Ask a room full of believers whether they are certain, right now, that they are right with God, and watch how many grow quiet. Many have been taught that confidence is out of reach, that the honest Christian lives with a low hum of worry and simply hopes it all works out in the end. But that is not the life Scripture holds out to us. God does not want His children guessing at where they stand with Him.
The apostle John could not be clearer about why he wrote his first letter. “These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life” (). Not so you may hope. Not so you may wonder. So you may know. Assurance is not spiritual arrogance. It is the settled peace God wants every faithful believer to carry.
Confidence Is Not Pride
Look at Paul near the end of his life, writing from prison with execution in view. “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; in the future there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness” (). There is no doubt in those words, no bracing for the worst. He does not say there might be a crown. He says there is. That is a man who knew exactly where he stood and where he was going.
The question is how we come to share that confidence. Paul was not presuming on grace while living however he pleased. His assurance grew out of a life poured out for the Lord. Real confidence and careless living have never belonged together.
Why “Once Saved, Always Saved” Falls Short
It is tempting to reach for an easier kind of comfort, the idea that once a person is saved nothing they do can ever undo it. It sounds reassuring, but the New Testament will not let it stand. Writing to Christians, the Hebrew writer warns, “Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God” (). You cannot fall from a place you were never standing. He is speaking to brothers and sisters in Christ, urging them to “hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end” ().
A believer can drift. That is exactly why Scripture keeps calling us to hold fast, to encourage one another daily, to keep walking (). The answer to drifting is not to pretend it cannot happen. The answer is a living, faithful walk that keeps us close to God.
Where Real Assurance Comes From
So how can we know? John ties assurance to how we actually live. “By this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments” (). Obedience is not how we earn God’s love; it is how we recognize that His love has taken root in us. A heart that wants to please God, that grieves over sin and turns from it, is a heart that belongs to Him.
John points to the same thing again when he writes, “If we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin” (). Walking in the light does not mean living without failure. The very next verses promise that “if we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins” (). The cleansing is ongoing, meant for people who keep walking even when they stumble.
There is also the quiet evidence of a changed life. “We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren” (). Love for God’s people, honesty before God about our sin, and a steady desire to obey are not the price of assurance. They are its fruit.
A Confidence Worth Carrying
Jesus spoke of His own with deep tenderness. “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand” (). Notice the sheep in that promise are the ones who hear and follow. Safety and faithfulness go together. Peter urges the same when he says, “be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choosing you” (). Making certain is something we are invited to do.
This is why Paul can tell us to “work out your salvation with fear and trembling” and in the same breath remind us that “it is God who is at work in you” (). The reverence and the confidence are not at war. We take our walk seriously precisely because we trust the God who is carrying it.
If you are in Christ and walking with Him, you do not have to wait until the judgment to know how things stand. The Spirit “testifies with our spirit that we are children of God” (). You can lay your head down tonight at peace, sure of the One who holds you, and keep walking with Him in the morning.
