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To: bibletruth
It is IMPOSSIBLE for believers like me to lose my salvation - no man, Pope, Priest, no one can Anathema me

Of course no man can condemn you.

How about God?

138 posted on 12/04/2010 9:14:17 PM PST by Jim Noble (It's the tyranny, stupid!)
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To: Jim Noble

The whole point of eternal security is that it is not based on man’s ability to condemn but God’s ability, and decision, to justify the elect. God will not anathematize whom he has chosen:

Rom 8:31-34 “What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.”

Being “chosen” is not some dead, static fact. It is a living reality which unfolds blessings to us every day, transforming us from dead sinners lying wrapped in sin’s grave clothes to living breathing children of God, who long every day to be closer to our Father, who like Peter have no need for a whole bath every day, but only that the daily dirt we acquire from walking in this world be washed from our feet.

Only we are not to presume upon our election, but to live as those enlivened by God’s grace:

2Peter 1:10-11 “Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”

Note the relationship between election and action. If God has chosen someone, he has chosen them unto a purpose, to live righteously, not merely to provide them an address in Heaven. The two always go together:

Philippians 2:12-13 “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.”

So there are two errors to avoid. First, one must not presume to be wiser than God by denying the straightforward reality of divine election, as difficult as it may be to accept. Second, we must not presume that mere intellectual assent to divine truth proves our election. Faith is born whole, not in parts. When he opens our eyes, we see him, not merely as a fact, but as the One we love and desire to obey:

Eph 2:8-10 “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”

There is a reason Calvinists describe that certainty of our salvation as Perseverance of the Saints, and not as Eternal Security. There is a modern heresy that has split in two what should be one whole thing; genuine faith and a transformed life are two halves of a single coin, and cannot be separated. Faith without repentance is no faith at all. God is not mocked. Those who presume upon a creed of election have no cause to believe they are in fact elect. Yet all those who do in fact trust in the Lord will not be disappointed, and may take joy in the eternal love with which they have been loved:

2Thessalonians 2:16-17 “Now may our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, and our God and Father, who has loved us and given us everlasting consolation and good hope by grace, comfort your hearts and establish you in every good word and work.”


139 posted on 12/05/2010 7:40:42 PM PST by Springfield Reformer (Winston Churchill: No Peace Till Victory!)
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