True and False Assurance

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YoungLearner

Puritan Board Freshman
This question has been giving me trouble, so I would like some help. Perhaps I should already know these things but I am very young spiritually and am without any other persons who share my beliefs.

I know many people who go to church and claim to be Christians. They talk about God and Christ a lot, and can tell you how easy it is to accept Christ as your personal Saviour and all that. They have full assurance that they are going to Heaven. Yet...they make light of sin. It is nothing to them to take the name of God in vain, and to commit other sins.

What bothers me so much is this: if they are totally convinced that they are Christians, what if I too am mistaken? What if I am in no better standing before God than they are, and have deceived myself like Simon Magus did in Acts?
 
Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter XVIII - Of Assurance of Grace and Salvation

I. Although hypocrites and other unregenerate men may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions of being in the favor of God, and estate of salvation (which hope of theirs shall perish): yet such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love Him in sincerity, endeavouring to walk in all good conscience before Him, may, in this life, be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace, and may rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, which hope shall never make them ashamed.

II. This certainty is not a bare conjectural and probable persuasion grounded upon a fallible hope; but an infallible assurance of faith founded upon 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 witnessing with our spirits that we are the children of God,[8] which Spirit is the earnest of our inheritance, whereby we are sealed to the day of redemption.

III. This infallible assurance does not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties, before he be partaker of it: yet, being enabled by the Spirit to know the things which are freely given him of God, he may, without extraordinary revelation in the right use of ordinary means, attain thereunto. And therefore it is the duty of every one to give all diligence to make his calling and election sure, that thereby his heart may be enlarged in peace and joy in the Holy Ghost, in love and thankfulness to God, and in strength and cheerfulness in the duties of obedience, the proper fruits of this assurance; so far is it from inclining men to looseness.

IV. True believers may have the assurance of their salvation divers ways shaken, diminished, and intermitted; as, by negligence in preserving of it, by falling into some special sin which wounds the conscience and grieves the Spirit; by some sudden or vehement temptation, by God's withdrawing the light of His countenance, and suffering even such as fear Him to walk in darkness and to have no light: yet are they never so utterly destitute of that seed of God, and life of faith, that love of Christ and the brethren, that sincerity of heart, and conscience of duty, out of which, by the operation of the Spirit, this assurance may, in due time, be revived; and by the which, in the mean time, they are supported from utter despair.

Not to simply quote the WCF as some mere appeal to authority, but it is difficult to improve upon the language here (since you are a Reformed Baptist, you could substitute the 1689 LBCF chapter on assurance--it does not vary significantly from the substance of the WCF language). The point being, there are indeed people who vainly deceive themselves and possess a false assurance. However, true assurance is the rightful possession of all believers and can be known definitively.
 
Assurance belongs to believers, not to those who "know" just how much or how excellent is their faith. Because the thing that saves is the Object of faith, and His hold on us, rather than our hold on him. Faith the size of a grain of mustard seed is more than enough to save the weakest sinner; let it only be in Christ.

If you wonder "shall I endure to the end, and so be saved?" may I humbly encourage you to "persevere?" Saints (true saints) persevere; it is a product of divine grace. We are promised grace for today, not grace for tomorrow ("do not worry about tomorrow..."). Repent today, believe today, now. And be assured.

Fear about the "quality" of my faith, or the "excellence" of my behaviors, or if later I could find out I was "too insincere"--these are all manifest examples of self-focus. "Looking unto Jesus, the Author and Finisher of our faith..." The more you look at your Savior, the more you should be drawn to him, and into the strength of his embrace.

Why am I confident in my salvation? Not because of yesterday's conversion, or tomorrow's finish; but because today I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And because I look to him, his Word assures me of his love for me from before all time, unto all eternity, and sustenance in the present moment.

Sister, be at peace, not in yourself, but in Christ.
 
There are many who are assured of their interest in Christ, and shouldn't be; and many who are not assured of their interest in Christ, and should be. God's Word and Holy Spirit are all we need to examine ourselves as to a work of grace within our hearts.
 
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