How You Know You're Saved

[CThomas]

Steve, just so I'm clear (as this is an issue of some significance). Am I correct in drawing the following conclusion from your analysis of the "obedience to the commandments" prong of the salvation test? I gather that the upshot here is that one need not sit around worrying whether the number of sins one has committed post-conversion has reached some particular critical threshold in figuring out whether one's sinful acts are evidence of being unsaved. Rather, so long as (a) you are sincerely (and not merely pretextually) striving to avoid any sin, and (b) this effort is manifested in compliance with the commandments being one's ordinary practice, with sins being exceptional in nautre, then you satisfy this fourth prong of the test. Is that a fair one-sentence "take-home" summary (to the extent any such brief synopsis can be a fair summary)?

Best regards,

CThomas

[steve]

Yes. Very good, though I would add one more point: (c) if you are genuinely repentant when you become aware that you have sinned.

[CThomas]

Thank you, very much. The thing that has troubled me about sin-specific repentance is that it seems to me that many of my sins are difficult to locate at any particular time, which makes me unsure whether I repent of all of them individually. For instance, I'm not as generous as I should be in my charitable donations. Yet it is impossible to localize this deficiency at any particular moment in time (or, to put it differently, I suppose you could say it is occurring at every moment of my life that I am not giving sufficiently). Many sins seem to be of this sort of generalized character (insufficient love for God and the brothers, etc.). It seems to me that it is significantly harder to "cover" all of the sins that are of this sort of general character deficiency with adequate repentence, as opposed to sins of commission that occur at a particular time. Of course, as you word your requirement (c), it may not present this problem because you simply say that you need to repent as you become aware of sins, without addressing the issue of inadvertly neglected sins. But it is an issue that has troubled me.

CThomas

[Jill]

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[CThomas]

Thanks, Jill. I honestly didn't mean to open up a big theological can of worms with that last message. I'm just talking about a very practical problem that I assume lots of people face. You didn't say in your last message how you evaluate the sort of situation I mentioned. For example, I am commanded to love God with all my strength. I, like many others, fall short of this many times. Yet it is difficult to place this generalized deficiency at a particular point in time, as opposed to any other. It's an ongoing problem that does not related to a particular moment in time. It seems to me that you could either say that my failure to love God with sufficient zeal is not a sin (which strikes me as wrong), or else you have to admit that some sins aren't localized at some particular time, but rather are ongoing deficiencies. Whatever you want to call them -- I'm not really focusing on the terminology. No matter what words you want to use to describe this situation, and I'm not particularly vested in any particular phrasing, surely this is a real issue that people face. No?

CThomas

[Jill]

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[Homer]

Hi CThomas,

Consider Luke 18:13-14:

Luke 18:13-14 (New American Standard Bible)

13. "But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, the sinner!'

14. "I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted."


Perhaps this will be of some comfort to you. Notice the man confessed no specific sin(s), but confessed his sinfulness - that he was not what he ought to be. And his plea was for God's mercy; that is, for God to act on his behalf. I think that man's heart was pleasing to God.

I think we all fail to measure up, in one way or another, in an ongoing way. And the Psalmist wrote:

Psalm 19:12 (New American Standard Bible)

12. Who can discern his errors? Acquit me of hidden faults.

Not only do we fail to love as we should, we also sin without realizing it! But God is merciful to those who show mercy.

[CThomas]

Thanks, Homer. Very reassuring text, indeed.

CThomas

[Jill]

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[CThomas]

Thanks for the thoughts, Jill.

CThomas