ASSURANCE By Nathan Williams

The topic of assurance of salvation has become a fascinating topic to me over the last 6 months. It all began when I took a class on the writings of Jonathan Edwards and the teacher said that he normally tells his students that if they read Religious Affections by Edwards and don’t doubt their salvation, they might not be a Christian. When I was much younger I remember an evangelist coming to my church and telling us exactly how he felt we could gain assurance of salvation. He said that what we needed to do was write the date when we made a decision for Christ in the front of our Bibles. Then, when Satan would tempt us or doubts would arise, we could flip open our Bibles and say “See, look at that date, I made a decision for Christ and I even have it written down inside my Bible!”
One of the more interesting aspects of assurance of salvation is the difference in the way Scripture tells us to evaluate the salvation of those around us and the way we evaluate our own salvation. Ultimately, it is impossible to be sure of the salvation of another. However, we do have certain criteria from Scripture with which to assess whether or not spiritual life exists in someone else. In Matthew 7:17-18 Jesus tells us that good trees produce good fruit and bad trees produce bad fruit. In some ways it is quite simple to evaluate the spiritual state of another person. Good fruit means you are looking at a good tree and bad fruit means you are looking at a bad tree. Ephesians 2:10 tells us that we were created in Christ Jesus for the purpose of performing good works. Again, we can look at the life of someone claiming to be a Christian and look at what the Bible considers good works and see if their life is producing good works. The basic principle is simple and vital, but because so much is based on internal motivation, it is ultimately impossible to know for certain the spiritual state of another.
This being said, I fear that sometimes we put an overemphasis on personal evaluation when it comes to gaining assurance of our own salvation. We look at the works of others and make judgment calls on their salvation and do the same thing to ourselves. This principle is definitely one aspect of assurance. We cannot expect to be living in the joy of assurance while we are living lifestyles which would be contrary to the Word of God. While looking at our own works and evaluating them in the light of Scripture is certainly important, it cannot be all we do to appraise our own state before God. Many times we become so introspective that we forget about the cross and the work Christ accomplished there on our behalf. In Assured by God, Richard Phillips had this to say concerning this issue:
“Let us find assurance not by long meditation on our own souls, not by pondering questions of assurance itself, but through an ever-absorbing interest in the saving blood of Jesus Christ.”
R.L. Dabney also spoke to this tendency of over self-examination in believers seeking assurance:
“The habit of introspection may be abused, to divert the eyes of the soul too much from Christ”
No doubt, we should test ourselves to see whether we are in the faith (2 Cor. 13:5). But often when we do this we begin to act as if we had something to do with our justification. The simple child-like trust in our sovereign God goes out the window. We are no longer focused on what He has done for us, but whether or not we have exercised enough faith. Thus, like everything else in our lives, even the assurance of salvation can become a self-centered pursuit rather than a God-centered pursuit. Erickson says this of faith:
“As repentance is the negative aspect of conversion, turning from one’s sin, so faith is the positive aspect, laying hold of the promises and the work of Christ.”
Our focus should always be on the cross-work of Jesus Christ. The faith we first exercise at the moment of salvation is the same faith that sustains us throughout our Christian lives. This is a faith that believes the facts about Christ and relies on those facts for salvation. It lays hold of the promises and the work of Christ. Inherent within this faith is what we call assurance of salvation. If you are dealing with someone who doubts their salvation, by all means examine the fruit showing in their life. But don’t stop there, go on to remind them of the promises and work of Christ they originally believed in and relied on for salvation. This is where true assurance is found, in God and not in us.