Peter advised "always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks you to give an account for the hope that is in you" (1Pe 3:15). That could lead to your asking yourself why you believe. There's a rationale to this since Paul advised, "Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith, examine yourselves!" (2 Co 13:5). There's the saying, "Do as I say, not as I do." "Faith, if it has no works is dead, being by itself" (Ja 2:17). In the case of Sardis, Jesus observed, "'I know your deeds, that you have a name that you are alive, but you are dead'" (Rev 3:1). He said, "'I have not found your deeds completed'" (:2). They didn't have the dedication to fulfill what they had started because of their attitude and their endeavors were unfinished and incomplete. Paul told them to "work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure" (Php 2:12-13). It is "not according to our works, but according to His own purpose" (2Ti 1:9).
God "desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" (1Ti 2:4). "God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him" (Jn 3:17). He "gave Himself a ransom for all" (1Ti 2:6). It was "in accordance with the eternal purpose which He carried out in Christ Jesus" (Eph 3:11). You were "called according to His purpose" (Ro 8:28) and "called for the very purpose that you might inherit a blessing" (1Pe 3:9). "You were called into fellowship with His Son" (1Co 1:9). It was so "you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness" (1Pe 2:9). "A death has taken place for the redemption . . . [so that] those who have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance" (Heb 9:15).
It is "Him who calls you" (Gal 5:8) "who called you by the grace of Christ" (1:6). It was "grace which was granted us in Christ Jesus from all eternity" (2Ti 1:9). Peter cited it was "'this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God'" (Ac 2:23). "He was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you" (1Pe 1:20). "It was for this He called you through our gospel, that you may gain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1Th 2:14). God formulated the whole plan from the beginning. We "have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose" (Eph 1:11). God's plan predetermined that "all men [were] to be saved" (1Ti 2:4) and "that the world might be saved" (Jn 3:17). Paul concluded that it was "God, who had set me apart from my mother's womb and called me through His grace" (Gal 1:15). Paul was God's "prisoner" (2Ti 1:8) and "the gifts and calling are irrevocable" (Ro 11:29).