According to today's New York Times, we can know that health care is a major issue by this fact: 16 months before the election, presidential candidates in both parties are talking about it. They promise to overhaul the system and cover more, if not all, of the 44.8 million people without insurance. What about soul care? Yesterday we asked if we can be sure of our salvation. How can we know that we know?

Let's start with God's promise: "I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life" (1 John 5:13). This phrase does not mean that we gradually grow into assurance, but that we can possess here and now a present certainty of the life we have already received in Jesus.

But here's the catch: first we must "believe in the name of the Son of God." "Believe" means more than intellectual assent--it is the biblical word for personal trust and commitment. I can assent to the fact that an airplane will fly me from Dallas to Atlanta, but I must get on board before it can. Those who trust Christ for their salvation "have eternal life," present tense, right now. Jesus promised, "whoever lives and believes in me will never die" (John 11:26). We simply step from time into eternity.

Nowhere does the Bible say how it feels to become the child of God, because our feelings can depend on the pizza we had for supper or the weather outside the window. No circumstances or events can guarantee our salvation. It takes as much faith to believe I am a Christian today as it did to become one more than thirty years ago. I still haven't seen God, or proven my salvation in a test tube. If I had, I could question the reality and veracity of what I saw or thought. So could you. We stand on the truth of God's word. Either he keeps his promises or he does not. We base our assurance on his promises, not our feelings. We do not hold onto him--he holds onto us (John 10:28).

Now, we should expect to face doubts about our salvation. The stronger your faith, the more likely you will be subjected to such attacks, intended by the enemy to paralyze and cripple your faith and prevent your service to God. The stronger your faith, the greater a threat you are to the enemy. Doubts sometimes come not because our faith is weak, but because it is strong.

When they find you, remember that you are God's child. My sons will always be my sons, no matter how they feel or what they do, because they were born that way. Have you been born again?

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