It is not uncommon for me to find theological questions in my inbox from brothers and sisters outside my own church. Unfortunately, I’m rarely able to respond directly to such queries. But some questioners are persistent enough, and some questions seem broadly relevant enough that I figure a brief blog post is in order.
Like this question: is glorification conditional?
The question was prompted by something John Piper said on a panel to the effect that glorification was conditional. The other panelists, of whom I was one, didn’t seem bothered by Piper’s statement. So this brother who emailed me is wondering why not. How can we say that the believer’s future and final glorification is in any sense conditional?
As often happens in theological discussion, we have to start by saying that in one sense glorification is not conditional, if by condition we mean we must earn our place in heaven or that the final salvation of those regenerated and justified hangs in the balance. The golden chain of Romans 8:30 cannot be broken: those whom God predestined will be called and those called will be justified and those justified will be glorified.
But the word “conditional” does not have to carry the sense of merit or uncertainty. A condition is simply a requirement that must be met or a state of affairs that must come to pass if a certain event or outcome is to be realized. To say something is “conditional” is to say nothing about how the condition is met or whether there is any doubt the condition will be fulfilled. I can see how the word “conditional” throws people off, but we must affirm from Scripture that without certain evidences made manifest in our lives, we will not be glorified.
- Without holiness we will not see the Lord (Heb. 12:14).
- Those marked by patterns of willful sin and disobedience will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:8-10).
- God will present us before him holy and blameless if we continue in the faith and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel (Col. 1:22-23).
We must not ignore these warnings and promises. We cannot live like the devil and expect to meet God. This is not because God demands a set number of holiness points before we can enter heaven. We are justified by faith alone through grace alone in Christ alone. And this grace that grants us faith will invariably be a grace that causes us to change and keeps us in the love of God. To ignore the second half of the previous sentence is to prove the first half never happened.
This is the point Piper makes in Part VI of Future Grace, a section entitled “Unmerited, Conditional Future Grace”:
If the language of conditions trips you up, think about what Piper is saying using the more familiar language of “perseverance.” Glorification is the promised reward for those persevere to the end. The fact that our perseverance is a gift from God which is infallibly given to the elect, born again, justified believer does not remove from us the requirement to preserve.
John Murray explains:
So is glorification conditional? Not if that means we can earn heaven or that those declared righteous before God are in danger of being declared unrighteous on the day of judgment. But will we be glorified irrespective of the kind of life we live? The testimony of the New Testament everywhere states just the opposite. As Murray says, “Perseverance means the engagement of our persons in the most intense and concentrated devotion to those means which God has ordained for the achievement of his saving purpose. The scripture doctrine of perseverance has no affinity with the quietism and antinomianism which are so prevalent in evangelical circles” (155). Or to put it another way, “the one who endures to the end will be saved” (Matt. 24:13).
