David Diga Hernandez - How to Know You're TRULY Saved

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had a fearful Christian come up to me or write to me and ask things like, «I committed this sin. Did God abandon me»? Or, «What happens if I die while having this unconfessed sin»? Or, «What if I think this thought or say this word or find myself in a sinful situation and I die at that moment, what then? Do I go to heaven or do I go to hell»? Many believers doubt their salvation. They go back and forth between living in faith and living in fear without ever being grounded in the certainty of salvation through Christ Jesus. I want you to know this that it is the religious spirit that causes you to question your salvation. And by that, I mean, religious thinking. Imagining that you have to work for your salvation, that you have to work to keep your salvation. We need to understand that salvation comes by faith period. Now I know there are some people who take issue with me saying that, because they’ll say something like, «Well, you can’t tell them it’s by faith alone. Because if you tell them that, they’re gonna go on sinning». That’s exactly why Paul the apostle had to say, «Am I saying we should go on sinning»? It’s precisely because salvation is by faith that Paul had to clarify that. But just because we trust in the Lord for our salvation doesn’t mean that we should give way to sin as I’m gonna show in a few minutes. But I want to, first and foremost, cause you by the scripture to understand how you are saved. We must understand first the place of salvation before we can understand the place of holiness. Ephesians 2:8-9 says this, «For by grace are ye saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. Not of works, lest any man should boast». The reason believers sometimes are so afraid of losing their salvation, the reason believers are sometimes fearful in questioning their salvation is because they imagine that they’re the ones working for it. Worry is an attempt at control. And we worry about our salvation because we think we’ve saved ourselves. We worry about our salvation because we think we’re the ones saving ourselves. It’s not your devotion to God that saves you. It’s His devotion to you. You didn’t do anything to earn your salvation and you can’t do anything to keep it. How are you saved? Romans 10:9 says this, «If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved». Now, I often used to look at that scripture and wonder how is someone who can’t speak supposed to confess with their mouth? And therefore, how are they supposed to be saved? But here, confession isn’t necessarily the phonetic pronunciation of the words. It’s an acknowledgement. It’s knowing. It’s believing. It’s that deep acknowledgement, that inner witness, I am saved. Jesus is Lord. I believe in my heart that God raised Him from the dead. It’s something that takes place internally. Galatians 3:6 says, «In the same way, Abraham believed God and God counted him as righteous because of his faith». So then salvation clearly comes by faith. Again, religious thinking will already start questioning that’s saying, «How can it be by faith? Aren’t we supposed to live holy? What happens if you sin? Brother David, if you tell people that, they’re gonna go on sinning. They’re gonna think that grace is a license to sin». No. As I said, we have to first understand the place of salvation before we can understand the place of holiness. Imagine this. You go in for an operation, some issue with your body. Now, if you go in for an operation, you’re not the one operating on yourself. You’re just the one who chose to get on the table. You see, when we go to God for salvation, we’re not the ones saving ourselves. That’s not our job. We don’t perform the works that save us. Rather, we surrender ourselves. We yield ourselves to that process. It’s the equivalent of getting on the operating table. We get on the place and say, «God, save me. God, change me. God, make me holy. God, I’m trusting You to do the work». Being saved is like getting onto that operating table in that, it required simple surrender and definitely trust. Being saved is like receiving a gift. Someone writes you a check. You didn’t do anything to earn that if it’s a gift. They just gave you the check, but you do have to deposit it. You do have to exercise your faith, believing that the check will clear. In the same way, it’s not your works that save you. It’s believing that God is saving you, that saves you. Now, this is so simple and it’s precisely because it’s so simple that it agitates religious spirits. Remember this. Whatever is complicated and tedious and burdensome is always religious. Whatever is simple and liberating is truly spiritual.

Now this is not to say that you can just go on living how you want to live. This is not to say that you can do anything that you want to do without consequence. No, I’m gonna show you that other side to the coin in just a moment. But you’ll hear people preaching very harsh messages about how just because you think you’re saved doesn’t mean you are. Or just because you trusted in God doesn’t mean you truly are saved. And they cause you to question your salvation at every chance that they get. Remember this. Just because someone is speaking harshly doesn’t mean they’re speaking truthfully. Sometimes, we’re trained to think that. We think, «Oh man, that guy’s being real harsh. That guy’s being real mean». In fact, some preachers are really rude with how they preach and they attack people. They criticize people. And just because they’re rude and harsh and rough doesn’t mean that they’re speaking truth. In the same way, just because someone is speaking smoothly or kindly doesn’t mean they’re speaking truth. Our gauge for truth is what the scripture says. But when religious people tried to add on the burden of you working for your salvation, they become like the Pharisees that Jesus was talking about in Matthew 23:13. «What sorrow awaits you, teachers of religious law and you, Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you shut the door of the Kingdom of Heaven in people’s faces. You won’t go in yourselves and you don’t let others enter either». 1 John 5:3 tells us, «Loving God means keeping His commandments, and His commandments are not burdensome». In other words, there is obedience involved once we’ve been saved, but God’s commands are not burdensome. And He gives us the grace to keep them.

So often, you’ll hear paranoid questions as I was talking about earlier. They say, «Well, what if I’m driving down the street and I look at a woman in lust. And in that moment, I get in a car accident. My last act on earth was lust. Am I saved»? Or, «What if I committed something that I’m working on or that I’m striving for holiness in? What if there’s an area in my life that I’m struggling in and I haven’t yet confessed it to another human being, and then I suffer a heart attack, where do I go when I die»? People even ask about suicide. People who commit suicide, where do they go when they die? Now, in every case, it would be different because we’re all at different places with the Lord, but rest assured on this, if your salvation depended upon what you last did here on this earth, if your salvation depended upon getting the timing of your death just right, then there would be no need of the cross. When Jesus died for your sins, He died for your past and your future sins. And it really is that simple to be saved. So wherein is the balance? The scripture says, «What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith, but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food and one of you says to them, 'Depart in peace, be warmed and filled, ' but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, 'You have faith and I have works.' Show me your faith without your works and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe and tremble. But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead? Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works when he offered Isaac, his son, on the altar? Do you see that faith was working together with his works and by works, faith was made perfect? And the scripture was fulfilled which says, 'Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness.' And he was called the friend of God. You see then that a man is justified by works and not by faith only. Likewise, was not Rahab, the harlot, also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out another way? For as the body without the Spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead». That’s James 2:14–26.

Now when comparing James Chapter 2 with Ephesians Chapter 2, it can seem like a contradiction. For in Ephesians we’re told it’s by faith alone. And then in James we’re told, «Ah, but faith without works is dead». There’s no contradiction here. What James is describing is not being saved by works, but being saved by genuine faith. He’s not saying that works save you, but that the kind of faith that produces works actually results in salvation. Picture a tree. The tree’s roots go deep into the ground and that tree bears fruit. We’ll call it the tree of salvation. Now, most people imagine that the roots of that tree are good works and the fruits therefore manifested their salvation or those fruits represent salvation, but it’s actually the other way around. The roots that go deep into the ground are faith. The roots represent faith. And what then is produced by this tree of salvation is the fruit of good works. Therefore, works are not the roots of salvation. They are the fruits of salvation. It’s the transformed heart, the transformed nature that produces good works. I don’t live holy to be saved. I can live holy because I’m saved. I don’t live righteously to try to convince God to save me. I live righteously because I know He saved me and it’s my offering of thanks back to Him.

Another illustration I’ll give you. Imagine that there before you is a door. That door, when you open it, leads down a long hallway. And that hallway is very long. At the other end of the hallway is another door. So then the first door that’s before you, we’ll call it justification. The long hallway is sanctification. The door at the very end, that’s glorification. Justification is me being in right standing with God. It’s a legal term. Meaning, it’s done, I’m forgiven. There is nothing that I’ve done in God’s eyes that would disqualify me from being justified. That hallway is long. It’s the process of sanctification. It’s the process of becoming like Jesus. It’s the process of being made holy. At the very end, glorification. That’s when I’m a finished product. So the first door is justification or position. The hallway is sanctification or process. The door at the very end is glorification or perfection. Justification, sanctification, glorification. No matter where I’m at in my sanctification, the process, I know that the door behind me, justification, is closed. My position. Where I am in the process doesn’t affect my position. Now there’s some debate among believers about whether or not I can go back through that door. There’s a whole debate on whether or not you can lose your salvation, but we’re not talking about that right now. We’re talking about sincere believers who want to live right, who are doing their best, and struggle. Sometimes in that hallway of sanctification, you feel like you’re taking 10 steps forward and on other days you feel like you’re going 100 steps backwards, but here’s the good news. God is not looking for perfection. He is looking for you to be submitted to the process of perfection. Our salvation rests on the finished work of the cross. All wrath was poured out on Christ. Therefore, God has no more wrath to give. So when I come under the cross, when I come under the benefits of that salvation, that means that I do not receive the wrath of God. Now, if I wasn’t saved, there’s plenty of wrath for me. But because I’m in Christ, when God looks at me, He sees the holiness of His Son. When God looks at His Son, He sees my sins upon Him on that cross. God is looking for you to be submitted to the process of being perfected. So justification is my position. Sanctification is my process. Glorification will one day be my perfection. You may go up and down that hallway, but that door of justification, you’ve already gone through. That’s salvation.

Now the Bible promises that there would be a guarantee of our salvation. Ephesians 1:14 says, «The Spirit is God’s guarantee that He will give us the inheritance He promised, and that He has purchased us to be His own people. He did this so we would praise and glorify Him». 2 Corinthians 1:22 says, «And He has identified us as His own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees everything He has promised us». Now in Jewish wedding culture, the father of the groom would usually be the one who picked the bride for his son. After the father of the groom found whom he believed to be the choice bride, he would approach the bride and her family. There will be a written marriage agreement made. After the written agreement was finished, it was customary for the father of the groom to give a gift to the father of the bride. That gift acted as a deposit for the bride. It was a promissory note, a guarantee of the groom’s intentions to marry. Once that deposit was made, the intent to marry would become official. The Jewish wedding traditions, like many of the Jewish traditions, mirror the spiritual realm. Just as the father of the groom selects the bride, so God the Father has chosen to give the Church to His Son. And just as the father of the groom leaves a gift representing a promise, so God fills you with His Holy Spirit, His divine promise. In other words, God’s Holy Spirit in you is the guarantee that He’s coming back for you. God’s Holy Spirit in you is the seal of salvation. The proof that you belong to Him. The Holy Spirit gives us that inner witness. So let’s revisit these truths. I’m saved by faith. Simple. Believing on the Lordship of Christ, believing on what He accomplished on the cross saying, «Lord, I trust you. I believe what You did was enough for me and I’m putting my hopes in what You did». It’s that simple. If it wasn’t that simple, we’d mess it up. It is simple and people still mess it up. But God made it simple, that’s the good news of the gospel. You couldn’t save yourself if you tried, even if you stopped sinning from now until the day you died, it wouldn’t be good enough. We just can’t meet God’s standard. We cannot save ourselves period. So we’re helpless and hopeless without Christ and His cross. We surrender ourselves to Him. We get on that operating table, say, «Okay, you do the work». But we have to surrender. Faith is not a work in God’s eyes, but it does require faith on our part. Now if that faith is genuine, it will produce results. This doesn’t mean we won’t struggle but remember, as long as you’re in the hallway of sanctification, that means you’ve already passed the door of justification and you’re on your way to the other side, the door of glorification. And the Holy Spirit lives in us to confirm this to our hearts. God’s Holy Spirit in you is proof that you belong to Him.