Posted on 11/21/2010 7:43:56 PM PST by bibletruth
Salvation is an ongoing process throughout our lives. It is a life-long struggle...
As this verse, mentioned earlier, tells us:
“Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” Phil 2:12.
Even St. Paul admitted that he could lose his salvation:
“...but I chastise my body and bring it into subjection, lest perhaps after preaching to others I myself should be rejected.”
1Cor 9:27
Then there is Rom 11:22, “See, then, the goodness and the severity of GOD: His severity towards those who have fallen, but the goodness of GOD towards you if you abide in His goodness; otherwise you also will be cut off.”
“...but he who has persevered to the end will be saved.” Matt 10:22, 24:13
Notice that these verses do not say that we are saved but that we will be saved...future tense. What does “persevered” mean? Why should anyone have to worry about perseverance if they are already saved?
Sorry but you are not believing the right stuff. No one taught what you believe up until Calvin showed up.
Please contunue to study His word with an open mind and heart.
It is very dangerous to say that you have some special insight into His truth.
I will not argue this point further.
Peace to you and love.
Calvinist
Wow, it’s a good thing that Calvin came along about 1,500 years AFTER Christ had instituted the Catholic Church. That way, all of us can be saved.......wait a second, Joseph Smith came along 200 or so years later and he said that he, and no one else had the answers.....How can we make up our minds, do we choose Jesus, Luther, Calvin, Zwingley, Henry VIII, or joseph Smith?????I’m so confused
Both Calvinists and Armenians use the scripture to prove their positions and have good points.
Arminians (Armenians are citizens of the Armenia), do not have Scripture to back their claims, those claims are gratuitously asserted, poorly supported and their opposition to the Doctrines of Grace are greatly demagogued.
Personally, I think they are both true
That might be a fashionable sentiment scoring Diversity and Tolerance points with your friends, but it is not possible for mutually exclusive ideas to co-exist in the same place and context. Its kind of like straddling the fence on the Crevo arguments by claiming to be be an "Evolutionary Creationist". You can't bridge antithetical ideas without appearing clueless and devoid of sense to everyone.
it is our small minds that say it is one or the other. Maybe that’s the easy way out
And insulting two thousand years of devout theologians and the true Saints of God by claiming that they all have "small minds" while you stand above us all because you have a "big mind" for allegedly "thinking both are true".
I submit that the Bible is a closed book to you and you understand neither monergistic or synergistic descriptions of soteriology.
With God, all things are possible?
Christ instituted the church, not the Catholic Church with the Bishop of Rome as Vicar. The Vicar of Christ is the Holy Spirit.
“16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.” - 2 Tim 3
All. Not just Paul’s writings.
Calvin reiterated the words of Augustine and the Apostle Paul. God’s Word does not change.
We will just have to respectfully disagree.
Enough of the man-centered, theological back-slapping already!
Interesting way to express it. Makes sense to me.
Impossible? Sort of like the three that make up the trinity that makes up one God - maybe?
But I have to tell you, there is so much expended on this particular argument, I have to wonder what category Christ would have to say about those spending so much time on this instead of time on justice, mercy, and faithfulness.
Reading Matthew 23:23 gives me a bit of a clue, "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former."
Cheers!
Matthew 23:23 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.
Matthew 23:24 Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat, and swallow a camel.
Matthew 23:25 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess.
Matthew 23:26 Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
Matthew 23:27 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness.
Matthew 23:28 Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity.
Matthew 23:29 Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,
Matthew 23:30 And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
Matthew 23:31 Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.
Matthew 23:32 Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
Matthew 23:33 Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
Matthew 23:34 Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:
Matthew 23:35 That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.
Nope. Calvinism goes more like this:
If it doesn’t seek you, you won’t seek it.
If you do seek it, it is already seeking you.
If you find it, you get to keep it.
If you have it, it will transform your life.
If you don’t have it, you won’t care that you don’t have it, until its too late.
Makes sense all right, but mainly because that’s what the Bible teaches.
Put me down for three and a half points please....
I’m an Arminian, but I actually believe some truth is beyond our understanding,
1 Corinthians 2:14 may help to explain why you feel that Truth is beyond YOUR understanding.
The logical conclusion of your soteriology demands that you believe in a false God and thus are not saved.
The Scriptures plainly state that all have sinned, are spiritually dead, doesn't seeks after God or righteousness, that the natural man hates God, hates righteousness, loves his sin, can't understand the Scriptures, thinks its foolish, is blinded by both God and Satan to the truth, and would prefer to be crushed by rocks than bow their knee to the LORD. Yet the Arminian says despite John 1:13 that by his own power and will he overcame all of that and boldly declares through that sentiment that the Scriptures are a lie.
I don't consider the Scriptures lies, and thus it is impossible for the unregenerate to come to Christ because they hate Christ. Now if the Arminian claims to love Jesus, then we have a problem because the Bible says that the Arminian can't love God because he is too busy hating God. So that only leaves us with (1) the Arminian is lying about this love, or (2) what is far more likely is that the Free Will Enthusiast has crafted in his mind a Jesus that he can love, who is not offensive, and who does not make uncomfortable demands of repentance and obedience from him.
I bet, under this scenario, if we compared your Jesus with the Scriptures we would not find the same Jesus.
There is also another distinct possibility.
Despite ignorance you have first been regenerated by the Spirit, and because your eyes have been opened to the Truth you naturally have come to believe as Scriptures promised. Yet as of now you have not been sanctified to understand that it was God's Grace, not your own imagined virtue that overcame the enmity. In which case, the Paraclete has promised to sanctify all into perfection, which I imagine will include you finally understanding the true source of your salvation, and all then I can predict for you is that in the near future, you too will embrace the Doctrines of Grace awkwardly described through the mneumonic TULIP.
Honestly, I believe that is the way most of us have come to saving knowledge of our LORD. Born a Pharisee, Saved as an Arminian, Sanctified into Calvinism. For all we know you are at stage two.
Why wait? Why resist the inevitable? Calvinists are on duty now to handle your inquiry.
Christ instituted the church, not the Catholic Church with the Bishop of Rome as Vicar. The Vicar of Christ is the Holy Spirit.
you can believe that all you want, it changes nothing. The church that Christ instituted, on the apostles is the Catholic church....it was called Catholic very early in its’ history....no denomination (notice I didn’t say other denomination) can even come close to claiming the foundation by Christ. I have no idea why protestants protest so much....Christ founded 1 church, not 20,000 or so denominations....just 1. It was man who decided that he could not live up to the expectations of the true church.....no divorce and remarriage, Confession, the presence of the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus in the eucharist. The Catholic church is not an easy organization to belong to.....you have to believe everything that Jesus taught, and you can’t pick and choose which tenets you wish to believe. We don’t believe that the church has the authority to ordain women, we believe marriage is between one man and one woman....forever, abortion is the taking of a human life....and MANY protestant denominations don’t.....very sad
Wow, it’s a good thing that Calvin came along about 1,500 years AFTER Christ had instituted the Catholic Church.
Rome didn't listen to Augustine or Thomas Aquinas.
But you have far larger problems than something coming along "1,500 years AFTER", because you have this silly thing call "Holy Tradition" that can make regular course changes and modifications to doctrine and historical fact, and the mechanism allows you folks to emend the Scripture to your liking even today, not just five hundred years ago.
.....How can we make up our minds, do we choose Jesus, Luther, Calvin, Zwingley
What rubbish. What did our LORD teach that was overriden or contradicted by Luther, Calvin or Zwingley?
On the other hand there are websites devoted to exposing the myriad of deviancies that Rome has made against the recorded words of our LORD.
Yes they are both true. That is one of the beautiful
things about Scripture, that we can hear and see with our heart which leads to understanding through the Holy Spirit.
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