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just one more brief point- and perhaps the strongest point in regards to eternal security in Christ Alone-

since we can never ever live up to the perfectly Holy Standard that being in God’s presence demands, how can we ever achieve salvation on our own in the first place? We can’t- Christ gives it to us- IF we must work to be holy in order to maintain our salvation, then we shall never keep our salvation because we can never do good enough to maintain it- never- We can not achieve mortal perfection- which is absolutely required in order to be with God in eternity

Our efforts ALWAYS ‘miss the mark’ (Interestingly, the word ‘sin’ means to ‘miss the mark’) because of our sin-

Now, Either we can be perfectly sinless in our own efforts, or we can’t- there is no ‘close enough’ with God- it is all or nothing. There are no ‘big and no small sins’ with God- ALL sin separates us from Him, so that even the tiniest sin in our minds, either conscious or not, is enough to separate us from Him because of His strict demand for perfect Holiness. Since we can never conquer all our sins, ‘big and small’, that woudl mean God could never accept us into eternal glory- even the smallest of sins woudl be enough to bar us from heaven- if salvation is left up to us to work for

Thank God it is not- Thank God that we are deemed perfect through the shed blood of Christ- and if we are perfect because of Him, we remain perfect because of him, not because of us or our feeble efforts to eschew earthly sin (We should strive to do so, but because we love Christ and want to show our appreciation for Him, not because it means we lose salvation if we don’t). Thank God we are washed pure as the driven snow by His blood which covers ALL our sins, even our unconfessed sins which we may or may not even be aware of.

Christ MUST save us- we can’t save ourselves-

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Amen.