Years ago, someone I know said, “There is no comfort in doctrine.” At the time, it didn’t sound right to me. Now I know that there is certainly great comfort in the doctrines of Christianity.
In John 17, the high, priestly prayer of Jesus, our Lord says seven times that those who come to Him by grace through faith are the gift of the Father to the Son. He says this in verses 2, 6, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 24. That should be a great, deep comfort to every saint.
There are those who teach that we can lose our salvation if we do something wrong–or if we do many wrong things. But that could only be true if we somehow earn our salvation. According to the prayer of our Lord Jesus, not only is salvation a gift, but Christians are a gift.
Paul says in Ephesians 1: 4-6 that we were chosen to be a gift “before the foundation of the world.” He also says in this choosing, God adopted us into His family and that it pleased Him to do so, that it is to His own praise, and that we have been accepted in the Beloved–Jesus Himself.
Even more, in the next chapter Paul tells us that our Father does this for His own glory: “that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” 2: 7.
The doctrine of the perseverance of the saints is at the very core of the Protestant Reformation. The Catholic church of the Middle Ages used the fear of losing one’s salvation to manipulate members and make them afraid even to read the scriptures. Reformers like Luther, Calvin and Knox fought to make the Bible available in the language of the common people so that they could read the wonderful passage quoted here and understand that it is the God who created the universe who calls us to Himself and secures our salvation by the sacrifice of His own dear Son and by the effectual calling of the Holy Spirit.
This is doctrine. There is no greater comfort for the one who has come to Jesus in repentance and faith than this: Our salvation is secured, not by OUR faithfulness, but by the faithful Creator and Ruler of earth and heaven.