By Sonny Hernandez
Assurance of salvation is an easy-to-understand topic for regenerate believers. God's elect don't look to their egregious decisions, corrupt religions, or synergistic sanctification for assurance but embrace the Father's divine election, the Savior's righteousness, and the Spirit's sealing because they know the Triune God infallibly secured their salvation and is thus the object of their faith.
The Holy Ghost seals the elect of the Father for whom Christ died. Therefore, the saints always look to the Savior's completed, saving, and effectual work alone and know His righteousness is the only ground of justification and assurance of salvation.
God's particular people or elect for whom Christ died must contrast Adam's fallibility and waywardness and the Savior's finished work. The garden revealed Adam's sin and rebellion (Genesis 3:6-7), but the gospel underscores the Savior's righteousness (Isaiah 61:10).
God's law demands perfection because it reflects the divine nature of Jehovah. Yet, Adam transgressed God's law, resulting in sin, death, and condemnation reckoned to all of his posterity (Romans 5:12). As a result, sinful creatures cannot meet God's perfect demands and thus break the law daily (James 2:10). All creatures, therefore, deserve death (Romans 6:23).
While Adam transgressed God's law, Christ satisfied the demands of the divine law (Matthew 5:17), having never broken it because it reflects His divine nature. All of Adam's posterity deserve death, but Christ died a propitiatory and substitutionary death in place of His sheep (John 10:11; 1 John 4:10).
The previous paragraphs emphasize the problem, solution, or the three imputations in Scripture: Adam's sin imputed to all of his posterity; the sins of the elect imputed to the Son; and the perfect righteousness of Christ imputed to the elect of God for whom the Savior died.
Therefore, God's particular people know they cannot satisfy the demands of the divine law or pay the penalty for disobedience and recognize they do not have a personal righteousness. Instead, the elect of the Father will always look to the perfect righteousness of another, Christ alone.
Instead of embracing the perfect righteousness of Christ alone (excluding works and law-keeping), lost men and women think they have a personal righteousness—that progressively grows—assuring them of salvation. Yet, the apostle referred to men as "ignorant of God's righteousness" for seeking to establish their "own righteousness" (Romans 10:3), and Paul called his personal righteousness "dung" (Philippians 3:8). Isaiah 64:6 reminds everyone that their personal righteousness "...are as filthy rags."
Sadly, many professing Christians think Christ saved them. However, they believe their good works, obedience, law-keeping, and forsaking themselves guarantee them assurance of salvation, but these works do not and will never save. Therefore, it's contradictory to say, "My good works, obedience, law-keeping, and forsaking myself give me assurance of salvation, but they don't save."
Christ's righteousness alone—the ground of justification—guarantees assurance of salvation to the elect. And assurance is the result of the ground of justification. Therefore, men who disagree are guilty of, admittedly or not, teaching a false gospel and, thus, false assurance.
In summary, the completed, saving, and effectual work of the Savior alone guarantees the elect assurance of salvation because Christ paid their debt; pardoned their iniquity; washed their sins with His blood; redeemed them from the curse of the law; delivered them from the power of sin, death, and Satan; reconciled them to God; appeased the Father's wrath in their place; accomplished justification on their behalf; clothed them with His perfect righteousness; resurrected for their justification; and promised them everlasting salvation.
"I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness..." (Isaiah 61:10, KJV)
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