What is the Doctrine of Preservation/Perseverance?
The Doctrines of Grace: How God Saves Sinners—Start to Finish (#5)
Romans 8:28–30; 1 Peter 1:3–9; Canons of Dort V.1–4
Romans 8 is sometimes called the golden chain of salvation—running from predestination to glorification—and it is no cheap trinket that breaks in the night. Every link is held together by the power and grace of almighty God.
In this final sermon on the doctrines of grace, Dr. Daniel Hyde considers the believers’ weakness, our daily struggle with sin in which even our best works are tainted; the believers’ perseverance, running the race set before us by faith, through trials, in love, and with joy; and God’s preservation, the promise that we are being guarded by God’s power for an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, unfading, and kept in heaven for us. Preservation and perseverance are not two doctrines but two sides of one coin: we persevere because God preserves. He’s given it. He’s promised it. He’s going to keep it..
Introduction
Romans 8 is sometimes called “the golden chain of salvation.” It’s called this because it goes from the beginning to the end of the Christian’s salvation. It starts with predestination—that mysterious and eternal purpose in God's own heart and mind. It goes from predestination—before time, before anything existed, before we had done anything either good or bad—all the way unto eternity forever, eternity future in what’s called “glorification.” God is a God who has predestined and who will glorify—and everything else in between.
The first little link in that golden chain is predestination. In Romans 8, the Apostle then speaks about calling and sanctification. God chose us not just to choose us because he could; and not for us to say, “well I'm chosen and now I can do whatever I would like to do.” No, he chose us so that we might be like Jesus, “conformed to his image.” He's the image of God, and so God is shaping and molding us, and forming and fashioning us to be like Jesus. That’s sanctification. Calling, sanctification, justification, then glorification. These are all links in the chain.
So imagine a golden chain or necklace. But it’s not the cheap kind of gold chain, kids, that you won at Dave and Buster's? You play some skeeball or a video game and you win those little tickets that come out of the bottom of the game. Then you take those tickets after the party is done and go to the little prize shop and you think, “Wow, I've got a lot of tickets tonight! I've got like 134 tickets and I did a good job playing skeeball. I've done a good job killing all those bugs in that Jurassic Park game.” You can tell I've been there a few times, right? Haha! But in the toy store, everything costs like 1,000 tickets. So about the only thing you can afford is a plastic container that has a "gold” chain. “Wow, only 130 tickets for a gold chain!” You put the necklace on and wear it to bed. Then you wake up in the morning. Where’s the necklace? It broken next to you in bed. It wasn’t even metal.
The golden chain of salvation isn’t a cheap little trinket that you and I can purchase for ourselves. It’s not made of fool’s gold. It’s not made of plastic. It’s not made out of stainless steel they spray painted. No, this is an unbreakable, glorious, perfect golden chain. Every little clasp, held together by the power and the grace of almighty God. As God gives this chain of salvation, it never can be broken. Never does it turn green and make your skin have an itchy feeling. No, it’s an unbreakable, glorious golden chain of salvation because it’s God who’s made it; it’s God who gives it.
God is the one who elects; God is the one who redeems; God is the one who regenerates; God is the one who preserves.
We’ve been thinking for the past few weeks about what are called the doctrines of grace. They’re a summary for us to understand what it means to be Christians. What does it mean that God saves sinners? He does so by his grace.
We end our series with the doctrine of preservation, or sometimes called perseverance of the saints. They’re not different doctrines. They’re two sides of one coin. They’re describing the same thing from God’s vantage point—that he’s the one who preserves—and from ours— we need to persevere.
The Believers’ Weakness
We’re called as Christians to persevere in our faith. We are to run with endurance that race that God has set before us. That’s what perseverance is.
But we’re weak. We struggle with our sins. God has set us free from the reign and the slavery of sin. God has redeemed us. He’s adopted. He’s regenerated us. Although in this life God hasn’t entirely freed us from what’s called “the flesh”—our sinfulness—sometimes called “the body of sin.” Point being, we’re not totally freed yet from all the aspects of our sins.
Our sins no longer condemn us. We’re no longer slaves of sin. It doesn’t reign over us. But yet we still feel the effects of our sins as struggle daily.
As we run the race, we run around the track for as long as we live. But sometimes, the track might have a gopher hole. There might be a rock in the way. There might be some other people trying to elbow and jostle their way into the inside, which is the fastest route to the finish line. There are lots of obstacles.
And we struggle with those obstacles of our sinfulness, our flesh, the body of sin. Our sins cling on to even the best things that we can do. We feel like we’ve done a good job, prayed really well, or like we took some time out of our week to go to church. We’ve given offerings of time, talent, and treasure. We feel like we’ve done a good job of being a Christian dad or a Christian mom, or a wife or husband. We feel like we’ve been done a good job of being a Christian son or daughter of God. But deep down inside we know we really haven’t done that great of a job.
Even the best works of the best saints are still tainted by sin. Even though we’re called to persevere, we must heed that call of Scripture to run the race as Hebrews 12 describes it.
We’re going to need to get some hydration on the route. We’re going to need to hear the crowd cheering us on. We’re going to need teammates to slow down and run with us, to push us ahead, to pull us ahead, or we’re going to need a teammate behind us to catch up. Because we’re weak, we need that encouragement.
But none of our weakness in ourselves can break the clasps and connections between those links in the golden chain of salvation.
The Believers’ Perseverance
Let’s also turn over to 1 Peter 1:3–9 for the second point—the believer’s perseverance.
We’re called to persevere, but we recognize our weakness. Here Peter says,
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has caused us to be born again to a living or to a lively hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”
We’ve saw last time that we’re born again by the Spirit of God. Here Peter says it’s through the power of Christ. We’re born again to a living hope through Christ’s resurrection. Just like he’s truly alive, so too we’re alive, despite our sins and weaknesses.
He’s brought us out of the grave of our sins and the power of the devil “to an inheritance that’s imperishable, undefiled, unfading”—like a golden chain—“kept in heaven for you, who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” It’s in this salvation that we’re born again to.
“You rejoice though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes though it’s tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, Jesus, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls.”
I want you to see in these verses as a beautiful little hymn of praise the believer’s perseverance. How do we do that?
…by faith
We persevere by faith, first and foremost. You are “being guarded through faith” (1 Peter 1:5). Faith is the means that God has given to us to receive Jesus. It’s also the means or method that God has given to us to cling to Jesus continually.
It’s not enough for us to say that we believe in Jesus once. We’ve got to cling to Jesus. You’re “being kept” or guarded by the power of God for that great and glorious eternal salvation, through faith.
God does the work of preservation.
We have to do the work of persevering through faith.
1 Peter 1:7 describes our faith that needs to be “refined like gold through fire.” Faith embraces Jesus. But there’s raw faith and there’s refined faith? There’s faith at the beginning of a Christian life, then as it’s being refined, there’s faith in the end? That’s what he describes here—that “outcome of your faith, the salvation of your soul.”
Just like there’s gold that’s mined and looks kind of like gold, but also has a lot of junk attached to it. It has to be melted and smelted, refined into the gold that you and I see as a precious thing. God has given you faith, and that faith in a sense is like raw gold that needs to be purified. That’s the process of perseverance. That faith is growing, becoming stronger, purer, more refined, and becoming more like the faith that’ll one day be faith in perfection.
In 1:8 he describes the fact that we don’t see Jesus now. Peter wrote this as a Jew in Jerusalem to Christians in what is today modern day Turkey, then the Roman province of Asia Minor. They weren’t there when Jesus lived, walked, and died. They didn’t hear his voice. They didn’t see the empty tomb. Yet they believe.
You have not seen him, yet you love him. Though you don’t see him now, you believe in him. That’s faith. Receiving and embracing the promises of God despite the fact that you may never have seen those promises in the reality.
…through trials
The believer’s perseverance is also through trials. Look at verse six: “in this you rejoice”—the salvation to come—“though now for a little while, if it’s necessary, you have been grieved by various trials.”
There are many trials in the Christian life in the race that’s before us.
There are the inner temptations of our sin nature. We feel those temptations.
There are outward temptations from the world around us. These are the things we know that if we partake of, they’ll lead us to nothing but more sin.
There’s persecution. That’s what these believers in particular were facing, the persecution of those outside the church, unbelievers from either the Jewish or Roman communities.
There were hardships of trusting the Lord. He’s promised us our daily bread, but it’s a hardship to be able to see that coming to reality. There are hardships of trusting him in various big and small ways in our daily lives.
Yet we have faith in him, and that faith is being refined through those trials. The race isn’t going to be always nice and glorious.
Have you ever seen a person run a marathon? When they’re done with all those miles, do they just stop and go to IHOP for pancakes? Do they just go to Starbucks and get a venti latte because? No, they’re exhausted. Sometimes they pass out.
And so, through various trials and tribulations the believer perseveres, by faith.
…in love
Perseverance is also in love. “Though you do not now see him, you love him.”
We have that famous little line: “absence makes the heart grow fonder.” In his humanity, Jesus is absent from us. “Though you have not seen him,” he says to these believers and to us, “you love him.” His absence makes our hearts grow fonder.
…with joy
And it’s with great joy that we persevere. “We rejoice with joy that is inexpressible, filled with glory.”
You’ve never met Jesus yet face to face. We’ve never heard that booming voice like the apostle heard on the road to Damascus. We haven’t seen him in his exaltation like the apostle saw him.
You’ve not seen him, yet you love him, and you rejoice, the apostle says, “with a joy that is inexpressible, filled with glory.” That’s the difference between joy and happiness. Happiness is just an outward fleeting feeling that comes and goes. Joy is that inner quality that even like Job, you feel like just lying down and dying, you know you’ll see the Lord face to face.
This is a joy that’s lasting, inexpressible, filled with glory in our Lord Jesus Christ.
So you and I are called to persevere by faith, through trials, in love, with joy.
It’s a lot of work, isn’t it? “Pastor, man, that sounds tiring.” That’s why it’s a race, right?
So on that side of the coin it’s very arduous and it’s very difficult. It’s like Jesus describing how difficult it was for a person to enter the kingdom of God who had great riches. It was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. That’s how difficult it is to enter the kingdom. It’s a straight and a narrow path. It’s hard. Broad and wide is the path to destruction and many follow that one because it’s easy.
On the other hand though, God is the one who’s preserving us. You are to have faith in Jesus. You are to have faith in him through all the trials of your life. You are to love Jesus. You are to have joy in Jesus. Those things can fluctuate up and down, they can grow, they can retract. You can feel hot in faith and you can feel cold in faith at times. Your love can be strong for Jesus. It can feel like it’s slipping away. On the other hand though, there’s God’s preservation.
God’s Preservation
Did you see here in all this the power of God? It’s God who in his great mercy has caused us to be born again to a living hope. It’s God who has called us to an inheritance that’s imperishable, undefiled, unfading.
Who’s doing the keeping?
The Lord, of who verse 5 says, by God’s power are being guarded through faith. Note that the inheritance is being kept by God and you too are being guarded. It’s the same verb": kept and guarded. God is keeping the inheritance that’s awaiting us. Through many trials and tribulations we will inherit that great and glorious inheritance. Why would we inherit those things? Because he’s guarding us. It’s his power that’s guarding it.
Didn’t Jesus teach us in the gospel that the Father holds us in his hands and that Jesus holds us in his hands? Then he asked, “Who is able to snatch us from the hands of God? No one. The devil may try to snatch us but he can’t.
He even told Peter that the devil had asked to sift Peter like wheat. God allowed this up to the point into which his faith felt like it was going to fail. But the Lord said that was the limit. He could be sifted no more. Just like with Job, the devil wanted to strike him down and take everything. The Lord gave limits to the devil. Why? Because he’s God.
You’re being kept by the power of God. We’re born again as sons to an inheritance that’s being kept, preserved, and reserved by God. You yourselves are by God's own power being guarded and kept for salvation.
We might say the guarantee of our perseverance is not our efforts. It’s not in the sweat of our brow, the toils of our lives. It’s in the power of God.
Back in the late 90s or early 2000s, former Vice President Al Gore gave an illustration in a debate about Social Security. You might remember that about Medicare and Social Security. I won’t presume to do his Tennessean accent, but he gave an illustration of why you should vote for him to become the new president: “If you vote for me, all that money for Social Security for all of your grandmas and grandfathers is going to be put away in a “lock box.” Some of us are old enough to remember that.
Now of course the great secret behind the veil of government was that there was no money. There was no money in the lock box, right? It was empty. It was empty.
God though promises to reserve all the treasures that are ours. It’s not a politician’s made believe lock box. It’s guarded by God.
Notice it’s reserved “in heaven.” Where’s Jesus? At the right hand of God in heaven? Can Jesus diminish? Can Jesus fade? Can Jesus’ luster no longer be there? I mean can the Father just sort of get rid of Jesus, kick him out of heaven? No.
If Jesus can't be kicked out of heaven, if he can't perish, if he can't be defiled, if he can’t fade, then neither can your inheritance and faith! They’re in the same place as Jesus.
We can confidently persevere. Run the race with faith, through many difficult trials, with love in our hearts for Jesus, and a great lasting joy that can’t be removed. Why? Because God is the one who by his power preserves us.
Weak and struggling believers are going to trip over the obstacles on the road. Your love will feel low and cold; your joy will seem to come and go as the sun rises and sets. But it’s God who preserves you. And so our confidence is in him!
Conclusion
So with confidence, let’s serve the Lord. With great, lasting joy love him, trust in him.
This God of grace has given to you the inheritance of a golden chain of salvation that can’t perish, fade, or be taken away.
He’s given it. He’s promised it. He’s going to keep it.