Okay, let's talk about predestination

[MennoSota]

Way to bash peoples faith, I am sure that I can find things about yours and you wouldnt like it any moe than I do that characterization.

It's fact. Finney's preaching lead to all sorts of cults. The most notable is the Mormons. Finney's pelagian teachings would have seen him burned at the stake in earlier days.

 

[Imalive]

It's fact. Finney's preaching lead to all sorts of cults. The most notable is the Mormons. Finney's pelagian teachings would have seen him burned at the stake in earlier days.

Someone said they would have burned Jesus if He had come to Geneve.

 

[MennoSota]

Someone said they would have burned Jesus if He had come to Geneve.

No, but they would have burned Finney because he taught pelagian heresy, which has led to Mormons, Jehovah's Witness, Church of God, etc, etc, etc. Many, many cults can be traced to Finney.
In the 1st Great Awakening the preachers just spoke the word and people repented. No need for extended camp meetings where you played on emotions. Just speak God's word. Edwards would purposely read his sermons in a monotone voice with his eyes on the page, never looking up, so that only God the Holy Spirit could get any credit. Over 2/3rds of the colonies repented. It is still the greatest work the Spirit has ever done in North America.

 

[Albion]

" Once Saved Always Saved" is a Calvinist theory? Interesting.. I thought it was some sort of Free Church Pietistic sort of thing. Good call. The Great Awakening in the early years of the United States was truly a disaster in more ways than one, and tent- meeting " revivals" that lead to this " making a decision, o.s.a.s., burning in the bosom, etc., etc." kind of pop theology was certainly a part of that disaster.

Well, Eternal Security for the Believer is Calvinist, but "Once Saved, Always Saved" is slang and is an expression most often used by opponents of Calvinism.

 

[atpollard]

I dont know Calvin or his theory, I only know the gospel.
I heard of a Calvin guy ppl keep talkin about, whats that got to do with the gospel?

Some guy named Arminius came along and wrote that people could save themselves. Some guy named Calvin came along and disagreed.
Some Anglican Church guy named Wesley eventually came along and fixed the most unbiblical parts of what Arminius wrote and formed Methodism (like the modern Methodist Church).

So it matters not one whit for preaching the Gospel, but it impacts later thoughts on Sanctification and whether someone can loose their salvation. (Do I need to cling to Jesus, or is Jesus clinging to me?)

 

[MoreCoffee]

In Presbyterian circles eternal-security is referred to as "The Perseverance of the Saints". It's an interesting chapter. The chapter says:

Chapter 17 - Of The Perseverance of the Saints

1. They, whom God hath accepted in his Beloved, effectually called, and sanctified by his Spirit, can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but shall certainly persevere therein to the end, and be eternally saved.

2. This perseverance of the saints depends not upon their own free will, but upon the immutability of the decree of election, flowing from the free and unchangeable love of God the Father; upon the efficacy of the merit and intercession of Jesus Christ, the abiding of the Spirit, and of the seed of God within them, and the nature of the covenant of grace: from all which ariseth also the certainty and infallibility thereof.

3. Nevertheless, they may, through the temptations of Satan and of the world, the prevalency of corruption remaining in them, and the neglect of the means of their preservation, fall into grievous sins; and, for a time, continue therein: whereby they incur God's displeasure, and grieve his Holy Spirit, come to be deprived of some measure of their graces and comforts, have their hearts hardened, and their consciences wounded; hurt and scandalize others, and bring temporal judgments upon themselves.​

The Anglican communion has The Thirty Nine Articles of religion as part of their heritage. The nearest thing to a statement about eternal-security it offers is two articles one about predestination and another about the forgiveness of sins after baptism

Article XVI

Of Sin after Baptism

Not every deadly sin willingly committed after Baptism is sin against the Holy Ghost, and unpardonable. Wherefore the grant of repentance is not to be denied to such as fall into sin after Baptism. After we have received the Holy Ghost, we may depart from grace given, and fall into sin, and by the grace of God we may arise again, and amend our lives. And therefore they are to be condemned, which say, thay can no more sin as long as they live here, or deny the place of forgiveness to such as truly repent.​

Article XVII

Of Predestination and Election

Predestination to Life is the everlasting purpose of God, whereby (before the foundations of the world were laid) he hath constantly decreed by his counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and damnation those whom he hath chosen in Christ out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to everlasting salvation, as vessels made to honour. Wherefore, they which be endued with so excellent a benefit of God be called according to God’s purpose by his Spirit working in due season: they through Grace obey the calling: they be justified freely: they be made sons of God by adoption: they be made like the image of his only-begotten Son Jesus Christ: they walk religiously in good works, and at length, by God’s mercy, they attain to everlasting felicity.

As the godly consideration of Predestination, and our Election in Christ, is full of sweet, pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons, and such as feel in themselves the working of the Spirit of Christ, mortifying the works of the flesh, and their earthly members, and drawing up their mind to high and heavenly things, as well because it doth greatly establish and confirm their faith of eternal Salvation to be enjoyed through Christ, as because it doth fervently kindle their love towards God: So, for curious and carnal persons, lacking the Spirit of Christ, to have continually before their eyes the sentence of God’s Predestination, is a most dangerous downfall, whereby the Devil doth thrust them either into desperation, or into wretchlessness of most unclean living, no less perilous than desperation.

Furthermore, we must receive God’s promises in such wise, as they be generally set forth to us in holy Scripture: and, in our doings, that Will of God is to be followed, which we have expressly declared unto us in the Word of God.​

 

[user1234]

Some guy named Arminius came along and wrote that people could save themselves. Some guy named Calvin came along and disagreed.
Some Anglican Church guy named Wesley eventually came along and fixed the most unbiblical parts of what Arminius wrote and formed Methodism (like the modern Methodist Church).

So it matters not one whit for preaching the Gospel, but it impacts later thoughts on Sanctification and whether someone can loose their salvation. (Do I need to cling to Jesus, or is Jesus clinging to me?)

I guess it might, if thats where ppl want to go to get their sanctification. I would highly recommend AGAINST going there to find out if a person can lose their salvation, though...Oy! Why are ppl so obsessed with that in the first place?
Jesus saved us by His own blood. We should be rejoicing and overwhelmed that our sins have been forgiven and our entrance to heaven secured, as a free, undeserved, gift of His grace, and we still argue about whether we can LOSE our salvation?? (And we look for the answers where?) I mean, God bless our brothers and sisters in Christ, and especially those who really did the work to forge the way and help us get where we are, but for the answer to the question of saved or lost, I'm thinking we really should go to the source of life and salvation Himself. Lord, help us!
Thanks for the reply info, atpollard :thumbsup:

Btw, I believe that when Jesus saves someone, they're saved.
So I believe in that meaning, perhaps its my own, of osas.
I think Im finding there are other definitions for it, or SOMEthing, bc Im really not understanding all the animosity towards it from some.

Ok, from ppl who are works-righteousness based, or caught in a specific denominational teaching, (or maybe some ppl just hate the grace of God) (?) I can understand a bit, but from some of the sources, I just dont get it.

 

[ImaginaryDay2]

No, a typical Presbyterian would share the gospel using something like this - Hi, when you die and God asks you "why should I let you into my heaven?" what will you say?

That's more a Baptist thing, isn't it? I suppose it depends on how strict a Calvinist the Presbyterian is.

 

[ImaginaryDay2]

The Bible should be read like other books. When imagery is present, read it as such. When poetic prose is used, read it as such. When historical data is used, read it as such.
The rules of literature apply.
Where problems persist is when people use literary devices that are not present in the context or when people take a couple sentences and remove them from their context. It's like cutting flowers from a garden...the flowers look great in the vase, but if you really observe, the flowers are dead and have no root to them. They produce nothing and die.

The bible should not be read like other books. It is full of culture, context, meaning, metaphor, mistranslated verbiage, on and on ad nauseam. If it were not, we'd be in full agreement, and could effectively close the thread. But because we have those that refuse to consider culture, context, and meaning outside their subjective reason, we have these discussions.

 

[MoreCoffee]

That's more a Baptist thing, isn't it? I suppose it depends on how strict a Calvinist the Presbyterian is.

The book from which it comes "Evangelism Explosion" was written by a Presbyterian Minister at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. The method was widely used among Presbyterians. I do not know if it was effective. I think that the idea was to challenge people to think about their beliefs. Would they say to God "I've lived a good life and done no one any harm" or would they know the proper Presbyterian response "Jesus Christ is all my hope and all my righteousness so let me in as you would your own Son" or something like that. The Presbyterian response is not a bad one, far better than the "good life" response.

 

[Imalive]

The book from which it comes "Evangelism Explosion" was written by a Presbyterian Minister at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. The method was widely used among Presbyterians. I do not know if it was effective. I think that the idea was to challenge people to think about their beliefs. Would they say to God "I've lived a good life and done no one any harm" or would they know the proper Presbyterian response "Jesus Christ is all my hope and all my righteousness so let me in as you would your own Son" or something like that. The Presbyterian response is not a bad one, far better than the "good life" response.

Enoch walked w God and he was no more is better.

 

[user1234]

The book from which it comes "Evangelism Explosion" was written by a Presbyterian Minister at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. The method was widely used among Presbyterians. I do not know if it was effective. I think that the idea was to challenge people to think about their beliefs. Would they say to God "I've lived a good life and done no one any harm" or would they know the proper Presbyterian response "Jesus Christ is all my hope and all my righteousness so let me in as you would your own Son" or something like that. The Presbyterian response is not a bad one, far better than the "good life" response.

Nice to see your version of the assumed Presbyterian response meets with your approval. Somewhat.
The "good life" response as you call it would be the standard and norm for the RomanCatholic practitioners, right? That would be their proper response, right?

 

[MoreCoffee]

Enoch walked w God and he was no more is better.

The question "Why should I let you into my heaven?" is a little bit silly but I suppose that the last judgement may well come down to something a little like that. Jesus taught that everything that was hidden would be revealed and all the secrets would be shouted from the housetops so I think that the last judgement will be all about the truth being exposed and seen. It will be very embarrassing for all of us and almost no one will be left unscathed yet the faithful will have Christ and the Holy Spirit as their help. Forgiveness and confession in this world matter - confession to God which need not be before another human being but often is since so many of our sins are sins against other people - because every sin we confess to God and ask to be forgiven is forgiven, we need fear nothing that God has forgiven and if we sin but do not confess and do not ask forgiveness then we have an advocate with God who pleads on our behalf and even our unconfessed sins are forgiven in Jesus Christ as we are members of his body. The holy scriptures say that the bride of Christ is pure and spotless without any blemish of any kind and that is what we are as the community of God's people - the bride of Christ - as long as we remain in Christ. Jesus taught that if you remain in him and his words remain in you, then you will ask for anything you wish, and you shall have it. I think that includes forgiveness for all our sins.

When God says "Why should I let you into my heaven?" answer "Because Jesus gave his life for me and there is no reason for entry into your presence that is better than that." Anyway, evangelism is not really about testing people to see if they know the right reply to a question in theology. Entry into heaven is by grace rather than by giving the right answer.

 

[MoreCoffee]

Nice to see your version of the assumed Presbyterian response meets with your approval. Somewhat.
The "good life" response as you call it would be the standard and norm for the RomanCatholic practitioners, right? That would be their proper response, right?

No [MENTION=333]Snerfle[/MENTION], that is not a Catholic response. Why do you believe it is?

 

[MennoSota]

The bible should not be read like other books. It is full of culture, context, meaning, metaphor, mistranslated verbiage, on and on ad nauseam. If it were not, we'd be in full agreement, and could effectively close the thread. But because we have those that refuse to consider culture, context, and meaning outside their subjective reason, we have these discussions.

Other books have all those things. We read books like they are meant to be read. We don't add mystical ideas and call them a mystery. We don't add allegories where the author provides no allegory. We don't add or subtract from the text.
Adding to the text is when we come up with wild, unsubstantiated interpretations out of context. Subtracting from the text is when we pull a sentence or two from a passage and force it to say what the context does not say.
The golden rule is this: "When the plain sense makes perfect sense seek no other sense."

 

[MennoSota]

The book from which it comes "Evangelism Explosion" was written by a Presbyterian Minister at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church. The method was widely used among Presbyterians. I do not know if it was effective. I think that the idea was to challenge people to think about their beliefs. Would they say to God "I've lived a good life and done no one any harm" or would they know the proper Presbyterian response "Jesus Christ is all my hope and all my righteousness so let me in as you would your own Son" or something like that. The Presbyterian response is not a bad one, far better than the "good life" response.

Sounds like you found a catechism you disagree with. What does the Bible say?

 

[MoreCoffee]

Sounds like you found a catechism you disagree with. What does the Bible say?

You tell me and then we can both benefit from the teaching of Christ.

If God asked you "Why should I let you into my heaven?" how would you reply?

 

[Albion]

If God asked you "Why should I let you into my heaven?" how would you reply?

I should think that if the reply in any way involved saying "I've been good," you would be on shaky grounds.

 

[MoreCoffee]

I should think that if the reply in any way involved saying "I've been good," you would be on shaky grounds.

It would be an inadequate answer.

 

[user1234]

No @Snerfle, that is not a Catholic response. Why do you believe it is?

Not 'a Catholic response' .. please stop misquoting ppl, and it's dishonest of you.
The standard response from the RomanCatholic practitioners that I know and/or have talked to about this is the "good life" response, as you called it.
It reveals the RC denominations works-righteousness teaching, and the way many RC 'experts' come across as authorities not only on their own religion, but on the bible and even other ppl's denominations and/or beliefs is both laughable and sad at the same time, bc so much of their doctrine, teaching and practice is typical of those who neither 'enter in' but also block others from entering in as well. Much of the RC teaching and practice is either extra- or un-biblical, and has doctrine that Jesus hates, so they're in no position to even question, let alone ridicule, Presbyterians, Baptists, Pentecostals, or any saved believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.