A common criticism I hear of the doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, is that it’s contradicted by the parable Jesus tells of the seed and the soils. This parable supposedly teaches that men might truly believe, and yet be lost because of their choice to reject God. It’s supposedly special pleading by the Calvinist to say that they were never saved in the first place. As a Calvinist, I don’t agree and I think going through the parable will demonstrate how it’s being misused to teach insecurity of the saints. For the purposes of this post I will be using the version of the parable found in Luke.
And when much people were gathered together, and were come to him out of every city, he spake by a parable: 5 A sower went out to sow his seed: and as he sowed, some fell by the way side; and it was trodden down, and the fowls of the air devoured it. 6 And some fell upon a rock; and as soon as it was sprung up, it withered away, because it lacked moisture. 7 And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up with it, and choked it. 8 And other fell on good ground, and sprang up, and bare fruit an hundredfold. And when he had said these things, he cried, He that hath ears to hear, let him hear. (Luke 8:4–8)
His disciples do not understand the parable so they ask for Christ to interpret it for them. The interpretation is where we will focus our attention:
And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand. 11 Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. 12 Those by the way side are they that hear; then cometh the devil, and taketh away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved. 13 They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away. 14 And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection. 15 But that on the good ground are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience. (Luke 8:10–15)
There are two important points to note for this discussion. The first is that the soils don’t change from one type to another. The person who falls away in temptation didn’t start out as good soil and become rocky soil. He was always rocky ground. So there may be underlying issues present from the time the word is planted that will eventually manifest in a falling away. The second point can be seen in verse 15. Those that are good soil keep the word “from an honest and good heart.” If these keep the word from an honest heart, it means that those that came before, whatever they were doing that seemed good from the outside, were not acting from an honest heart. If they were, Jesus’ highlight of this in regards to the good soil would make no sense. If these previous soils did not work from an honest heart, we can safely say they weren’t true believers. At the very least, if other portions of the scripture tell us that true believers will persevere, there is no reason to interpret this passage in a way that contradicts that.
This discussion should lead us back to the purpose of the parable. Jesus does not tell his disciples this to directly describe what’s happening in salvation per se. His purpose is to describe the various reactions to the preaching of the word. For some, it will go in one ear and out the other. There are others, as anyone who has been a Christian for a long time will know, that initially seem to be on fire for the Lord, only for them to quickly burn out and disappear from the church. Still others that we saw coming to church for years end up going back to world for the most foolish of reasons, choked out by the cares of this life. Just because these groups of people heard the word and reacted to it in varying degrees, does not mean that any were truly born again. And we have the testimony of the rest of the scripture to the contrary:
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: 28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (John 10:27–28)
The logical conclusion from this, is that if someone perishes, they were not of Christ’s sheep. Those who are Christ’s sheep will never perish, we cannot be plucked from His hand. No one in this life has the power to prevent the Lord from keeping us. But those who object to perseverance of the saints might say “ah, but while no man can pluck us out of His hand, we can pluck ourselves out of His hand. We have free will after all.” This is obviously not what Jesus meant to convey, and it still contradicts the fact that “they shall never perish.” Why someone would want to trade a God who will keep me from finally falling for the ability to totally reject the God who loved me and gave himself for me, I’ll never understand. I don’t want the will to do evil, and I never will. I’ll end this blogpost with the benediction of Jude:
Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, 25 to the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. (Jude 24–25)
The Particular Baptist 
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