Why should we discourage people from gaining or losing assurance of salvation, based on how they live?

I do not EVER question my salvation. I say that boldly, with assurance, and with absolutely no pride attached. I do not look at my works to determine whether or not I am saved. I am 100% confident that when I die, I will go to heaven. No question. Why?
Because of what Christ did for me on the cross. His blood covered my sins, and I have accepted the gift of salvation. My works have nothing to do with it. I am confident that if I left my husband and children today, murdered someone and then committed suicide, I would still go to heaven. It is not the fear of hell that keeps me on the right path. I don't want to do any of the things I mentioned above, and I seek to avoid other areas of sin in my life as well. But it's not because I'm afraid of hell; there are plenty of other motivations to live a godly life. (The book of James is a wonderful book for helping us see those motivations! James 2:14-26 is meant to inspire good works in believers, not cause people to doubt their salvation.)

Here is why this is so important. Many people are taught to look at their works to gain assurance of their salvation. If you are a good person, doing what God wants you to do, they say you're probably saved. If you're struggling with a particular area of sin that you are either unwilling to give up, or are having a very hard time doing so, or if you are generally not following God in most areas of your life, you're probably not saved. This idea is not found in the Bible. There are many, many people who live good, religious lives who are not saved. They have never trusted in Christ for salvation. If you ask them whether or not they will go to heaven someday, they will answer something like this: "I hope so," "I've been a pretty good person," or "Yes, because I follow God's commands." Nothing about what Christ did for them. These are the people that we should see as a mission field, the people whose salvation we ought to call into question! Yet so many times, the church teaches that we should instead question the salvation of people who are living ungodly lives. After all, doesn't James 2 teach that faith and works always go together? If they truly had faith, wouldn't their lives be changed for the better? So if a person is living sinfully, they are told, "You are not really saved." The person might answer, "But you told me that Christ paid for my sins on the cross, and to be saved all I have to do is believe." Then they are told, "You must not really have believed, because obviously you're still sinful." The person is stuck, unsure how to proceed. Instead, we should say, "If you truly believe in Christ, you are really saved. You are eternally secure, no matter how sinful you are. But God has a better plan for your life. There are many motivations to follow Christ in this life, which have nothing to do with hell. God allows consequences for sin in this life, and He blesses obedience. There are eternal rewards for doing what is right." (You can go on for a long time explaining all the reasons to follow God in this life, but I'll stop here.)

Real Christians CAN and DO sin. They can even fall into deep, addictive sin, or turn away from the faith they once believed in. This is not good, but it is reality. Unbelievers, on the other hand, can often do good things that may convince them that they are saved, when in reality they are not (because they have not believed in Christ, or trusted that His death was the necessary payment for their sins.) Assurance of salvation should ALWAYS be based on whether or not you believe in Christ, not based on how you live. I have complete assurance, and you can too.

What happens when we base assurance of salvation on our works and not on Christ?

·         We make salvation about what we do instead of what Christ did, and distort the gospel.

·         We neglect to witness to people who live “good” lives but have never trusted in Christ for salvation.

·         We try to convince people who truly have trusted in Christ that they do not really believe, since we see them as sinful. I know one church in WV where a person “accepted Christ” 20 times in her life. This church taught eternal security, but also taught people to question their salvation based on their sin. The woman constantly believed that she wasn’t saved! She was never able to move on in her Christian life, to grow, to add to her faith. She always felt like she had to start at square one, and it makes me think that she doesn’t really understand what Christ did.

·         We are unable to share the gospel clearly, which should focus on what Christ did and how our response is to believe. We feel like we need to add some extra strings to it that God doesn’t add.

·         We are unable to counsel people who are trapped in addictions. We try to convince them that they can’t truly be Christians, or we would see their fruit. Instead, a person with addictions needs to be counseled according to the grace and forgiveness of God, to understand that real Christians can fall into deep sin, and to be given motivations and tools that can help them overcome addiction. Correct theology can go a long way, and adding to that with realistic goals and actions and teaching them how to yield to the Holy Spirit can help them achieve victory.

·         We are not on guard against temptation. If we believe that real Christians don’t do certain things, we won’t guard against them. Instead, we should realize that we all can fall, and take steps to avoid temptations.

·         If we are not sure that we are saved, then we cannot truly experience God’s grace and love. We don’t understand what forgiveness is. We don’t appreciate what Christ has done for us.

·         We cannot add to our faith and grow as Christians. We see the commands in Scripture to do good things as tests to see if we have faith rather than as commands for the Christian. The Christian life is not a passive one. To grow and achieve victory, we have to act. The commands in the New Testament are not trying to tell us who is really saved and who isn’t. They are commands to be followed, and not every Christian follows those commands. None of us do all the time, but every time we read them we should be reminded to put them into practice.

·         We do not correctly interpret passages that talk about rewards for the Christian life, and the judgment of works for the Christian. If we interpret every passage as heaven or hell, we will miss out on lessons God wants us to learn. There are many of these passages in the New Testament, which encourage us to do good works. If these passages are misinterpreted, we might think that they are telling us that we can’t go to heaven if we don’t do good works, and that is not true at all. Many passages in the Bible which talk about works refer to the judgment for Christians or the future kingdom. It is important to keep that in mind as we study.

These are some of the reasons why I believe it’s important to keep “faith” and “works” separate. Faith is believing; works are acting. God wants us to do both. Both should be strong In a Christian’s life. If a person just believes in Christ in order to gain entrance into heaven, and doesn’t live for God, he isn’t doing what God wants. But to say that real faith always will produce good works is to blur the message of the gospel, and can lead to the problems I mentioned above. We can be confident of our salvation based on the work of Christ, and use that confidence and the power of the Holy Spirit to be victorious as we seek to obey God and bear fruit for Him.