NOTES ON BROKEN COVENANTS IN THE AMERICAN CHURCH: OSAS, DONALD TRUMP, AND BEING “CUT OFF.” – (WITH VIDEO)

1. THEOLOGY

SCRIPTURE. [To God’s own people, THE JUDAHITES] “Do we not all have one Father? Has not one God created us? Why do we deal treacherously with one another, profaning the covenant of our fathers [with God]? Judah has been treacherous (disloyal), and an repulsive act has been committed in Israel and in Jerusalem; for Judah has profaned the sanctuary of the Lord which He loves, and has married the daughter of a foreign god. As for the man who does this, may the Lord cut off from the tents of Jacob to the last man those who do this [evil thing], awake and aware, even the one who brings an offering to the Lord of hosts.” – MALACHI 2:10-12, AMP

KEY TERMS:

• “TREACHERY.” ‘BAGAD’ [נִבְגַּד֙]: “From a primitive root, ‘To cover (with a garment), to act covertly [against the Holy One];’ to pillage and deal deceitfully; to be traitorous; to betray.” NOTE: “The Hebrew verb ‘bagad’ conveys the idea of acting treacherously or deceitfully. It is often used in contexts where there is a ‘Breach of trust or faithfulness,’ whether in personal relationships, national alliances, or in the Covenant relationship between God and His people. ‘The term clearly implies betrayal, unfaithfulness, or deceitful dealings.’”

• “CUT OFF!” ‘KARATH’ [יַכְרֵ֨ת]: “A primitive root, ‘To cut down or asunder, destroy, utterly consume;’ also to make a [false] league; to be chewed between the teeth; to take away, permit to  perish (implying the death penalty).” NOTE: “The Hebrew verb ‘karath’ primarily means ‘to cut’ or ‘to cut off.’ It is used in various contexts, including the physical act of cutting or severing, as well as in a metaphorical sense, such as cutting off a person from a community or cutting down trees. Importantly, ‘karath’ is also used in the context of making covenants, where it implies the cutting or dividing of an animal as part of the covenant-making process, symbolizing the seriousness and binding nature of the agreement.”

QUOTATION. “For you will certainly carry out God’s Purpose, however you act, but it makes a difference to you whether you serve like Judas or like John.” ― C.S. LEWIS, The Problem of Pain, 1940; edited

COMMENTARY. “‘The Lord will cut off the man that doeth this [breaketh the Marriage Covenant], the master and the scholar.’ Literally ‘The Lord cut off from the man that doeth this, watcher and answerer’ … ‘And him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts’ – i.e., him, who, doing these things, offereth an offering to God, to bribe Him, as it were, to connivance at his sin. In the same meaning, Isaiah says, that God hateth Isaiah 1:13. ‘iniquity and the solemn meeting,’ and Isaiah 61:8, ‘I hate robbery with burnt-offering;’ or Solomon (Proverbs 15:8), ‘The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord’ (Proverbs 28:9); ‘He that turneth away his ear from hearing the Law, his prayer shall be an abomination.’

And God by Amos says , ‘I hate, I despise, your feast-days, and will not accept your solemn assemblies.’ In one sense the sacrifice was an aggravation, in that the worship of God made the offence either a sin against light, or implied that God might be bribed into connivance in the breaking of His Laws. ‘The ancient discipline of Removing from Communion those guilty of grievous sin was founded on this Principle.’” – JOSEPH BENSON, Notes on the Holy Bible, 5 vols., 1811-1818; edited

II. TEACHING

I’ll get straight to a couple of points I have made previously but will sharpen them here. First: The Covenant we strike with Jesus Christ is very much like a Marriage Covenant, in that we “Marry Him” with the concomitant Promise to remain faithful to Him for both Perpetuity and Eternity.

Second: When we violate that Covenant repeatedly and spiritually violently, we “Break Covenant” with our Master, and without zealously suing for Repentance and the Kept Promise to never stray again, we are indeed: “Cut off!” Both the original Hebrew text and the Benson Commentary together make it indelibly clear that under that severe and sustained PRACTICE OF BETRAYAL:

‘We lose God and His Promises forever.’ Selah.

THE SEVERITY OF PAUL. “For [it is impossible to restore to repentance] those who have once been enlightened [spiritually] and who have tasted and consciously experienced the heavenly gift and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted and consciously experienced the good word of God and the powers of the age (world) to come, and then have fallen away—it is impossible to bring them back again to repentance, since they again nail the Son of God on the cross [for as far as they are concerned, they are treating the death of Christ as if they were not saved by it], and are holding Him up again to public disgrace.” – HEBREWS 6:4-6, AMP

In Reply to this troubling passage, modern theologians furiously defend the OSAS (‘Once Saved Always Saved’) HERESY to their last dying breath. This in generational, rebellious Violation to the Biblical Canon, the very Words of Christ, the Apostles, and most Early Church teaching. Though I have written of this on two previous occasions, I am compelled to visit it again.

Why? Because it has substantially contributed to the White American Church’s hideous False Imprimatur to Give Donald Trump ‘Seditious Permission’ to shipwreck the Gospel! That’s why.

THE EARLY CHURCH VIEW. You know how much I love the Idea of Origins, so do I take us to an excellent historical essay by JEAN (JOHN) CALAHAN, former pastor, aerospace engineer and lay theologian with degrees in Biblical Studies, Mathematics, and Education. The title of his piece:

“Did the Primitive Church Teach the Doctrine of “Once Saved Always Saved?” (Never Thirsty, ret. Feb. 20, 2025; edited).

• CONSENSUS. “The writings of the Early Church Fathers indicate that they did not all agree with the statement ‘once saved always saved.’ Some of the early Christian writers appear to have believed that a person could lose his or her salvation by sinning and others believed that a person could lose his or her salvation if he or she no longer believed in Jesus. Here are a variety of quotes from some very significant Early Church Fathers.”

• JUSTIN MARTYR. “But I believe that even those, who have been persuaded … to observe the legal dispensation along with their confession of God in Christ, shall probably be saved. And I hold, further, that such as have confessed and known this Man to be Christ, yet who have gone back from some cause to the legal dispensation, and have denied that this Man is Christ, and have not repented before death, shall by no means be saved. Further, I hold that those of the seed of Abraham who live according to the Law, and do not believe in this Christ before death, shall likewise not be saved. – Dialogue Of Justin 47, 155-160 AD; edited

• SHEPHERD OF HERMAS. “They only who fear the Lord and keep His Commandments have life with God; but as to those who keep not His Commandments, there is no life in them … And he said, ‘If you do not guard yourself against [anger], you and your house lose all hope of salvation’ … [But] ‘Hear now,’ said he, ‘how wicked is the action of anger, and in what way it overthrows the servants of God by its action, and turns them from righteousness. But [anger] does not turn away those who are full of faith, nor does it act on them, for the power of the Lord is with them.’” – Shepherd of Hermas, 2.7; Book 1.4.1; Book 1-2, Commandment Fourth, Chap. 1; 155-170 AD; edited

• IRENAEUS. “Those who do not obey Him … have ceased to be His sons … But with respect to obedience and doctrine we are not all the sons of God: Those only are so who believe in Him and do His will. And those who do not believe, and do not obey His will, are sons and angels of the Devil, because they do the works of the Devil.” – Against Heresies, Book 4.41.3;  Book 41, 2; 180 AD; edited

• TERTULLIAN. “But what if a bishop, if a deacon, if a widow, if a virgin, if a doctor, if even a martyr, have fallen from the Rule (of Faith), will heresies on that account appear to possess the truth? Do we prove the Faith by the persons, or the persons by the Faith? No one is wise, no one is faithful, no one excels in dignity, but the Christian; and no one is a Christian but he who perseveres even to the end … But the world returned unto sin; in which point baptism would ill be compared to the deluge. And so it is destined to fire; just as the man too is, who after Baptism renews his sins: so that this also ought to be accepted as a sign for our admonition.” – The Prescription Against Heretics, Chap. 3; On Repentance, 2.9; 207-208 AD; edited

• ORIGEN. “If there is any other nature which is holy, it possesses this property of being made holy by the reception or inspiration of the Holy Spirit, not having it by nature, but as an accidental quality, for which reason it may be lost, in consequence of being accidental. So also a man may possess an accidental righteousness, from which it is possible for him to fall away … He who has not denied himself, but denied Christ, will experience the saying, ‘I also will deny Him.’” – De Principilis, Book , Chap 8; Gospel of Matthew, Book 12.” 24; 220-248 AD; edited

• CYPRIAN. “Whoever is separated from the Church and is joined to an adulteress, is separated from the Promises of the Church; nor can he who forsakes the Church of Christ attain to the rewards of Christ. He is a stranger; he is profane; he is an enemy. He can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother.” – Treatises of Cyprian, Treaties 1.6; 251-257 AD; edited

• CONCLUSION. “These men wrote from about A.D. 100 – 250. ‘We do not find any statements to the effect that once a Christian is saved, he or she is always saved. But we do find a consistent belief, except for a few instances, that faith and works go together.’ This is consistent with the Teachings of the Bible. The earliest statement regarding “once saved always saved” comes from Augustine (A.D. 354-430). It was left to Augustine to speak a clear word for perseverance in pre-Reformation times. Starting with Predestination, he saw that Election to Eternal Life inevitably involves Final Perseverance. Since salvation is always God’s gift, he entitled his work on perseverance On the Gift of Perseverance. He denied, however, that the believer can have any assurance of his final salvation. It is important to note that the doctrine of ‘Once Saved Always Saved’ did not appear in the literature of the Church until the Reformation Period [cf. John Calvin]. – CARL F.H. HENRY, Basic Christian Doctrines, 1962.

So, I state it plain enough for a child to hear and heed: The Judas-like American Apostasy under the darkened auspices of Trump-fueled Christian Nationalism permits Christians to believe in The Christ and the Antichrist simultaneously. Why? Because ‘Once you’re Saved, you can never become Unsaved, no matter what you think, do, or say for the rest of your days!’  

Selah.

III. LAST THOUGHTS

So, let’s just fit a Final Noose fully round the neck of most of the doctrinal slop of America’s Cheap Grace Teachings in America once and for all as it helped fuel the Spiritual and Political Sedition of Donald Trump’s Movement.

To the Severest of Warning I have ever penned.

MAXIM: ‘Those who consistently follow after and support Donald Trump’s Antichristian Lawlessness, axiomatically, Reject Christ and shall very probably perish in the Second Death.’

After ten years of the most intensive applied theological research I have ever conducted in my 80 years on this planet, I can no longer mince nor soften nor massage the Words of our God. They are Relentless. They are Absolute. They are a Blaze of Truth that blots out all the Darkness – if heard, and heeded:

‘You cannot serve Christ and Antichrist!’

DR. J.D. GREEAR. What I love most about the work that I do for y’all is the occasional ‘Discovery of a Diamond midst all that rough Darkness.’ Such is the case with the Rev. Dr. Greear, Pastor of The Summit Church, in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina. He is an author of nearly a dozen books on sound doctrine, who completed his Ph.D. in Theology at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

Significantly, Dr. Greear served with distinction as President of the Southern Baptist Convention during the scandalous debate over Dr. Russell Moore’s tenure as head of the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission. Dr. Greear stood steadfast with Dr. Moore throughout the contentious moral and political controversies and left his position around the same time as Dr. Moore’s exit.

I am delighted therefore to begin to close out our conversation with an essay by Pastor Greear titled, “Beware the Complacency of ‘Once Saved Always Saved’” (Jan. 29, 2020; edited). Here are his MAIN IDEAS.

• OPEN. “‘Many Cultural Christians think Church is a good thing, but they are not committed.’ They are not involved in any ministry. They don’t sacrificially give. They couldn’t tell you the last time they told someone about Jesus. They come to church about once every couple months, because they are ‘just so busy.’ (Plus, their extended family has a beach house and so they try and get down to it for the weekend whenever the weather is nice). For these people, Church is a good thing, but they’re just not interested in making it a priority. Ask any of these people if they are saved, and they will say ‘Yes.’ They will tell you about a time when they prayed a prayer and got baptized. But they don’t live their lives as if Jesus is Lord.”

• PRUNING. “‘Aren’t these like The Branches that God removed from Israel?’ “Now if some of the branches were broken off, and you, though a wild olive branch, were grafted in among them and have come to share in the rich root of the cultivated olive tree, do not boast that you are better than those branches … they were broken off because of unbelief, but you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but beware, because if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.’” – ROMANS 11:17–21 CSB

• AWAKEN! “If we see that God was willing to ‘cut off branches’ from His own Original Tree because of their unbelief, why would we (who have been grafted somewhat unnaturally into this Jewish Tree) ever think we can get away with the very things that got them removed? ‘The same transgressions that got Israel removed from the tree—compromise, taking their salvation for granted, giving lip-service to God, and going through religious motions without their hearts really belonging to Him—are rampant within the Church today!’ I am especially concerned for children who grow up in church, are raised in Christian families, and live up to expectations by, at some point, ‘getting saved.’ They avoid most major sins—at least, the ones they think are major. But in their heart of hearts, they know Jesus is not Lord. If this is you, Paul says, ‘Wake up! If this is what God did to the sons and daughters of Abraham, it’s what He will do to you, too!”

• OSAS. Sometimes Christians will use a perverted version of the Doctrine of Eternal Security to assure themselves they belong to God. This doctrine says, ‘once saved, always saved.’ That is, once you are truly saved, you can never lose it. Eternal Security is a glorious and comforting truth. But notice what Paul says in Romans 11:20: ‘You will be kept IF you avoid the unbelief that overcame Israel and “stand by faith.”’ If.

• TRUTH. “We have Two seemingly Contradictory Truths: On the one hand, the Bible says that once God saves you, you’ll always be saved (e.g., John 10; Romans 8); on the other, it says that only if you endure to the end will you be saved (cf. Hebrews 3:12–14). ‘You have to put the two together.’ One of the essential marks of truly saving faith is that it endures to the end. The Real Doctrine of Eternal Security reads like this: Not only ‘Once saved, always saved’ but also ‘Once saved, forever following.’ Having a faith that endures to the end is evidence that you possess the salvation you could never lose. Not enduring to the end is evidence you never had it to begin with. ‘Saving faith is staying faith!’ You see, the evidence of saving faith is not the intensity of emotion at the beginning but its endurance over time. Think of it like a marriage: You don’t judge the sincerity of a marriage vow by the lavishness of the wedding ceremony but by the faithful commitment that follows it. ‘When it comes to God, a lot of Christians are all ceremony, no marriage.’

DK’S TAKE. I have said it too many times to count in these last several years, with greater and greater urgency: You cannot be partially saved, anymore than you can be partially married. Hear me now:

‘You are either 100% in Christ, or you are not in Christ at all!’

Don’t take my word for it, beloved, but consider His Warning about hedging our spiritual bets in relation to the Unpardonable Sin:“He who is not with Me [once and for all on My side] is against Me; and he who does not [unequivocally] 

gather with Me scatters.” – MATTHEW 12:30, AMP

This my friends is the True Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Biblical Canon of the Living God, and the only interpretation of Eternal Security there is. Please therefore Reject and Renounce all False Security and the Rampant Complacency that engineered the Triumph of the American Antichrist in our time.

‘He has drawn the Divine Line, beloved. Do not by any means dare to be found on the wrong side of it.’

YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/J0mNxwEwJS0