Who is Pail talking about? Who is us?
That's the question. And to believe that
everyone who ever heard those words, which are only meant as words of encouragement and exhortation to begin with, and applied them to themselves, whether they be the first audience who heard them or any of the rest of us down through the centuries, was/is necessarily saved woud not be reasonable, For that matter, the bible speaks of those who thought they were one of God's but were not, and others who didn't know they were His but were.
All with saving faith will persevere.
And we'll know for certain who persevered-who apparently had this "saving faith"- at the end.
All that have saving faith have love so I don’t know what you are arguing about.
If we love, we'll show the fruit of that love-and you know far better than I if you have it. If so, more power to you; you're doing God's will.
The Bible is clear that God pardons sin by His grace based on Christ’s work on the cross alone, not on man’s actions. This is part of our daily prayers asking for forgiveness for our daily sins so Jesus is not referring to God’s initial act of forgiveness (reconciliation) that we experienced when we first believed the Gospel. We pray this prayer daily and daily we forget some of our sins including forgiving someone that did us wrong. God does not go back in His promises.
You seem to accept the carrots and reject any sticks. To the extent that we love, then we will have no problem forgiving others. But with faith and without love we are nothing, as Paul tells us in 1 Cor 13. Jesus didn't say those words in Matt 6 just to fill in space. Again, if you love, if you return the love and mercy that's been shown to you, then you're doing God's will. This
begins with faith in Him. His purpose is to
produce something in us, something better than He began with, something like Himself, something within whom real truth and justice and righteousness reign, rather than simply to ignore injustice now and allow us to remain in our sins as long as we...
believe.
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