pastor mike weblog

Once when I was covering the pastor-on-call an email came through from a church member asking about whether or not we can lose our salvation. Here is my answer:

We believe that once saved, always saved.  This is known by the term “perseverance of the Saints.”  I.e. if someone is saved, and they persevere to the end of their life here on earth as saved, they are truly born again.  We hold to a reformed theology on this subject, that a truly born again individual cannot lose their faith.  John 6:38-40 shows that “every one who sees the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”  Another scripture is John 10:27-29 where we read “…I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish…and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.”  Many more passages exist to support the view of the perseverance of the Saints including Romans 8:1 and 8:30.  Ephesians 1 says we are “sealed with the promise of the Holy Spirit” and it is the “guarantee of our inheritance.”  There are so many other passages to support this perspective.  There are people who are close to the church that appear as if they have a genuine saving faith, but actually don’t. The best example I can think of is Judas who apparently exhibited saving faith but ultimately was not truly saved (Jesus called him the “devil”).  And also Jesus says in Matthew 7 “Not everyone who says to me “Lord, Lord” shall enter the kingdom…”  If a person exhibits behavior that does not line up with one of a saved, and sanctified individual, it calls into question whether or not they were truly saved to begin with.  As I said, we do not believe that you can lose your salvation.  The Armenian view that you can lose your salvation often uses Hebrews 6:4-6 as the main basis for their argument: 

For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they fall away,to renew them again to repentance, since they crucify again for themselves the Son of God, and put Him to an open shame. For the earth which drinks in the rain that often comes upon it, and bears herbs useful for those by whom it is cultivated, receives blessing from God; but if it bears thorns and briers, it is rejected and near to being cursed, whose end is to be burned – Hebrews 6:4-8 (NKJV)

In this scriptural example (reading on through verses 7 and 8), those who receive final judgment are compared to land which bears no fruit but rather bears thorns and thistles.  It appears that the author of Hebrews is referring to fruitlessness, and in scripture we see this as a sign of someone who is not a believer (see Matt 3:8-10; 7:15-20; 12:33-35). I.e. if you bear no fruit, you are likely not saved.  In John 15 Jesus says “every branch of mine that bears no fruit…” showing that there are branches that are fruitless.  Armenians use this verse to imply that branches that bear no fruit are still true branches on the vine.  We would say they are counterfeits. The term “enlightened” in verse 4 of the Hebrews passage simply means that they understand the truth of the Gospel, not that they have entered into a saving faith.  The argument for losing your faith is just not convincing enough when we have so much overwhelming evidence to support the reformed view.

Okay so this is fun, the final video blog for Julian’s new album has now posted. Sweet! Secondly, the CD is here. YES it’s true! It’s here, sitting in boxes in the studio, waiting for Julian to arrive from JBU so we can all open it together. How fun is that? If you go to www.julianmichaelmusic.com/store you can order the CD. Buy a copy to support Julian and our little recording studio in the Black Forest! Thank you.

Hey, there’s a new video out for you to see. Julian’s album is really close to being here (next week in fact). Have fun!

Okay so I just had to post this cause it is bugging me. The new song “Free” on Switchfoot’s latest album “Hello Hurricane” (released just a few days ago) has exactly the same melody line in the verse as “War Pigs” by Black Sabbath. This is not a stretch to hear. I personally have no, and have never had, any interest in Black Sabbath (not the least of reasons is that the motivation for the band’s music was based in attempting to create the musical equivalent of horror films). But that’s not the point. The point is, “War Pigs” is a very popular song, and Jon Foreman lifted the melody line from it. It may be an error, but that’s not really the point either. As a songwriter myself I experienced a time where we were literally one day away from sending a CD off to be manufactured and we discovered that the melody in our chorus was exactly the same as another popular worship tune. This was an honest mistake and I recall the day I wrote that melody line and know it was original…for me. There are only so many notes, and I have heard so much music in my life, somehow that melody line made it into the tune and we didn’t catch it. But fact is, we did catch it before the CD was made so we did a quick re-write, re-recorded the vocals same day, remastered the CD and sent it off. I just have to wonder how this got missed in the grand scheme of releasing Switchfoot’s latest album. Those guys most certainly have heard the song “War Pigs” being students of the rock genre. And if they didn’t catch it, wouldn’t the producer(s) know? Or how about an agent, or a friend, or their mom, or someone, somewhere at Atlantic records? Recently there was some brouhaha and a lawsuit brought (and recently settled) to mega-band Coldplay by guitarist extraordinaire Joe Satriani who said the band had lifted one of his songs. Fact is, “lack of originality” happens all the time in music. But in the case of “Free” I really wonder who was listening to this song (besides the band) and if someone heard the similarity, why didn’t they say anything? Final possibility: sometimes artists pay homage to other artists and influences in their songs intentionally, and I think that’s cool. I’ve done it myself. Now if *that* is the case it leaves me asking Jon Foreman: why Black Sabbath?

“War Pigs” at 1:04 and “Free” at 0:32 for reference.

Jasmine is playing Louisa Hurst in an all-original play production of Pride and Prejudice. I am so proud of her and her commitment to theatre! This is an almost 2 week run that ends on Saturday (I am attending 3 times). Well I bought a ticket tonight just so I could film this one scene. Enjoy!

Hey everyone, we need some help and you get to make the call! We get to submit one song from Julian’s album to an A&R rep for evaluation, and also we need to figure out which song to release on college radio. But we can’t decide! You can help us. For those of you who already know most of these tunes, please vote below. For those who don’t know the songs, you can check out some previews at www.julianmichael.com. Please vote and help us out!

Hey, check out Julian’s website if you want to watch a new video of him in the studio featuring 5 seconds of our guest bassist TOM SNIDER!

Or you could just see it below…

Last Sunday at church I gave the message and now it’s available on the Vineyard CS website to listen to. Giving the message was a ton of fun. As always I had too much material but that’s what you get when you only speak once in a while, I’m such a preaching noob. I had two sermons packed into one, but with a title like “Free to Worship” there’s a lot of territory to cover.

Below is the Freedom Grid I discuss in the message if you want to follow along but you can also access it on the Vineyard site. Enjoy!

Click here to listen to the message posted on the Vineyard website (will open a new window).

image (c) 2009 Destinysong, Inc. used by permission all rights reserved

By the way, the video referenced in the sermon can be seen here. It’s pretty much amazing.

Okay, obviously Delirious? is amazing. Read this testimony someone wrote in to the band on their History Makers blog. It will show you how much God really cares for each and every one of us, and also what an act of obedience (on the band’s part and on this friend’s part) can do. It can save a life. Literally:

“A few years ago I went to the delirious? gig in Liverpool on the World Service Tour. During Every Little Thing, Martin asked us to ring a friend and let them listen to the song. A friend of mine had been unable to make the gig, I rung him, let him listen to the chorus a couple of times and hung up – didn’t want to waste my credit! That Sunday at church he gave the following testimony: A couple of months back he had started to slip away from God. He had been having problems at home and these were getting him down. He started to hang around with the wrong crowd and get involved in drink and drugs. Things got so bad that he decided to end his own life. He went into the bathroom and picked up some razor blades ready to slash his wrists and kill himself. Just then his phone rang and it was me saying “Mate,we are at a delirious concert, listen to this …”Every Little things, Gonna Be Alright”". Thesong and more importantly the timing of it, gave him hope for the future. He obviously didn’t take his own life and still alive and well today! When I heard this testimony I just went numb. What I did, as a fun thing at a d: gig, saved someones life.I just want to thank God, for working the whole timing out – it was amazing how they played the song, just at the right time. I also want to honour Martin and delirious for being faithful, for listening to God and for making a difference. – Andrew”

This photo is Martin reading scripture at the show we went to Saturday night. Their last show in America.