Charles H. Spurgeon's Battle Against Antinomianism
Surely NO person who possesses the gift of eternal salvation will EVER as a result of possessing such a wondrous gift, as a result will EVEN think for a second they can live like the rest of the world. No way! As said, I can say that I will not live like the rest of the world not out of the burden of obligation but rather because by the grace of God, I have my delight to do good and the inevitable result to do good (Titus 2:11-15). Not under the Law's condemnation but by God's grace I cannot live like the rest of the world gone wrong. Now here's pages 224-225 of Charles Haddon Spurgeon's autobiography on his battle against the sinister doctrine of Antinomianism thus hence why he is one of my favorite dead preachers with underlines by me for emphasis:
I my first pastorate, I had often to battle with Antinomonians- that is, people who held that, because they believed themselves to be elect, they might live as they liked. I hope that the heresy has to a great extent died out, but it was sadly prevalent in my early ministerial days. I knew one man, who stood on the table of a public house, and held a glass of gin in his hand, declaring that he was one of the chosen people of God. They kicked him out of the public-house and when I heard of it, I felt that it served him right. Even those ungodly men said that they did not want any such 'elect" people there. There is no one who can live in sin- drinking, swearing, lying and so on- who can truly declare that he is one of the Lord's chosen people... From my very soul I detest everything that in at least savours of the Antinomianism which leads people to prate about being secure in Christ while they are living in sin. We cannot be saved by or for our good works neither can we be saved without good works. Christ will never save any of His people in their sins; He saves His people from their sins. If a man is not desiring a holy life in the sight of God, with the help of the Holy Spirit, he is still "in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity"... the idea of "saving faith" apart from good works, is ridiculous. The saved man is not a perfect man but his heart's desire is to become perfect, he is always panting after perfection and the day will come when he will be perfected, after the image of his once crucified and now glorified Saviour in knowledge and true holiness. While I was minister at Waterbeach, I used to have a man sitting in front of the gallery who would always nod his head when I was preaching what he considered sound doctrine, although he was about as bad as an old hypocrite as ever lived. When I talked to him about justification, down went his head; when I preached about imputed righteousness, down it went again. I was a dear good man in his estimation, without doubt. So I thought so I remarked, "There is a great deal of difference between God electing you and you electing yourself; a vast deal of difference between God justifying you by His Spirit and your justifying yourself by a false belief or presumption; this is the difference," said I - and the old man at once put me down as a rank Arminian - "you who have elected yourselves and justified yourselves, have no marks of the Spirit of God; you have no evidence of genuine piety, you are not holy men and women, you can live in sin, you can walk as sinners walk, you have the image of the Devil upon you and yet you call yourselves children of God. One of the first evidences that anyone is a child of God is that he hates sin with a perfect hatred and seeks to live a holy, Christlike life." The old Antinomian did not approve of that doctrine but I knew that I was preaching what was revealed in the Word of God.
Looking at such statement, how can ANYBODY so horribly think for once that having eternal security is staying saved without any SLIGHT change? Absolutely not. Such people who are Antinomians pretend to be saved or perhaps are there to make fun of salvation by grace through faith by pretending to be Christians THEN they live like devils. For one thing, I am truly convinced that salvation cannot be lost and one's eternal security is better yet described as "perseverance of the saints" to which now Paul Washer "lends a hand"...
PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS. Those whom God has accepted in the Beloved, and sanctified by His Spirit, will never totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but shall certainly persevere to the end; and though they may fall, through neglect and temptation, into sin, whereby they grieve the Spirit, impair their graces and comforts, bring reproach on the Church, and temporal judgments on themselves, yet they shall be renewed again unto repentance, and be kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.
How true. 1 John 2:19 is clear that NO Christian can depart from the faith. It's not a just believe once and you're still saved even if you don't believe afterwards. Rather eternal security means having TRUE FAITH that perseveres as a result of being unable to lose one's salvation. It will mean continuous walk in Christ even if they do stumble in the faith. Can they live the way they want? Not a chance! Now I urge you to read the following articles below: