Assurance of Salvation - Glenn Conjurske

Assurance of Salvation
by Glenn Conjurske

There have been times in the history of the church when assurance of salvation was a rare thing. It was considered the special privilege of a select few, so that there were many who were saved who yet were not sure that they were. The pendulum has swung to the opposite side today, so that assurance of salvation is not only regarded as the common prerogative of all the godly, but of half the ungodly also—-for the antinomian gospel of these days makes both salvation and the assurance of it the property of many who are no more saved than the devil.

But the antinomian gospel aside, we surely believe that all who have salvation are entitled to the assurance of it. Yet such doctrinal confusion prevails on this subject today that it is safe to say we almost never hear the truth concerning it. An example of this confusion has lately come to hand. Among the various Christian periodicals which are sent to me without my request is a little paper called “The Persuader,” published by Edgar Lee Paschall, of the New Hope Baptist Church, Calvert City, Kentucky. The April/June issue of the present year contains the testimony of one Steven A. Johnson. He says, “I was tired of sin and the world and needed God. I made some decisions at that point and began the process of changing. … I started reading my Bible, praying, and witnessing. I did all the things a newborn Christian is supposed to do. The things of God became a priority in my life.” He began to preach a couple of months after his conversion, but for fifteen years doubted his salvation. He finally concluded that he had never been saved.

“The Lord showed me that I came to Him that night, but failed to receive Him. Since that day I have had a heart of unbelief. My life changed that night, but my heart didn’t. … The reason I failed to receive the Lord that night is, I lacked understanding. I was not guided to a saving knowledge of Christ. … It’s as if I came to the door, but failed to enter.” All this is mere confusion, and I observe that though the man tells us he “lacked understanding,” he fails to mention a single point in which that was true. If he then lacked the understanding which he now possesses, it must be almost a crime to state the fact, and ascribe to it his fifteen years of uncertainty and misbelief, and not give a single hint as to wherein that lack of understanding consisted. He obviously has no clear idea of it himself, nor of what he understands now which he did not then.

But after fifteen years of uncertainty—-in which he now believes he was not saved—-”I told the Lord, ‘I now believe and receive.’ I can’t describe to you the peace that I felt in my heart and still feel to this day. … I had peace and assurance in my heart like I had never had before. It was REAL!”

Now it seems obvious to me that the man gained nothing in understanding at this point. If he did, he ought to be able to give some account of it. But observe, “I can’t describe to you the peace that I FELT in my heart and still FEEL to this day.” What he gained was not understanding, but feeling, and this is apparently the basis of his present assurance. All this is confusion, and anyone who is confused concerning assurance of salvation will certainly be the more so by reading a testimony like this one. It contains nothing at all which anyone could lay hold of as a basis for assurance, and the plain Bible basis for assurance is never hinted at, nor remotely dreamed of, in the entire article.

And such teaching is typical. Such confusion prevails today. The Bible basis of assurance is simply unknown, while some other basis is put in its place. Not that the Bible gives any uncertain sound on the subject. Far from that. But the Bible is very little known in the modern church, and so far as it is known it is commonly ignored or explained away, in order to maintain doctrines which are directly opposed to it. This is certainly the case with the Bible doctrine of assurance. It is so opposed to the common antinomian orthodoxy that men simply cannot see it, or will not believe it.

But it is time that I mention what the Bible basis for assurance consists of. To what does the Bible bid us look for the assurance of our salvation? Without question, to our present spiritual condition. Mark now, I do not say that the Bible offers us this as the basis for our salvation, but as the basis for our assurance of our salvation. To have eternal life is one thing. To know that we have it is another. We have salvation on the basis of something past, but we know that we have it on the basis of something present, and to this the Bible directs us for our assurance.

But in place of this present basis of our assurance, to which the Bible clearly directs us, modern Fundamentalism almost universally directs us to something past—-either to the death of Christ for us, or to some past experience of our own, in which we were saved. By some we are told to look altogether outside of ourselves for our assurance—-to look to the cross and death and blood of Christ, and there to find the assurance of our acceptance with God. But this is as much against reason as it is against Scripture. I was once knocking on doors, and spoke with a woman who claimed to be saved (as almost everyone does). I asked her how she knew she was saved. She told me that her pastor had told her that when she came to the gate of heaven, if God asked her why he should let her in, she should say, “Because Christ died for me.” I asked her, “Did not Christ die for the whole world—-for all men?” She granted that he did, and granted also that all for whom Christ died are not saved. But if this be true, the merest child can see that we must have something other than the death of Christ as the basis of our assurance, and of our salvation too. Something must depend upon us. There is no middle ground between this, and all the points of rigid Calvinism. We must either deny that Christ died for all men, or contend that all men shall be saved, or admit that we must have something more than the death of Christ as the basis for our salvation, and certainly for our assurance of it. All this is simple reason.

This may sound impious, but that I cannot help. Ask not whether it sound impious, but whether it be true. No man ought to be willing to maintain error because it sounds pious, nor to refuse the truth because it sounds impious. Hyperspiritual doctrines always look pious. This is the primary ground of their appeal. To oppose them will generally seem impious, but that we cannot help. Calvinism is always hyperspiritual, putting the direct working of God in the place of the gifts which he has created, in the place of the means which he has ordained, and in the place of the requirements which he has enjoined. It puts God in the place of man, exalting the Creator, but making nothing of his creation, and I frankly doubt that God will thank anybody for this. It may look as pious as it is well-meant, but it is false. It is always at the expense of both reason and Scripture. If Christ died for all men, as the Bible plainly asserts, and all men are not saved, then there must be something further required for our salvation than the death of Christ. By the same token there must be something more required for our assurance. Those who direct the doubting simply to the death of Christ for their assurance ignore the real issue altogether, and generally deceive souls in the process. This is but one more plank in the platform of antinomianism. No Israelite was saved merely by the shed blood of the passover lamb. He must appropriate the virtue of that blood to himself by sprinkling it upon the sideposts of his own door, and he must remain in the house besides. To direct a man to the shed blood of the passover lamb as the basis of his assurance—-or of his salvation—-while he stands in the street, or walks in the field, is only to deceive him. And the fact is, God directed that the blood should be placed where man could not see it. The blood was sprinkled outside the house, and man commanded to remain inside. The blood was for God to see. God said, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you,” not “when you see it.”

But as most error contains an admixture of truth, so here also. It would have been quite proper, and very blessed also, to direct a man to look to the shed blood of the lamb as the basis of his peace and his assurance, while he remained in the house. In that case, let the virtue of the blood be preached in all its fulness, as the solid ground of his peace with God, and his peace of mind also. Then let him hear, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you,” and let this be preached with such pathos and tears as to make his very heart burn. All such preaching which proceeds upon the assumption that the blood is sprinkled, and that the man abides in the house, is the blessed truth. But any preaching which implies that a man must look wholly outside of his own state or condition, solely to the shed blood of the lamb, whether he abides in the house or not, is nothing other than antinomian delusion.

And so also all that preaching today, which tells men to disregard the state of their own souls, to look wholly outside of themselves, solely to the blood of the Lamb, for the assurance of their salvation. Such preaching is a pernicious perversion of precious truth, directly against the plain teaching of the New Testament, and its certain effect is to give assurance of salvation to multitudes who are not saved at all.

Others suppose our assurance to stand upon a past “salvation experience.” Because once upon a time, on such-and-such a date, at such-and-such a place, I came to Christ, I now therefore know that I am saved. When doubts of our salvation arise, we are told to look to that experience, the same as we would look back to our wedding if we doubted we were married. If we doubt the reality of our “salvation experience,” we are told simply to repeat it. “Come to Christ as a lost sinner in need of mercy, with the assurance that he will in no wise cast you out.” Thus we gain a new experience in which to rest, when the old has become uncertain. Some repeat this process numerous times, each new “experience” soon growing as doubtful as those which preceded it.

Such doctrine is wholly unscriptural in itself, while it wholly ignores the doctrine of Scripture on the subject. This while it ignores also the real issue. There is generally a reason why men doubt their salvation, and that reason is usually sin. Sam Jones says, “And if you want to get doubt out of your heart you go right down and pull it up by the roots, and there is a seed at the bottom of that tap root, and the name of that seed is sin.” This is generally the case. Doubts concerning our salvation usually proceed from a defiled conscience. R. A. Torrey understood this well, and wrote, “The trouble with those who lack assurance is, often, that there is some sin or questionable practice which they ought to confess and give up. John viii: 12, Is. lv: 7, Prov. xxviii: 13, Ps. xxxii: 1-5, are useful passages in dealing with this class of men, for they show that it is when sin is confessed and forsaken and we follow Christ, that we receive pardon, light and assurance. Often times it is well when one lacks assurance to put the question squarely to him: ‘Do you know of any sin on to which you are holding or anything in your life which your conscience troubles you about?”’

Mark now, Sam Jones and R. A. Torrey were two of a very small class of the most successful evangelists of all time, and in fact they knew their business. Doubts of our salvation almost always proceed from a bad conscience, and that conscience is in fact the voice of God. Alas, most of our modern preachers labor to silence the voice of God, by preaching faith where they ought to be preaching repentance. Paul directs us to hold fast “faith and a good conscience, which some having put away, concerning faith have made shipwreck.” (I Tim. 1:19). It is as useless as it is pernicious to preach faith to a bad conscience. Those who put away a good conscience make shipwreck of their faith, nor will it do them any good if they are so steeped in antinomianism as to be able to maintain faith without a good conscience, for the faith which is without works is dead, and can no more save me from perdition than a dead dog can save me from drowning.

But I proceed to prove my doctrine of assurance from the Bible. The book of First John is written, among other things, for the purpose of giving us assurance of salvation. Near the close of the book John writes, “These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that ye have eternal life.” (I John 5:13). This is assurance of salvation. He does not write “these things” that they might have salvation, but that they might know that they have it. And what are “these things”? Numerous things, throughout this book, by which he draws the line between the righteous and the wicked, and in several cases he tells us explicitly that he presents to us “these things” as a test by which we might know whether we have eternal life. It is really a great wonder that “these things” should be almost universally ignored in the modern doctrines of assurance.

Now what are “these things”? To begin with one of the clearest, “And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” (I John 2:3-4). Observe, this test is given explicitly that we might know that we know him. The test itself is as clear as words can make it: “if we keep his commandments.” No man who declines to keep the commandments of God has any right whatsoever to assurance of salvation. If he has that assurance, he is deceived and deluded. On the other hand, “if we keep his commandments,” we may “hereby” know that we know him. “Hereby we do know that we know him”—-not because Christ has died for us, not because we have accepted him, but “if we keep his commandments.” We know indeed that God will accept us because Christ has died for us, as we know also that if we accept Christ he will accept us, but it is “hereby” that we know that we are accepted of him, “if we keep his commandments.”

But we anticipate the reaction of modern Fundamentalism. What shockingly legal theology is this, what perfidiously cultish doctrine is this, which bases assurance of salvation on keeping the commandments of God! This is law, not grace! And to all such objections I reply, Let the modern preachers of antinomian grace say what they please: I stand by the apostle John. Those who disallow this doctrine have no controversy with me, but with an apostle of Christ, and if with an apostle of Christ, then with Christ who sent him, and if with Christ, then with God who sent him. Their controversy is not with me, but with the Bible, and if with the Bible, then with the Holy Ghost who inspired it.

Let it be understood, the doctrine for which I stand here is not merely my own interpretation of the text. It is the text itself. The text itself is so perfectly plain that it cannot be misinterpreted, cannot be misunderstood, cannot be mistaken. “Hereby do we know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.” The difficulty lies not in understanding or interpreting the text, but in believing it. The modern church is so steeped in antinomian doctrines that it simply cannot accept the truth of the Bible. So often have men been told that their state cannot affect their standing, that they regard it as the greatest impertinence—-and heresy besides—-to be told to look to their state as the test of their standing. If it happens to be the Bible which tells them to do so, then they must ignore it, wrest it, suppress it—-anything but believe it. If some preacher ruffles their feathers by insisting upon the plain words of the text, then they must flee to their favorite Calvinistic author, their favorite antinomian preacher, their favorite chapter of the Bible, to be soothed with precious promises, and so have their equilibrium restored. I might soothe them with precious promises also, if this were what their state required, but those promises have nothing to do with those who claim to know God, and yet keep not his commandments. “He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.”

But some who do keep the commandments of God stand in need of some soothing also, for they are very conscious that they do not keep them so well as they ought. But very frankly, the soothing which these folks need is not to be found in a profuse administration of the precious promises. Here is the state of their case. When they hear such texts as “He that committeth sin is of the devil,” or “Hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments,” they are troubled. When they hear such texts as “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish,” they are soothed and comforted. They wish, therefore, always to be fed with the promises, in order that they may keep their faith up.

But what is such comfort worth? What is that comfort worth which must be bought by dwelling always upon half the Bible, while we ignore the other half? Even granting that such comfort is real and substantial, and that the soul which receives it is genuinely entitled to it, what can it be worth, if it can be sustained only by ignoring one part of the Bible, and emphasizing some other part? This can only be likened to dwelling in a nest of thorns, but carefully covering them over with soft down. We nestle down in the soft feathers, and are oh! so comfortable, but all the while we must be oh! so careful how we rest, for at every false move the thorns poke through, and even while we do not feel them, we know very well that they are there. Such is the comfort of those who flee to the promises, while they try to ignore those thorny texts which require them to be righteous and holy. Their comfort is very unstable after all, nor can they ever attain to a very high degree of comfort, for those hard texts which they would rather ignore are gnawing always at the roots of what comfort they have.

Permit me to suggest that the only way for them to gain solid and lasting comfort of the highest degree is to squarely face those thorny texts which so disturb them, and refuse all comfort but such as they can enjoy under the full light of those hard texts. Let them understand that the text before us, “Hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments”—-let them understand that this text was not written to deprive them of their comfort or their peace, but precisely to comfort and assure them. “Hereby do we know that we know him!” This is assurance. This is comfort.

Yet some sensitive and godly souls find that such texts deprive them of their peace, and choose therefore to ignore them. But I tell them, it is unbelief to ignore the plain statements of the Bible. Do you think to keep your faith up by means of unbelief? This is folly, and it will not work. It is unbelief in both the wisdom and the goodness of God, to flee from the very texts which were written on purpose to give us assurance of salvation, and seek to find it instead in the promises. This is not faith, but unbelief, and there is a hard price to be paid for it. Those who must flee to the promises to sustain their assurance will never have any assurance but such as must falter and fail every time they happen to meet with any of the solemn warnings of Scripture. Those who work out their assurance under the light of the solemn warnings of the Bible will have an assurance which is solid and enduring, and which nothing can shake. This is the solid ground of faith.

Yet the fact remains that many of the godly are troubled by the very texts which were given of God to sustain their assurance. We suppose their difficulty lies mainly in a failure to understand these texts—-and it may lie in the self-sufficiency which assumes that it understands all, and declines to go to a prophet of God for a resolution of its difficulties. But observe, by understanding the texts, we certainly do not mean explaining them away. We ought by all means to shun the counsel of a man who will deprive such texts of their plain meaning. We want a man who can give us light—-who can give us such an explanation as does justice to the text, and satisfies our conscience, while it maintains both the love and the holiness of God.

Now if a true saint of God, who does keep the commandments of God, is troubled by such texts, it must surely be because he fails to understand them. He very likely has no understanding of the difference between law and grace, and so turns the requirements of grace into a second law. Let him understand, therefore, that no man keeps the commandments of God perfectly, nor does the grace of God require him to do so. The verses which immediately precede this text affirm, “And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” An advocate! to defend us when we sin. A propitiation! to blot out our sins. Surely, then, when in the next verse the apostle says we know that we know him if we keep his commandments, he cannot mean, if we perfectly keep them. He must mean, if we sincerely and habitually keep them, in spite of all our failures and weaknesses. If he means any more than this, then we are under law, and no man is saved.

But I must proceed to another of the apostle John’s tests, by which we may know that we have eternal life. “If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of him.” (I John 2:29). This is as plain as the other text. “Doeth righteousness.” This is the test. This is the ground of our assurance that we are born of him. By this we know.

The apostle writes also, “Little children, let no man deceive you: he that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous. He that committeth sin is of the devil.” (I John 3:7-8). “Let no man deceive you”: not he that believes, or thinks he believes, not he for whom Christ died, not he that has “received Christ as his personal Saviour,” not he that trusts Christ for salvation, but “he that doeth righteousness is righteous.” “He that doeth sin is of the devil.”

This text ought indeed to trouble the unrighteous, but it ought to have directly the reverse effect upon the righteous. Yet no text of Scripture has given more trouble to real saints of God than this one. I believe that difficulty derives primarily from a misunderstanding of the text. For many years, therefore, I have labored to give the saints of God a true understanding of this, while laboring also to maintain the text in all its integrity.

The first and greatest difficulty arises from a deficiency in the common English translation. “He that committeth sin” would appear to refer to any man that ever sins at all. This is certainly not its meaning. The scripture contains two statements, exactly parallel:

“He that doeth righteousness is righteous.”
“He that doeth sin is of the devil.”

The word “doeth” is the same, in the Greek, in both verses, and it was really a great mistake to render it “doeth” in verse 7, and “committeth” in verse 8. The two statements are parallel, and must be understood in each other’s light.

Now if “he that doeth righteousness is righteous,” this cannot mean he that doeth one righteous act once in a while. Common sense would rebel at such a meaning. “He that doeth righteousness” is he that habitually does so, he that lives a righteous life. He alone is righteous before God.

On the other side, then, “he that doeth sin” cannot mean he that occasionally does so, he who fails and falls upon occasion, in spite of the determination of his heart to walk righteously. “He that doeth sin” is he that habitually does so, he that lives a life of sin. He is of the devil, and “In this,” John tells us in the tenth verse, “the children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil: whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother.” “Manifest”—-that is, clear, obvious, apparent, evident, plain, and visible. It is manifest who are the children of God, and who the children of the devil, manifest to the eyes of all, and this by a righteous character, or a sinful one. The passage has nothing to do with a sinful man who occasionally does a righteous deed, nor with a righteous man who is not perfectly so. It speaks of the righteousness of Abraham, of Samson, of David, of Peter. All of them sinned, and some of them grievously, but none of them lived in sin. God speaks of “my servant David, who kept my commandments, and who followed me with all his heart, to do that only which was right in mine eyes.” (I Kings 14:8). This was David’s character, God himself being the witness, though we know that on occasion David sinned. The text refers to the general habit and character of the life, such as is manifest to all who behold it. And in this lies our assurance. “He that doeth righteousness is righteous.” “Whoso doeth not righteousness is not of God.” “He that sinneth”—-as the habit and character of his life—-”hath not seen him, neither known him.”

And “neither he that loveth not his brother,” for this is another test given to us explicitly as the ground of our assurance. “We know that we have passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.” (I John 3:14-15). There is a great deal of teaching on assurance of salvation in the modern church, and most of it proceeds just as though such scriptures as this do not exist. This is really amazing, for this text was written explicitly as the ground of our assurance. By this “we know that we have passed from death unto life.”

The apostle John gives numerous such tests, always making our state the test of our standing. “If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” “Whosoever sinneth hath not seen him, neither known him.” “Whosoever is born of God doth not do sin.” “If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth.” “He that saith, I know him, and keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.”

Ah! but such scriptures do not suit the antinomian theology of modern times. In place of all the solemn tests of the apostle John, modern teachers put a little formula of their own, and profess to derive it, of all things, from the very epistle of John which they so generally ignore. They quote I John 5:10, which says, “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave of his Son.” God, they say, says that if you believe, you are saved. If you do not believe that you are saved, therefore, you make God a liar. But this is a gross perversion of the text, which says nothing whatever of believing that you are saved, but only of believing the record which God has given of his Son. This pat formula perverts the one text which it employs, while it wholly ignores a dozen plain and pointed texts which lie all around it.

And apart altogether from the common teaching of these degenerate days, in talking with various professing Christians, I have observed many of them clinging to one thing or another as the ground of their assurance, always in entire disregard of the explicit tests which God has given. One knows he is saved because God answers his prayers, or because God answered some particular prayer once upon a time. Another knows he is saved because God delivered him from some great danger. Another knows he is saved because God helped him through some period of distress. Another knows he is saved because God provides for his needs. And is there not a little tendency in all of us to grasp at such straws? Anything which assures us of the favor of God is very comfortable. But the fact is, God shows a great deal of favor to the whole human race, “for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.” (Matt. 5:45). None of this is any ground whatsoever for assurance of our acceptance with him. That assurance is to be found only in our state—-in our walk—-in the life which we live. This is the solid doctrine of the Bible, and any assurance which is based upon anything else is a delusion.

Glenn Conjurske