Any of you who believe you can eternally LOSE your salvation in actuality cannot find ONE SINGLE NAMED BELIEVING INDIVIDUAL unto whom this supposed fate befell in the entirety of the BIBLE.
How is it then YOU GOT THERE?
Here's some scriptural references about this subject.
There are many verses like this: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved" (Acts 16:31). But to set these up as the sole component of salvation is a refusal to take into account dozens of
other verses that demonstrate the need for more than some static one-moment-in-time belief.
Nowhere in Scripture is there the slightest support for an instantaneous, effortless, and permanent salvation, for a one-time belief in the Lord Jesus Christ that results in a completed act or state of "eternal security." Rather, Scripture evidences the unequivocal necessity for struggle and enduring to the end.
"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" (Php. 2:12).
"Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected, but I press on...reaching forwared to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize fo the upward call of God in Christ Jesus" (Php. 3:12-14).
"To us who are being saved" (1 Cor. 1:18).
"Those who are being saved" (2 Cor. 2:15).
"I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith" (2 Tim. 4:7).
"Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it" (1 Cor. 9:24).
"Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us" (Heb. 12:1).
"But he who endures to the end will be saved" (Matt. 10:22).
"Exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying, 'We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God'" (Acts 14:22).
"If we endure, we shall also reign with Him" (2 Tim. 2:12).
"We must give more earnest heed to the things we have heard, lest we drift away" (Heb. 2:1).
"If we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end" (Heb. 3:6).
"For we have become partakers of Christ if we held the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end" (Heb. 3:14).
Examples of those who fell away in the Bible:
We can begin with Judas Iscariot, one of the original apostles. "He called his disciples to Himself; and from then He chose twelve whom He also named apostles...and Judas Iscariot who also became a traitor" (Lk. 6:13, 16). Then Satan entered Judas, surnamed Iscariot, who was numbered among the twelve. So he went his way and conferred with the chief priests and captains, how he might betray Him to them. And they were glad, and agreed to give him money. So he promised and sought opportunity to betray Him to them in the absence of the multitude." (Lk. 22:3-6).
Next, there is Nicolas, one of the original seven deacons. We read: "Seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint...and Nicolas, a proselyte from Antioch" (Acts 6:3, 5). Sometime later, Nicolas founded and led the Gnostic Nicolaitan sect, a heretical band of schismatics condemned by Jesus: "But this you have, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate...Thus you also have those who hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which I hate" (Rev. 2:6, 15).
Another example is Demas, a co-worker of St. Paul in Rome, and friend of St. Luke: "Luke the beloved Physician and Demas greet you" (Col. 4:14). Demas abandoned apostle Paul and the Church, returning to lusts of the flesh: "For Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world, and has departed for Thessalonica" (2 Tim. 4:10).
We are not referring here to marginal congregants but rather to righteous one-time sincere believers. Judas was one of Jesus' twelve apostles. Not only was Nicolas a deacon he was described as being "full of the Holy Spirit." And Demas closely tied to no less than Apostle Paul and St. Luke.
**from "West of Jesus" by monk Anthony
