Of the Fall of Man, Of Sin, And of the Punishment Thereof - 1689 LBC - 2

They being the root, and by God's appointment, standing in the room and stead of all mankind, the guilt of the sin was imputed, and corrupted nature conveyed, to all their posterity descending from them by ordinary generation, being now conceived in sin, and by nature children of wrath, the servants of sin, the subjects of death, and all other miseries, spiritual, temporal, and eternal, unless the Lord Jesus set them free.
( Romans 5:12-19; 1 Corinthians 15:21, 22, 45, 49; Psalms 51:5; Job 14:4; Ephesians 2:3; Romans 6:20 Romans 5:12; Hebrews 2:14, 15; 1 Thessalonians 1:10 )

From this original corruption, whereby we are utterly indisposed, disabled, and made opposite to all good, and wholly inclined to all evil, do proceed all actual transgressions.
( Romans 8:7; Colossians 1:21; James 1:14, 15; Matthew 15:19 )

The corruption of nature, during this life, doth remain in those that are regenerated; and although it be through Christ pardoned and mortified, yet both itself, and the first motions thereof, are truly and properly sin.
( Romans 7:18,23; Ecclesiastes 7:20; 1 John 1:8; Romans 7:23-25; Galatians 5:17 )

Of the Fall of Man, Of Sin, And of the Punishment Thereof - 1689 LBC - 1

Although God created man upright and perfect, and gave him a righteous law, which had been unto life had he kept it, and threatened death upon the breach thereof, yet he did not long abide in this honour; Satan using the subtlety of the serpent to subdue Eve, then by her seducing Adam, who, without any compulsion, did willfully transgress the law of their creation, and the command given unto them, in eating the forbidden fruit, which God was pleased, according to his wise and holy counsel to permit, having purposed to order it to his own glory.
( Genesis 2:16, 17; Genesis 3:12,13; 2 Corinthians 11:3 )

Our first parents, by this sin, fell from their original righteousness and communion with God, and we in them whereby death came upon all: all becoming dead in sin, and wholly defiled in all the faculties and parts of soul and body.
( Romans 3:23; Romans 5:12, etc; Titus 1:15; Genesis 6:5; Jeremiah 17:9; Romans 3:10-19 )

Inviting Christ Into Your Heart: But there are none who do good

If you are a child of God today it is because God chose you unto salvation from before the foundation of the world, even time itself. It is a choice made in eternal love by the Triune God (Ephesians 1:3-6). God's electing Grace in which He chose some to eternal life while passing by others was an eternal exercise of the Divine volition with eternal motive and intent.

This is a Divine act worth our feeble human thought and pondering on a daily basis. For it was the Divine intent and motive to save us not only from our sin-wrecked lives but also to purify us (Titus 2: 11-15) and set us apart (sanctification) unto a holy manner of life and to eventually glorify us. His infinite and unchanging character guaranteed that His eternal volition to save us would be carried out in our behalf. There is never the risk of those whom He has chosen of not coming to saving faith in Christ.

But lest you, O Reader, become arrogant over this, rest assured that God choosing you to come to faith in Christ Jesus was not because of something He saw in you. It was NOT because of some foreseen exercise of your will He saw from eternity past. It was from the sheer collective pool of fallen humanity, all without exception deserving eternal damnation, that God elected some and did not elect others unto salvation.

So prevalent in Evangelicalism today is this idea that the basis of one's salvation goes something like this:

“I am a Christian because I once made a decision based on an act of my will to invite Jesus into my heart...”

What one is saying in making this sort of profession of faith is that becoming a Christian is based squarely upon the decisive act of human volition. In other words, when push comes to shove, getting saved, or not saved, is dependent upon a human being deciding to accept Jesus into their hearts or to reject Him. This makes salvation a human work, does it not?

Let me further illustrate this: Let's say for the sake of argument that it is a correct proposition that getting saved is dependent upon someone hearing the facts of the Gospel and making a positive decision to invite Christ into his or her heart. The questions that come to my mind are as follows:

Would inviting Christ into your heart be a righteous decision? The obvious answer is, of course, yes. It certainly is not an unrighteous decision. However, in Romans 3:10 it says that man is not able to make a righteous decision:

“As it is written: There is none righteous, no not one;” Romans 3:10

Would not inviting Christ into your heart have to imply a certain level of understanding of the facts of the Gospel and what is involved with a certain degree of a seeking after God? However, it says in Romans 3:11 that there is none who understands or who seeks God.

“There is none who understands, there is none who seeks God.” Romans 3:11

And, this description of man in Romans 3 under sin gets worse and worse as we read:

12 They have all turned aside;

They have together become unprofitable;

There is none who does good, no, not one.”

13 “ Their throat is an open tomb;

With their tongues they have practiced deceit”;

“ The poison of asps is under their lips”;

14 “ Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.”

15 “ Their feet are swift to shed blood;

16 Destruction and misery are in their ways;

17 And the way of peace they have not known.”

18 “ There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

So the problem I have with this idea that dominates the Evangelical churches today that man, when he hears the facts of the Gospel, will either choose, as an act of his human will, to receive Christ into his heart or reject Christ is, HOW IS THIS EVEN POSSIBLE based on the description of all mankind under sin as Paul wrote in Romans 3:10 -18? How is it that any man, woman, or child can exercise their volition Godward in a salvific sense?

Note the carefully what the text says:

There is no one who has the righteousness to come to God through His Son in saving faith (vs. 10)

There is no one who is able to understand the things of God much less seek him (vs. 11).

There is no one who is able to exercise his or her will Godward in saving faith because being under sin (Rom. 3:9) ALL have turned aside and become unprofitable (Rom. 3:12)

There is no one who has the goodness that coming to Christ would most certainly require. I mean, can we agree that it would be a good thing, a good and excellent decision, to come to Christ and invite Him into your heart? The Bible says: “There is none who does good, no not one (Romans 3: 12).

The list goes on ending with verse 18: “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

So this idea that saving faith is when someone makes a decision as an act of his or her human will doesn't work. It is apparently, according to Romans 3:10-18, in error. It is wrong. Man is not able to exercise himself Godward in saving faith because in his humanity he is under sin.

The Apostle Paul elaborates on his Romans 3 description of man's inability in Ephesians 2:1-10 and it isn't any better a picture of man's fallen nature. Man, writes the Apostle, is:

1.) Dead in his trespasses and sins.

2.) Walking in the course of this world according to the prince of the power of the air (Satan).

3.) Conducting himself or herself as a son or a daughter of disobedience in the lusts of the flesh and conducting himself or herself in the lust of his or her flesh and mind.

4.) By nature a child of wrath.

If this is the state of man's nature, how can anyone exercise his or her spiritually dead human will Godward in saving faith? How is it even possible? How does a human being who is dead in sin, walking according to the Devil (see point #2 above), behaving as a child of disobedience, living in his or her flesh, and is, by nature, a child of wrath make a righteous decision Godward? How?

It is not up to your fallen human will to make a decision Godward. If you are a believer today, truly born again, it is because God, in His infinite and rich mercy, chose you. You did not choose Him, but He chose you.

"No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day." (John 6:44)

Those whom God the Father has chosen in God's timing draws those to Christ.

“All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out.” (John 6:37)

Those whom God the Father has chosen unto salvation He, in God's timing, not only gives to the Son, but those whom He gives to the Son will come.

“But you do not believe, because you are not of My sheep, as I said to you. My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father’s hand.” (John 10:26-29)

To try and sum this all up: The above text makes the case plainly. It is His sheep that hear the voice of the Savior and follow Him. If you are a true believer it is not that you made a decision to invite Christ into your heart. It is because God chose you before time itself to be holy and blameless in Christ and predestined you to that end (Ephesians 1:3-4). And, in His timing, while you were yet dead in your sins unable to respond Godwardly, God made you alive together with Christ so that (and not a means to) you could respond in saving faith (See Ephesians 2:1-10). God made you a sheep so that you could hear His voice and follow Him. You did not make yourself a sheep. God did it from start to finish. That is why Paul wrote in Ephesians 2: 1-10:

"But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast." (Ephesians 2:4-9)

Recommended Reading by Stan Palmer

Of the Assurance of Grace and Salvation - 1689 LBC - 3

True believers may have the assurance of their salvation divers ways shaken, diminished, and intermitted; as by negligence in preserving of it, by falling into some special sin which woundeth the conscience and grieveth the Spirit; by some sudden or vehement temptation, by God's withdrawing the light of his countenance, and suffering even such as fear him to walk in darkness and to have no light, yet are they never destitute of the seed of God and life of faith, that love of Christ and the brethren, that sincerity of heart and conscience of duty out of which, by the operation of the Spirit, this assurance may in due time be revived, and by the which, in the meantime, they are preserved from utter despair.
( Canticles 5:2, 3, 6; Psalms 51:8, 12, 14; Psalms 116:11; Psalms 77:7, 8; Psalms 31:22; Psalms 30:7; 1 John 3:9; Luke 22:32; Psalms 42:5, 11; Lamentations 3:26-31 )

Of the Assurance of Grace and Salvation - 1689 LBC - 2

This certainty is not a bare conjectural and probable persuasion grounded upon a fallible hope, but an infallible assurance of faith founded on the blood and righteousness of Christ revealed in the Gospel; and also upon the inward evidence of those graces of the Spirit unto which promises are made, and on the testimony of the Spirit of adoption, witnessing with our spirits that we are the children of God; and, as a fruit thereof, keeping the heart both humble and holy.
( Hebrews 6:11, 19; Hebrews 6:17, 18; 2 Peter 1:4, 5, 10, 11; Romans 8:15, 16; 1 John 3:1-3 )
 
This infallible assurance doth not so belong to the essence of faith, but that a true believer may wait long, and conflict with many difficulties before he be partaker of it; yet being enabled by the Spirit to know the things which are freely given him of God, he may, without extraordinary revelation, in the right use of means, attain thereunto: and therefore it is the duty of every one to give all diligence to make his calling and election sure, that thereby his heart may be enlarged in peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, in love and thankfulness to God, and in strength and cheerfulness in the duties of obedience, the proper fruits of this assurance; -so far is it from inclining men to looseness.
( Isaiah 50:10; Psalms 88; Psalms 77:1-12; 1 John 4:13; Hebrews 6:11, 12; Romans 5:1, 2, 5; Romans 14:17; Psalms 119:32; Romans 6:1,2; Titus 2:11, 12, 14 )

Of the Assurance of Grace and Salvation - 1689 LBC - 1

Although temporary believers, and other unregenerate men, may vainly deceive themselves with false hopes and carnal presumptions of being in the favour of God and state of salvation, which hope of theirs shall perish; yet such as truly believe in the Lord Jesus, and love him in sincerity, endeavouring to walk in all good conscience before him, may in this life be certainly assured that they are in the state of grace, and may rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, which hope shall never make them ashamed.
( Job 8:13, 14; Matthew 7:22, 23; 1 John 2:3; 1 John 3:14, 18, 19, 21, 24; 1 John 5:13; Romans 5:2, 5 )

Of Repentance Unto Life and Salvation - 1689 LBC - 2

This saving repentance is an evangelical grace, whereby a person, being by the Holy Spirit made sensible of the manifold evils of his sin, doth, by faith in Christ, humble himself for it with godly sorrow, detestation of it, and self-abhorrency, praying for pardon and strength of grace, with a purpose and endeavour, by supplies of the Spirit, to walk before God unto all well-pleasing in all things.
( Zechariah 12:10; Acts 11:18; Ezekiel 36:31; 2 Corinthians 7:11; Psalms 119:6; Psalms 119:128 )

  As repentance is to be continued through the whole course of our lives, upon the account of the body of death, and the motions thereof, so it is every man's duty to repent of his particular known sins particularly.
( Luke 19:8; 1 Timothy 1:13, 15 )

Such is the provision which God hath made through Christ in the covenant of grace for the preservation of believers unto salvation; that although there is no sin so small but it deserves damnation; yet there is no sin so great that it shall bring damnation on them that repent; which makes the constant preaching of repentance necessary.
( Romans 6:23; Isaiah 1:16-18 Isaiah 55:7 )

Of Repentance Unto Life and Salvation - 1689 LBC - 1

Such of the elect as are converted at riper years, having sometime lived in the state of nature, and therein served divers lusts and pleasures, God in their effectual calling giveth them repentance unto life. ( Titus 3:2-5 )

Whereas there is none that doth good and sinneth not, and the best of men may, through the power and deceitfulness of their corruption dwelling in them, with the prevalency of temptation, fall into great sins and provocations; God hath, in the covenant of grace, mercifully provided that believers so sinning and falling be renewed through repentance unto salvation.
( Ecclesiastes 7:20; Luke 22:31, 32 ) 

Of Saving Faith - 1689 LBC - 3

This faith, although it be different in degrees, and may be weak or strong, yet it is in the least degree of it different in the kind or nature of it, as is all other saving grace, from the faith and common grace of temporary believers; and therefore, though it may be many times assailed and weakened, yet it gets the victory, growing up in many to the attainment of a full assurance through Christ, who is both the author and finisher of our faith.
( Hebrews 5:13, 14; Matthew 6:30; Romans 4:19, 20; 2 Peter 1:1; Ephesians 6:16; 1 John 5:4, 5; Hebrews 6:11, 12; Colossians 2:2; Hebrews 12:2 )

Of Saving Faith - 1689 LBC - 2

By this faith a Christian believeth to be true whatsoever is revealed in the Word for the authority of God himself, and also apprehendeth an excellency therein above all other writings and all things in the world, as it bears forth the glory of God in his attributes, the excellency of Christ in his nature and offices, and the power and fullness of the Holy Spirit in his workings and operations: and so is enabled to cast his soul upon the truth thus believed; and also acteth differently upon that which each particular passage thereof containeth; yielding obedience to the commands, trembling at the threatenings, and embracing the promises of God for this life and that which is to come; but the principal acts of saving faith have immediate relation to Christ, accepting, receiving, and resting upon him alone for justification, sanctification, and eternal life, by virtue of the covenant of grace.
( Acts 24:14; Psalms 27:7-10; Psalms 119:72; 2 Timothy 1:12; John 14:14; Isaiah 66:2; Hebrews 11:13; John 1:12; Acts 16:31; Galatians 2:20; Acts 15:11 )

Of Saving Faith - 1689 LBC - 1

The grace of faith, whereby the elect are enabled to believe to the saving of their souls, is the work of the Spirit of Christ in their hearts, and is ordinarily wrought by the ministry of the Word; by which also, and by the administration of baptism and the Lord's supper, prayer, and other means appointed of God, it is increased and strengthened. ( 2 Corinthians 4:13; Ephesians 2:8; Romans 10:14, 17; Luke 17:5; 1 Peter 2:2; Acts 20:32 )

A.W. Pink

Many… are willing for Christ to save them from Hell, but are not willing for Him to save them from self. They want to be delivered from the wrath to come, but they wish to retain their self-will and self-pleasing. But He will not be dictated unto: you must be saved on His terms, or not at all. When Christ saves, He saves from sin—from its power and pollution, and therefore from its guilt. And the very essence of sin is the determination to have my own way (Isaiah 53:6). Where Christ saves, He subdues the spirit of self-will, and implants a genuine, a powerful, a lasting desire and determination to please Him.

Again; many are never saved because they wish to divide Christ; they want to take Him as a Savior, but are unwilling to subject themselves unto Him as their Lord. Or, if they are prepared to own Him as Lord, it is not as an absolute Lord. But this cannot be: Christ will be either Lord of all, or He will not be Lord at all. (from: Studies on Saving Faith, A.W. Pink)

Christ in You: Prophet, Priest, King

"There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness" (Prov. 30:12).

There is a paradigm that exists in today's evangelicalism that amounts to a corruption of the doctrine of “justification by faith alone.” The advocates of this corruption do not permit in their thinking that this doctrinal corruption they promote creates in the objects of their evangelism a faith that is disingenuous, insincere, and spurious. They refuse to acknowledge the difference between true and insincere believers, which the Bible speaks to loudly and clearly:

”Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you are disqualified.” (2 Cor. 13:5; NKJV)

And though the church today is full of those who think they are believers based on a prior experience and give no biblical proof in their lives of true salvation in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the purveyors of this paradigm offer little more than a faith based on a mental assent, an intellectual grasp of some gospel history, to the detriment of souls.

"There is a way which seemeth right unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death" (Prov. 14:12; KJV).

In the simplest of terms, mere professing believers want a salvation in Jesus Christ to save them from hell but they do not want all of Christ. They want assurance they will be saved from hellfire and brimstone but they don't want what comes with the real deal: Lordship. They want the mercy of Christ but not His dominion and rule in their lives. Another way of saying it is that this paradigm offers a salvation from the consequences of sin but not from sin's dominion. The problem is that if one is “in Christ and Christ is in them,” the Bible says this of the true believer:

“Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.” (Romans 6:12-14)

In the context of Romans 6, earlier in the text, Paul writes that those who are in Christ by faith alone are “baptized into the likeness of Christ's death and resurrection” and therefore cannot continue to have sin reigning in his or her life.

“What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Or do you not know that as many of us as were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? Therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:1-4; NKJV)

A true believer does not continue in sin but rather walks in newness of life. A true and genuine faith wants Christ not only as Savior but also as the One who rules his or her life so that he or she walks in newness of life, showing the fruit of repentance in daily life.

What I am saying here is that if someone professes to be a Christian, there can be no continuance in sin in the life of that professor.

The verses contained in Romans 6 have often been called the “Identification Truths.” What this means is that among many wonderful and marvelous things that happen at the moment God regenerates us, makes us alive together in Christ, the Holy Spirit baptizes us into the likeness of Christ's death and resurrection. The death Christ died He died to sin once for all, the Romans 6 text says, but the resurrection life He lives He lives to God. It is in both of those acts, death and resurrection, into which we have been baptized or identified that we too might be free from sin's consequence and rule. Christ's death to sin is our death to sin. Christ's resurrection becomes our resurrection. His death and resurrection bought for us freedom from the penalty of sin, death (hell), and freedom from sin's evil rule in our lives.

Someone who professes Christ and yet has sin ruling over his or her life betrays the person’s profession of faith. This person cannot be a Christian.

The sickening implication of this is that churches are full to overflowing with those who want fire insurance from eternal burning in hell and yet they don't want the rule of Christ in their lives. They come to church each week for an emotional experience or to do their Christian duty of once a week church attendance and then live like the rest of the world Monday through Saturday. These are shallow and empty professions of faith that do not save.

The problem boils down to this: The massive doctrinal corruption that has infected Evangelicalism is that the message preached in churches today is how one can “receive Christ” with no mentioning of sin, freedom from its dominion, and that you must, as Romans 6 teaches, by virtue of your baptism into the likeness of Christ's death and resurrection, walk in newness of life with sin having no dominion over you.

When one receives Christ, Christ enters that person's life as Prophet, Priest, and King.

When Christ is received as Prophet in the believer's life, He is absolute prudence, He is the supreme instructor in all spiritual things, and He is the ultimate advocate in the believer's life.

When Christ is received as Priest, He is received as the One who offered himself as the atonement for the penalty of sin and lives forever to make intercession for us as our Eternal Great High Priest.

When Christ is received as King, He is received as the One who is the Sovereign Ruler in and through that true believer's life.

It is impossible to call oneself a Christian if one has not received Christ in His completeness. This false salvation paradigm wants to offer sinners Christ as the mediator that bridges the unrighteous gap between God the Father and sinful man. But, as that Mediator between God and man, Christ is Prophet, Priest, and King.

It is all three or it is nothing at all.

Christians Do Sin.

  Lordship salvation does not teach that Christians can't sin. It does teach that Christians can't live complacently in it. Lordship salvation does not say Christians will be sinless. But it does insist that Christians will sin less. Christians do sin, but they don't practice it (1 John 3:6). Christians sin; sometimes seriously. But if they are Christians, they will suffer for it (Heb. 12). Complacency and contentment in sin are the hallmark of the unregenerate soul. Conviction is the sign of the saved one. In other words, the Christian will sin, but it will make him miserable. (Sam Storms)

Saving Faith

I never cease to be astounded at some of the things professing believers in Christ come up with in their attempts at interpreting the Bible. One recent cause for my astonishment is a graduate of a reputable Bible College using Exodus 22:16-17 as a justification for a young woman of tender years being compelled to marry the equally-naive and immature young man. The passage goes like this:

“If a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride-price for her to be his wife. If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride-price of virgins.”

I wonder just what kind of “bride-price” this reckless Bible School exegete had in mind for this young lady?

I digress.

This kind of cafeteria-style Biblical exegesis (pick and choose Biblical interpretation), this recklessness, is all too apparent when such eternal life and death issues are in the forefront of a discussion of the Gospel. When this lazy, good-for-nothing method of Biblical interpretation is adhered to, the exact nature of saving faith is lost to the eternal perishing of man's soul. That is precisely why this issue is so important. Without a clear understanding of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, how...how...how can a man obtain that righteousness without which no man shall see God?

This discussion is not just important. It is a life and death issue on an eternal scale.

An idea, no, an error, courses through professing evangelicalism that a man may be saved without mentioning sin, without explaining Biblical faith, without saying a word about confessing Jesus Christ as Lord (See Romans 10:9), and without saying anything about submission and obedience to Christ's commandments (See 1 John 2:3-9). There are those, and I am talking about professing Christians, both laymen and clergy, who teach that these issues have nothing to do in presenting the Gospel in an evangelistic presentation.

This half-baked false gospel has produced shallow and insincere conversions in society. Instead of genuine conversions producing true believers who show evidence of their submission to their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, there are pews filled with people who have a faith empty of any ethical meaning. In other words, their practice betrays their profession of faith. They made a “decision” for Christ, but there was no conversion. There was no becoming a New Creature in Christ (See Galatians 5:17). There is no repentance of sin.

So, what is being missed in the Gospel presentation of the 21^st century?

1) Some who are in error (false teachers) preach that one may be saved with a mere intellectual assent to the “facts” of the Gospel without making Christ Lord of their lives. This is not just absurd; it is unbiblical:

“And it shall come to pass That whoever calls on the name of the LORD Shall be saved.” (Acts 2:21)

“Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly that God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.” (Acts 2:36)

“that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. ” (Romans 10:9)

If one is truly born-again, then Christ is Lord of his or her life!

2) Crucial to the Gospel of Jesus Christ is repentance. This is not merely a “change of mind” where one moment you don't believe the facts of the Gospel and the next moment you do. It is turning from sin and turning to Christ as Lord and Savior. It is a change of mind that always produces a change of moral conduct. It is an act of God generated in the heart of those whom He has chosen to redeem.

3) What is the nature of saving faith? The object of our faith is not the facts of the Gospel but the Person and work of Jesus Christ. It not an ideology that saves us. It is a Person who saves us: Christ. A faith that saves is one that confesses that Jesus is Lord, and believes God raised Him from the dead. A person who has that faith is the one who is saved.

4) The Two-Step Plan of Salvation: There are those who teach that one becomes a Christian at their initial salvation experience in which they believe the facts of the Gospel and later, or perhaps never, he or she makes Christ Lord of his or her life. This is such a misunderstanding of the Gospel and is on the level of the charismatic-Pentecostal error of the “second work of grace.” It is to say that Christ did “His part” to save you, now you have to do “your part” in making Christ as Lord of your life. This “Two-Step Plan of Salvation” is essentially the argument that the “Easy-Believism” crowd espouses. It also reduces the Biblical requirement to obey the commandments of Christ (See 1 John 2) to a “second blessing or a second work of grace” experience.

5) Where's the changed life? A shallow and watered-downed gospel offers an “unchanged” life at the moment of salvation. It is even said that someone can fall into unbelief and still have eternal life because they once “believed.” The Bible teaches that someone who apostatizes was never a believer in the first place (See 1 John 2:19).

Some say that this error really is the old heresy, Semi-Pelagianism. The more I study this issue; the more and more I believe this is the case. This kind of fraudulence is nothing more than an appeal to the sinful, fallen nature of man with a gospel in which a turning from sin will not be required. Man is not totally depraved, the appeal goes, but “tainted” and all he needs to do is “believe” with nothing more expected or needed.

J.I. Packer said this:

“When Scripture speaks of regeneration, which it represents as a new birth, a quickening of the dead, what is in view is an inner transformation of one's being, or "heart," which makes it impossible for one to go on living under sin's sway as one lived before. The effect of regeneration is that now one wants, from the bottom of one's heart, to know, love, serve, trust, obey, and honor the Father and the Son, so that obedient devotion and discipleship spontaneously spring up where there was only resentful hostility to God before.” ⁱ

i  http://www.fpcjackson.org/resources/apologetics/Modern%20Unbib%20Chall%20to%20Covt%20Theology/packer_lordship_controversy.htm