It is in the nature of the case that Reformed theologians always maintained that the believers in Christ will certainly persevere unto the end, and that final and complete apostasy and falling away from grace is impossible. I say that this is in the nature of the case. For, in the first place, they are elect. They are chosen from eternity to glory. And God’s election certainly can never be changed. And, in the second place, Reformed theologians always emphasized that the grace of God is absolutely sovereign: and therefore that grace of God can never be lost. Reformed theologians all attribute the work of salvation to God alone, as the sovereign and almighty Author, who works all things according to the counsel of His will, and who also works in the elect to will and to do of His good pleasure. To be sure, this work of God does not make the believers stocks and blocks, does not deny their responsibility, does not deny their rational, moral nature, but maintains it, and that too, emphatically. Nevertheless, man, according to Reformed theology, is not the author of his own salvation, either completely or in part, as Arminianism has it, which therefore denies the final perseverance of the saints and maintains that the regenerated Christian can finally fall away. Salvation is from beginning to end the work of God, and His alone. And since God never forsakes the work of His hands, it is evident that the question whether the saints shall persevere unto the end is really equivalent to the other question, whether God will perfect His own work in the believers. Hence, we say that it lies in the nature of the case that Reformed theologians always maintained the perseverance of the saints.

—H.H.