I’ve participated in a number of these discussions. I’ve been never fully happy with any of the answers.
First, realize that there are two very closely related doctrines: perseverance of the saints and “once saved, always saved.” Perseverance goes back (at least) to the Reformers. Luther had been the victim of continuing doubt about his salvation, because he could never be sure he had lived up to the rather legalistic concepts he had learned. (Whether that was correct Catholic teaching is a whole other question.) He was greatly comforted to learn that God saved people even when they didn’t deserve it, and we could trust him. He found that he could trust God when he couldn’t trust himself.
For Luther, and from a slightly different perspective, Calvin, it was comforting to realize that salvation didn’t depend upon them, but they could trust God. And of course the Bible gives us assurances that God won’t give up on us. So they felt they could be sure that they wouldn’t lose salvation.
But when you move from a personal trust in God to an abstract doctrine, you start getting into a minefield. Luther might be able to trust in God, but we all know people who as far as anyone can tell were faithful Christians but gave up. If God can be trusted not to lose anyone, what about them? There were three answers given:
Calvin’s answer, which is generally the answer of the Reformed movement, is that those people were never actually God’s people, but only gave the appearance of it.
The Lutheran answer (though I’m not sure it’s Luther’s) was that while God was entirely responsible for saving us, we could reject him.
Some Baptists developed a different answer. Originally Baptists were Reformed. But many in the US gave up the perspective that salvation was entirely God’s action, becoming “free will” baptists. For them, perseverance (God will make sure we don’t fall away) turned into “once saved, always saved.” That says that once we are born again, that doesn’t go away, no matter what we become or do later in life.
All of these have problems. The Reformed concept gives up any real hope of assurance, at least in theory. Yes, we can be sure that God will never give up on the elect, but we can never be sure we are elect. Certain parts of the Reformed tradition then tried to develop tests for whether we’re elect. Everyone agreed that we could never know for sure, but there were things you could see about someone’s life that made it pretty likely that they were really elect. But note that the original goal of assurance was now gone, being replaced by tests for election that ended up looking a lot like legalism. (I note that not all Reformed went down this path.)
The later Lutheran position gave up on any doctrinal way of defining assurance.
The Baptist position managed to create assurance, but at the cost of saying that people were saved even if they had no faith, and indeed ended up as anti-Christian.
In my opinion, there simply is no abstract doctrine that can solve the problem of assurance, because it’s really a personal problem. Suppose you suspected that your spouse didn’t really love you. Would hiring a private investigator to come up with proofs be helpful? Almost certainly not.
The problem is that assurance that someone loves you comes out of your relationship with them. The way to gain assurance is to get to know them better. Similarly with God. Despite the problems with their abstract doctrines, when someone says they aren’t sure that they’re really saved, Reformed and Lutheran folks almost always give the same answer: The way you gain confidence is not by trying to find some proof that you’re elect, but by looking to Christ, to what he has done for you, and realizing that he loves you and you can trust him. I think this is likely what Calvin meant when he said that the elect should generally be able to have confidence in their salvation.
That is, this is a relational problem, not a doctrinal one. Perhaps the Lutherans are the wisest in having given up solving this doctrinally.
First, realize that there are two very closely related doctrines: perseverance of the saints and “once saved, always saved.” Perseverance goes back (at least) to the Reformers. Luther had been the victim of continuing doubt about his salvation, because he could never be sure he had lived up to the rather legalistic concepts he had learned. (Whether that was correct Catholic teaching is a whole other question.) He was greatly comforted to learn that God saved people even when they didn’t deserve it, and we could trust him. He found that he could trust God when he couldn’t trust himself.
For Luther, and from a slightly different perspective, Calvin, it was comforting to realize that salvation didn’t depend upon them, but they could trust God. And of course the Bible gives us assurances that God won’t give up on us. So they felt they could be sure that they wouldn’t lose salvation.
But when you move from a personal trust in God to an abstract doctrine, you start getting into a minefield. Luther might be able to trust in God, but we all know people who as far as anyone can tell were faithful Christians but gave up. If God can be trusted not to lose anyone, what about them? There were three answers given:
Calvin’s answer, which is generally the answer of the Reformed movement, is that those people were never actually God’s people, but only gave the appearance of it.
The Lutheran answer (though I’m not sure it’s Luther’s) was that while God was entirely responsible for saving us, we could reject him.
Some Baptists developed a different answer. Originally Baptists were Reformed. But many in the US gave up the perspective that salvation was entirely God’s action, becoming “free will” baptists. For them, perseverance (God will make sure we don’t fall away) turned into “once saved, always saved.” That says that once we are born again, that doesn’t go away, no matter what we become or do later in life.
All of these have problems. The Reformed concept gives up any real hope of assurance, at least in theory. Yes, we can be sure that God will never give up on the elect, but we can never be sure we are elect. Certain parts of the Reformed tradition then tried to develop tests for whether we’re elect. Everyone agreed that we could never know for sure, but there were things you could see about someone’s life that made it pretty likely that they were really elect. But note that the original goal of assurance was now gone, being replaced by tests for election that ended up looking a lot like legalism. (I note that not all Reformed went down this path.)
The later Lutheran position gave up on any doctrinal way of defining assurance.
The Baptist position managed to create assurance, but at the cost of saying that people were saved even if they had no faith, and indeed ended up as anti-Christian.
In my opinion, there simply is no abstract doctrine that can solve the problem of assurance, because it’s really a personal problem. Suppose you suspected that your spouse didn’t really love you. Would hiring a private investigator to come up with proofs be helpful? Almost certainly not.
The problem is that assurance that someone loves you comes out of your relationship with them. The way to gain assurance is to get to know them better. Similarly with God. Despite the problems with their abstract doctrines, when someone says they aren’t sure that they’re really saved, Reformed and Lutheran folks almost always give the same answer: The way you gain confidence is not by trying to find some proof that you’re elect, but by looking to Christ, to what he has done for you, and realizing that he loves you and you can trust him. I think this is likely what Calvin meant when he said that the elect should generally be able to have confidence in their salvation.
That is, this is a relational problem, not a doctrinal one. Perhaps the Lutherans are the wisest in having given up solving this doctrinally.
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