Subject: "Once Saved Always Saved" |
Bible Note: It may make a cute joke, but it would be a real shame if someone believed it. Peter nor Mary are standing by a door in heaven ready to let people in. They don't have the authority to do anything to save anyone alive today, and in many aspects that really is the key point in salvation, isn't it? Salvation means freedom from the bondage of sin, but it also means eternal life with God. So, who saves is a key point I think? John 10:8-14 Jesus speaking, "...I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture..." Joking aside... there is no other that can help you get into heaven. You said: I think Brian is saying the Lord would not create innocent peoples only to cast them into hell. I'd like to refer you to Romans 9:14-24 "What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? Certainly not! For He says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whomever I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whomever I will have compassion.' So then it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy... Therefore He has mercy on whom He wills, and whom He wills He hardens. You will say to me then, 'Why does He still find fault? For who has resisted His will?' But indeed O man, who are you to reply against God? Will the thing formed say to him who formed it, 'Why have you made me like this?' Does not the potter have power over the clay, from the same lump to make one vessel for honor and another for dishonor? What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom He called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?" The Creator does not necessarily "think" like we would like to think He thinks sometimes. And who is it that you know of who does not know the Lord... that is "innocent" before Him? Scripture says we are all sinners... and our righteousness is in Christ. No Christ, no righteousness before God. You said: They are his creation. Are they to be condemned because no one has been able to reach them with God's word? Isn't that God's choice? And if He says salvation is only through His Son... should we try to tell Him He's doing it wrong if He doesn't save those who do not know His Son? Should we question God's method of salvation, or His judgement? God bless. |