100. Eternal Life
John 10:28 And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
Eternal Life is a certainty: Jesus promised to give it to us; He promised we would never perish; He promised that no one would pluck us out of His hand. Eternal life is promised again and again as a gift earned for us by Jesus. The opposite of eternal life is perishing, which will never happen; perish means to be destroyed and never come to life again; perish is more than just die; perishing is the Second Death, an eternal death from which one will never return; perish means no hope, no life and no God.
The further guarantee of the eternal life promise is that we are in the hands of Jesus, and no one will be able to pluck us out of His hand. We cannot be more secure and assured; being securely in the hands of Jesus is the safest place we could ever be. No person, no demon, no devil, no sin and no death can take us out of such certain security. Eternal Security is real and it is solid. We can face life and death with the guaranteed promise of eternal life. All the power of God is keeping us. From God’s point of view we cannot lose that Life.
However, it is left to each saved person that it is still possible to reject that life and intentionally lose or give up that salvation; God leaves it up to us to jump out of His secure hands if we so choose. God does not force us into anything; nor does He override our own sinful self-will to prevent us from making a bad choice. It is possible to fall away, but the fall is caused by willfully jumping, not being pushed. It would seem impossible that anyone would reject such a great salvation, but the option is there. For this reason, the Bible has many warnings about falling away.
The short answer to the “eternal security” question: from God’s point of view it is impossible to lose eternal life; from the saved human’s point of view we still have the option of rejecting salvation and losing eternal life should we so choose. The simple promise: you have eternal life, and you won’t lose it.