Are followers in Christ eternally secure (OSAS)?
Yes.
...or can they forfeit their salvation by turning to a lifestyle of sin?
No.
Humans are not sufficiently powerful enough to wrest themselves from God's grasp. We do not have the power to render the blood of Christ worthless and ineffective.
One of the reasons the debate on this matter exists is because of the failure to discriminate or properly exegete all mentions of "
saved," or "
salvation" mentioned in scripture. Many, many of the comments "
If you do _________, then you will be saved," are references to salvation from the pending judgment coming upon Israel/Jerusalem in the first century. The reference was not a salvation from sin, but a salvation from judgment or wrath.
Hebrews 9:23-28
"Therefore it was necessary for the copies of the things in the heavens to be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a holy place made with hands, a mere copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us; nor was it that He would offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise, He would have needed to suffer often since the foundation of the world; but now once at the consummation of the ages He has been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time for salvation without reference to sin, to those who eagerly await Him."
What,
exactly, is a salvation "
without reference to sin" because Calvary was definitely, inescapably, undeniably, irrefutably about salvation form sin and the same is true of the final judgment in which each and all will be held to account for every misguided word ever spoken. So we see there are salvations mentioned in the NT that have nothing to do with the salvation from sin provided at Calvary. You watch as the discussion of this op unfolds; posters are going to quote scriptures 1) in proof-text manner and 2) ignore the context of pending judgment alluded to in the larger passage.
The Zondrvan Counterpoints Series has a book dedicated to the topic of
Eternal Security in which the Classic Calvinist, Moderate Calvinist, Reformed Arminian, and Wesleyan Arminian views are discussed comparatively. It is pretty good and will provide a basic understanding of the first three views (Harper does not do a very good job of articulating the Wesleyan view).
Personally, even though the passage is not specifically about eternal security, I find the following the most powerful.
1 Corinthians 3:10-15
"According to the grace of God which was given to me, like a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building on it. But each man must be careful how he builds on it. For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work. If any man's work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire."
If we are building on the foundation of Christ crucified and resurrected then we are saved. Period. If we are not building upon that foundation then we weren't saved to begin with. We may be fruitless and ineffective as Christians 9I don't believe that actually happens) but we are saved. We could enter the final judgment with what we think is an abundant of bona fides but all works of flesh will be burned up and we might exit charred and covered in soot but the blood of Christ washes away all unrighteousness. Those not building on Christ don't emerge.[/QUOTE]
