Marie Hugershoff: Discussion Questions

1.Can someone lose their salvation? If so, what would make them lose it? Select a few Bible passages that address this subject and briefly (1-3 sentences each) explain how the verse speaks to this question.
- I have always believed that once you accepted salvation you couldn't lose it. It didn't make sense to me how you could have a real relationship with Jesus with the understanding of what he did on the cross and then one day decide to turn away from him. One passage that I thought of and that Bird brings up is John 10: 27-28. In this passage Jesus says that His sheep can can never be taken away from Him. According to Jesus in this passage those who know Him will have eternal life and nothing is great enough to snatch that away. This seems pretty clear to me that once you know Jesus you can not be lost again.

Another Passage is Romans 8:39 which says "neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans Chapter 8 says that we will be tempted, we will have trials, we will be persecuted, but none of those things will be able to separate us from the love that we find in Jesus. The bible says that we all stray away from God and some of us stray a lot farther than others, but I believe that once you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior you will never be able to stray far enough so that you are no longer a part of His flock.



2. What image of salvation do you naturally gravitate towards and why?
- I think it's difficult to say that I only gravitate towards one image of salvation. They are all so incredible and I think I gravitate towards different ones in different seasons of my life. Lately I have been thinking and praying a lot about redemption . For me, redemption is the closest to encompassing all of salvation.  Knowing that God redeemed me from sin and continues to redeem me gives me so much hope that God will never give up on me and that He will continue to grow me. It also makes me feel so loved by God. Bird writes "slaves contribute nothing to their redemption. The price is paid by another, not by the enslaved"(p553). This reminds me that I would be nothing without my redeemer and that I am so undeserving of His salvation, but He paid the price for me because of how much he loves me.

Marie Hugershoff wrote:
1.Can someone lose their salvation? If so, what would make them lose it? Select a few Bible passages that address this subject and briefly (1-3 sentences each) explain how the verse speaks to this question.
- I have always believed that once you accepted salvation you couldn't lose it. It didn't make sense to me how you could have a real relationship with Jesus with the understanding of what he did on the cross and then one day decide to turn away from him. One passage that I thought of and that Bird brings up is John 10: 27-28. In this passage Jesus says that His sheep can can never be taken away from Him. According to Jesus in this passage those who know Him will have eternal life and nothing is great enough to snatch that away. This seems pretty clear to me that once you know Jesus you can not be lost again.

Another Passage is Romans 8:39 which says "neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans Chapter 8 says that we will be tempted, we will have trials, we will be persecuted, but none of those things will be able to separate us from the love that we find in Jesus. The bible says that we all stray away from God and some of us stray a lot farther than others, but I believe that once you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior you will never be able to stray far enough so that you are no longer a part of His flock.


2. What image of salvation do you naturally gravitate towards and why?
- I think it's difficult to say that I only gravitate towards one image of salvation. They are all so incredible and I think I gravitate towards different ones in different seasons of my life. Lately I have been thinking and praying a lot about redemption . For me, redemption is the closest to encompassing all of salvation.  Knowing that God redeemed me from sin and continues to redeem me gives me so much hope that God will never give up on me and that He will continue to grow me. It also makes me feel so loved by God. Bird writes "slaves contribute nothing to their redemption. The price is paid by another, not by the enslaved"(p553). This reminds me that I would be nothing without my redeemer and that I am so undeserving of His salvation, but He paid the price for me because of how much he loves me.

I would agree with you that if a person has a relationship with God then I don't think they will stray from Him. But what if they don't have a relationship? Oftentimes people's knowledge of God is just head knowledge but they don't truly understand God in their heart. In my opinion, it's very possible that these people could stray away from God if at some point they deny the Gospel. Many times people with head knowledge but not heart knowledge reach a place in their lives when they if following God is worth it. At this point they either develop a deeper understanding of God or they push him away and may never come back to Him.