Have you loved your neighbor(s) as yourself?
Do you believe a born again Christian who hates his brother has eternal life?
Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. 1 John 3:15 JLB
So --- your point was that silly questions only deserve silly answers?You just made my point. JLB
My doctrine and that of God is that those whom He predestined He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified.Your doctrine is not from God.
Of course.Dontcha think lost people need saving?
We may never know. He seems to be running scared.Wonder where he was going with this?
lolOf course.
We didn't deserve what He did for us. But we sure as heck needed it.
We may never know. He seems to be running scared.
Certainly...........But what about AFTER salvation? Can we agree that God actually requires good works from us? Those that we do in the name of Christ...Eph. 2:10
In the parable of the Good Samaritan did any individual who passed the man on the road that day actually hate him? Who was the one who actually loved him?
How perfectly do we need to keep His commandments? One commandments is to love one another. I don’t know your intent or your heart, and posts like these make it difficult to discern tone, but the words you use do not come across as loving.Here is how we are to remain “in Christ”.
Now he who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him. And by this we know that He abides in us, by the Spirit whom He has given us. 1 John 3:24
Go ahead and post the scripture and let’s discuss it. JLB
One commandments is to love one another. I don’t know your intent or your heart, and posts like these make it difficult to discern tone, but the words you use do not come across as loving.
How perfectly do we need to keep His commandments?
In the parable of the Good Samaritan did any individual who passed the man on the road that day actually hate him? Who was the one who actually loved him?
Luke 10:25 And a lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26 And He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?” 27 And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” 28 And He said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.” 29 But wishing to justify himself, he said to Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
30 Jesus replied and said, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among robbers, and they stripped him and beat him, and went away leaving him half dead. 31 And by chance a priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32 Likewise a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, who was on a journey, came upon him; and when he saw him, he felt compassion, 34 and came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 On the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return I will repay you.’ 36 Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers’ hands?” 37 And he said, “The one who showed mercy toward him.” Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do the same.”
You quoted 1 John 3:24. Do we need to keep His commandments perfectly? Since you quoted 1:9, I’m guessing that you don’t think we need to. Is that correct?My post’s are my answer’s to the question of the thread title which asks:
Can a believer fall away and become an unbeliever?
From that perspective I am listing scriptures that teach us people who are “in Christ”, which refers to a believer, can indeed become disconnected from, or separated from Christ, a position of an unbeliever.
IOW, His sheep can indeed become lost.
Reaching out to a lost sheep in order to turn them back to the truth, is the very definition of love.
Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins. James 5:19-20
- he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death
- and cover a multitude of sins.
Love covers a multitude of sins.
I don’t fully understand what you mean by this question.
To me this is asking....
If we just lie some of the time, is that ok?
If we just murder a few people, is that good enough?
If I just commit adultery with my neighbors wife just a few times, is that acceptable?
I don’t think this is what you mean, so please help me to understand more fully what you mean.
If we should break a commandment, which is sin, then we can confess our sin, and be forgiven. 1 John 1:9
JLB
IOW 'my spirit' which was 'born-again by the Holy Spirit and the grace of God, can't do anything to go back and become 'unborn' (John 3:3-6). His good work trumps my bad work all the way from His cross to my glory. (2Cor 5:19) Makes sense to me.Absolutely amazing. It would be funny if it were not so sad.
This confirms my suspicions. You are sorely in need of spending some time meditating on the scriptures.
My post is little else but scripture. Even a fairly new Christian should be able to recognize that.
If you are so new that you aren't familiar with the scriptures I was referencing - you probably ought not to be engaged in a soteriology discussion - except to perhaps ask "serious" questions of others (as opposed to silly ones).
My doctrine and that of God is that anyone born of God has passed from death to life and will never again come into condemnation. (John 5:24)
My doctrine and that of God is that He Who began a good work in me will complete that work. (Philippians 1:6)
My doctrine and that of God is that we know Whom we have believed and we are convinced that He is able to keep what I have entrusted to Him against the wrath of God that is coming upon all those who believe not the gospel or add their own works to simple faith in what He has accomplished for us at Calvary as a way to acquire or to deserve to keep salvation in the basic sense. (2 Timothy 1:12)
My doctrine and that of God is that He has saved us for good works but not by good works. (Ephesians 2:10)
My doctrine and that of God is that the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. (Romans 11:29)
Absolutely.IOW 'my spirit' which was 'born-again by the Holy Spirit and the grace of God, can't do anything to go back and become 'unborn' (John 3:3-6). His good work trumps my bad work all the way from His cross to my glory. (2Cor 5:19) Makes sense to me.
Yes I do, but it is because His eternal life is being hidden in you. "your life is hid with Christ in God". But His eternal life is 'abiding/remaining' in you when you love your brother, for doing whatever hateful evil he did to you? IOW ONLY when Christ's life is being FORMED IN YOU and manifest through you, do YOU have eternal life abiding. But, until then, Jesus still has whatever you come up short of, on the day of judgment!Do you believe a born again Christian who hates his brother has eternal life?
Do you know the difference between 'immortality life' here and now, and 'eternal life' here and now...as well as in the "ages to come"?Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. 1 John 3:15
Any honest student of the scriptures will admit that there are scriptures that seem to lead to the conclusion that one can lose their salvation in some instances.
Some who feel that way make any loss of salvation seem to be quite easy and end up preaching what can only be considered a false gospel of “works”.
Conversely – any honest student of the scriptures must also acknowledge those scriptures which seem to lead to the conclusion that one cannot lose their salvation.
So – any honest theologian has to look at both sides of the argument and decide on which side the coin lands.
Every one of the scriptures that seem to teach loss of salvation can be and have been explained in a different way than their undermining eternal security. Some are easier than others to address (as I have shown here in this thread) and some are admittedly much more difficult to “explain away”.
On the other hand – every one of the scriptures that seem to teach eternal security can only be taken one way. I.e. that one simply cannot thwart the plans of God, the author and finisher of our faith, by becoming lost. They can for a time seem not to be sons of God, as with the prodigal son for instance. But if you take the scriptures that teach eternal security at face value – it can only be a temporary condition.
So --- what’s a good theologian to do? Unless one has strong feelings on the matter vis a vis anti-OSAS -- any good systematic theologian has to come down on the side of the preponderance of the evidence. I.e. eternal security is a scriptural fact – like it or not.
We're not condoning sin at all, but we are just suffering the 'temporal death' ('mortality') that it causes us on 'this side' of glory. IOW if we HAVE 100% ETERNAL LIFE, then why do our bodies still DIE?Absolutely.
What the anti eternal security folks constantly hurl at us is the false charge that we are condoning sin or even that we must all be extremely great sinners in our lives since we teach, as they do, that we do not become "unborn" and born again and again and again and again and again based on our performance at different periods in our lives.
For me this is divided by understanding the difference between the salvation of my soul as being subsequent and separate, to being OSAS in my spirit.It's a straw man argument of course. We all believe and teach that there is almost every reason in the world to cooperate with the Holy Spirit in the sanctification process.
I say "almost" because getting saved again or staying saved by not sinning isn't one of them.
And Ive sinned in my 70 years also. But, unlike you, I'm not embarrassed, although I am repentant.Many of those times, I'm embarrassed to say, have been in the area of my sexual thought life - especially when I was younger than I am now. Time has taken it's toll in this area and it isn't as big a struggle as it once was.
The only thing I might add to your comment; "As the Bride of Christ" would be this; we are not yet WED. We are in the "betrothed" time of preparation to BECOME the Bride of Christ.As the "Bride of Christ" - all those who have been saved are destined to become conformed to the image of God's Son through the process of sanctification. That process does not involve my being divorced and remarried to the Lord dozens of times over the many decades of my life as a believer.
Certainly there are some scriptures that are hard to understand as they relate to our security. But the vision of a bride jumping out of her husband's arms and crawling back into the arms her husband over and over and over and over and over again should really make these folks reevaluate their stance.