us how to BE.
What obedience looks like
So how do we actually obey God’s commands?
Let’s look again at that Colossians passage. The first imperatives are to “keep seeking the things above, where Christ is,” and to “set your mind on the things above not on the things that are on earth.” These imperatives apply to us if we have trusted Jesus and have been born of His Spirit. Then, having already been hidden with Christ in God, we can fix our minds on Him by thanking Him that we are His. We set our minds on the eternal realities by believing He’s telling the truth in His word. We thank Him for bringing us to life and for making us His. We thank Him for the blessings He has given us, and for transferring us out of the domain of darkness into the kingdom of His beloved Son. We thank Him for not being surprised by what surprises us, and we ask Him to show us how to see our situations as He sees them and to give us His wisdom.
Sometimes, when I feel depressed and desperate, I ask Him to show me how to do the next right thing with thankfulness, and I thank Him that His word cannot fail!
Giving up what we love
I understand your question about the Sabbath as well, and your fear that your joy in discovering the Sabbath is not required might indicate that you don’t really love God.
Here’s the important thing we need to know: the Lord is not asking us to figure out whether or not we would give anything for Him. Rather, He only asks us to do what He presents to us at the moment.
Here is what He asks of us: to believe in His Son. He asks us to believe that He has died for our sin, and He has asked us to trust that His shed blood has purchased our forgiveness. What we felt about the Sabbath as Adventists is not even on the table. Adventism was our former life; it was what we knew before we understood the new covenant. Now that we have received the gospel of our salvation, the issues are completely different.
When the rich young ruler asked Jesus what he had to do to be saved, Jesus replied first by saying to keep the commandments. The man said he already was keeping them. Then Jesus revealed that those commandments were not what would save him; He asked him to give up what he loved the most—in his case it was his possessions—and follow Him. The man refused.
Your being happy to give up the Sabbath doesn’t mean that you wouldn’t give up everything for Him if He asked you. We can’t analyze our willingness to honor Jesus by evaluating our false beliefs as evidence of what we would be willing to do. He is not asking you to hold onto the Sabbath. What He is asking you to do is to trust Him.
Furthermore, He will not confront you with everything you have to face all at once. You have a lifetime to live with Him! He will only ask you to trust Him for what He already knows you need to do today.
How do I keep from losing my salvation?
A person who has truly trusted God cannot lose his salvation because he cannot be un-born. Jesus’ parable of the soils (Matthew 13) describes four kinds of people: the bad soil describes people who have no heart for the truth at all. They have no interest in the gospel, and the gospel seed bounces off and never takes root. The birds eat the seed.
The rocky soil describes people who like the idea of the gospel. It sounds good, and they might even like the Christians who taught it to them. They might like fraternizing in church and enjoying the environment of the body of Christ. But their reception of the gospel is shallow. They “receive” it, but they never put down roots. They may even appear to grow a “gospel plant” and to look like a believer, but they have no deep roots. When trouble or opposition comes, they wither and die. They have no roots into God’s truth and His word and His Life to sustain them.
The weedy soil represents people who receive the gospel, but they are not willing to let the gospel become their identity. They still love the pull of worldly forces like money and worldly concerns, and they allow those things to fill up their minds and time and energy. In fact, their focus on worldly concerns is so consuming that they choke out the gospel plant. These people have never been truly born again; they have never placed their trust in Christ alone. Like Judas, they appear to be believers, but they are only “believers” superficially. Under the surface, they are still the same people they always were.
The fourth soil is the good soil that receives the gospel seed, and it flourishes there. It puts down deep roots, grows a lush plant, and ultimately it produces much gospel fruit. The rocky and weedy soils produce fragile plants, but they never produce fruit before they die from lack of nourishment.
In other words, only people who are truly born again and trusting God produce gospel fruit.
The warnings throughout the New Testament are warnings to people who are in church but who are actually among those rocky and weedy soils. The Lord knows our hearts, but the person sitting next to us may not. Nevertheless, the word of God reveals the “next right thing” for each of us. For the rocky and weedy soils, that next right thing would be to truly believe and repent. For the good soil, the next right thing is to trust God with what He puts in front of us. His word reveals how we are to relate to our lives!
Equip yourself
I want to give you an assignment. I want you to get a notebook and literally to begin, gradually, a few verses every day, to copy Romans 8. Ask the Lord to teach you what He already knows He wants you to learn. Then, when you have finished copying Romans 8, copy the book of Galatians, a few verses a day. Ask the Lord to teach you and to show you how to thank Him for His indicative statements about who you are in Him! Ask Him to apply His word to your heart and to show you what is real and true.
We Adventists were taught a completely inside-out description of reality. We were lied to. God, not our free will, is the ultimate value in the universe. The sovereign God who calls, chooses, elects, predestines, and births us into Himself through belief in His Son cannot fail, and we cannot fall out of His hand. †
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wonderful response to the same nagging doubts & fears I`ve experienced in my own journey with God. wish I had found a wise insightful helper like you years ago.
It’s never too late to trust the Lord more deeply! He is more faithful than we can imagine. He knows how to redeem our past and to plant us deeply in His word. I am so thankful that He called us to life and has given us His work to do for His glory and for our good!