Suicide, Salvation, and Eternal Security
, I receive many emails, phone calls, and questions about grief. One of the most difficult questions I hear is from family members who have lost a loved one to suicide.The question often sounds something like this.
“We are confident that our mother (or father, brother, sister, daughter, son) was a Christian by faith in Christ. Yet we have heard some say that if a believer commits suicide they lose their salvation. What does the Bible say?”
Shared Sorrow Is Endurable Sorrow
Any response to this question must first, of course, address the grief and agony of the surviving family members. The loss of a loved one is always a legitimate cause for great grief. Loss by suicide heaps even more grief and pain upon a family.
Christians, in particular, seem to struggle with “permission to grieve.” That was one reason I wrote God’s Healing for Life’s Losses : to help Christians struggling with any life loss to understand that the Bible encourages grief and provides a way toward growth and healing hope.
Any response must also include the encouragement for the family to cling to Christ and to the Body of Christ. No one should suffer grief alone. As I say in the book, “shared sorrow is endurable sorrow.”
Salvation and Eternal Security
Regarding the specific question concerning a loved one’s eternal security, my response, in summary, usually sounds something like the following.
There is nothing in the Bible to indicate that a believer in Christ can ever lose their salvation, their eternal security. The Apostle Paul is clear that there is now therefore no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). Paul continues in that chapter to state that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ, including death—by any means (Romans 8:28-39).
Jesus Himself guarantees us: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. I and the Father are one” (John 10:28-30). Jesus died to save us from our sins—every sin, including suicide.
Doubt and Faith
Further, even doubt and loss of hope is not an evidence of loss of faith. In Mark 9:24, we read of the father of a sick child who said to Jesus, “I believe, help me overcome my unbelief.” The rest of the passage indicates that this father had faith, though like all of us, he struggled to overcome his doubts.
Romans 8 28-39 - News
Paul continues in that chapter to state that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ, including death—by any means (Romans 8:28-39). Jesus Himself guarantees us: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch
Sermon on Romans 8:28-39 « The Blog of St. Mark
Death is the separation of body and soul. This corruptible, perishable, and mortal flesh finally fails and falls apart. It goes into the grave while the soul, that gift from God which separates us from animals, goes to its eternal destiny – heaven or hell – to await the reunification of body and soul at Christ’s return.
Death is also the separation of people from each other. Death takes a husband from his wife, a father from his son, a son from his mother, a brother from his siblings, an uncle from his nieces and nephews, a friend from his friends. There are no more talks, no more vacations, no more family events, no more hugs, no more kisses, only photographs and memories and stories.
We hate this separation. We want our son, our husband, or father, our brother, our uncle, our friend to be on the other end of that phone or email or hug. We want memories and stories narrarated by Mitch. But they aren’t. And they won’t be. I’m going to propose to you today that this is not the worst separation. It’s the one we focus on and fear and rage against God about. But it’s not the worst. Paul asked, Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? And he goes on to say, “No one and nothing.” But that’s not the whole story.
Seven hundred years before Paul, the LORD said through Isaiah, Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. Isaiah describes the worst of separations – separation from God. God, whose arm is not too short, who is not deaf, says, “There is a vast gulf between us, because of it, I don’t know you. I can’t hear you.” And there is such a gulf. It’s called sin. It’s disobedience – not of a Mom or Dad or government – but of God. And sin has a simple outcome – death. God told Adam, “The moment you do what I have told you not to do, you’ll die.” Paul says, The wages of sin is death. Hell.
I knew Mitch for less than year, less than all of you. I knew him only when he was sick and in and out of hospitals.