How can one lose their salvation?

losing salvation?

well i truly believe that once u are saved.. ur saved for all eternity and u cant lose ur salvation.. but u can lose rewards on judgement day when we all get to heaven... we will be judged at the judgement seat of christ while those who never accepted Jesus as their lord and saviour will go to the great white throne judgement.. i believe that once u are saved ur saved.. satan is the master of deception and u can sin and backslide which is used often to describe someone being close to God once but not as close now.. but I've seen examples of people who are strong then fall away but before they die they come back... and the bible also says that some will get in by the skin of their teeth.. what will be hard about that is they wont have any rewards to lay at the feet of Christ in heaven.

 

I disagree.

christian's are human and have the same sinful nature as every other human. christian's kill people, steal, cheat and lie. doesn't mean they are not a christian or have never REALLY been a christian. it means that they allowed their sinful nature to take over long enough to commit the sin.

becoming a christian doesn't mean you become perfect, it means you follow a God that is perfect therefore you strive for the same perfection. No one will ever achieve that perfection. The whole point of christianity is salvation not perfection.

 

Actually, it's both.

By that, I mean salvation is a gift. We maintain that gift through a developing relationship with Christ. That same relationship changes us gradually into the mental, emotional, and spiritual likeness of Christ, which by His nature moves us toward perfection.

Not that I'm saying any of us will actually get there (at least, not on this side of heaven), but the transformation should be apparent.

Murder by definition is an intentional act. To say a person is fully committed to following Jesus, yet willing to take a life against everything that He stood for, is impossible IMO. We're not talking about something minor here. We're talking about murder.

 

there is no such thing as a major or minor sin.

whether I lie or kill it's still a sin in God's eyes. There are not different levels of sin. sin is sin and all are forgiven.

christians do murder. jails are full of murdering christians. doesn't mean they lose their faith. means that they sinned and will need to repent. at the point they murdered they were a christian after they murdered they were a christian with a sin on that they must ask repentance for.

to believe that christianity can make someone sin free is simply not true. to believe that murder is any worse in God's eyes than lying to your wife is not true. there is not a ranking scale. God does say in the old testiment that if a man takes another's life he must pay with his life. he pays while here on earth. doesn't say that he will burn in hell for it though.

now if you got an christian axe murderer out killing once a week, then i would question his christianity, but someone that in anger kills someone else as cain did, could very easily be a christian before and after the murder.

 

I totally agree, and I apologize if I led you to believe I think otherwise.

The point I'm trying to make is that while sin is univerally vile in God's eyes, in our eyes the acts themselves carry different weight for us. One would have to completely ignore his faith and conscience to an alarming degree to go through with murder. I just think anyone who is willing to do that places their status with God in serious doubt.

Agreed. Our sins are forgiven, not erased. All the more reason to live a life of gratitude and obedience, wouldn't you agree?

How do you define "being a Christian"? I'm just curious because I don't think we're working from the same definition.

 

Christian= asking Jesus to forgive you of your sins and enter your heart at this point you are saved and unless you denounce Jesus you will be in Heaven.

Denouncing Jesus is not the same as committing a sin. You can denounce him a couple different ways. The first is saying that you do not believe he is Lord and that he did not die for man's sins and rise again. The second is even though you know that he did die for your sins you no longer want him in your heart and you don't want his forgiveness. You denounce him and tell him to get out. You tell him you don't want what he has and walk away.

Does a christian denounce Jesus by continuing to commit the same sin? No. Is the christian still saved? Yes. Are they a good christian and will they be rewarded when they go to heaven, probably not. Will they go to heaven? Yes. The world is full of back slidden christian's that ignore his tug on their heart. The church is FULL of them. I am a great example.

I turned my back on the church and most christian's and I followed my own way even though I knew how much it hurt God and others. God always kept his hand on me even when I was passed out at the titty bar. His plan was not evident to me at the time, but I can assure you it is evident now. My life will be an example to many and my actions will be judged by the world, but I am forgiven. I'm the guy that people will point at and say, well if God could stand by him, then he could stand by me. If he could forgive that piece of crap, then he can surely forgive me.

I would rather be surrounded by murderous rage filled christians that are honest and recognize their faults, than the hypocrits that destroy christianity by pretending to be something they are not. Facades are very difficult to build and very hard to knock down. A so called christian that pretends they are perfect on the outside and commits sins that no one but God sees are the ones that scare me. They don't even know they are screwed up, because they have fooled the world and are left to deal with their sins behind close doors. I'd rather kill a man out of sheer anger and rage and have the whole world know I'm a christian that sinned, than hide in my bedroom watching kiddie porn with the doors locked so no one ever knows and still pretend to be a christian when the lights are on and the doors are unlocked.

Hasbeen. You are a smart guy, but you are dead wrong on this thing. Murdering is no worse than lying. The world may say different, but God doesn't. In all honesty, I would rather kill a man and pay the price then ask for forgiveness, than commit a small sin that no one ever saw and I never asked for forgiveness for and then I allowed to chip away slowly at my christian armor until I was sitting passed out in a titty bar again. Trust me brother minor sins....quiet sins that you don't view as a MAJOR sin will kill a man's religion faster than a 38s bullet to the skull any day of the week. It's easy to be a christian when your locked up. Try making big money and living the lifestyle that the world portrays and see how long your christianity lasts. Those minor sins will eat you alive.

 

We're talking about apples and oranges here. Let me try to re-state what I'm trying to say.

First, once again I totally agree that in the eyes of God there are no spiritual differences between sins.

Second, I totally agree that if a person has truly acknowledged his sin, asked forgiveness for that sin, asked for the grace provided by Christ's crucifixion and resurrection to pay for that sin, then fully committed to living the rest of his life in obedience to Christ as Lord, then he is saved.

Third, I totally agree that hiding a chronic sin behind closed doors while keeping up a nice, polished semi-righteous facade is no better than sinning in the public view in broad daylight. And I speak from experience here. That is not to say murder is beyond Christ's capacity or will to forgive, for the Christian or the non-Christian.

I do not subscribe to the "once saved, always saved" universal concept which reduces the Christian experience to a one-time prayer, making discipleship optional. There are several passages in Matthew, Romans, Hebrews, and Revelation that have been key in leading me to disagree with that premise. Not that I believe in salvation by works -- not at all. I believe in salvation through the grace of Christ and through the relationship that grace makes possible.

I'm not talking about a Christian losing his salvation by murdering someone. I'm suggesting that the chances of a fully-devoted follower of Christ choosing to murder another human being (whom Christ also died to save, I might add) are miniscule at best. However, for the person who claims to be a Christian but refuses to "walk the walk" of Christian discipleship, the chances of murder under the right circumstances rise dramatically.

All of that to say, I don't believe one man can actually know whether or not another man is saved. Only God can know that. All we have to go on is a Christian's testimony, and how he lives his life. All I'm saying is that if the two aren't in sync, something is very wrong.

 

why is murder more of a stretch for a real christian than lying? you miss the point. lying is easier and the worldly consequences are not nearly as severe. lying takes place all the time. murder doesn't. i would dare to say that if you took the number of murders a year and calculated which were committed by christians and which were committed by non-christians that it would MATCH the statistics of christians per capita in that area. we are talking about a sin that happens very rarely in the realm of sins is definately not confined to non-christians.

what i'm telling you is that murder is a cleaner better sinner than lying. atleast a christian can acknowledge that is was wrong because the entire world says it is. lying is acceptable and allowed and christians do it all the time. the point is this. IT DOESN'T TAKE A NON-CHRISTIAN TO MURDER. christians commit the same crimes and sins that non-christians do.

if a christian murders a person and is killed immediatly with out time to repent he still goes to heaven.

not all christians are walking right with the Lord. your grace there is based on works if you require a christian to be walking with the Lord in order to be saved.

you are a smart guy, but i can assure you that you are wrong. i have been saved since i was a young boy. i have turned away from God, but i never denounced him. he was always in my life. i was always going to heaven.

once adam and eve ate of the tree they were allowed choices. the human nature is sinful. sin is always around the christian. to say that a true christian can not murder is 100% incorrect. to say that a true christian should not murder is 100% correct. to say that a true christian can not lie is 100% incorrect. to say that a true christian should not lie is 100% correct. the can part is what makes us human and not CHRIST. we will always have the free will to choose. we will never be sin free. if we are christians we will always be forgiven.

 

i believe it was peter that cut off the soldiers ear. did he follow christ? peter denied he knew jesus 3 times. was he not a follower of christ?

 

That precisely is my point. Though lying and murder precipitate the same spiritual consequence, mankind views it as MUCH heavier, much more heinous. Murder doesn't happen all the time because mankind does take it so seriously, even on a secular level. A Christian, with the Holy Spirit dwelling within his heart, mind, and soul, should take it infinitely more seriously because of his commitment to living in obedience to Christ, an amplified conscience by the Holy Spirit, and the vastly increased sense of the value of human life as a result of the influence of Christ.

I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm just saying that when it does happen, it raises serious questions.

Again, I believe that poll, while interesting, would be impossible to take because mankind cannot know absolutely whether or not a person is saved.

Now who's assigning a severity scale to sin?

Unfortunately, I agree that's true. The complacency of the world we live in has an enormous undermining effect on Christian discipleship. The idea is, and I'm sure you agree, that Christians should be holding themselves accountable and patterning their lives after Jesus, not by what society accepts or doesn't accept. That's the goal.

Again, I agree.