I am waiting for a clarification of your previous question.
Christian Forums
This is a sample guest message. Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!
-
-
Guest, Join Papa Zoom today for some uplifting biblical encouragement! --> Daily Verses
Saved by Grace Through Faith, Not by Works
- Thread starter Jim Parker
- Start date
Nathan
Member
Which one?
Papa Zoom
CF Ambassador
Or you could just ask another question. Because sometimes the best answer to a question of a question is another question. In the event you simply get another question, then you could ask an addition question. Because sometimes the best answer to a question of a question of a question is another question. You won't have any answers, but just think of all the cool questions that would have been asked!
Nathan
Member
Papa Zoom
CF Ambassador
I didn't ask any questions.The only reason you wont have answers is because you did not want them.
Nathan
Member
I know.
Roro1972
Member
This is a question I have pondered many times. As a child most adult relatives did not attend church at all and a couple went several times a year. Saying grace before eating was not practiced in most of my kins homes; in a couple it was. Us kids went to bible school a few times each summer but not all summer.
It did not matter which adult relative we were around all were quick to punish us kids if we said something that might not be ok with God. So I would like to feel they had belief in God and must have had faith also
even though they were not active soul winning Christians they appeared to believe and made sure the kids did not cross the line.
Gregg T
Member
No one is claiming that God does not do the saving. As my post says God is the Savior. And, it is His righteousness accounted / credited to the one believing into Christ. I've never said otherwise.
Read Rom 10:9-10 slowly, word by word, pausing in between each word. It plainly requires one to believe and confess before one is saved and justified; and as such 1. a person believes with the heart resulting in righteousness, and 2. confessess with the mouth resulting in salvation.
This is what I was saying about Theological Dyslexia Disorder. It seems you want to disregard the order - first believing and confesing, which must be done by the person before God justifies the individual person (accounts His righteousness to) and saves the individual person.
Can you agree with this? If yes, please say so. If not, please show me how you understand Rom 10:9-10 reverses that order 1. believe and confess, 2. resulting in justification and salvation.
Last edited:
Nathan
Member
The first rule when we study is that passages can never contradict any other passages. God will not contradict Himself. Second rule is to always look before, and after, a passage to get the context.
We first have to see that in Romans Paul is addressing Jewish beliefs about salvation and righteousness. Then after, in verse 14, we see what Paul is stating - this is where He ties it all together.
Rom 10:14
How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?
What Paul was indicating was not an "order" of salvation, but rather how salvation is understood in Christ verses how the Jewish people understood it. Its a contrast that Paul is setting forth, not an order.
God saves us before we ever believed and confessed it.
Eph 2:4-7
But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
We see that we were made alive with Christ while we were dead in our sins. When is the last time you saw a dead anything make a confession?
Again, in Romans Paul is simply showing the contrast of the Jewish way of thinking about justification and salvation, verses how we know it to be. In other words, the Jews thought they did something - then received something. We know that we receive something - and respond with doing something. We are justified by God through Christ and we believe this. We will be saved from the wrath to come by God in Christ and we confess this.
If justification and salvation only were given to us on the basis of our confession and belief, then we could boast in what we did in order to receive what God makes available.
Here is the main thing to understand. When we do not believe in the God who justifies us, then we believe in something else that does. When we do not confess that it is God who saves us, then we confess that something else does. So when Paul states that "For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.", he is saying that we are justified and we believe this in our heart - we are saved and we confess this with our mouth.
I don't believe in order to be saved, I believe because I am saved. A sinner is not one because he sins, he sins because he is a sinner. A righteous person is not one because he does righteousness, he does righteousness because he is righteous.
Gregg T
Member
okay.
I said this in post #2376:
"I'm not going to tread through any number of posts trying to decide or assume whatever question you have in mind.
If you don't repeat the question, then the discussion is over.
However, my question of clarification was never answered. So it's clear I'm not to have any. That's no way to discuss an issue.
However, in trying to be helpful, this is what I asked:
"I don't know what this means or refers to. What kind of people is being referred to here? Those who have already believed, and then changed their minds, or those who have never believed?"
Once this is clarified, then I can answer whatever question you originally asked. If you repeat the question. If you don't remember it, that's ok."
"I remember very well."
So now, you're not remembering?
OK. We can forget it. Apparently wasn't that important. And still supports my comments about having the discussion anyway.
"I'm not going to tread through any number of posts trying to decide or assume whatever question you have in mind.
If you don't repeat the question, then the discussion is over.
However, my question of clarification was never answered. So it's clear I'm not to have any. That's no way to discuss an issue.
However, in trying to be helpful, this is what I asked:
"I don't know what this means or refers to. What kind of people is being referred to here? Those who have already believed, and then changed their minds, or those who have never believed?"
Once this is clarified, then I can answer whatever question you originally asked. If you repeat the question. If you don't remember it, that's ok."
Your reply to that comment was:
"I remember very well."
So now, you're not remembering?
OK. We can forget it. Apparently wasn't that important. And still supports my comments about having the discussion anyway.
Well, this is interesting! You've advanced the idea that a saved person can leave Christ and therefore lose salvation/eternal life.
Yet, Jesus said those He gives eternal life to will never perish. In direct contradiction to your ideas.
Please respond.
This has YET to be shown from Scripture.
otoh, the exact opposite has been shown. Here are some examples:
John 3:16, 5:24, 6:40, Acts 16:31, Eph 2:8.
That is from Eph 2:5 - made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved.
Why did Paul add the phrase "it is by grace you have been saved" after the dash? To equate the phrase "made us alive with Christ" with "you have been saved". So that last phrase is equated with being "made alive with Christ".
Now, down to v.8 - For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—
To be saved is "through faith". iow, the faith MUST precede being saved. How can one be saved if there is no faith. The words "through faith" mean that faith is present. So salvation proceeds from faith.
How is this relevant to anything? Spiritual death and physical death are not related. Spiritual death is soul separation from God, while physical death is soul separation from the body. James 2:26.
Please stop contradicting the Bible. You've never provided ANY Scripture to support this opinion, and Paul directly contradicts your opinion in his answer to the jailer in Acts 16:31 - They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.”
The tense for 'believe' is aorist. The words "will be saved" is future. So obviously, being saved FOLLOWS believing. No other option.
Nathan
Member
If a person thinks they are saved because they did something - that person is caught in the bonds of iniquity. I cannot be more clear than that.
God does not save you as a result of you believing, you have the ability to believe because God has saved you. Sin tells us that we get something because we do something.
God sent His Son to die for all our sins. Believe this and come out of the chains of darkness.
2 Peter 2
19 They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved.
20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first.
21 For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them.
22 What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."
According to his teaching, his sheep will not fall away because they are being held in his hand. So I don't expect his sheep will fall away.
Many will fall away, as Jesus said, but his sheep will not fall away.
Remember, Jesus will separate the goats from the sheep in the end. His sheep will be distinguished by their acts of kindness and mercy towards his brethren ie. 'For as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.' Mt. 25:40
Sorry I don't know what you mean by 'no conditions for recipients'. The sheep are given to the Son by the Father ie. the apostles, for example, were given to Jesus. He knew them even before they were called.
Jesus said other things about his sheep ie. he said he knows his own sheep, and his sheep know him. He also said they know his voice, and they follow him, and they do not follow the voice of strangers.
So what conditions are you talking about, aside from being his sheep?
I'd say when they hear the words of life they begin to grow and take root. But then, afterwards, if they reject the words, they die. Jesus' words are spirit and life. John 6:63
Not true. To reject the words of eternal life is to reject eternal life.
John 3:18
He who believes in him is not condemned; he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
Last edited:
Gregg T
Member
You have misunderstood what I have been saying.
I never said or implied we were justified and saved on the basis of confession and belief, but that belief and confession (by an individual person) are prerequisite to (the individual person) being justified and saved.
However, I am speaking about the rightousness of God ( Rom 10:3 ) and a righteousness out from faith ( Rom 10:6 ).
The basis is God's accomplished work in His Son.
- It is by grace that He justifies the individual (by accounting His righteousness), an action God does after one believes.
- It is by grace that He saves the individual (by adopting us through Christ to Himself, and by sealing us with His Spirit), an action God does after one confesses the LORD Jesus.
- Call - will be saved
- Believe and confess - will be saved
Well, yes, you could, but we've been over this already. There's nothing more to say about it.
Yes He does. Scripture opposes this comment.
Paul said this in Acts 16 -
30 He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”
31 They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.”
Paul also said this in 1 Cor -
21 For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.
Paul also said this in Eph 2 -
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—
This is as clear as can be. Salvation is based on believing, or faith.
This has been repeated many times, and at NO TIME has ANY verse been provided to support this.
billybalke
Member
Believe is a general term. Saved by belief? Yes, but at what point of belief.
Not sure I understand the question. What is meant by "point of belief"?
Thanks.
No one is saved by the act of believing. Everyone is saved by God. He saves the one who believes. Does this help?
Nathan
Member
Jude 1:5 (ESV)
Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
Saved first, belief (or rejection/deny) second. Did God require them to believe first?
1 Corinthians 15
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand,
2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you-unless you believed in vain.
3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,
4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
Did Christ die for us before or after we believe?
Saved first, believe or reject after. Your choice. God gives you the choice. No forcing. Will you believe or deny the good news of your salvation?
Now I want to remind you, although you once fully knew it, that Jesus, who saved a people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
Saved first, belief (or rejection/deny) second. Did God require them to believe first?
1 Corinthians 15
1 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand,
2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you-unless you believed in vain.
3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures,
4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,
Did Christ die for us before or after we believe?
Saved first, believe or reject after. Your choice. God gives you the choice. No forcing. Will you believe or deny the good news of your salvation?