Peter Barnes | John 10:28-30
SERMON NOTES
PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS
John 10:28-30
Augustus Toplady: As sure as the earnest is given:/ More happy, but not more secure/ The glorified spirits in heaven. Charles Wesley: Ah! Lord, with trembling I confess/ A gracious soul may fall from grace.
1. People who appear to be Christians can fall away.
(a) Matthew 12:43-45.
(b) Matthew 13:20-21. Joy yet temporary faith.
(c) Acts 8:9-13, 18-23. Simon was baptized but not regenerate.
(d) Gal.5:4. Christ plus food laws, circumcision and Jewish holy days.
(e) Hebrews 6:4-6. Very close to the kingdom without entering it.
– Matt.7:21-23. Jesus says: ‘I never knew you’. See 1 John 2:19.
2. True Christians can backslide.
– Samson, Lot, David but note Ps.37:23-24. How do we tell an apostate from a backslider? Sometimes we cannot tell.
3. Those whom the Holy Spirit regenerates persevere to the end.
(a) Romans 8:29-39.
(b) John 6:39.
(c) John 10:28-29.
(d) Ephesians 1:13-14.
(e) 1 Peter 1:4-5. Christians are kept to the end.
– we are to persevere – Matt.24:13. See Isa.49:14, 15-16. Augustine: ‘If any one of these perishes, God is overcome by human sin; but none of them perishes, because God is overcome by nothing.’ Martyn Lloyd-Jones: ‘If you are regenerate, you will remain regenerate.’