Salvation - Part 2

[Arsenios]

ONE of the many problems with the soteriology
you and our EOC friend are promoting...
if you put mans' WILL and WORKS as first....

Boy oh boy it's a really really good thing nobody does that, huh!

We begin with the foreknowledge of God...

You begin with all those works Jesus did on the Cross...

Which fruit did Adam and Eve eat?

Do you deny that we partake of this fruit who are in Adam?

Hello???


Arsenios

 

[MoreCoffee]

ONE of the many problems with the soteriology you and our EOC friend are promoting (for entirely different reasons)...

When you tell me what I allegedly think (and get it wrong) I don't want to play along with you and pretend that you're honestly dealing with what I have said.

 

[Albion]

Much more can be taken from this passage...

But the three stages are hard to avoid...


Arsenios

Yes, but that aspect of the passage really doesn't deal with the issue we were considering. You are thinking of what salvation leads to, but it was only salvation that we were talking about.

 

[Josiah]

Yes, but that aspect of the passage really doesn't deal with the issue we were considering. You are thinking of what salvation leads to, but it was only salvation that we were talking about.

... the typical confusion of Justification with Sanctification (both in narrow sense).... of Gospel and Law. WHY is this done? To make man as big as possible, God as small as possible.... to suggest we should be looking more in the mirror and less to the Cross.... we should be patting ourselves on the back more and thanking Jesus less. It's dangerous. It's unbiblical.

YES, EVERYONE has ALWAYS agreed that once justified.... once we've recieved the "free gifts" of spiritual life, faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit.... THEN much comes into play. We are to LIVE the life we now have. We are to love as we first were loved. We are to serve as we were first served. We are to become more Christ-like in our heart, our attitudes, our thoughts, our words and especially our deeds. Yup. EVERYONE agrees with that. Luther STRESSED that in the Reformation and the RCC stressed that it agreed with Luther and Luther stressed that he agreed with the RCC on that. That's why the RCC stressed the difference was NOT at all abour Sanctification but about Justification - the COMING of spiritual life, faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit. Luther said these are gifts (as the Bible of course so boldly says) and the RCC - reverting to Pelagianism and largely violating the Ecumenical Council of Orange - said people earn it. You are continuing that - suggesting that the dead atheist WILLS all and WORKS much - all with zero involvement of God, no faith, no Holy Spirit, no spiritual life, and that God simply pays the wages that such has earned.


Christianity states that ALL people NEED salving. Not just a vitamin pill, not just a helping hand, not just a door to be opened, but SAVING. And that God has provided exactly that in Jesus - who (alone) is (actually) the (one and only, all sufficient) SAVIOR (not helper, not offerer, not possibility maker). Some try hard - really hard - and with an amazing persistence to argue against that - trying to make man big and Christ small - to get us to look at the one in the mirror rather than the One on the Cross. You have to wonder what motivates them to do this? Some Protestant posts, "Jesus is the Savior" and they seem to come ungluded, going on and on and on - for hundreds of posts, even hundreds of pages of posts, to argue that. Now, it would be different if they agreed with Luther and Calvin and Protestants in saying, "Yes, and THEN as Christians, we are to ___________" but they don't - they would be taking the Protestant stand if they did, they would be repudiating all the RCC did 500 years ago.




.

 

[MoreCoffee]

... the typical confusion of Justification with Sanctification (both in narrow sense).... of Gospel and Law. WHY is this done? To make man as big as possible, God as small as possible.... to suggest we should be looking more in the mirror and less to the Cross.... we should be patting ourselves on the back more and thanking Jesus less. It's dangerous. It's unbiblical ...

That may be how you see things but it is not how I see it. You're talking but not to me. There's a lot of words in your post but they all miss the mark by a long way. You tell us what we allegedly think but do not ask.

 

[Josiah]

Boy oh boy it's a really really good thing nobody does that, huh!

Maybe you haven't read your own posts.... the points you keep bringing up, perpetually, to argue against Jesus is the Savior..... It's you who have stated repeatedly that God doesn't give anything unless the fallen, dead, atheist FIRST wills it (the will of fallen man) and that He can't even do that until FIRST that dead, fallen, atheist repents (a work you attribute to the fallen, dead atheist). Thus, your whole point: It's all because of the WILL and WORKS of the fallen, dead, atheist.... only AFTER the dead fallen person WILLS and WORKS does God do anything. This is your argument with Jesus as the Savior, your argument that the Holy Spirit is the GIVER of life, that faith is the "free gift" of God NOT because of the will or works but because of the mercy 0f God.





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[Arsenios]

Yes, but that aspect of the passage really doesn't deal with the issue we were considering. You are thinking of what salvation leads to, but it was only salvation that we were talking about.

Actually, Paul is dealing with the whole of the topic of Salvation in Christ...

Beginning with God's Foreknowledge...
Followed by His Calling of man to repentance...
Followed by His Justifying of repenting man...
Followed by His Glorification of man overcoming...

This is what Salvation is...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

... the typical confusion of Justification with Sanctification (both in narrow sense).... of Gospel and Law. WHY is this done? To make man as big as possible, God as small as possible.... to suggest we should be looking more in the mirror and less to the Cross.... we should be patting ourselves on the back more and thanking Jesus less.

If you want Salvation in Christ you need to change, and that means taking a look at one's miserable self, and responding to the Call of God to repentance from the sorriness of one's fallen and death bound life... IF you are unwilling to do whatever it takes to turn away from sin, God will not Save you, but permit you to live and then die in sin, as He did Judas -
"What you are about to do, do it more quickly!"
And this AFTER Judas ate His Body and drank His Blood...

The simple fact is that you are entirely responsible for your Salvation...
AND...
You cannot CAUSE it to happen at all in any way...

The result of your repentance is Repentance, not Life...
ONLY God has Life to Give you, and when God gives you His Life, that is Salvation...

Your responsibility, you see, is your response to the Call of God to Repentance...
You ARE able to respond to this Call of God to Repentance from sin...
AND...
You CAN call upon the Name of the Lord for Salvation...

To say that we try to make man big and God small is mind-reading on your part...
You do not have that ability, Josiah...
You are not clairvoiant...
To attribute my motives is pretentious on your part...
Please try to avoid doing so...

You can say that by making man responsible for his Salvation without the ability to Save himself at all by me is an understanding that diminishes God... But you cannot say my motive is to diminish God and enlarge man... First off, you do not know my motivation, and second, your attribution of my motive is false...

Would you please agree to stop accusing me of your suspected motives that you think I have?
Such accusations have no place here, and do not contribute to an understanding of the Bible...

Thank-you...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

Maybe you haven't read your own posts...

Maybe I wrote them, my Brother...

So what can I tell an unsaved Brother to DO in order to be saved?

How can your answer be anything other than nothing?


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

Maybe you haven't read your own posts...

Maybe I wrote them, my Brother...

So what can I tell an unsaved Brother to DO in order to be saved?

How can your answer be anything other than nothing?


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

You tell us what we allegedly think but do not ask.

He is purporting to be a mind-reader of our motives...

Saying we want to make God small and man big...

It is a pathetically demeaning form of argumentation...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

Yes, but that aspect of the passage really doesn't deal with the issue we were considering. You are thinking of what salvation leads to, but it was only salvation that we were talking about.

Salvation is always an already and not yet matter...

We GROW and MATURE in the Faith of Christ across our lives, you see...

And Biblically, we are to persevere to the end...

Turning away from God is to forsake our Salvation in Christ...

Lot's wife is one archetype of this danger...

In this life, the Faith of Christ is a struggle to the end...

A struggle unto our Salvation...


Arsenios

 

[MoreCoffee]

Maybe you haven't read your own posts.... the points you keep bringing up, perpetually, to argue against Jesus is the Savior.....

That is your perspective on what Arsenios wrote but it is not what I see in his posts and not what he says he means. You've put a predictably negative spin on what he writes so you can complain about it and pony up with your view which you allege is God honouring and good in ways that what Arsenios writes is not. I do not share your point of view. I do not think that Arsenios does either.

 

[Albion]

Salvation is always an already and not yet matter...

We GROW and MATURE in the Faith of Christ across our lives, you see...

Of course, but we are not speaking of all episodes in ones life simultaneously. If I ask when your mother gave birth to you, do you answer that its still going on??

 

[Lamb]

Maybe I wrote them, my Brother...

So what can I tell an unsaved Brother to DO in order to be saved?

How can your answer be anything other than nothing?


Arsenios

He tells them of the Savior who died for their sins.

 

[psalms 91]

He tells them of the Savior who died for their sins.

And does he not instruct them in Romans 10:9-10?

 

[Lamb]

And does he not instruct them in Romans 10:9-10?

If faith comes from hearing the gospel man will want to confess Him as Lord. It will follow because the Holy Spirit will guide man to make a confession of the faith he was given after hearing the Gospel. It's the good news of the Gospel that works faith into man. It is not man's confession that brings about faith.

 

[MennoSota]

Actually, Paul is dealing with the whole of the topic of Salvation in Christ...

Beginning with God's Foreknowledge...
Followed by His Calling of man to repentance...
Followed by His Justifying of repenting man...
Followed by His Glorification of man overcoming...

This is what Salvation is...


Arsenios

You have added a lot to salvation. Try this:
God chose before the foundation of the world and at the chosen time he extended grace to those He chose.

 

[Josiah]

And does he not instruct them in Romans 10:9-10?

Friend, don'f force some chronology into this. Yes, one justified does profess Him as Savior. The dead, atheist, enemy of God does not perform that good work and THEREFORE God rewards them accordingly (so that it IS all a matter of fallen mans will and works - a direct contradiction of SO many Scriptures). Paul's point here is what Christians DO, not what dead atheistic enemies of God do that causes their salvation.



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[psalms 91]

Funny, people I have led to Christ I always include this and they invariably do this as part of what is called the sinners prayer. You are the one forcing what you believe rather than what my experience has taught me.