Lordship Salvation: Biblical Principle or Heresy?

       I've been wanting to write this article for quite some time because I feel it is an important topic.  Salvation, grace, discipleship and sanctification are complicated subjects to where I honestly felt I didn't fully understand until a long time after I knew Jesus and not being familiar with christianese did not help one bit.  Its like trying to learn quantum mechanics in a foreign language. These subjects are often harder to understand with plenty of wolves in sheep clothing spreading false doctrines to push personal agendas regardless of what scripture tells them.  One of those agendas is the heresy of lordship salvation.  If you ever encountered people like Brother Ross at ECU then you may be familiar with it.

So what exactly is Lordship Salvation?

 

Lordship Salvation pretty much states that you must declare Jesus as the Lord of your life, repent of your sins and live a consecrated christian life free of sin in order to receive salvation..  In this false gospel, there is no such thing as backsliders, grace or faith alone being required for salvation. Versing saying that we have all sinned do not register for Lordship Salvationist. Salvation is dependent on your ability to live a sin free Godly life and if you fail, the gates of hell swing wide to receive you.  Your works in living sin free, not the death of Jesus, determine your salvation and if you screw up then sucks to be you. lol

Ha.ha.ha, such a cliche joke William.. You've been working on that all night?...*eyeroll*

Well why is this wrong? I though Jesus called us to submit ourselves and follow him?

 

Yes, Jesus told us to come to him and follow him BUT sanctification and salvation are two separate steps.  Christians do good works BECAUSE we are saved, NOT to get saved.  Lordship Salvation arose out of good intentions at the mass of Christians not living a sanctified life by abusing grace and failing to grow spiritually.  We are not called to follow good intentions but to follow scripture.  Sanctification in laymen's terms is obedience to God's word. Sanctification is a process after we get saved and it can be as quick as wild fire or something that inches slowly.  It is the process where you are slowly setting a good example of Jesus, spreading his aroma around and living a God centered life.  For me its not as rapid as some people and its something that I work at every day along with the millions of other Christians.  We are already saved and our salvation came when we chose to trust in Jesus for our salvation and repented(to feel sorry, realize guilt, etc) of our sins. Sanctification comes after. Salvation is a FREE gift and you can't pay anything for it because it was already bought by the blood of Jesus when he died on the cross.  You can only choose to accept the gift of salvation.  We are called to be disciples and honor God in what we do but that is AFTER we get saved.  You will never get saved if you try to live a sin free life to earn salvation.  We are expected to obey God AFTER we get saved.  Putting the fruit of salvation at the root of our faith in Jesus is not the message preached in the gospel.

So wait, its just faith alone for salvation? Can I just work my way around Jesus?

 

  The bible is full of sinners who were saved by their faith alone.  Even Abraham's faith counted him as righteous.  It was not works but his faith that saved him.  David was a very faithful Christian King who had backslid into adultery and assassination of the husband who's wife he slept with.  He was still a christian because his faith is what saved him.  Judas for example was a follower of Christ who jumped through all the right hoops but because he didn't trust in Jesus for his salvation, he still went to hell even after he did works as a Follower of Christ.  He did the works but he did not have faith in Jesus.  Even John the Baptist had doubts about Jesus being the messiah who still put his trust and faith in Jesus but a lordship salvationist would claim that this was a sign that he was never really saved to begin with.  Peter denied Jesus not once but a total of THREE TIMES!!!  They broke bread together, spent close time as practically brothers and Peter punked out on Jesus.  He still was saved and ended up coming around.  Lordship salvation would mean that Peter was not saved.  Even Paul struggled with sin. Lordship salvation would mean that Paul was not a christian and he was not saved.  Salvation is not about being perfect, its about what Jesus did for us on the cross which was die for our sins. Its about putting our faith and trust in him for saving us and not our own works.  Good works are simply fruit AFTER we have already received salvation.  Salvation is by grace alone and is not tied to works,  God saves sinners.  Grace alone is not an excuse to abuse the forgiveness but the fruit is not the tree, its a product AFTER the tree(Salvation) has been formed.

Come to Jesus FIRST for salvation, THEN get your life straightened out

 

Yes, even "that guy" in the back recovering from a hangover.. We see you! lol

 If you don't know Jesus or trust him for your salvation then you need to come to him regardless of how much you feel you should straighten up first because Jesus is the one who grants you salvation and makes you right again.  The Gospel is open for everyone and Jesus died so that everyone may be saved, even that guy that took a dump on the police car at the Occupy Wall Street protest. (Like really dude? What made you think that was even the slightest bit acceptable?)  What in the world was your state of mind?) Its up to you to choose Jesus, I can't force anything.  This false doctrine has kept people from accepting Jesus because they can't stop sinning and don't want to go to church unless they clean themselves up first.   You don't come to Jesus correct, you come to Jesus to GET correct.  Jesus came to save sinners.

God Bless!