Welcome back to Shemis Popery. I'm Joe Heschmire. Is it possible for a Christian to lose their salvation?

Can a Christian forfeit their salvation by returning to a life of serious sin? Can a Christian forfeit their

salvation by deciding that they no longer believe in Jesus Christ? This is an important question

that is long divided even different groups of Protestants. If it is possible that Christians can lose their eternal salvation through sin or unbelief,

telling them that they can't would be like convincing someone standing on the ledge of a bridge

that even if they throw themselves off, they'll survive because they're immortal.

So you might be wondering, how do people who claim this handle the obvious objection, that there

are a lot of former Christians? I mean, you can see people, whether in the public square or

perhaps in your own life, who have gone from being seemingly devout Christians to rejecting

Christianity entirely. No, the usual claim here is that these ex-Christians must never have really been Christians

in the first place.

If you're familiar with the No True Scotsman fallacy, this seems like an obvious version

of that, so much so that my Catholic Answers colleague Trent Horn calls it the No True

Protsman objection.

But I want to propose four reasons to suggest that this idea of

one saved always saved is a dangerous falsehood. And the fourth one in particular is an argument

that I suspect you may not have heard before. And by the way, if this is a kind of project that you

think is helpful in building up the body of Christ, I'd ask you to consider joining my Patreon over at

Shamelessjo.com. It's a lovely community with both Catholics and Protestants, and I'm loving

the conversations over there. I can't promise you eternal security, but I can promise you,

my sincere gratitude and my prayers, for your direct support. So the idea that you can't lose your

salvation is called different things by different

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