As to your defense of OSAS...
My defense is for perseverance of the saints, not OSAS. OSAS is a
johnny-one-note doctrine that comforts the comfortable and disturbed conscience alike with a smothering salve. It usually teaches that "doubt" is the worst sin, and is the one thing that would demonstrate a lack of salvation. Thus, it offers almost nothing of genuine grace to the trembling soul; and for the casual "believer," it assists him in searing his conscience. In either case, the utmost confidence is urged in an act of the human will.
Believers are not mere punctiliar Christians. The Spirit waters and feeds our repentance and faith through the means of grace. These means
keep us alive in the faith and are not just a means for
starting us in the faith. God commands our ongoing attention to our faith, that we examine ourselves to make sure our faith is real. God also provides that which He commands, ordaining the ends as well as the means to the ends, even the believer's salvation. Augustine's little prayer sums it up: "
O Lord, grant what Thou dost command and command what Thou dost desire." Pelagius never grasped what Augustine meant, failing to see that no one can please God unless God helps us in some manner to meet His requirements.
As Scripture teaches, enduring to the end, holding fast to the faith, abiding in Christ and His Word are essential to one's salvation. If these do not exist a professing Christian cannot expect to be saved.
But,
and this is important, some hold that a true believer
may not persevere and can be ultimately lost. Instead I believe that the true believer
will in fact persevere. At this point, some would then ask, "Well, if the believer
will persevere then why do the Scriptures contain admonitions or conditions for salvation?" In reply I answer, as noted above, God ordains the end but also the
means to the end.
One of those means of God to His final glory is the
perseverance of the Christian in faith to the end. I understand that one way God
effects this means of perseverance in the saved is by
admonishing them of the consequences of not persevering to the end and the conditions for salvation. I take these admonishments seriously. These admonishments stir up the faithful.
An example might help explain this. Consider Paul about to be shipwrecked in Acts 27. We read that God had
assured Paul that no one would lose their life in that shipwreck. Yet, despite this clear assurance
from God, Paul
admonishes those on the ship that unless the persons trying to leave by the lifeboat remain on board, those on the ship
would not be saved. Note here that the Apostle was
assured of their salvation, he knew the
means of their salvation, and his warning produced the
desired result. The warnings are a means by God through which
the faithful are stirred up and will in fact persevere.
Speaking under the inspiration of the Spirit, Peter tells us that those who are "
elect according to the foreknowledge of God" and "
begotten again unto a lively hope" are "
kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time." (I Peter 1:2-5).
Indeed, God's almighty power
preserves the true believer so that he or she receives that final and complete salvation that will be revealed at the eschaton. It can be no other way, for
the work of salvation is God's work and
God's work does not fail.
In summary, the Reformed argue that the corrosive power of sin upon genuine faith cannot hollow it out, because the source of that faith is divine, the gifts of God are without repentance, the Lord knows them that are His, no one can pluck them out of his hands, He conquers those He loves and wins them infallibly to Himself, for they are chosen in love and in Christ from all eternity.
AMR
