Garin in Crossville, Tennessee, listening on the Catholic Answers App.
Garin, thanks for downloading the app onto your phone.
Your question for Tim.
Hello gentlemen, I've only got a few minutes so I might leave abruptly.
Okay.
A little while ago, I was walking to Dollar General, and, well, for lack of a better term,
I was ambushed by a few Baptist street missionaries.
And we got into talking about salvation, and they say, you know, once you make the profession
of faith, you know, there's nothing you can do to lose your salvation.
I tried my best to explain the Catholic viewpoint that you can choose against God at any point,
and then one of them asked me the question: "So you're mightier than God?"
How would one respond to that?
Yeah, that's a great question, a very important question.
And the answer is no.
We're not mightier than God.
The fact is, God has given us a great gift, and that is the gift of free will.
And that's what you want to focus on first, is pointing out to them, from the very beginning
in the Garden of Eden in fact, you know, it was God who created Adam and Eve free--and
we could back up a step and say the angels as well were created with freedom.
They had to choose whether to serve God or not.
Lucifer and one-third of the angels chose not to.
Adam and Eve, certainly, we have in the book of Genesis: "You can eat of all the other
trees in the garden, but not this one."
He gives them freedom to choose, and they chose wrongly, of course.
You can go to Deuteronomy 30:15-18, and there God says to the Israelites: "Choose this day.
I set before you life and death."
He gives them the commandments, right, or the "second law," Deuteronomy.
"Choose."
You know, you can obey, which leads to life; or you can choose not to.
You go to the New Testament, and my favorites are Revelation 3:20, where Jesus says: "Behold,
I stand at the door and knock.
If any man hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him, in fellowship with
him and he with me."
Notice he says, "I stand at the door and knock," but we have to open it.
That doesn't mean that we're more powerful than Jesus or more powerful than God.
It means God has given to us this great gift, this great dignity.
In fact, Jesus describes it in Matthew 23:37 when he weeps over Jerusalem and says "Jerusalem,
Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, how oft I would have gathered you, as a hen
doth gather her chicks, but you refused."
So notice, God wants them to come, but they refuse.
So the first point we have to accentuate to them is that we're free.
We can either accept Christ or not.
However, for your Baptist friends, they'll say "Okay, but once you choose, then you're
going to Heaven.
There's nothing you can do about it."
Right?
Because, you know, "Once saved, always saved."
And for that, I like to point out a couple of verses--I mean, there's so many verses
we could look at, but a couple of the more obvious ones are Hebrews 10:28-29, which says:
"A man who violated the Law of Moses died without mercy at the testimony of two to three
witnesses.
How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by the man who has spurned the
Son of God, profaned the Blood of the Covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged
the Spirit of Grace?"
And you can keep reading down where he makes clear he's talking about believers who reject
Christ and fall away.
So Hebrews 10:28-29.
And you also want to show them 2 Peter 2:20-22.
Listen to this: "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overpowered,
the last state of theirs has become worse for them than the first."
Now that language is very important.
In fact, Cy Kellett and I were just recently doing a Focus series on this, and I pointed
out there as I will to you--and I hope you can with your friend--notice the language:
"after they have escaped the defilements--" different translations will say "the pollutions
of the world," "the lusts of the world--" "defilements of the world through the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior," so notice, "after they have escaped."
Right?
Well, if you back up to 2 Peter 1:2-4, Peter has just described Christians in those same
terms.
He says: "May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus
Christ.
His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and Godliness through
the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has
granted to us precious and great promises, that through these you may escape from the
pollution--" "the corruption," "the lust," "--that is in the world because of passion.
And you have been made partakers of the divine nature."
So notice: "You have escaped the defilements, the pollutions, of the world;" but then what
does he say in chapter 2 verse 20?
He says, "But if, AFTER they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overpowered,
the last state of theirs has become worse for them than the first."
Skip down to verse 22: "It has happened to them according to the true proverb: 'The dog
turns back to its own vomit, and the sow, having been washed--'" there's a reference
to baptism-- '"only to wallow in the mire.'"
There's many more we could look at, I recommend--there are some excellent resources at Catholic.com,
in fact I've written a couple of articles up there, and you'll get a whole lot more
if you go to Catholic.com and search "Once saved, always saved," you'll get a ton.
But does that help at all?
Yes, that helps tremendously, and just in time, too, cuz I gotta get back to work.
Okay, thanks Garin.
God bless you.