Fire Insurance is Only for Your House, not Your Temple

I had a request. 
Seems some info I had included in my previous post "It's just too much!" got a little lost in the midst of everything else I was saying. 
Once again I will just jump right in.

Do you know the truth or are you deceived?
Do you know Jesus or are you expecting to get into Heaven with fire insurance?

For a long time we have been led to believe that all we had to do was repeat a prayer the preacher or visiting evangelist or Sunday School teacher said and we would be saved.
That helped to get a lot of people 'saved' and souls brought to Christ.
After all Romans 10:13 says (we can probably all quote this one in King James version): For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
And maybe some people were saved that way, truly saved and went on to develop a true relationship with the Lord.
And then there are those who base their salvation on that prayer they said or repeated when they were younger and their lives have not followed the Lord since.

Now don't get me wrong. I firmly believe in 'once saved always saved'. I believe the Bible demonstrates that principle over and over many times.

But no where in God's Word have I found anything about fire insurance salvation. 
That is the very thing that Jesus spoke about in Matthew 7:21 when He told the people standing before Him in heaven to depart because He never knew them. And these people had done all manner of things in Jesus' name. Everyone had probably looked at them as being some of the best 'saints in their church'; after all, these people had cast out demons and performed miracles. Yet they weren't saved. 
But, you may argue, they knew Jesus.
     James 2:19 - "You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe -   
     and tremble!"
The demons know God. They know Jesus. They definitely believe He exists. They really know better than all of us the reality of God and Jesus because they've seen Him. They even know what Jesus did in paying the price for salvation. BUT they haven't repented of THEIR sins and evil ways and accepted Jesus as THEIR Savior, THEIR Lord. 
There is a belief that still doesn't save.

So how does all this work? What is true salvation? How can we know that we are saved, after all the Bible tells us God wants us to have assurance of our salvation.
Glad you asked! Let's go back to the Romans 10:13 scripture.
     "For whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."
This verse taken out of context can pretty much mean anything you want it to mean.  It sounds like "Ok, just say the Lord's name and I will be saved." Or "I'll just pray that prayer because it has me reaching out to the Lord and I will be saved. Cool."  Or it could mean one can wait forever and if on their deathbed they just say "Lord!" then they will be saved.

But this verse taken in context means something a whole lot different. 
In Romans Paul is talking to both the Jews and the Gentiles.  Romans 10 is talking about salvation and WHO can be saved. At the time it was a completely new idea to the Jews that the Gentiles could be included in their faith. It was a completely new concept that Jesus opened faith and salvation up to not only the Jews, His chosen people, but also opened faith and salvation to the Gentiles as well.  
Paul also talks to the people how just because the Jews were circumcised didn't mean the Gentiles had to be circumcised for their salvation to be sealed, to take effect.
So in the midst of all this Paul says, "For WHOSOEVER shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved."  Whosoever included Jews and Gentiles, slaved and freed, any race, any nationality, any person on the face of the earth. And whosoever included you and me since we are included under the 'title' of Gentile.
So we see any of us are able, are allowed, to be saved.

It's vitally important to read for context and not take a verse or group of verses out of context, we must read the whole story to make sure we understand what is being said.
That's also why it is vitally important for us to understand the background of what is going on when the writer was writing the letter and to whom the letter was addressing.

So how are we saved?
In my post a few days back, I mentioned salvation is like a coin.  We all know what coin we are looking at whether we see the front of the coin or the back of the coin. Regardless of seeing the back or front we know exactly what we are looking at and we can pay with it whether we hand it over face up or face down. The coin is one coin with two sides and the same value every single time. And the coin wouldn't be the same without both sides. Different pictures on either side and it would be a counterfeit coin.

Salvation is like a coin.  It is one salvation but it has two sides.  
                                                                Belief and Repentance. 

(I've been trying to come up with this explanation for years! And suddenly in the last month or so God revealed it to me!)
You can't have true salvation without both sides "of the coin".
Like we said in James 2:19, the demons believe. Even satan believes.  Good grief, let's call it what it is - the demons and satan KNOW because they have seen God.  But their knowledge and their belief doesn't save them.

Your knowledge and your belief doesn't save you.
It's when repentance comes into the picture that salvation is true.
The demons and satan have never repented of their sins. That's why their knowledge and belief do not save them.
                     True salvation comes when there is repentance with your belief.

Mark 1:14-15 Jesus Himself went into Galilee preaching the gospel saying, "The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel". 

Repentance comes because we absolutely feel Godly sorrow for our sins and we realize that Jesus Himself put on those sins for us on the cross. Jesus died for OUR sins. How can we not repent of those sins and be sorrowful for what we have done?
And if He died for all the sins of all mankind, how can we continue to purposely live in continued sin if we say we want Him to be our Lord, to be our Savior?

Salvation is a one time work with an ongoing living. We are being saved every day. 

Yes, I believe 'once saved always saved'. 
But I believe just what the Bible says, "If any man be in Christ he IS a new creation. Old things are passed away, behold all things are become new." 2 Corinthians 5:17
Do I think we will never sin? Heavens No!
But I do think our lifestyle will be such that God has more victory than the enemy does in our life.
I do think our 'want-to' will be different.
I do think our desires will be different.
I do think our heart will yearn to be all of what God has for us and not continue to be more wrapped up in the world than wrapped up in Christ.
I do think we will allow God to work in our lives to change us and we will do the HARD WORK He calls us to.

Will there possibly be a season or several seasons in our life where we may walk more in sin than in the Spirit? Absolutely.
BUT the Spirit within us will not let us stay there and we can't live with ourselves by staying there.

NO fire insurance salvation. 

It is a commitment of our heart and our life and our forever - forever not only in eternity but our forever here on earth.
After all, we all live for eternity. We just get to choose where our eternity after earth will be.
We all live for eternity. And when we give our lives over the Lord our heavenly eternity started right then. It's not something we strive for, it's something we are working on right now.

I'm saved. My husband is saved. My daughters are saved. I have some great friends who are saved.
All of our lives have been changed. There is more of an upward walk with God than a downward spiral. We have all chosen to persevere to the end.

What about you?
Do you have the salvation 'coin' of belief and repentance in your life, choosing to persevere to the end?
I pray so, if not, now is the time of salvation.

Until He comes...