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Join For His Glory for a discussion on how
https://christianforums.net/threads/a-vessel-of-honor.110278/
https://christianforums.net/threads/psalm-70-1-save-me-o-god-lord-help-me-now.108509/
Read through the following study by Tenchi for more on this topic
https://christianforums.net/threads/without-the-holy-spirit-we-can-do-nothing.109419/
Join Sola Scriptura for a discussion on the subject
https://christianforums.net/threads/anointed-preaching-teaching.109331/#post-1912042
Of course it's in the Bible. That's the only reason we're talking about it. What is not in the Bible is the word 'election' used in conjunction with the damnation of the wicked. As far as I can see 'election' is only used in regard to people receiving the mercy of God.
It comes to us through the hearing of the word.
Faith comes to a person through the voice of the Holy Spirit testifying through the word.
Answer: God has compassion and mercy in salvation on the one who has the faith to ask for it, not the one who works for it.
In the passage I just posted above (Luke 18:13-14), are you best represented in the person of the tax collector, or the Pharisee? Which best describes your conversion experience? What commands were you careful to do in order to be justified in salvation?
The right way to look at it is people who don't care how they live have not received God's mercy. The wrong way to look at it is they don't have God's mercy because they haven't done anything merciful. The obedient life comes as the result of first receiving God's grace and mercy in salvation. The grace and mercy of salvation is not given as payment for first being merciful, or forgiving, or loving. Being merciful is the evidence of the faith in salvation that produced it.
The mistake is thinking that you are made holy by being holy.
Hebrews 10:14
Yes, they were not holy in behavior and were indeed blamed for their sin. But not in regard to the perfection that Hebrews 10:14 says they and all believers growing up into holy behavior have.
Only if their bad behavior is because they don't believe anymore. Because if they do believe in the blood of Christ, the blood they believe in cleanses them of the legal guilt of their sin and keeps them in their salvation. And don't even bother talking about the 'believer' who sins on purpose thinking grace is their license to sin and remain perfect in Christ. That's the description of an unbeliever, not a believer who is somehow perfect in Christ despite their sinning.
Legally speaking, for the genuine believer it is automatic. The believer does not lose their legal perfection in Christ every time they sin. The blood of Christ is always interceding before the Father in heaven on behalf of the true believer (Hebrews 7:25), and before they even realize it. Like Peter who only needed to have his feet washed, not his whole body because he was already made clean by the word, so God need only to deal with the practical issue of the believer's sin every time he sins, not the eternal issue of his sin. Only if the believer abandons Christ and stops believing in the blood will his forgiveness not be automatic through the completed but ongoing intercession of Christ's blood. Belief is what lays hold of the intercessory ministry of Christ, not your righteous works. And so it is the absence of faith that will cause you to lose the benefit of Christ's intercessory ministry, not your works.
But as we are see in scripture, the absence of forgiveness in you life is because you yourself do not have God's forgiveness. The real believer walks in the obedience of forgiveness, because he himself has been forgiven. The obedience of forgiveness being a fruit of the Spirit that he has as the result of being saved. The unbeliever doesn't walk in the obedience of forgiveness, because he himself has not been forgiven. That is why the unforgiving person will not be forgiven. They themselves don't have the grace of forgiveness to extend to someone else. They are showing themselves to not be forgiven through faith in Christ, not failing to earn forgiveness by being forgiving to others.
Only if the believer stops believing in Christ. But that is a forbidden topic and so we can not discuss if this is possible or not. But the point is, not being forgiven because you have not forgiven others is not because a person fails to earn God's forgiveness by forgiving others. It's because they don't have God's forgiveness in the first place that would cause them to forgive others, and so they are condemned for being the unbeliever they are, not condemned for not earning God's forgiveness by forgiving others.
Willfully sinning and thinking you remain perfect in Christ in salvation despite your willful sinning is what constitutes making grace a license to sin. So it isn't just about 'thinking'. It's about purposely sinning. God's grace is not a license that allows a person to live in willful disobedience and live in the kingdom at the same time.
No, that's not the argument.
The person who willfully sins is not holy and blameless because they failed to behave holy and blameless, but because they don't have the grace of God in salvation to make them holy and blameless before God through faith in the blood of Christ.
There's a lot to talk about here. I may or may not hit all the points. First off, I'm not aware of the phrase "the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Esau". But anyway, the point is, the promise of a son did not follow the lineage of Esau but rather Jacob, and not because Jacob behaved righteously while Esau did not. That's what election is all about. Election is on the basis of faith, like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had, not works. That is what was determined before Esau and Jacob were born and had done anything good or bad. Paul is showing that being a true child of God, and thus, being in line for the inheritance, has never been a matter of doing right vs. doing wrong. It was determined ahead of time by God right from the beginning that the blessing would come by faith, not works. That's the point.
Then why did mercy follow the lineage of Jacob? It's not because Jacob acted righteously while Esau did not. Paul makes that clear. But rather because of the calling of God and the giving of mercy through faith, not works. God's 'whim' if you want to call it that is that he of his own free will, not ours, calls people to his mercy and compassion. Which, in the context of Romans 9, is the mercy and compassion of God in regard to righteousness. The mercy and compassion of God that most in Israel failed to receive, not because they failed to earn it through works of the law, but because they failed to receive it from God as a free gift through faith (Romans 9:31-32). The way God established from the beginning as the way one would be reckoned as righteous. That's what election is all about.
Pharaoh is used as an example of how God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy on, and has compassion on whom he wants to have compassion. And Paul is using that example to illustrate the giving of mercy and compassion in regard to righteousness, the context of the chapter. The point being, righteousness comes to a person through the mercy and forgiveness of God received through faith as he opens the door to that mercy and compassion to that person, not according to a person's works, or even their desire to receive it. This is the element of God's sovereignty in salvation that I'm pointing out. And it has nothing to do with God sovereignly deciding ahead of time who will be a believer and who will not.
He does it every day. I encounter people everyday that God has not opened the door of faith to. And not because of how they have acted, or because of what they want or don't want, but because God simply has not opened that door to them. That's the sovereignty of God in salvation. In no way can man's will rule over God's will in this matter. Everyone is at the mercy of God as to whether or not he will call a person and open the door of faith and salvation to them. You can't exercise your free will in the matter until God exercises his. It's that rat in a maze thing I was talking about. You only have as much free will as God's free will allows you to have. That's not a contradiction.
I do not believe it occurs passively as I think you mean that. People don't just wake up one day saved. A person must consciously receive and retain the word of the gospel in faith in order to be saved.
In regard to election, it is the way that a person is saved that has been decided ahead of time by God. It was established from the foundation of the world that people would be saved through the grace of election by faith, not by the merit of doing righteous work. The only way in which God decides who will have faith is when and if he opens the door of faith to them. I'm not ready to accept election as God deciding ahead of time who will be a believer and who will not be a believer and causing people who would have otherwise believed and been saved to go to hell because God denied them the opportunity to believe. I'm not a Reformist. Hopefully, you can see how my view guards God's sovereignty in salvation while preserving the free will of the individual. Something Calvinism nor the doctrine of man's absolute free will does.
What people don't understand is that is what the concept of election is all about. It's a predetermined plan on how men will be saved, not a group of people determined ahead of time by God to be saved by grace (though in his foreknowledge he already knows who they will be). Those who participate in that plan of salvation by the election of grace through faith are called the elect.