Introduction
In this article, I will be talking about Bible verses against eternal security.
But my question to you is this, do you think there are verses in the Bible against the eternal security of believers?
Matthew 7:21-23
21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
This passage is a favorite for those who teach that in order to get to Heaven, one must do some undefined amount of works to “prove their faith is genuine” or some other hare-brained way of justifying teaching works Salvation.
This demonstrates the spiritual blindness of such people because that’s exactly the opposite of what this verse is teaching, as I will now show.
The Will of the Father
First, let’s zoom in on verse 21:
Matthew 7:21
21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
The people using this verse to teach works Salvation would like to have you believe that doing the “will of the Father” is just some non-precise commandment to obey all of the things that God commanded in the entire Bible.
Let me ask you something, if that were the case, could you really say that Salvation is not of works (Ephesians 2:8-9, Titus 3:5, Romans 4:5)? No, no you couldn’t. Could you really call it a gift (Romans 6:23) if that were the case? Absolutely not.
You could pay lip service to such claims (as I’ve seen done hundreds of times – it’s trite by now), but the fact is that in the final estimation, you would either get to Heaven or go to Hell based on your efforts to obey God.
If such a situation is what God has left us with, then calling Jesus your “Savior” has lost all meaning. Calling Eternal Life a “gift”, similarly, means nothing, neither does saying it’s “not of works”.
There’s a cognitive dissonance held by all works Salvationists where they change all of these terms the Bible uses about Salvation being free and redefine them to mean absolutely anything besides what they plainly say, or rather completely ignore them in order to hold onto their self-righteous delusion.
The “will of the Father” has a specific meaning, and it’s defined in John 6:39-40:
John 6:39-40
39 And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.
40 And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day.
So in order to teach works for Salvation, the pharisee has left out the definition of “the will of the Father” in order to make it seem like you had to obey everything to some unquantified extent in order to make it to Heaven.
Bible Reasons for Evangelism: Importance of Sharing Your Faith
The will of the Father is for anyone that believes on Jesus Christ to have everlasting life. Therefore, if you want to be in the will of the Father, you have to have Jesus Christ as your Savior, and that’s accomplished by faith.
Now let’s look at verse 22:
Matthew 7:22
22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
Picture this, you get to the gates of Heaven, and God Almighty says that you can’t get in. How would you respond? Would you even dream of bringing up your works? I would be mentioning John 3:36, 5:24, 6:47 and all the other verses where I was told that if I believed I would receive Eternal Life. I wouldn’t say a peep in regard to my “wonderful works”. This shows, ironically, that these people are trusting in themselves and their performance to justify them – they are Lordship Salvationists, or Pentecostals, or Catholics, etc.
Furthermore, you’ll notice, they actually had the works! They had done wonderful works, and even done works in the name of Jesus Christ. Did Jesus accept these works? Verse 23:
Matthew 7:23
23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
Jesus makes it clear that He never knew these people at any point during their lives. Do you think Jesus knows you if you’re literally in His family? Of course. Well, how do you get born into His family? Works of righteousness? No, over and over again you’re told that faith is what gets you born into the family of God:
John 1:12
12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:
This is repeated in Galatians 3:26 as well as 1 John 5:1 – you are born into God’s family by faith alone. This shows that the people in Matthew 7:21-23 never trusted in Christ to save them. I have. As a result, I know that I am born of God, and one of His children – a sibling of Jesus Christ. Therefore I will never be among those who Jesus “never knew”.
I know this beyond any doubt, as the Bible says that when we believe, we instantly receive the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13-14), and all those with the Spirit are called “His” (Romans 8:9) – i.e., they belong to God. It cannot be said of such that Jesus “never knew them”, because the Bible also says “the Lord knoweth them that are His” (2 Timothy 2:19). But when did a self-righteous Catholic Pope ever show you any of that?
Conclusion
Ironically, those who are trying to bind you back into keeping the Law for Salvation with these verses will be those condemned by them. It’s sad that someone can be so deceived and spiritually blind as to seriously think that this passage teaches works.
The teachers of works Salvation in any of it’s ugly permutations are truly the blind leaders of the blind (Matthew 15:14).
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