While we gain assurance of our salvation through telltale signs of God’s workmanship, such as love for others and conviction of the truth revealed, our confidence is grounded in the God who appointed our salvation, accomplished it for us, and applied it to us. He holds us fast. Jesus will lose none of those the Father has given Him. 

But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you (1 John 2:27, NKJV).

John speaks to the importance of our abiding in truth and not abandoning that truth for a lie. Any other gospel, any other source of spiritual life, can only be a counterfeit. Like a fake gold watch, it will tarnish and break and disappoint.

John is concerned that we abide in Christ. But his ultimate confidence that we will abide in Christ and realize true life – spiritual, abundant, and eternal – is not rooted in our efforts to abide, but in God’s efforts on our behalf.

That’s why John goes on to speak of the anointing that abides in us. “But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him” (1 John 2:27).

What is this anointing that we as Christians receive from God? It is the presence of God Himself who takes up residence in our hearts and seals us as His own.

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