“Why did you stop? Paul says “grace through faith”, never does Scripture ever say by grace alone”
As far as I can tell, you share the same opinion as me on this. Only, for some odd reason, you add works that you yourself confess are utterly irrelevant by sharing my stance. For if salvation is by the grace of God through Faith, faith itself arising from God’s grace, then how can something as minor as food and dietary laws change or add onto the work of God? But you do not follow the logic of your own arguments to their end, intending to put a yoke on people that even the Jews themselves could not maintain.
It’s an insidious and worldly error.
“You see there is grace, deliverance, justification and salvation, in that order.”
It’s predestination, calling, justification, and glorification, in that order:
Rom 8:30 Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.
The predestination from eternity, the calling, which follows predestination, and from calling to justification, occur in time.
The word “Justification” is also simply just another word for salvation.
“Yes, Salvation is a free gift so suppose you were given as a gift, say a plane ticket to your favorite vacation destination. Now there is only one catch, the ticket is for a date in the future, say 10 yrs from now. “
Except it is not a plane ticket 10 years into the future. It is the gift of God that works without the running or willing of man.
Act_13:48 And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord: and as many as were ordained to eternal life believed.
These are ordained to eternal life, and therefore they believed. They were not ordained conditionally based on a plane ticket. What God has declared, no one can cast away.
Certainly, we are warned often to check our election, but not that one scripture contradicts another. The election of God is secret and unknown to man. Therefore, we must always be on guard. When I see a Christian who is terrified of losing his salvation, and comes to me asking for help, he is a truly a Christian of Christians, for the damned never worry for such things. Those who fall away, and yet confessed Christ at one point, were never known by Christ to begin with.
Mat 7:22-23 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? (23) And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
Notice these people even seem to operate in the gifts of the Spirit, casting out devils and performing miracles. The scripture is clear that He rains His blessings on both the good and evil seeds, yet the evil seeds only grow up to damnation. However, it is not, “I knew you until you fell away,” it is “I never knew you” at all.
John himself supports this view again:
1Jn_2:19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
They were not “once of us,” and then fell out and became “not of us.” They were always “not of us,” and had to leave to make it manifest that they were not all of us.
The scriptures cannot be broken.
God knows who His sheep are, and none can escape His hand:
Joh 10:27-30 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: (28) And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. (29) My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand. (30) I and my Father are one.
Your battle is with the sovereignty of God and the sufficiency of His own will and power. And for that reason you insert things we are not commanded to obey and harp on works. But this is the true error, common with all worldly religions. They all promote works-righteousness in one form or another.
Salvation, grace and works are in relationship with each other, they are not and never have been opposed. What got man in the fallen state we find ourselves in today? Was it something moral that they did wrong? Did they neglect the Sabbath? NO!
They ate of the forbidden food! So please do not tell me that what goes in our mouths does not matter because that is what started it all in the first place. Ever heard the phrase, “the way to a man's heart is through his stomach”? That did not come from no where, it came right from the garden, in the beginning.
You've got the Christian verse plucking down to a tee. The only problem is that verse plucking broadens the path, it does not keep it narrow, straight and difficult as it was meant to be.
Mt 7:13 “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. 14 Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.
The bride is the remnant, not the majority who thinks their way is right. We see this picture in Joshua and Caleb, those who were alive to actually cross over. Over 3 million left Egypt but only 2 of the original that left Egypt actually entered into the Promised Land. Why?
Num 14:24 But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.
Caleb received through grace, the Spirit of Truth. Caleb was not of the ‘seed’ of Judah of the Israelites who left Egypt, he was one of the smart Gentiles who left was grafted into Judah just as we are grafted into Messiah.
Num 32:12 except Caleb the son of Jephunneh, the Kenizzite, and Joshua the son of Nun, for they have wholly followed the LORD.’
Both Caleb and Joshua, the natural and the spiritual, walking in the Spirit of Truth
Jn 4:23 But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.”
And as we witness from Yeshua’s testimony in John 4, the Jews have the truth and the Gentiles have the spirit but it is only when the two unite and become one that we become one with God as Yeshua is one with God.
As far as the yoke, that yoke is what Judah had added to God's word, that salvation is by works. But just because it is not by works does not mean we do not do it, that is why Yeshua came, so we can do it without the fear of the curse of it for our past sins, “for all have sinned and fallen short”. Why do you think Yeshua said, go and sin no more? Did the lame man in the temple do something immoral to cause him to be lame? No, disease and infirmity are results of the curse of the Law for not obeying it and that curse can go to the forth generation unless one chooses to stop it as it exampled for us in Eze 18 as well as the story of Ruth.
Dt 30:19 “I call heaven and earth as witnesses today against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing; therefore choose life, that both you and your descendants may live”
Mt 5:18 “For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the Law till all is fulfilled. 19 Whoever therefore breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches men so, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.” (see also Jer 23)