Can one say with honesty, "I am saved", if you do not live a life worthy of your calling as a Christian?

[RileyG]

We don't. That's the point of the parable of the tares and the wheat. It is not our job to discern who is saved and who is not. That will be the job of the angels when they divide the sheep from the goats on the Day of Judgment. In the meantime, we have to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. We can't go on outward appearances. There have been too many false accusations by people who think they know more than God about who is saved and who isn't. If we decide to judge people, God will exact the same judgment on us. None of us are righteous in ourselves. We all have faults and failings and so our judgment of one another is always faulty.

Very well said.

 

[RileyG]

im careful about this kind of view.

Some religion is running away from hell. Fear based. This isn't true service to God and can't really yield a true love of god. I think it's needs to be dropped for a much higher standard ...
Running towards God.
I think the fear religion needs to die off and handover to a proper blooming of "running towards God" instead of running away from hell.

I think we should have a healthy fear of hell but ultimately trust in God's mercy. Perfect love casts out all fear.

 

[Confused-by-christianity]

I think we should have a healthy fear of hell but ultimately trust in God's mercy. Perfect love casts out all fear.

Are you saying gods perfect love cures us from the fear of hell (that we should rightly have??)

 

[Dan Perez]

I think we should have a healthy fear of hell but ultimately trust in God's mercy. Perfect love casts out all fear.

Great if you can come with a verse that shows how that happens , would be great ?

dan p

 

[RileyG]

Great if you can come with a verse that shows how that happens , would be great ?

dan p

1 John 4:18

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

The quote that you gave and to which I replied was ... "D Martyn Lloyd-Jones said, "There is no such person as a good Christian. We are all vile people saved by the grace of God."" he was wrong, there are good Christians, and some good people are saved by grace, Enoch, Job, Blessed Mary all come to mind.

So you tend toward the Arminian side of things where you believe that there is some goodness in a person to enable them to make a choice for Christ when confronted with the Gospel. How about Romans 3?

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

Alright, but for those interested in the historic teachings of Christianity, my positions also generally reflect and are consistent with those.,

If your spiritual foundation is shaky to the point where you can believe that you can fall away from Christ, then that is up to you. I believe that once a person is genuinely saved and converted to Christ, he cannot be "unsaved" unless he totally rejects Christ and His finished work on the Cross. I am a sinner and will continue to be until the day I die, but I have absolute faith and trust in Jesus Christ and what He did on the Cross for me. I know I am saved because that's what the Scripture says: "By grace I am saved, not of myself, but is the gift of God; not of works lest any should boast."

I am not saved by being able to be free from sin, nor by anything that I can do to contribute to my salvation. I have no intrinsic goodness that I can hold up to God to give me merit. I am saved through God's absolute mercy and grace because I decided to believe and accept that when Jesus died on the Cross He paid my eternal debt of sin to God, taking away the penalty for my sinfulness. I can stand before God in Christ's righteousness, without guilt, shame, or fear, and when I do fail, Jesus Himself is my advocate in heaven to plead my case before the Father on the basis of His blood shed for me on the Cross.

So, who, being genuinely converted to Christ and sees the glorious Gospel of Christ which is the best good news that I can have, how could I turn my back on the wonderful Saviour who loved me while I was yet a sinner, and gave Himself for me?

That's why I don't identify with your view that "we could fall into serious sin and lose our salvation." It might be more appropriate for you to make the comment in the first person singular than the third person plural.

 

[Confused-by-christianity]

The only ones afraid of the devil or hell or maybe almost anything else
are those not yet set free from the fear of punishment - even being timid is a sign that what God has to give has not yet been received.
God does not give us/ his children/ a spirit of fear(timidity) , but of self-control (steady unshaken power in Christ Life), and of agape (self-sacrificial obedience), and a sound mind.

Yes - I think so too
I basically said the same but in different words.
Fear is not a worthy motivation.
“I did the good deeds because I was afraid of what would happen if I didn’t”

I accept it plays a part in the early stages of a spiritual journey - but I think it should be outgrown in time.

 

[Xeno.of.athens]

So you tend toward the Arminian side of things where you believe that there is some goodness in a person to enable them to make a choice for Christ when confronted with the Gospel. How about Romans 3?

No. Jacob Arminius came about 1,600 years after the early Church taught what I said.

 

[Dan Perez]

1 John 4:18

It is better id all can explain what you mean ?

1 John really means that if have FEAR , He that FEARETH is not made PERFECT or who has seen one who is PERFCT ??

The Greek word FEARETH // PHOBEO is in the Greek PRESENT TENSE and that means you re FEARFUL , is in the PASSIVE VOICE , and in the INDICATIVE MOOD in the SINGULAR .

Next And you are FEARFUL , it means you are not PERFECT // TELEIOO which is in the Greek PERFECT TENSE , PASSIVE VOICE , and in the INDICATIVE MOOD of fact you do not have it , and in the SINULAR .

By the way , I do not believe that ONLY the epistles that Paul wrote are to ONLY the BODY OF CHRIST . PERIOD

The other books are written to Israel >

dan p

 

[RileyG]

It is better id all can explain what you mean ?

1 John really means that if have FEAR , He that FEARETH is not made PERFECT or who has seen one who is PERFCT ??

The Greek word FEARETH // PHOBEO is in the Greek PRESENT TENSE and that means you re FEARFUL , is in the PASSIVE VOICE , and in the INDICATIVE MOOD in the SINGULAR .

Next And you are FEARFUL , it means you are not PERFECT // TELEIOO which is in the Greek PERFECT TENSE , PASSIVE VOICE , and in the INDICATIVE MOOD of fact you do not have it , and in the SINULAR .

By the way , I do not believe that ONLY the epistles that Paul wrote are to ONLY the BODY OF CHRIST . PERIOD

The other books are written to Israel >

dan p

I'm not sure if I am following you.

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

No. Jacob Arminius came about 1,600 years after the early Church taught what I said.

That is what he taught, and many modern churches teach the same. I read the works of Arminius, and he quotes accurate Scripture to back up his teaching. It is also interesting that the Calvinists also quote Scripture to back up their teaching about human depravity. The early church taught what Paul said in Romans 3, "We have all gone astray and turned to our own way. There is none righteous, no, not one." Also the early church taught that those who are in the world are no friends of God. What this says is that every single person started out as an enemy of God, and that God will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and will harden those He will harden. A person can be convicted of sin, but only the Holy Spirit will convince him of the truth of the Gospel. Paul said that if a person depends on what he can do to get himself saved, then grace is no more grace, and Christ has no effect for him. Outside of God's unmerited mercy, we are all sunk.

 

[The Liturgist]

No. Jacob Arminius came about 1,600 years after the early Church taught what I said.

Indeed so, Arminius and his Remonstrants were basically Reformed Christians who decided Calvin was wrong with regards to predestination and monergism, and in so doing inadvertently rediscovered the theology of the early church. But it wasn’t until Wesley that anything more of a Patristic ressourcement would happen in Protestantism, but by the 19th century with movements like Anglo-Catholicism, Scoto-Catholicism and Mercersburg Theology, such ressourcement was in full swing. It is only in the 20th century that we have seen, in some Protestant communities, mainly those associated with the Radical Reformation, like Baptists and Fundamentalist Calvinists, and also among Evangelicals, and among some Restorationist churches, that we have seen the pendulum start to swing the other way.

 

[Xeno.of.athens]

Indeed so, Arminius and his Remonstrants were basically Reformed Christians who decided Calvin was wrong with regards to predestination and monergism, and in so doing inadvertently rediscovered the theology of the early church. But it wasn’t until Wesley that anything more of a Patristic ressourcement would happen in Protestantism, but by the 19th century with movements like Anglo-Catholicism, Scoto-Catholicism and Mercersburg Theology, such ressourcement was in full swing. It is only in the 20th century that we have seen, in some Protestant communities, mainly those associated with the Radical Reformation, like Baptists and Fundamentalist Calvinists, and also among Evangelicals, and among some Restorationist churches, that we have seen the pendulum start to swing the other way.

Agreed, yet here we are in a CF discussion where some think that when a protestant group unintentionally rediscovers a doctrine of early Christianity they are making new doctrine! The only new part of it is that it is produced in an atmosphere of dispute between Calvinists about their own system of doctrine, Calvinism being a recent invention of one of their number, John Calvin, who is a founding father for their denominations.