Can a person really be saved who commits sin, seeks forgiveness, and sins again?

Can a person really be saved who commits sin, seeks forgiveness, and sins again?
by Matt Slick

Yes, a person can really be saved if he commits sin, asks for forgiveness from that sin, and then commits the same sin again. Our salvation is not dependent upon how little we sin or how good we are. It is dependent upon the grace of God. Now, please let me make it clear that I am not saying it is okay to go out and sin all we want so that we can be forgiven over and over again. This is not a license to sin. The Bible speaks against that.

Romans 6:1-2, "What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace might increase? 2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?"

We have to realize that part of being saved is also being regenerated, which means that the Lord God lives in us and has changed us. We are new creatures (2 Corinthians 5:17) who have been born again (John 3:3). It is this change in us that produces our struggle against sin. Often, critics of our eternal security with the Lord will say that if we cannot lose our salvation then it is a license to sin. However, such critics always ignore the fact that we are regenerated, and the result of that regeneration produces a desire to fight against sin. We cannot lose our salvation (see Can the Christian believer lose his salvation?), but it is not an excuse to do what is wrong. After all, 1 John 2:4 says that if we say we are Christians and then go out and sin willingly, that we were not really saved to begin with.

We all sin. Christians sin in varying ways and in varying degrees. We all should repent and seek the Lord and turn from our sins as best we can. However, the fact remains that many of us fail, and many of us even get caught up in our sins. It is when these sins become dominant and retain a measure of control over us that we wonder if we can be forgiven - even though we have sinned the same way before. But yes, we can be forgiven because Jesus is the one who forgives us. The Bible does not tell us there is a number of times we can ask for forgiveness, and then anything past that number we can't be forgiven. If anything, we're told that God's love for us is truly great.