The Incompatibility Of Lordship Salvation With The Gospel Of Grace

The deadliest threat to New Testament churches in the 21st century is something called: Lordship Salvation. This popular heresy falsely teaches that more than faith is necessary to get to Heaven. In addition, proponents of Lordship Salvation errantly preach one or more of the following unbiblical things are required to be saved: 

• Live a changed life.
• Commit your life to Christ.
• Forsake your sinful ways.
• Follow Jesus as the absolute “Lord” of their life.
• Surrender all to God.
• Run the Christian race faithfully.
• Endure unto the end.
• Live a lifestyle of repentance.

My friend in the ministry, Pastor Ralph Yankee Arnold, makes the following helpful true statements:

“Salvation can only be evidenced by works, if works are required to be saved.” —Pastor Ralph “Yankee” Arnold, “Why Lordship Salvation Is Wrong!”

“Lordship Salvation is the unsupportable and unbiblical belief that the performance of good works, the promise of good works, or the evidence of good works, must accompany faith in Christ to establish or provide evidence that such faith has resulted in eternal life.” —Pastor Ralph Yankee Arnold, "Jesus versus John MacArthur"

The following excellent information by Pastor Hank Lindstrom (1940-2008) is from the helpful Christian website: Get God's Gift...

THE INCOMPATIBILITY OF THE LORDSHIP GOSPEL WITH THE GOSPEL OF GRACE

"But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed." Galatians 1:8,9

The importance of this question can't be overestimated in relation to both salvation and sanctification. The message of faith only and the message of commitment of life can't both be the gospel; therefore, one of them is a false gospel and come under the curse of perverting the gospel or preaching another gospel.

"It is an inexcusable error to confront sinners with problems that concern the Christian life and call upon them to make promises regarding them. An unsaved person is never called upon to surrender himself to God. The saving act is in no instance represented as our 'giving ourselves to God'; it is, on the contrary, taking His Son as our Savior." Ryrie, Charles. Balancing the Christian Life. Moody Press, Inc., 1969 (p. 170).

"The second approach finds faith in the gospel alone an 'easy Believism' and seeks to add something to faith in order to accomplish salvation. To repent is to 'change one's mind,' and to believe is to remove one's trust from that in which it has rested and place it in Christ." Howard, William. "Is Faith Enough to Save?" Bibliotheca Sacra. January-March, 1942 (p.99).

"This kind of faith is not 'easy believism'. It is not easy to say, 'I can't save myself, I must recognize that there is something wrong with me, and I must seek help from someone else.'" Hook, H. Phillip. "A Biblical Definition of Saving Faith." Bibliotheca Sacra. April-June, 1964 (p. 133, 138).

"Eternal life is free. Discipleship is immeasurably hard. The former is attained by faith alone, the latter by a faith that works... the former brings with it the righteousness of God so that a man is 'justified freely by his grace' (Romans 3:24). The latter develops a personal righteousness, based on good deeds, so that a man was also 'justified by works' (James 2:24). The former constituted the believer God's workmanship, the latter fulfilled the wonderful purpose for which he had been created. The former cost man nothing, the latter could cost him everything, including life itself." Hodges, Zane C. The Hungry Inherit. Moody Press, Inc., 1972 (p. 114, 115).

"There is a vast difference between coming to Jesus for salvation and coming after Jesus for service. Coming to Christ makes one a believer, while coming after Christ makes one a disciple. All believers are not disciples. To become a believer one accepts the invitation of the Gospel, to be a disciple one obeys the challenge to a life of dedicated service and separation. Salvation comes through the sacrifice of Christ; discipleship comes only by sacrifice of self and surrender to His call for devoted service. Salvation is free, but discipleship involves paying the price of a separated walk. Salvation can't be lost because it depends upon God's faithfulness, but discipleship can be lost because it depends upon our faithfulness." DeHaan, M. R. Hebrews. Zondervan Publishing House, 1959 (p. 117).

"For the unregenerate man, repentance is the change of mind whereby he turns from unbelief to faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ." Post, Roger. "The Meanings of the Words Translated 'Repent' and 'Repentance' in the New Testament." Master's Thesis, Wheaton College, June 1972 (p. 80).

"There are those who, in their zeal to get people to turn from their sinful ways and receive the Lord, almost put repentance on a par with believing... Repentance, as it relates to Christ, means to change our minds about Him, who He is and what He's done to provide forgiveness and deliverance from our sins. When we place faith in Jesus as having taken our place personally on the cross and borne the penalty due our sins, then we're automatically repenting, because we couldn't accept Him in this way without having had to change our minds in some way concerning Him." Lindsey, Hal. The Liberation of Planet Earth. Zondervan Publishing House, 1974 (p. 136, 137).

"Discipleship is frequently equated with salvation and often erroneously made a condition for becoming a Christian". Pentecost, J. Dwight. Design for Discipleship. Zondervan Publishing House, 1971 (p. 11).

"Certainly discipleship is a most important aspect of our relation to Christ, but it belongs to the sphere of Christian life rather than entrance upon that life... One does not become a disciple in order to become a Christian, but because he has become a Christian by faith in the Savior, it is fitting that he embark upon a life of discipleship". Harrison, Everett F. "Must Christ be Lord to Be Savior?-No." Eternity, September 1959 (p. 14).

"There is no more piously subtle abrogation of the Gospel than to tell a Sinner that he must not only believe in the Savior, but dedicate himself to do God's will, crown the Savior Lord of his life, etc., etc. Obviously, dedication and service are highly desirable, but they are the privilege and the duty of the saved, never a condition of salvation for the unsaved (cf. Romans 12:1, 2)." Unger, Merrill F. God is Waiting to Meet You. Moody Press, 1975 (p. 117, 118).

"People are sometimes led to believe that there is saving value in some public confession of Christ, or profession of a decision. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness." This is salvation. "With the mouth confession is made unto salvation." This is the voice of the newborn child speaking to and of its father. The only condition on which one may be saved is to believe." Chafer, Lewis Sperry. Salvation. Dunham Publishing Company, 1917 (p. 46).

SUMMARY
Lordship salvation is where someone teaches that there must be a commitment to Christ as Lord of one's life in order to be saved. Recently there has been a modification of this position to say that willingness to be controlled by the Lord at the time of salvation is all that is required in addition to faith in order to be saved. The message of faith only and the message of faith plus commitment of life can't both be the gospel; therefore, one of them is a FALSE GOSPEL and comes under the curse of perverting the gospel or preaching another gospel.

Galatians 1:8, 9 says, "But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you, than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that you have received, let him be accursed."

If only committed people are saved people, then where is there room for carnal Christians? What kind of dedication must be preached to people, if in order to be saved, they have already dedicated their lives to the Lord? Where do you stop if you start adding something else to this which is the gospel revealed in the Bible? Look at what God says about adding to the revelation of Jesus Christ (gospel), "For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book (Revelation 22:18)." The Bible plainly declares that we are saved by faith, and not by works. Where does it say this? Ephesians 2:8, 9 "For by grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast." What are you trusting in to get you to heaven?

* Written by Dr. Hank Lindstrom

You are saved in a moment of time, because you are trusting in the true Savior now, not working your way to Heaven day by day, which is not even possible.

Once saved you can never be lost, not for any reason. This is because you were born spiritually into God's family the moment you put your trust in Him. Just like your physical birth, which brought you into this human world, your spiritual birth gave you a new spiritual life that is permanent. You were born-again, made righteous and holy by God's imputed (counted to you by faith) righteousness. You then have the righteousness of God. You are sinless and perfect in God's eyes by faith in His only begotten Son, and that's why you can enter into a perfect Heaven.

One of my favorite sayings is:

God will not save anyone who is trying to be saved, He will only save those who are trusting to be saved.

Another is:

Faith is the only righteous thing that I can do.

You MUST put ALL your trust in Jesus to be saved. Simply trust in the blood that He shed on the cross. Trust that He is God in the flesh. Trust that He made the complete payment for your sins, not just in part. Christ paid for ALL of your sins (past, present and future)! Trust that He rose from the dead after 3 days and 3 nights. In return for your trust, God gives YOU Eternal Life. All false Christians put part of their trust in Jesus, and then some of their trust in a church or baptistery. Some put part of their trust in them self. If you put 99.99% trust in Jesus and 00.01% in something else, you will go to Hell. It must be 100% trust in Jesus and what He did on Calvary's cross to redeem you, and 0% in your works or your church! This information in critical because grace always cancels works, and works always cancels grace! You are going to Hell if it's by your works, or grace plus works. You are going to Heaven solely by Gods grace. It's as simple as that. Lordship Salvation is a perversion of God's grace!

The $64,000 question comes down to: Who are you trusting? Are you trusting yourself to get to Heaven by being a good person, serving Jesus and giving lots of money to your church; or are you trusting Jesus, the Lamb of God who was slain for the sins of the world to get you to Heaven? You receive the Gift of God (Eternal Life) as soon as you stop trusting in yourself, your church, your synagogue, your mosque, your money, or any other works; and put your childlike faith in Christ ALONE.

False prophets are everywhere, and they will find and kill you (Matthew 7:15). Satan's greatest weapon is to con people into living the Christian life without ever being born again. Salvation is receiving, not achieving! Getting saved is a TAKE proposition, not a GIVE proposition. It is a free gift. You simply take God's gift of eternal life by faith in His only begotten Son. John3:16, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

Remember, when you get saved by faith alone, your STANDING in Christ is forever settled. You were saved by God's grace, which has nothing to do with works or service. The way you choose to live your life after you get saved is your STATE in Christ. If you have to look at your life to prove that you're saved, it proves that you're not.

When we get saved, that is SALVATION. But our growth in Christ as a child of God is our SERVICE (Romans 12:2). We must always keep service separate from getting saved. Put another way theologically, getting saved is the believer's JUSTIFICATION. The life we should live for Christ because we love Him is the believer's SANCTIFICATION. These two train rails must never contact each other, or else you will be spiritually electrocuted and die. I love what Pilgrim's Progress author and free grace Gospel preacher, John Bunyan, said:

“If you do not put a difference between justification wrought by the man Christ without and sanctification wrought by the Spirit of Christ within, you are not able to divide the Word aright; but contrariwise, you corrupt the Word of God, and cast stumbling blocks before the people.” —John Bunyan (1628-1688)

Amen and amen!!!

If all this makes sense to you and you would like to trust Jesus as your personal Savior right now, then simply make your decision to trust Jesus Christ as your only hope of Heaven. You don't have to pray to be saved, but if it makes you feel better, you may tell Jesus that you are no longer putting your trust in your actions, or your church, or your church membership, or your idols, or in your money, or in your Rabbi, or in your synagogue or your Mosque, or in the baptistery water, but that you are putting all of your trust in Jesus Christ alone.

Somebody asked me if they should put their trust in Jesus, or the Good News about Jesus. Dear reader, they are one and the same! You must agree with the fact that you are a sinner in God's sight (Romans 3:23), and there is a penalty for sin, which is death (Romans 6:23). This penalty includes a second death in Hell (Revelation 20:11-15; 21:8). You must agree with the facts of the Gospel, which are threefold: Jesus DIED on the cross for our sins, He was BURIED, and then three days later He RESURRECTED.

All Jesus wants is for you to believe that He did it all for you, and if you will simply place your trust in Him, Jesus will save you. Repentance is a change of mind toward THE TRUTH (John 3:21; 2nd Timothy 2:25-26). Biblical Salvation is forsaking any other means of salvation but Christ and casting ourselves fully upon Him for eternal life.

Why Lordship Salvation Is WRONG!