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Results from: Answered Bible Questions, Answers, Unanswered Bible Questions, Notes Ordered by Verse | ||||||
Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
1 | Are you a follower of Jesus or a church? | Matt 10:32 | flinkywood | 108927 | ||
Hello, CDBJ, You make a good point about estrangement from Christ. Michelle appears to take this point further by saying that a Christian child of God can sin himself out of eternal life. Do you think her position has NT support? Colin |
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2 | Are you a follower of Jesus or a church? | Matt 10:32 | EdB | 108966 | ||
Colin I wouldn't use the terminology of sinning ones self out of salvation. However I have seen people that I once thought they were saved living and acting like they are hell's children. Now the question is were they ever really saved? I don't know. Are they really lost right now? I don't know. If they were really saved are they really lost right now? Again I don't know. What I do know is you can't be saved and act like hell's child. Jesus said if you love me you will obey my commandments. Scripture says we will know them by their fruit. Today too many believe they can be saved 'believe in Jesus Christ' and change nothing in their lives. They live like they did before they claimed to know Jesus Christ some even commit a sin and say it is forgiven I'm a child of the Lord's. I don't believe that! Salvation requires a change one we know of we see in Jesus talking to Peter about forgiveness. He said we must forgive to be forgiven. Jesus when he taught the disciples the Lord's prayer said we must forgive to receive forgiveness. James says the demons believe but they aren't saved, so just the fact you believe is not enough there has to be a change of spirit, a change of heart. I say all of this to say there is more to salvation than just believing, it has to be alive in your heart your spirit. You have to actively be in relationship with Christ. Can that relationship be appear to exist and then be broken I say yes! Some will say were they really saved and lost it? I don't know but I know we can break relationship with Christ. Does that cost us our salvation? I don't know but I sure don't want to try it to find out. So many claim to know the answer but I don't believe any one this side of heaven knows exactly how God’s justice totally works. I do know anyone that loves Jesus wouldn't place himself in the position to test the principal. I guess what I'm saying after all of this, is I don't believe a truly saved Christian would intentionally and willfully sin. EdB |
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3 | Are you a follower of Jesus or a church? | Matt 10:32 | flinkywood | 109292 | ||
EdB, as I read your response I wondered how you would conclude. Your candor is great to hear, by the way. Our pastor has been preaching sequentially through Romans since early November. Since then, I've begun to question the doctrine of assurance of salvation as it was first explained to me by the one who led me to the Lord and, later, the one who began my schooling in the scriptures. As I understood it we are instantly and categorically justified by faith the moment we believe in our hearts and confess with our mouths Jesus as Lord and honestly recognize our sin and ask the Lord’s forgiveness. Lately I’ve been wondering whether either the immediacy or assurance of salvation can be confirmed by scripture. Your post — a great one — asks whether a saved Christian would willfully sin after such a conversion and, if so whether that conversion was the real McCoy. Paul himself struggled with the burden of sin (Romans 7:15), saying that he often did precisely what he did not want to do. He asks, "Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free the body of this death?" And answers, "Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Rom 7:25). But was Paul’s sin willful? No, willful sin implies open rebellion against God, so by your definition Paul is most definitely saved. But did Paul himself ever feel assured of salvation? Or did he include himself in the admonition, “Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” (Phi 2:12) On the face of it, and if I read Paul correctly, it sounds as though our salvation is a process, a thing worked out and, therefore, a thing whose end we cannot know but must strive towards in hopes of attaining it, thus proving God’s election of us to have been be true from all eternity: “…let God be found true, though every man be found a liar, as it is written, "THAT YOU MAY BE JUSTIFIED IN YOUR WORDS, AND PREVAIL WHEN YOU ARE JUDGED." (Rom 3:4) I think we have an example of this salvation process in the life of Abraham, who goes out in Genesis 12, and not until Genesis 15, 23 years later, is declared righteous for believing God (and the Gospel, as pointed out in Gal 3:8!). Why did 23 faithful (we presume) years elapse before his belief was credited to him as righteousness? Perhaps because Abraham had to share the burden of proof. In Genesis 22:12, the angel of the Lord saves Isaac from the knife hand of his father: "Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me." It’s not so much that Abraham had proven himself righteous, in itself a marvel of self-sacrificial (and scary) faith, rather that God’s election of Abraham, His righteous assessment of him, had been tested and confirmed, all to His glory, to the degree that Abraham now receives the covenant promise, to which God unconditionally obligates Himself (to the eventual point of death in Jesus) by swearing to it by Himself (Gen 22:16)! God’s election of Abraham was tried and perfected through time. Abraham had faith from the outset, but his righteousness came not instantly at all, but by degrees. Why is this process of salvation gradual? In Hebrews 12:7-8 we read, “It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.” It seems we are being raised as children, and as children we need discipline to grow and become good obedient citizens. Later in V14 we read, “Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.” Sanctification, apparently, is to be pursued or we’ll never see the Lord. As children we can go astray, we can forfeit our sonship, our salvation. I think your question of whether a willful sinner was ever truly saved could be answered with, “They turned away, became illegitimate children, not sons. Adios muchachos.” As children we grow, are raised and are proven by faith through faith, “according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood…” (1Pe 1:2). And, as Peter later warns, “Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall: (2Pe 1:10) The idea of sonship, of membership in a family, best answers the question of whether sanctification is gradual or instantaneous; effectual (not earned!) or guaranteed. I like having the assurance that I’m a son who still has to work out my salvation with the help of Jesus Christ and the Spirit of God (grist for another string!). Colin |
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