Perseverance of the Saints is the Calvinist belief that those whom God has elected for salvation will certainly continue in faith to the end, so that their salvation is guaranteed. The Westminster Confession of Faith states it this way:

The Confession grounds this not in the believer's own will but in "the immutability of the decree of election," the work of Christ, and the abiding of the Spirit (17.2). The reasoning follows the rest of the TULIP system: if God unconditionally elected certain people and His grace is irresistible, then an elect person must always remain elect and cannot do anything to lose their salvation. This doctrine rightly emphasizes God's faithfulness to keep His people.

While this may seem similar to the commonly discussed belief of once-saved-always-saved, the two are not the same doctrine. The authors of this site believe in once-saved-always-saved, also called eternal security, yet we reject Perseverance of the Saints. The end result may resemble the once-saved-always-saved position, but the path Calvinists take to reach this conclusion is where we find issues:

• What guarantees it. In Calvinism, the guarantee is God's decree of election. In eternal security, it is God's promise to everyone who believes in Christ and the sealing of the Holy Spirit.
• What is guaranteed. Calvinism says every elect person will persevere in faith and holiness until death. Eternal security says God will keep the believer, even a believer who does not walk faithfully.
• How it is known. Calvinism reasons from election to being in Christ. Eternal security reasons from being in Christ to being among the elect.

Since there are differing views among non-Calvinists—some affirming once-saved-always-saved and others believing salvation can be lost—this critique will focus on why the Calvinist approach to perseverance, rather than the debate over eternal security itself, is in error.

The Uncertainty of Personal Election

Ironically, the Calvinist doctrine of Perseverance of the Saints, which is meant to provide believers with security in their salvation, ends up undermining that very assurance. The doctrine says that if someone is truly elect, their salvation is guaranteed. But how does one know if they are truly among the elect?

The Westminster Confession answers that assurance rests on "the divine truth of the promises of salvation, the inward evidence of those graces unto which these promises are made, the testimony of the Spirit of adoption" (18.2). The promises are real, but the promises are made to the elect, and election itself is hidden. So the question of whether the promises apply to me is settled by looking inward for evidence. The Confession even acknowledges that "a true believer may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties" before he has assurance (18.3).

A Calvinist might have assurance that the Elect will persevere, but there is no assurance that they truly are one of the Elect.

In order to determine their election, Calvinists are directed to look to the "fruit" of their lives for evidence. However, this introduces a dangerous shift from relying on Christ's finished work to relying on their own performance. As they inevitably encounter struggles, sin, and hardship, Calvinists may begin to doubt their own election—not whether the elect will be saved, but whether they are truly part of the elect. After all, would a truly elect person go through the kind of spiritual struggle they are facing?

This leads to a performance-based mindset where a person's sense of security hinges on their behavior and works. Instead of leaning on the promises of Christ during these times, they become fearful that they are not part of that promise. In essence, the doctrine of Perseverance of the Saints, meant to assure believers, can cause them to lose the very assurance it seeks to provide.

What About Apostasy?

In everyday life, we all know of people who once claimed to follow Christ but later turned away, sometimes even entering apostasy, where they now openly reject Christ. When this happens, three possible outcomes are typically considered:

1. The person was saved and is still saved, even in their apostasy.
2. The person was saved but has now lost their salvation.
3. The person was never truly saved, and therefore was never one of the elect.

Most Calvinists would say that they cannot know whether such a person was one of the elect, and most would lean toward the third answer. Some may allow the first answer if the person was in fact elect, but they would have no way of knowing whether that is the case. There is even a formal term for a person who thought they were saved and then fell away: evanescent grace, which suggests that a person may appear to be a believer, and may even have believed themselves to be one, but was never truly regenerate. Non-Calvinists may agree that this sometimes happens. But from the Calvinistic perspective it raises a troubling issue: the apostate's initial faith, which they sincerely thought was genuine, would have been ordained by God, and so would their falling away. If someone who appeared to be a faithful Christian was never truly saved, how can anyone be certain of their own salvation? The thought can creep into the mind of even the most devout Calvinist that they may have only an evanescent grace.

We believe the first answer is also possible. A true believer can stop walking faithfully and live as a carnal Christian, whom Paul addresses as "people of the flesh, as infants in Christ" (1 Corinthians 3:1), without losing salvation. That decline may be brief or lengthy, and a backsliding believer may not be restored before death. For that reason, the presence or absence of fruit at a given moment cannot settle whether a person was ever saved.

The Warning Passages

Scripture contains serious warnings to believers, and Calvinists and non-Calvinists alike must account for them. Hebrews warns that it is "impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit… and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance" ( Hebrews 6:4 - 6). Calvinists commonly read this as describing people who came close to faith but were never truly saved. We read it as written to genuine believers about a real danger: a hardened state in which a believer loses fellowship, fruitfulness, testimony, and reward. The author's own illustration points this way. Land that bears thorns "is worthless and near to being cursed, and its end is to be burned" (Hebrews 6:8), much like the believer whose work is burned up: "he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire" (1 Corinthians 3:15).

Likewise, Paul tells the Colossians that Christ will "present you holy and blameless and above reproach before him, if indeed you continue in the faith" ( Colossians 1:22 - 23). This is a genuine command to the believer's will, not merely a description of an unavoidable result. A believer who wavers loses much, and "the Lord disciplines the one he loves" (Hebrews 12:6), but wavering does not undo the new life God has given.

True Assurance in Christ

The biblical concepts of election and predestination, when understood in their proper context, offer real assurance of salvation. When detached from the Calvinist system, election is not about God arbitrarily choosing some and rejecting others but about God's gracious promise to save those who are in Christ. Scripture teaches that those who are "in Christ" are predestined for adoption and glorification (Romans 8:23; Ephesians 1:5), and this promise is sealed by the Holy Spirit, "who is the guarantee of our inheritance" (Ephesians 1:13–14; 2 Corinthians 5:5).

In contrast to the uncertainty of the Calvinist's understanding of perseverance, the Bible presents a clear and comforting assurance:

• If I am in Christ, then I am one of the elect
  not
• If I am one of the elect, then I am in Christ

We develop this from Ephesians 1 in Unconditional Election. Being in Christ is the condition, not the consequence, of election.

Jesus illustrates this in the Matthew 22:1 - 14 (Matthew 22:1–14). The king's servants gather everyone they can find, "both bad and good" (v. 10), yet one guest is thrown out. He is not removed for being bad, but because he has "no wedding garment" (v. 11). Jesus concludes, "For many are called, but few are chosen" (v. 14). The man was not left without a garment because he was not chosen; he was not chosen because he was not clothed. Scripture calls each of us to Romans 13:14 (Romans 13:14), and "as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ" (Galatians 3:27). Those who come clothed in Christ are the chosen.

The Bible clearly teaches that those who go to Christ have life, and Jesus promises, "I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand" (John 10:28).

The power of the Gospel lies in Christ's death on the cross, which calls out to all people to repent and believe, and God desires all to be saved. God commands everyone everywhere to repent, and His promise for His elect is true: those who believe in Christ are kept by Him to the end. Those who are in Christ have been predestined to live with Christ in glory, and there is nothing the enemy can do to take it from us.

Romans 8:33–39: A Promise for the Elect

33 Who shall bring any charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? 36 As it is written,

"For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
   we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."

37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
— Romans 8:38 - 39 (ESV)

The promise of salvation is not based on a subjective evaluation of our own works or behavior, but on the objective truth of God's love for us in Christ. When we are in Christ, we can rest assured that nothing—no sin, no struggle, no hardship—can separate us from the love of God. This is the true security of the saints: the security that comes from faith in Christ, not the uncertainty of wondering whether we are among the elect. And this is how a non-Calvinist can believe in once-saved-always-saved but still reject the premise of Perseverance of the Saints. Although we might arrive at the same conclusion as our Calvinist brothers, the journey to get to our conclusion is so different that we must disagree with this point.