How Shall we then Live?

This past week I talked to a lady who was confused by what she had read in the Scripture and what she had heard in a sermon at her church. Her question related to whether or not one could lose their salvation. I sent her the following that I wrote earlier.

The Bible clearly teaches that we are saved by faith and not by anything that we do and that we are to live our lives by faith. Paul in Galatians makes it clear that after we have begun in the Spirit that we cannot live by our own wills.

However, we are also told that we are to preserver the end and we shall be delivered or that we are to overcome as we read in the letters to the seven churches in Revelation.

However, there is one problem. If how we live depend upon our own efforts to keep ourselves in the faith then it becomes man’s effort and not God’s grace. So what is the answer? Peter tells us in 2 Peter 1:3-4 “His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness 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 and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.” Then the next verse he says, “For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith.” Peter clearly saw that the Christian live is not by our strength but then there is something that we must do. IF this is confusing it is because we are trying to understand an infinite God with our finite minds.

How shall we then live? First, we must realize that we are saved by God’s grace and we are kept by God’s grace and we must rest upon this truth. Second, we must live as though our eternal life depended upon how we live even though we know that it does not.