Subject: Proselyte to Judaism as means of salv. |
Bible Note: SpreadWord, I disagree with your view of salvation and so does scripture when you stated "Salvation is a New Testament concept". Salvation has never been a "concept" and nowhere does scripture teach so. Salvation has and always will be a "reality" and "actual" even in the Old Testament (and prior). The change of covenants has never influenced the definition of salvation. Salvation has always been and always will be entirely by the mercy and grace of God (Eph. 2:8). Man has never been able to obey in perfection the laws of God, starting with Adam and leading up to you and I and forward to the last human. The laws of God found in any covenant have never been the mode of salvation under any circumstances. Your statement, "Christ's salvation is the answer to man's inability to keep the law imposed upon the Old Testament believer" is very misleading. Salvation is not just merely the answer to enable man to obey God's laws for even the believer still disobeys those same laws. God's laws are designed to teach us about Himself and His righteous demands for "ALL" men to live by, not only the believer. The covenants are an expanding revelation of God, His will, His laws, His Son, His righteousness and our sinfulness. One covenant is built upon another but never does one displace another. There is both continuity and discontinuity within each covenant as well as among all covenants. The discontinuity is found within the specific framework of each and all successive covenants but never does one covenant supercede or contradict another since all are God's will for man. Your statement,"While Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever, God has operated under different covenants during different periods of time" seems to force the Father and the Son to be on different sides of the same will and in opposing directions. Nonething could be further from truth. The Father, the Son and the Spirit are always in perfect harmoniuous agreement. Could you show the scripture that states any differently? And to your statement, "salvation" is through Christ alone (Acts 4:12), but for those who lived before the New Covenant, they were required to join God in the covenant He had established at the time" is not only unbiblical, it is anti-biblical. Absolutely nothing in the whole of scripture agrees with you and this is very dangerous advice to give to people. The very verse you used to justify your view actually refutes your view. Acts 4:12 clearly states that salvation is found in nothing, nowhere and nobody but Christ alone. So, if there was salvation prior to the New Testament (and there most certainly was) then their salvation was strictly according to Acts 4:12. Sam Hughey |