Can I Be Sure I'm Saved? (Crucial Questions)

by R.C. Sproul

This rare grammatical structure has significance in the Hebrew language. When someone repeats the personal form of address, it suggests and communicates an intimate personal relationship with the person to whom he is speaking.

when we make a profession of faith as Christians, we have to ask ourselves a question: How do we know that we won’t be among this group of people who will come at the last judgment, expecting entrance into the kingdom and addressing Jesus in intimate terms, only to be cast out? How do we know that our confidence that we are in a state of grace is not misplaced? How do we know we have not deceived ourselves? How can we be sure we are saved?

historically, the doctrine of the assurance of salvation has been tied closely to the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints.

Then there is Reformed theology, my own theological persuasion, which teaches that we not only can know today that we are in a state of grace, but that we can have full assurance that we still will be in a state of grace at the times of our deaths.

Jesus says that His true brother is the one who does the will of the Father, not one who simply makes a decision to follow Him.

Judas chose to follow Jesus; he made his own decision to enter the school of Jesus, and he stayed with our Lord during His earthly ministry for three years. Yet we are told that he was a devil (John 6:70). It wasn’t that Judas was genuinely converted and then fell out of grace and was lost; rather, although he was close to Jesus, he was never a converted man. That ought to give us pause as we consider the states of our own souls.

That explanation is most helpful because this parable differs from normal parabolic instruction. Most parables have just one point. It is generally dangerous, therefore, to turn parables into allegories, which tend to have symbolic meanings sprinkled throughout the story. But the parable of the sower approaches the level of an allegory as Jesus makes several points of application.

The first group He is talking about is represented by the seed that fell on the path.

Jesus likens the birds to Satan. Many people are like this seed. They hear the preaching of the gospel, but it makes no impact on them. It does not take root in their lives.

If you go to an evangelistic meeting or watch one on TV, you may see huge crowds thronging to the front of the church in response to the call of the gospel. In fact, I once saw a report about a massive international evangelistic campaign in which millions of people supposedly had made decisions for Christ. When I read that, I wondered how many of those decisions for Christ were true conversions and how many of them were spurious. People like what they hear at these events and can be emotionally moved to make a decision to follow Christ. However, it is an established fact that many of those who come forward at evangelistic meetings soon abandon their commitments altogether. Their spur-of-the-moment responses are often groundless.

But Jesus warns us about that here in the parable of the sower when He says that many people hear the gospel with joy—but they don’t continue in the faith. This second type of seed falls on stony ground—ground that is so shallow the seed cannot put down roots, and as soon as the sun comes up, the seedlings begin to wither. The result is that they die away and never bear fruit. Jesus tells us that these people fall away because of the tribulations and persecutions that inevitably arise in the way of faith.

This seed represents a category of people who also hear and receive the Word, but who are overwhelmed by the cares of this world. Like thorns, worldly cares “choke the word.”

Clearly, then, there are many who respond to the message of the gospel with joy but ultimately do not continue in the faith. Not everyone who hears the Word of God is saved, and the same is true for many who respond to it initially. Those who are genuinely saved are those who prove themselves to be doers of the Word. When the seed takes root and grows, there is fruit.

In thinking about fruitfulness, we must remember that we are not saved by our works. Rather, we are justified by faith alone. Yet we also remember that the magisterial Reformers of the sixteenth century, such as Martin Luther, said we are justified by faith alone but not by a faith that is alone.

ROMAN CATHOLIC VIEW: Faith + Works = Justification

PROTESTANT VIEW: Faith = Justification + Works

In the Protestant view, works are a consequence, a manifestation of the state of grace we are in; thus, they add nothing to justification. The only works of righteousness that serve to justify a sinner are the works of Christ. So when we say that we are justified by faith alone, we mean that we are justifie...

True faith that connects us to Christ always manifests itself in works, and if there are no works on the right side of the equation, that tells us there is no faith on the left side of the equation. Sadly, if there is no faith on the left side of the equation, then there is no justification on the right side of the equation. So faith links us to Christ, and if our faith is authentic, we won’t come to the last day saying, “Lord, Lord,” only to hear Him call us people of lawlessness. No, we will have fruit that demonstrates that our faith is real.

The amount of fruit Christians produce varies. Jesus says the good seed may yield “in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty” (13:23b). Some true Christians are not as fruitful as other Christians, but every true believer bears some fruit. If he does not, he’s not a believer. That’s why Jesus says, “You will recognize them by their fruits” (Matt. 7:16a)—not by their professions.

it is easy to miss this important point—making a decision to follow Jesus has never converted anyone. This is because it is not a decision that converts a person; it is the power of the Holy Spirit that does so. We get into the kingdom not because we make a decision, walk down an aisle, raise a hand, or sign a card. We get into the kingdom because there is true faith in our hearts. Don’t misunderstand—there’s absolutely nothing improper about public professions of faith; they should be made. Everyone who is justified is called to profess that faith; everyone who is a Christian is called to confess Christ before others. The problem comes when we make a public profession of faith the litmus test of our conversion. After all, Jesus speaks of people who honor Him with their lips while their hearts are far from Him (Matt. 15:8). No one has ever been justified by a profession of faith.

Does this mean, then, that the easiest way to solve the problem of assurance of salvation is to examine the fruit of our lives to determine whether it reflects consistency with a profession of faith? There is a definite place for self-examination in the Christian life, and I will say more about that in chapter 4. Yet none of us lives up to the full measure of what we say we believe. If we focus attention simply on our performance, authentic assurance becomes very slippery.

So it is possible to have false assurance, but true assurance can be difficult to acquire. How, then, can we know with certainty that our professions of faith are motivated by the possession of true saving grace? This question is extremely important, for it touches where we live as Christians and has a tremendous impact on our feelings, our comfort, and our behavior ...

Evangelism Explosion

When it comes to assurance of salvation, there are four kinds of people in the world. Every living person, without exception, can be assigned to one of these categories. The categories are: 1) those who are saved and know it, 2) those who are saved but do not know it, 3) those (like the man I mentioned above) who are unsaved and know it, and 4) those who are unsaved but do not know it.

The first category is people who are saved and know it. These people have full assurance that they are in a state of grace. It is a settled matter for them.

So when we speak of assurance of salvation, we’re not talking about mathematical certitude, such as belief in the idea that two plus two equals four. We’re talking about assurance of a personal state, and the intensity of that assurance vacillates from day to day. There are days when someone might say to me, “R. C., are you sure you’re saved?” and I would say, “Absolutely.” The next day, if I’m under the burden of guilt, I might say, “You know, I think so.” There are ups and downs in the Christian life. Yet, true assurance survives the doubts, for as we will see, it is based on more than feelings. The person in this category has a foundation from which he can say, “I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day” (2 Tim. 1:12, NKJV).

The second category is composed of those who are saved but do not know it. It is possible for a person to be in a state of grace and yet not possess full assurance that he is in such a state.

Likewise, others claim that it is impossible to really be in a state of grace and not know it. They argue that the very content of saving faith is a trust in a Savior whom you believe will save you. So if a person thinks he has faith but lacks confidence that Jesus Christ is saving him, does he really have faith at all?

Part of the problem has to do with a popular view of Christianity that insists on a dramatic conversion.

Other people, however, cannot identify even the year when they became Christians.

The bottom line is this: Nowhere does Scripture say we have to know the exact time of our conversion. Here’s where the plot thickens and becomes a bit problematic. No one is half-regenerate or semi-regenerate; you are either born of the Spirit of God or you are not. Regeneration, which is that work of God by which we are transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, is a real work of conversion, and it happens instantly by the work of the Holy Spirit, so that a person is either in that state or not. There is no process of regeneration; it is instantaneous. But if that’s the case, doesn’t that raise suspicions about people who cannot state the day and the hour of their conversion? No. We need to distinguish between a conversion and a conversion experience. Furthermore, we need to recognize that not everyone is instantly aware of the moment when the Spirit of God does His supernatural work within his or her soul.