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Is It Possible For A Christian To Fall From "Grace"?

bluegirl said:
Thank you, it was a rough gestation and birth, a hairy ride, but here I am. I have read the bible before, as an academic! Lolol. Now I am REALLY reading it. Had to shed a lot of stuff to follow the Lord. Smile.
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Welcome to the family bluegirl!

Me too, I know what you are saying.
 
bluegirl said:
Believe me, no sooner was I coming to the Lord that a trial presented itself for me to endure. But I am sticking with my Friend, Jesus, and leaving earthly trials behind.
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Dear one, you have received some good counsel from faithful brothers, may I add a little to their wisdom that has helped me in times of temptation,

...trials are like a two sided coin, one side is the devil tempting us and the other side is a test from Father and He has given us the answer before hand in His Book.

Father allows trials into our lives to build our faith and to conform us into the image of His Son, I look at them as lessons to be learned.

Jesus said we are in the hand of our Father, then He said we are in His hand, since we can't be in two places at the same time that has to mean we are inside of their clasped hands, .....that means that nothing can touch us except what has been filtered through the loving nail punctured hand of our Savior.

Think about that.............

Blessings
 
Karl said:
Dear one, you have received some good counsel from faithful brothers, may I add a little to their wisdom that has helped me in times of temptation,

...trials are like a two sided coin, one side is the devil tempting us and the other side is a test from Father and He has given us the answer before hand in His Book.

Father allows trials into our lives to build our faith and to conform us into the image of His Son, I look at them as lessons to be learned.

Jesus said we are in the hand of our Father, then He said we are in His hand, since we can't be in two places at the same time that has to mean we are inside of their clasped hands, .....that means that nothing can touch us except what has been filtered through the loving nail punctured hand of our Savior.

Think about that.............

Blessings
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thank you Karl. I am so new here I don't know where the emoticons are, so all I can do is smile. :)
 
Mike S said:
God isn't inconsistent, those who record His words and work ARE.

You're determined to repeat for me what Jesus said and how Jewish holidays are determined, but you fail completely to explain why that's recorded inconsistently in the Gospels.
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It's humans unable to understand God, not that God is ever inconsistent. As for holidays, if you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, it seems to matter little what day you celebrate what, just as it mattered little if Jesus healed on the sabbath. What matters is having found Jesus. Everything else is gravy.
 
Jethro Bodine said:
Surely, it is difficult to grasp. I sometimes ask myself, "who am I that I believed, while so many do not?"

I don't know how or why I'm of the right kind of soil to support the word of God and which responds to the grace of God. I know that he did not do that for me for he says he wants all men to be saved, but so many simply don't have the right soil of the heart for that to happen. There's just some intrinsic quality of the soil of the heart that belongs to man in which the potential of the soil is realized by the grace of God. Who am I that I have that quality of soil?


I think that virtually everybody is touched by grace somewhere along in their lives. It's just that the vast majority of humans will reject that grace and be lost. I get that from this verse:

"10 The one who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself; the one who does not believe God has made Him a liar,because he has not believed in the testimony that God has given concerning His Son." (1 John 5:10 NASB)

The point being, John is not saying that God has not approached those who don't believe with grace, and so that's why they're not saved, but rather that God DID approach them in their hearts with the message of God's grace but that they chose to not believe it, in effect calling God a liar.
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To reject Jesus one has to know what one rejected. For many years I did not follow Jesus, yet I did not see and understand. I was deaf and blind to God's word. And then I was not deaf and blind and I accepted the Word. And understood. But this was no action on my part except for one, that I gave up on the world, let go of my will, and called out to Jesus. That I accepted my own weakness and for the first time Feared God.
 
Mike S said:
Calvinist doctrine holds that a man cannot fall from grace, Arminian doctrine holds that he can.
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Thank you for that clarification. But essentially it just means that men are free to follow Jesus and accept him as Lord or to walk away. The issue then is, or the question, of whether once one has followed Jesus it was a true conversion that cannot be taken away or whether one could decide to walk away., even after having seen the Truth. An comparison is sometimes made to the fall of Lucifer, who had seen the truth, was so perfect and yet fell.

I think that I refuse to choose calvinist or armenian, just because I don't see how arguing about this would bring us closer to the Love each other part which Jesus commands us.

There are lots of reasons to think either way. Look at the OT, filled with God's faithful who then pursue wickedness and grow lax in their obedience to the Lord. But also consider grace, that the Lord can protect who he has chosen.

Since we are not angels as Lucifer was, I also don't feel the analogy is a good one. Yes, I know no one here brought it up, but I have seen that analogy offered someplace else. And it was on my mind so I mention it.

If we are not to judge each other, then it is not for us to be concerned with whether our fellow man is or is not saved. That is God's business. We are here to praise and obey Him and our job is not to judge our neighbor's soul. That is at least how I am feeling about it all and it's why I can't decide with the calvinists or the armenians. I doubt it matters actually. What matters is to accept and follow Jesus and his law of LOVE.
 
Mike S said:
Calvinist doctrine holds that a man cannot fall from grace, Arminian doctrine holds that he can.
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Scripture teaches that a man can fall from grace.

Unbelief holds that a man can not fall from grace.


JLB
 
JLB said:
Scripture teaches that a man can fall from grace.

Unbelief holds that a man can not fall from grace.


JLB
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All I said was that the door to heaven opens to those who accept Jesus. THe rest is important but rather than become arguing pharisees i don't need to have the part you speak of figured out to go to heaven. Once I accepted Jesus and allow the Holy Spirit to work in me, that is it.
 
Karl said:
Ummmm, I don't know how to say this so that it isn't taken the wrong way, but please believe there is no malice intended, ...it's being asked in the spirit of the Bereans Acts 17:11. :confused

I believe the the Scriptures you have quoted, but I don't believe your opinion of Jesus being crucified on Friday.

Can you count?

If so, then please do the math and show us the three nights between Friday night and Sunday morning.

Thanks
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I can count.

Here it is again - I will clarify what I mean for you.

Thursday evening to Friday - Day 1 - Thursday night - Night 1
Friday Evening to Saturday - Day 2 - Friday Night - Night 2
Saturday evening to Sunday - Day 3 - Saturday Night - Night 3

Crucified on Friday before the Sabbath, He rose on the Third Day, which is the first day of the week after the Sabbath.

God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day. Genesis 1:5


JLB
 
bluegirl said:
All I said was that the door to heaven opens to those who accept Jesus. THe rest is important but rather than become arguing pharisees i don't need to have the part you speak of figured out to go to heaven. Once I accepted Jesus and allow the Holy Spirit to work in me, that is it.
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God bless you.

Thanks for your reply.


JLB
 
bluegirl said:
To reject Jesus one has to know what one rejected.
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Exactly!

bluegirl said:
For many years I did not follow Jesus, yet I did not see and understand. I was deaf and blind to God's word. And then I was not deaf and blind and I accepted the Word. And understood.
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Most people who have their eyes opened and their ears unstopped long enough to accept the truth do not do that. It's sad, but it's the truth.
 
bluegirl said:
yes, well I am already what he wants me to BE, since I am what he made me.
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What I'm talking about is this:

"...love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness,faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control..." (Galatians 5:22-23 NASB)

What we have inside of us when we get born again is the potential to be these. And we'll spend a lifetime growing up into these and making them manifest in our lives. And for us average Joe and Jane Christians, the more we grow up into them making them a visible manifestation of our faith in Christ, the more we'll see the power of God at work in our lives through the gifts God has given us.

Peter says it like this:

"...applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge,
6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and in your self-control,perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness,
7 and in your godliness, brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness, love.
8 For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfruitful in the true knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." (2 Peter 1:5-8 NASB)
 
Jethro Bodine said:
Exactly!


Most people who have their eyes opened and their ears unstopped long enough to accept the truth do not do that. It's sad, but it's the truth.
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Now THAT I do not 'get'. How could anyone SEE the BEAUTY and LOVE of Jesus and yet walk away. Unbelievable. Sad.
 
Karl said:
I hesitate to ask this, but what inconsistencies, ...but even more important, are we to believe what Paul said or not?

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 2Ti 3:16

Does not ALL mean ALL? And the word inspiration is literally God (Divinely) breathed, isn't Paul telling us that every single word is given the writer from God?
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No, inspiration does not mean "literally breathed by God," but I realize some fundamentalist denominations have that as a core belief.

Karl said:
Please explain to me how there can be inconsistencies or private opinions if every word of Scripture is God breathed, or more literally, directly from the mouth of God.
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God breathed His word, but fallible humans recorded it and later translated it. That's what inspired by means.

Which is the breathed word of God?

"Thou shall not kill" - King James Version
"Thou shall not kill" - Darby Bible Translation
"Thou shall not murder" - English Revised Version
"Thou dost not murder" - Young's Literal Translation
 
bluegirl said:
Now THAT I do not 'get'. How could anyone SEE the BEAUTY and LOVE of Jesus and yet walk away. Unbelievable. Sad.
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You're right. How can those of us who have openly and lovingly embraced the truth imagine someone walking away from it? But the scriptures do talk about people doing that. This is one of those subjects where you have to go with what the Bible says and not what your feelings tell you.

Just like a person can doubt himself into a hardened position of unbelief, I think a person can also 'trust' himself into a hardened position of believing. And it is this latter group of people who have a hard time with the passages of scripture that talk about Christians falling from faith in Christ.
 
Yes, absolutely. And the same ones who struggle with the idea that
'everyone' is not saved. Is thsi right, I heard the pope, one of them anyway, said that even those who are not christian are saved? An example perhaps of the denial of the unbelief of others and what it will reap for their eternity.
 
bluegirl said:
Is thsi right, I heard the pope, one of them anyway, said that even those who are not christian are saved? An example perhaps of the denial of the unbelief of others and what it will reap for their eternity.
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It depends on if they've ever heard the name of Jesus Christ and the gospel before. What he actually meant by what he said we do not know. I think this is what got Joel Osteen in hot water. He apparently knows what the Bible says about accountability, while his critics do not.
 
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