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Assurance or Presumption — 10 Comments

  1. On assurance of salvation/presumption.
    My Assurance of salvation Is Not based on obedience But on trusting on the promises of God and the finished work of Jesus at the cross for me.
    Being in Christ Is the key:
    “The just shall live by faith. “
    —true faith always engender obedience is the message of the book of James. Not that we are saved by faith and keeping the law.
    Paul in Romans tells us :” no one will be justified by the works of the law”. Presumption is thinking that obedience / keeping the commandments is what make us right with God. The rich young ruler made that mistake. Jesus proved to him that in reality he never truly kept the commandments. None of us can or ever will perfectly.
    The law is designed to point out sin and our need of Jesus and his righteousness that becomes ours when we believe in him. Assurance of Salvation is grounded only in Trusting Jesus and or God who can not lie...
    for it is by grace you have been saved, through faith in Jesus not of works so No One can boast...

    (7)
    • Thank you Kerby for helping us stay balanced. Indeed people can be presumptuous of their performance as well as some can be presumptuous of their sins. I hope no one got the idea that we are saved by our works. However the article does point out according to the Bible that real faith leads to good works while presumption leads into willful and presumptuous sins. The Bible says the just shall live by faith. Too many though misread that and are presumptuous thinking the unjust shall live by faith. The last passage in your comment goes on to read, "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them" Ephesians 2:10.

      You commented. "true faith always engender obedience is the message of the book of James. Not that we are saved by faith and keeping the law." That is totally true and the point of this article. Thank you for your insights and balance. I have written several articles you may have read about how no one in the Old or New Testament was ever saved by the law. We are all saved by grace. Too get the proper balance of a topic we have to read different passages of Scripture to get the whole topic. In James 2:24 James says, " You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only." That may seem unbalanced but when you compare Romans and James together you get the big picture. Just as James and Paul could not exhaust the entire subject in one book, neither can I exhaust the subject in one article. I believe both James and Romans and this article can be summed up in the phrase you eloquently put together and thank you for sharing, "true faith always engender obedience."

      (7)
    • I was just curious about your statement, "...Trusting Jesus and or God ..." Do you believe that Jesus is not God or did you misspeak?

      (3)
      • Thanks for your kind reply to my comments; I was glad to see that we agree. Of course I believe Jesus is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. The Bible is very clear about that: Father, son and Holy Spirit are One.
        I meant to reply earlier and share what prompted my first comments about the “foundation of our assurance of salvation:
        1 John 5:11-13 tells us:
        And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.
        13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life. That’s the foundation of my assurance. I hope that’s not presumption.
        My frustration with The way we tend to present our theology is that it is law centric rather than Christ centric, Instead of the other way around. So people focus on outer appearance rather than inner or heart transformation, they develop a false sense of security based on their keeping the sabbath and the other nine commands.
        The focus is so much on works that we forget that our works are the fruit of the spirit which dwells in us. The good works prepared for us to walk in are the product of Christ living in us. We can’t ever take credit for them. They are product of the new birth and regeneration from God with his spirit just as He did at creation.

        Many atheists do good works just like some Christians who will tell to Jesus : didn’t we do this Or that in your name but God will tell them “ I never knew you” depart from me you who practice iniquity.
        If we were to focus our teachings on heart transformation and the renewing of the mind by yielding to the prompting of the spirit then good works will automatically follow, because we would truly learn to love God and our neighbors.
        In fact The Other reason that I remain certain of my salvation is that I believe that our sovereign God promised also to bring to completion what He started. Therefore my salvation is completely from The Lord. Out of gratefulness I then long to walk in the good works God prepare for all his children to walk in.
        Thank you for your contribution to our daily lessons. God bless

        (5)
        • Hello Kerby - I am happy to find that your understanding about 'good works' is the same as mine. In Friday's and today's(Sabbath) lesson comments, I pointed out how difficult it is for us Christians to fully recognize and accept the 'absence' of anything good residing in the flesh.
          I agree that much too much emphasis is based on 'law-centric' obedience and not the obedience resulting from loving God with one's whole heart, mind and soul, which will then manifest itself in inspired obedience and so being equipped to pass on His Love.

          Rom.8:14-27 - v.14 - "For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, THEY are the sons of God."
          Rom.8:26,27 - "Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. "(27) "And he(God) that searchet the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. "

          1Cor.15:50 - "Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the Kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption."
          Without the Holy Spirit's presence in us, all we are is corruptible flesh. Without the Holy Spirit's manifestation of God's presence within us, we cannot commune with Him; without the Holy Spirit's renewing of our heart, mind and soul, we are still walking in the darkness of this world.
          May God help all who are still working in the power of the flesh to see the Spiritual Light of the Gospel message and walk by Faith in the Holy Spirit's Power after the teachings of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
          Eph.2:10 - "For we are His workmanship, created IN Christ Jesus (as we abide in His Gospel Truth) unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them."
          The Gospel message is not ABOUT Jesus, it IS Jesus - 'offered to mankind as the Spirit of Truth and Life.'

          (4)
      • To be fair, the term "God," as used in the English language, is often an individual reference to God the Father, as distinct from God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Such usage is not necessarily a denial of the full divinity of Christ, nor of His equality with the Father.

        (3)
  2. He that turneth away his ears from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be an abomination Prov 28:9.

    Assumption or Presumption!!!!

    Are we SDA Christians operating under the spirit of assumption or presumption? Are we as individuals operating under the spirit of assumption or presumption? What about faith or foolishness, how do we stand as Christians? I do not boast in myself but only in Christ alone for who He is.
    The bible is full to capacity with powerful stories upon stories of us, humans, Jews who operated under assurance, presumption, faith and foolishness. Not forgetting many have operated under the spirit of assumption. To assume is dangerous.
    Exodus 16:1-36 This is about the Manna and all it entails. What were the people mindset, the whys and the hows manna was given, the what to do with the manna, the what not to do with it, when and how much to collect daily etc. Despite the instructions were clear as crystals or as the clear blue sea, did all the people trusted God although they saw his might works in the past? why not? Were they operating under the spirit of assumption? O Faithless generation!!!

    1 Samuel 4:1-22 Another powerful story. To assume that God is with us to protect even when we are willfully doing wrong is dangerous. But even in presumptuous sins, God is gracious to sinners, but dont go about tempting him. He bears long with sinners allowing us to listen to the promptings of his Spirit. These men went into the Most Holy place(only the High Priest should enter once a year), took the ark of the covenant, went to war. The first time in battle, 4000 men were smitten, second time around 30,000 smitten. Do not temp the Lord with our sins.

    The children were defeated in battle again and the ark of covenant was taken by the ungodly/unchurched. They examined it, looked inside, place it among the abominable. Were they presumptuous? How many Philistines were killed according to the bible as a results of handling and looking into the ark? They unchurched did not know much about the ark but was punished because of their actions and proudness against God.

    Now the ark was sent back after seven months? The Beth-shemites looked into the ark of the covenant and 50,070 were smitten, Why? 1 Samuel 6:19. Were they assuming the protection of God? Was this a case of presumption?

    How about our personal and private life. Only the Lord knows, we dont need an answer. Let us cont to serve God with a spirit of love.

    (1)

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