First, we haven't "passed from death into life" just because we love the brothers. That would contradict Jesus' words in John 5:24. Instead, because we love the brothers, the implication is thta the passage "from death to life", which occurs at the point of salvation can be experientially known and appreciated through Christian love. Therefore, since love is an experience of "life", John is saying, hatred of one's Christian brother is an experience of "death". IOW, the believer abiding in death is in the sence that he has lost touch with the experience of God's life.
Sadly, you've taken 2 different verses, and out of context, to try to show contradiction.
Since you've rejected the teaching of being in or out of fellowship, which John laid out in ch 1 of his first epistle, there's not anything more that can be said.
OK, so what's your point? Just trying to gladden my heart??
We are saved by grace through faith. Eph 2:8.
We receive eternal life by believing in Jesus Christ. The gospel of John. (3:15,16, 36, 5:24, 6:40, 6:47, 11:25-27, 20:31)
These are great verses. What do they mean to you?
Just quoting a verse doesn't help anyone. I need to know why you quoted them and the purpose.
I have answered your questions, but you do not want to accept the explanation, but instead tried to divert. For example I have shown you your error when you claimed that no verse existed that explained "remaining in death" to be "not having passed from death into eternal life," with Alfred Keith's help (thanks, AK!) although John 5:24 is a repetition of the same theme, something I already mentioned as a feature of Scripture. Instead of accepting your error you state:
"First, we haven't "passed from death into life" just because we love the brothers. That would contradict Jesus' words in John 5:24."
If loving our brothers is not evidence that we have passed from death to life, then what is 1 John 3:14?
1 John 3:14We know that we have passed over from death into life because we love the brothers. Anyone not loving remains in death. 15Anyone hating his brother is a murderer, and we know that any murderer does not have eternal life remaining in him.
Is it dung?
I shudder at your disrespect for Scripture.
Instead of accepting correction, you twist Scripture, claiming that my view states that we pass from life to death because we love our brothers. For heaven's sake man, loving our brothers is EVIDENCE that we have passed from death to eternal life.
Which does NOT contradict John 5:24
John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth him that sent me, hath eternal life, and cometh not into judgment, but hath passed out of death into life.
Where "hears my word" is hebraism for "obeys Christ's command," "loves his fellow man."
However, I'll keep answering your diverts because this is a serious issue. Calvinists and Arminians may be wrong on how they obey Christ, but the end result is the same as Zane Hodges noted, both obey Christ. He calls the Calvinist a back loader of works while an Arminian is faulted for front loading works as a condition for salvation. The problem is that Calvinists, Arminian AND Free Grace adherents are ALL in danger of not being fully saved.
The New Perspective on Paul adherents claim that Luther was mistaken in teaching that the fault of the Jews was legalism, salvation by works. They claimed that Paul taught that works of the law, ceremonial law, could not save. The problem with this rebuttal, which leaves them swinging in the wind, is that nowhere in Scripture does it state that moral law could justify, EITHER. Luther saw, clearly, that God had given a Way, in which men could be saved, without working, by resting from their own effort, just as God could have His will done, without doing anything more, by resting from doing anything more.
Jesus said the disciples were clean, because of the word He had spoken to them. What was this word? It is the word that the baptiser speaks when the believer asks for baptism, saying, "Why should I not be baptised, I have turned away from the world, from myself, from serving idols, for temporary riches, to God, for heavenly treasure, and I ask forgiveness for my error, for a clean conscience." The words of the baptiser are, "You are clean, because you have repented, left Egypt."
Did Judas make this meaningful confession? Did Simon the sorcerer make this confession? Did Ananias and Sapphira make this confession? All the evidence points to the conclusion that they did NOT. That is why they were not clean. Then why were they accepted, chosen, baptised? Because their bodies left Egypt, whilst their hearts were still in two minds. They were baptised through the water, walked under the pillar of fire, INTO the assembly of God's People. They drank from the Rock (were taught the Way), but with them God was not pleased (they disbelieved), and He swore to Himself that they would never enter His rest, because they despised their new birth, their birthright, and their sins had mounted to the state where they could not be brought back to repentance. Like Esau, who lived a life of living to his flesh, even in the light of the promise to Abraham.
Why were the judaisers reverting back to law? Because they faced problems. They thought this was God's wrath. But they forgot that God tested those He anointed, made them pass through strange trials after baptism: even Israel, even Jesus, finding the former wanting and the latter obedient. Instead of murmuring at being tested by being made thirsty and hungry, like Israel, they should have persevered, like Jesus. Having been justified by faith, they shouldnot have looked to obtain eternal life by circumcision, but should have looked for sanctification by faith.
Look at how this is done:
Jesus said that the believers should accept His washing of their feet just as they had accepted His washing of their bodies, else they would have no participation in Him, would not be co inheritors. They should accept the word, His declaration of the clean status of their body, absolution on confession, just as they accepted the absolution on baptism, His declaration of the clean status of their spirit.
Should we read all this into the words of Scripture? Do you want to be fed milk food all your life? Please, don't be like the lazy servant who gave the Master back his original talent. Expand on the text.
Do you want me to keep answering all your obfuscation? Please don't keep objecting. I know you are objecting to works salvation, but we are not preaching works salvation.
If you accept this, we can move into the deeper teachings, meat, meant for the mature, a detailed study on what loving our brothers mean, and how eternal life is made itself evident, strongly evident, in the life of the believer.
