Just the other night I was continuing this study by considering another verse used to support the teaching of once save, always saved. This verse was from Hebrews 13:5. “Be free from the love of money, content with such things as you have, for he has said, ‘I will in no way leave you, neither will I in any way forsake you.’” The last part of this passage is a quote from Deuteronomy 31:8.

As I considered this passage in Hebrews, I was prompted to turn to the source of the quote in Deuteronomy. In that passage, Moses is encouraging the children of Israel as they prepare to enter the promised land and drive out the nations that lived there saying, “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you” (NIV).

I continued to read from verse eight down to verse sixteen to get a sense of the context. It was then that I was shocked as I read, “And the Lord said to Moses: ‘You are going to rest with your ancestors, and these people will soon prostitute themselves to the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake me and break the covenant I made with them. 

“And in that day I will become angry with them and forsake them; I will hide my face from them, and they will be destroyed. Many disasters and calamities will come on them, and in that day they will ask, “Have not these disasters come on us because our God is not with us?” And I will certainly hide my face in that day because of all their wickedness in turning to other gods’” (Deuteronomy 31:16-18, NIV).

How could this be? In verse eight, God promises He will never forsake His people. Then in verse seventeen, God says He will forsake them. I believe the scriptures are true. I also believe it is not possible for God to lie (Hebrews 6:18).

I checked with Strong’s Concordance to make sure that the words translated in these verses were both from the same Hebrew word. They were. They were both from word #5800, azab.

So, no matter how you translate the word azab, in verse eight God says He will not do this to His people and in verse seventeen He says He will do this to His people. Therefore what God means when He says He will not forsake us is something different then I and most Christians believe He means.

It becomes clear from the passages in this chapter that God is not giving His people a license to live any way they desire because of His promise never to forsake them. No, He is promising to remain faithful to them as long as they remain faithful to Him.

If God’s people forsake Him, God is no longer bound to His commitment not to forsake them. I could almost hear cries of objection to this interpretation from my old religious self, saying, “This was from the old covenant, it is different under the freedom of the new covenant.”

I was reminded, to have confidence that any understanding of scripture is accurate, it must be true to the context of the specific passages and true to the full council of God. As I considered this, I was prompted to turn to John 15 and consider the words of Jesus as He speaks to His disciples.

Jesus said, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer. Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, he takes away. Every branch that bears fruit, he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. You are already pruned clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. 

“Remain in me, and I in you. As the branch can’t bear fruit by itself unless it remains in the vine, so neither can you, unless you remain in me. I am the vine. You are the branches.

“He who remains in me and I in him bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If a man doesn’t remain in me, he is thrown out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned” (John 15:1-6).

I began to realize, the covenants may have changed, but God has not. “They will forsake me and break the covenant I made with them. And in that day I will become angry with them and forsake them.” “Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, he takes away.” And again, “If a man doesn’t remain in me, he is thrown out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned.”

When Jesus tells His disciples, “Remain in me, and I in you,” He is giving His disciples notice that His abiding, His continuing to remain in them, is contingent on their continuing to remain in Him. In another translation, this verse is rendered as, “Continue in me and I will be continually in you” (John 15:4, TFLV).

Jesus testifies to His disciples, “Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, he takes away,” And again, “If a man doesn’t remain in me, he is thrown out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned.” His commitment to abide in us is contingent on our abiding in Him.

Paul reaffirms this in his letter to the church in Rome. He writes to the believers, “If some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the root and of the richness of the olive tree, don’t boast over the branches. But if you boast, it is not you who support the root, but the root supports you. 

“You will say then, ‘Branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in.’ True; by their unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by your faith. Don’t be conceited, but fear; for if God didn’t spare the natural branches, neither will he spare you. 

“See then the goodness and severity of God. Toward those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness; otherwise you also will be cut off” (Romans 11:17-22).

Whenever we see the word “if” used, we need to be aware that the one thing being mentioned is contingent on the other thing being mentioned. If you continue faithful, you will not be cut off. However, if you do not continue faithful, you will be cut off.

Paul also warns the believers in Corinth. “If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are” (I Corinthians 3:17, KJV).

And again, in 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 Paul exhorts the believers saying, “Or don’t you know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.

And finally, “What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: ‘I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people’” (2 Corinthians 6:16).

Peter reminds the believers that God has given us everything we need to live holy, godly lives. “His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires” (2 Peter 1:3-4).

God, by virtue of His power working in us through the indwelling Holy Spirit, has given us everything we need to live holy lives. By our death with Christ through our baptism by the Holy Spirit into Christ, we have been liberated, set free from bondage to sin. In Christ, sin no longer has dominion over us. We have been set free to walk by the Spirit, serving God in newness of life.

Now if a believer sins, it is not because he was forced to, it is because he has chosen to. As a born-again believer, he has been set free from the bondage and dominion of sin and has been given everything required to live a holy, godly life while still in the midst of this crooked, perverse world.

James explains this to us saying, “Let no man say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God,” for God can’t be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Then the lust, when it has conceived, bears sin. The sin, when it is full grown, produces death” (James 1:13-15).

Many Christians consider sin in their lives as a small thing, something that is not serious. I have heard many versions of whitewashing the issue. Some will say, “All of my sins have been forgiven, past, present and future, so I am covered.” Or, “Sure, I sin continually, many times every day, but I am okay. Look at Paul’s testimony in Romans chapter seven about his constant struggle with sin as a believer. He says in chapter seven that he is enslaved to sin, that he has no power to do the good he wants to do, and that he practices the evil he does not want to do.”

Other professing Christians say, “When God looks at me, He doesn’t see me, He sees Jesus.” Yet another has told me, “God is pleased with me because Jesus is in me, and He is pleased with Jesus. It does not matter what I do, God is still pleased with me.”

Finally, a pastor and a teacher at a church in our area said, “It is impossible for a believer, a Christian, to go even one minute without sinning, because we as born-again believers are still sinners by nature. Everything we do is sin.”

Among passages that come to mind when I hear statements like these are those from the book of Jeremiah and from Paul in his letter to Timothy. In Jeremiah we read, “An astonishing and horrible thing has happened in the land. The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?”

Continuing in the next chapter we read, “From the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; prophets and priests alike, all practice deceit. They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. ‘Peace, peace,’ they say, when there is no peace. Are they ashamed of their detestable conduct? No, they have no shame at all; they do not even know how to blush. So they will fall among the fallen; they will be brought down when I punish them,’ say the Lord” (Jeremiah 5:30-31, 6:13-15, NIV).

Paul writes to Timothy about these fleshly minded Christians. “Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away” (2 Timothy 3:5, KJV). I can not conceive of a more fitting description of professing Christians that have an appearance of religion, a form of godliness, but that deny the power of God that He gives to every born-again believer to live godly, holy lives. God is adamant in His instruction, “From such turn away.”

Paul addresses this matter in his letter to the Corinthians. “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate: A man is sleeping with his father’s wife. And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have gone into mourning and have put out of your fellowship the man who has been doing this? 

“Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? Get rid of the old yeast, so that you may be a new unleavened batch—as you really are. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the Festival, not with the old bread leavened with malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

“I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.

“What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you” (1 Corinthians 5:1-2, 6-13, NIV).

God does not take sin among His people lightly, or as a small thing. Paul warns us, “Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

“The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit” (Galatians 5:16-25).

The apostle John testifies, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, and there is no longer any sea. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 

“And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, ‘Behold, the tabernacle of God is among the people, and He will dwell among them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself will be among them, and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.’

“And He who sits on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all things new.’ And He said, ‘Write, for these words are faithful and true.’ Then He said to me, ‘It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give water to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life, without cost. The one who overcomes will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son. 

‘“But for the cowardly, and unbelieving, and abominable, and murderers, and sexually immoral persons, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, their part will be in the lake that burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death’” (Revelation 21:1-8).

At the end of the last book of the Bible, Jesus announces, “Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they will have the right to the tree of life, and may enter the city by the gates. Outside are the dogs, the sorcerers, the sexually immoral persons, the murderers, the idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices lying” (Revelation 22:14-15).

It becomes evident that if we forsake God, He will forsake us. A covenant is a legal contract. When one party to that contract violates the terms of the contract, the other party is released from their obligations under that contract.

God promises He will never break His covenant with us. He promises He will keep His word. His word will not return to Him void. It will accomplish exactly what He sent it to do. The righteous will be rewarded according to His word. The evildoers will also be rewarded according to His word.

It seems very clear from these passages that people who have made a practice of sinning, who have made a practice of walking according to the flesh, will not be found worthy of the kingdom. They will not be permitted to enter the city or to have access to the tree of life.

According to these verses, the destiny of those that practice such things will be outside the city or in the lake of fire, the second death. I do not know which would apply in any specific case, perhaps it will depend on the severity of their rebellion.

Writings By Jon von Ernst

The Lord of All Things Series - A Trilogy of Truth 
Books in this series:
Book 1 - The Gospel of the Kingdom
Book 2- The Victorious Christian
Book 3 - Walking in the Light  -  Following in His Steps

*- Audio of these books are available free of charge at thepureword.net.