In John 10:28b the Lord Jesus declares concerning His believers, “No one shall snatch them out of My hand.” The Son’s mighty hand is for our protection. Not only the Father’s hand but also the Lord’s hand will keep us from perishing. No one can snatch us out of the Father’s hand nor out of the Lord’s hand. We are secured by two divine hands, the Father’s hand of love and the Son’s hand of grace, both of which are powerful to keep. Because the hands of the Father and the Son will never fail, the believers are eternally secured and will never perish.
Finally, our salvation is secured by Christ’s unfailing promise. The Lord Jesus said, “All that the Father gives Me shall come to Me, and him that comes to Me I will by no means cast out” (John 6:37). Here we see that the Lord Jesus promised that He will never reject or forsake anyone who comes to Him.
All the verses concerning the twelve factors of the security of our salvation are clear and unambiguous. These verses give us a solid foundation for the security of our salvation, and nothing can annul them. Therefore, all the believers in Christ may have the proper faith to believe that God’s salvation is eternal.
Now we come to the last matter in the initial stage of God’s full salvation, the stage of regeneration—clearing the past. The normal experience of regeneration includes the clearing of the past. Once a person has been saved, he will want to make a clearance of his past.
Clearing the past is not a fulfillment of the requirement for salvation. In other words, it is not necessary for someone to clear the past in order to be saved. The clearing of the past is an issue, a result, of the enjoyment of salvation. When a believer enjoys God’s salvation, this enjoyment will cause him to clear the past.
The clearing of the past is not required for initial salvation. Initial salvation requires only that we believe in Christ. Although the clearing of the past is not required for initial salvation, it is needed for a better Christian life. If we follow the leading of the Lord within us to clear the past, we shall be enlivened, enlightened, strengthened, and satisfied. We shall also feel peaceful, secure, and full of the presence of the Lord. Then we shall be able to follow the Lord in our Christian life without dragging.
The clearing of the past is not by teaching but by the move of the Spirit. The religions of the world are built on their various religious codes, and their followers live and behave according to these rules. But the Lord’s salvation is not like that. The salvation of the Lord, through the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, gives us a new life. Because we have a new life, the divine life, we can now live and behave in the presence of God through the sense of this life and through the moving of the Spirit within us. Hence, the clearing of the past is based on the move of the Spirit. The Spirit will move within a regenerated person and cause him to sense certain things from his past that need to be cleared, for such things are not compatible with his new life as a believer in Christ. Such a believer should then proceed to clear the past according to the move of the Spirit within him.