Is Christ's Love About Measuring Up?

Many years ago, I was taught and believed that we had a choice to get saved or to walk away from that salvation.  I had no sense of permanency or security in my walk with My Lord.  I questioned whether someday I may do something that God was displeased with and He would no longer love me and cast me aside for whatever that sin was.  

I believed this because my life experience was like that.  If I did not measure up to someone else’s idea of a “godly” person then I was not in the kingdom.  The problem was not sin in my life, it was how I viewed relationships.  Those who were supposed to love me, judged my heart regularly without even talking to me.  They would not listen when I needed a friend and didn’t care if I recovered.  For them it was about winning, they didn’t like the questions so their way of  “handling” me was to guilt me into submission without attempting to understand why I had the questions. 

I had such a hard time believing that I had the strength to carry on for Him or that I could measure up, after all, my life was fraught with the indoctrination from my childhood that I was of no value to my family or my community.  How could I ever be loved by God, how could He knowing me, love me.  I questioned God on numerous occasions, what sin would separate us, how many sins or how big did they have to be to incur the wrath of God, that He would throw me away.

I thought, what kind of God would tell us we could lose our salvation and then not even describe to us the detailed criteria of what can cause us to be thrown away.  

Or what kind of God would say "In Him you also [trusted], after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory"  Ephesians 1:13-14,  and then withdraw it when I had a weak moment. 

Most of my human experiences have been this kind of love, measuring up, looking good, doing all the right things that are approved of by those who are superior and your in, that is if you act the way they do, think the way they do or enhance them in some way.  If you embrace them with honesty or questions they can not answer, you become labeled as unworthy of their love.  I can see how many people who have not walked in the Spirit would act in this way.  They love to have the prominent places and seek out the “beautiful” people who will bring them personal glory.  Holiness and a deep yearning for the things of God are not necessary to live this grandiose life.  Only conforming to the culture you place yourself in and schmoozing others to like you will get you in.

I believed the teaching that one could lose their salvation because this is what people did, if I didn't measure up, they went away and rejected me, so I had the impression that this is what God does too.  I begged God to love me differently than people did, which didn't seem like love at all.  One slip up in my character and the people disappeared.  They not only disappeared but had no compulsion to come to me to try to save me, to snatch me from the firebrand.  My slip ups were not sin they were the crime of wanting more than a superficial walk with God.  I wanted answers to life situations in light of God’s Word, and most people wanted a safe, uncomplicated walk, that enhanced their life pleasurably, elevating them in some way. 

Is it possible that our view of God and our interpretation of Scripture come from our observations about people and their responses to us?  I am grateful that God is not like people. His ways are so far above mankind, that we have no ability to understand or carry out His righteousness.  We must have the Holy Spirit to walk with Him and we must possess the Holy Spirit if we are to remain.  If the Holy Spirit left us, as people do, and we are not saved by our works, then how would we ever get back again to possess the Holy Spirit, our works would not save us to come back. Oh my what a dilemma I struggled with before the Lord opened my eyes.  I saw no evidence in the Word that the Holy Spirit hopped in and out of people like a jumping jack because we didn’t measure up.  What I saw was a merciful and loving God who knows we cannot measure up on our own, so He gave us The Ultimate Helper, the Holy Spirit.   

I am convinced without doubt that we cannot lose our salvation. If we believe that God saved us after we chose and confessed our sin, and that Christ said in Ephesians 2:8 "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; [it is] the gift of God," then we have to believe that God is the one who saves and we do not save ourselves through our works. If we know that we can not save ourselves through our own works then we have to know that we cannot keep ourselves by our works.

When God saves us, He gives us what we desire and that is to be forgiven and to be saved, then He does the work of saving, He does the work of cleansing and He does the work of keeping. God said 2 Corinthians 5:17, "Therefore, if anyone [is] in Christ, [he is] a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new." God changes us into something we were not before.

We are however trapped in this body of death, Our soul has been overtaken by the Holy Spirit of God. Ephesians 1:13-14 says "In Him you also [trusted], after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory."

I would like us to take a look at some of the words in this verse, they are; Holy Spirit of Promise, Sealed, Guarantee, inheritance, purchased possession. All of these show that it is a done deal when we have been changed by God. When we realize that He changes us when we get saved, He makes two people one in marriage and He remains faithful to Israel in all His promises. All of these works are His and constant with His character. We cannot undo our salvation, and we don't want to. We cannot undo our marriage and if we are saved, we don't want to. God is a God of faithfulness even when we are not.

We do sin after salvation because God said that no one is righteous no not one, this is why God had to seal us with His Holy Spirit, to keep us. It is a salvation by works and inconsistent to say that we can't save our self but we can do enough good works to keep ourselves. Christ can not come off the cross, He said it is finished. HE will not ever go back to the cross, because "it is finished."

Now the problem is that, we see people who claim to be saved and have walked away, but God said in Matthew 7:21-23, "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord , Lord', shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, and cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?' And then I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.'"

It is clear that many people who claim to be saved, will look so good that others looking on will not realize that they are not saved and never have been. In this passage God says "I NEVER knew you." They were never changed into a new creation even though they looked so good on the outside.

We do however sin, we are not sinless but we sin less, because God said that He is in the process of sanctification until the day we die. This is why God said in 1 John 2 "My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous." An unsaved person does not have an advocate with the Father, only His children do. If we see someone living a lifestyle of sin without conscience about it, then they not saved. They may go to church, pray in front of people, and even.....get this....cast out demons in His name...but they have never been changed because they have never trusted Christ. They may even have lived a good life, but are doing it in the flesh rather than under the control of the Holy Spirit. For me this matter is settled. The Lord gave me the "smoking gun" scripture in Ephesians 1:13-14, that settles it completely for me.

My God told me, "I will never throw you away because you do not measure up, you could never measure up.  When you fall I will pick you up and bring you back"  I remember the story of the lamb who wanders off from his shepherd. The shepherd does not let him go to fall over cliffs and die; he goes after him and breaks the legs of the lamb.  He breaks his legs and then carries him so that the lamb learns to depend on the shepherd and will not continue to wander away after that.  God sometimes breaks our legs as believers, but he never throws us away as people do. He is pure love and knows the propensity of man to wander.  

Do we love people as God loves us or do we love people the way humanity does, with disinterest in one another. Associating only with those we think “measure up.”  Do we do the easy thing focusing on feelings and fun, rather than the hard work of rebuke and discipline praying for and hoping that our loved one will be restored?  God does walk away from rebellious pretenders, but He never walks away from His lambs.