Can a True Christian Fall Away?

Last week we heard the apostle Paul tell us that none of us owns our own body. Either sin owns your body, or God does.

If sin owns your body, you are curved in on yourself. You trust yourself to be good, righteous and just. You love yourself and think of your own needs and desires. Your body is a slave to getting what you want, to protecting what you fear losing, to justifying yourself, to comforting yourself, to making yourself feel alive.

But sin, this self-trust, pays you in decay and death.

If God owns your body, then you belong to Christ. You don’t rely on yourself—you trust him. And so, you are free—you are free from the burden of your goodness, righteousness, future depending on you. You don’t need to trust yourself. You don’t need to “fix” whatever the issue is.

And the fruit of Christ owning your body is increasing confidence and assurance that God is in a good mood with you purely because of Jesus—this assurance is the beginning of eternal life, and it transforms your desires, your thoughts and your behaviour.

So last week’s question from Romans 6 was: “Who owns your body?”

But this week, now in chapter 8, Paul pushes the question further: “If God owns your body, can sin take ownership again?”

All Christians are made righteous by Jesus from the outside. But the Old Adam still remains.

So, while I trust Jesus—that’s who I am—the old man inside me is always tugging me away to rely on myself to be worthy and acceptable, and to secure comfort, hope, a future for myself.

What Paul now addresses in Romans 8 is this: Can that old man take over? Can a True Christian Fall Away?—as in “fall away from trusting Christ” so that we stop trusting him altogether?

That is a frightening question many of us struggle with.

Even as I say that, there will be some of us here, who are regularly concerned that we’ve already fallen away.

If you struggle with anger in your marriage: in that moment when the rage takes over—have you fallen from grace?

If you struggle with apathy and depression: then how many Sundays of just not bothering to get up to come to church before your faith is “dead”?

If you struggle with porn or some other addiction: then at those times when you feel rational, but you’ve fixed to do something you know is wrong,—are you no longer at Christian at that point?

If a true Christian can fall away, then how can you ever feel safe? How do you know you haven’t already?

Paul knows this fear is real, and so in this passage he has three things to say:

1) If you live by trusting yourself, you will fall away (vv. 12-13a)
2) If you live by trusting in Jesus, you will not fall away (v. 13b)
3) God gave you his Spirit so that you won’t fall away (vv. 14-17)

First, 1) If you live by trusting yourself, you will fall away

Paul is unambiguous about this warning. Look at v. 12:

¹² So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. ¹³ For if you live according to the flesh you will die,

Paul’s writing to people who are already Christians. He’s writing to them as Christians. And he gives these Roman Christians this unambiguous and stark warning:

if you live according to the flesh you will die

Now, to live “according to the flesh” means to live trusting in outward, external, earthly things, rather than trusting in God’s invisible Word of Christ.

Throughout Romans, Paul contrasts invisible reality with visible flesh.

In chapter 1 verse 3, he says the Son of God,

was descended from David according to the flesh

In chapter 2 verse 28, he says true Jewishness is internal and so:

no one is a Jew who is merely one outwardly, nor is circumcision outward and physical.

In chapter 4 verse 1, he contrasts Abraham’s righteousness, which is spiritual, received only through faith, and says:

What then shall we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh?

In other words: what practical, earthly, physical benefits did Abraham get?

Your flesh is your earthly power: your own intellect, wisdom, power of will, moral capacity, reason, emotions, empathy, giftings, social skills, etc.

And Paul described what it means to live according to these things back in chapter 1, verses 21-23:

²¹ For although they knew God, they did not honour him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. ²² Claiming to be wise, they became fools, ²³ and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

To live according to the flesh is to replace God with false gods made in your own image.

A “god”—Luther explains in the Large Catechism—is the term for that to which we are to look for all good and in which we are to find refuge in all need. Therefore, to have a god is nothing else than to trust and believe in that one with your whole heart. …it is the trust and faith of the heart alone that make both God and an idol. If your faith and trust are right, then your God is the true one. Conversely, where your trust is false and wrong, there you do not have the true God. For these two belong together, faith and God. Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that is really your God.

So when Paul says if you live according to the flesh you will die he is saying this: There is no salvation outside of Christ.

Because if you trust in yourself, rather than Christ, you are rejecting the salvation Christ has given you.

If you live by trusting yourself, you will fall away.

And this is where we must hear what Paul’s warning actually is. He doesn’t say “If you commit acts of the flesh you will die.”

Falling away is not about doing particular bad things, or committing acts that are especially serious or anything.

Falling away is trusting other things to the point that you no longer trust Christ.

It’s good to have money. It’s good to start a business. More than one of us at church are or have done that.

But when you suffer misfortune and distress, do you crawl to money, cling to money, and only feel as safe in as much as you have money?

At that point, money has become more than a good gift of God.

It’s good to enjoy the pleasures of this life. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying encouragement, success, comfort, food and drink, rest, beauty, marriage.

There’s also nothing wrong with using our reason to structure life in a wise way: thinking, planning, making decisions carefully.

But when life becomes frightening, when the future feels uncertain, when you feel exposed, ashamed, and out of control—then what comforts and assures you?

I am trusting these things if they assure me, rather than Christ.

Because assurance from outside Christ is false assurance, even when it looks religious—maybe especially so:

I made a decision for Christ five years ago.

I started feeling serious about Jesus at uni.

I’m a member of the church.

I know and can explain a lot of doctrine.

I’m not making that mistake those other people are. All of this is the flesh—live trusting these things, and you’ll die.

But Paul doesn’t leave it there. His second point is:

2) If you live by trusting in Jesus, you will not fall away

Look at the second half of v. 13:

but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.

Paul is not saying “Do better and stop doing bad things and you won’t fall away.”

Back in v. 2 he told us that:

The law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.

To live by the Spirit means to be free from the Law. In v. 5 Paul says:

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.

Setting your mind on things of flesh means becoming mentally consumed with fixing things yourself. And this is what leads to bad behaviour:

“I must seize justice/control for myself.” — so I get angry

“I must comfort and reward myself.” — so I misuse substances or the internet

“I must protect myself.” — so I withdraw or get apathetic

“I must prove to myself I’m valued through human approval.” — so I become a people-pleaser

“My sincerity will prove I am safe.” — so I rely on religious ceremony.

“I must secure my own future.” — so I get anxious

But setting your mind on things of the Spirit means becoming mentally consumed with what Christ has already done for you. And that puts these deeds of the body to death not by turning you back into yourself, but by turning outward toward Christ.

The more I’m genuinely convinced:

“The one controlling this situation died for me.” — then the less angry I feel

“Christ gave up all his glory and comfort so that I can be comforted and rewarded at the best time.” — then patience and self control just start emerging

“Jesus lost all his security in order to make me secure.” — so I don’t need to protect myself through withdrawal

If you live by trusting in Jesus, you will not fall away

Because the Spirit changes me as I trust Jesus, and so keeps strengthening my assurance in him.

And Paul assures you of that in his final comfort:

3) God gave you his Spirit so that you won’t fall away

Please look at v. 14:

 ¹⁴ For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. ¹⁵ For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” ¹⁶ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, ¹⁷ and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

The Christian life is an endurance—we suffer with Christ. You know this.

The challenges of every day try to pull your eyes away from him.

But you are a son, an heir of the living God, an inheritor of glory.

Not because of anything within you.

But because of the Spirit God has put within you through his Word.

And that is why you cry “Abba! Father!” Not because of your own conviction, willpower, or thoughts, but purely because of God’s Spirit working in you from the outside.

And because it is the Spirit who bears this witness through you: know that the Spirit will never take this confession from your mouth.

Through your sufferings, through your challenges, through your struggles with sin: look at Jesus and his commitment to you.

The Spirit who rested on Christ, who led him through suffering, through the cross, and into glory—this is the Spirit who lives within you now.

God gave you his Spirit so that you won’t fall away

So, Can a True Christian Fall Away? Well, yes because falling away is living from self-trust until Christ is no longer trusted

If you live by trusting yourself, you will fall away

But If you live by trusting in Jesus, you will not fall away

God gave you his Spirit to keep you and guard you.

So, look at Christ, and come to the place where God gives his Spirit: His Word. Absolution. The body and blood of Jesus.

Here, in these means around which Christ gathers his Church, The Lord will guard you from all evil. He’ll guard your soul secure.