Is salvation by faith alone, or by faith plus works

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #357:

The Christian is called to make Christ Lord and Saviour of their life.

That's right, and as our Lord, He requires obedience of us, for:

Luke 6:46 . . . why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?

stuart lawrence said in post #357:

Those who's christianity consists of going to church once a week, and making sure they don't get drunk, use foul language, have extra marital affairs and smoke. They basically believe that will give them a free pass to enter heaven.

Note that Jesus Christ requires more, for:

Luke 14:33 . . . whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.

 

[stuart lawrence]

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

You didn't answer the question

 

[stuart lawrence]

Note that the New Covenant/New Testament law of Jesus Christ has a list of sins much longer than that in the letter of the Ten Commandments of the Old Covenant Mosaic law which the apostle Paul showed in 2 Corinthians 3:6-18 has been abolished. Also, at the end of the New Covenant list of sins, Paul shows Christians are not released from the New Covenant/New Testament law of Jesus Christ. For if Christians commit any of these sins without repentance, they will ultimately lose their salvation:

Galatians 5:19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
20 Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,
21 Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

You have already been shown Paul means what is abolished is the structure regarding a law of righteousness. The law in regard to it being a legally enforceable written down law needing to be looked to and including observed to be righteous before God.
God will not abolish the fact he wants you to love him with all your heart body soul and mind.
God will not abolish the fact he doesn't want you to murder, lie steal commit adultery etc.
That law was placed on your heart, not abolished. No longer on tablets of stone but tablets of human hearts( 2cor3:3)

 

[stuart lawrence]

Regarding "kills more severely", that's right. For:

Hebrews 10:26 For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,
27 But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.
28 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:
29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?

Rom 10:26 does not refer to you. You do not understand the truth!
And it refers to a continuous sinful lifestyle otherwise every Christian on earth is condemned

Glad you accept the law of righteousness you insist exists, is far harder to obey than the law of righteousness Paul refers to as the letter that kills and the ministry of death and condemnation.

 

[stuart lawrence]

That's right, and as our Lord, He requires obedience of us, for:

Luke 6:46 . . . why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?



Note that Jesus Christ requires more, for:

Luke 14:33 . . . whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple.

Have you forsaken all you have?
Do you even try to obey all of the literal commands of Christ you incorporate into NC law if righteousness?

Of course you don't. You testify against yourself in your statements, apparently oblivious to the fact you are doing so.
The result of head theology, based on the letter without understanding the message. Head theology devoid of reality in your life.
So as per your quote. Why call Jesus Lord when you don't even try to obey each and everyone of his literal commands you insist must be obeyed under a law of righteousness?

The measure you use to judge others will be used to judge you
Matt7:2

 

[stuart lawrence]

The only way to live according to the heart of Christ's teachings is to die to a law of righteousness.
Live earnestly under a law of righteousness and you will not reflect love, mercy and compassion in your life. You will simply reel off the letter from your head and demand of others what you do not demand of yourself. You won't practice what you preach.
No love in that for others, so you cannot then live as Christ taught.

The teachers of the law and Pharisees sit in Moses seat so you must be careful to do everything they tell you.
But do not do what they do for they do not practice what they preach.
They tie up heavy loads and place them on men's shoulders, while they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them
Matt23:2-4

The above does NOT refer to man made rules. The Pharisees faultlessly practised them. It refers to law they preached but did not practice

 

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #363:

You have already been shown Paul means what is abolished is the structure regarding a law of righteousness.

Note that the structure of Jesus Christ's New Covenant/New Testament law of righteousness has not been abolished. For the apostle Paul shows that if Christians commit any of the following sins without repentance, they will ultimately lose their salvation. For:

1 Corinthians 6:9 ¶Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters,
nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

 

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #364:

Rom 10:26 does not refer to you.

Did you mean Hebrews 10:26 instead of Romans 10:26?

If so, note that Hebrews 10:26-29 does refer to "we" Christians, just as its context does (Hebrews 10:25). For initial salvation doesn't take away our free will.

stuart lawrence said in post #364:

And it refers to a continuous sinful lifestyle otherwise every Christian on earth is condemned

That's right: It refers only to if we sin without repentance. For we can be forgiven if we repent (1 John 1:9).

stuart lawrence said in post #364:

Glad you accept the law of righteousness you insist exists, is far harder to obey than the law of righteousness Paul refers to as the letter that kills and the ministry of death and condemnation.

Note that it hasn't been said that it's far harder to obey, for we now have faith and the Holy Spirit:

Romans 8:13 . . . if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.

Colossians 3:5 ¶Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry:
6 For which things' sake the wrath of God cometh on the children of disobedience:

 

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #366:

The teachers of the law and Pharisees sit in Moses seat so you must be careful to do everything they tell you.
But do not do what they do for they do not practice what they preach.
They tie up heavy loads and place them on men's shoulders, while they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them
Matt23:2-4

Matthew 23:2 . . . The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat:
3 All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do . . .

Note that Jesus said to do what they said, not to reject what they said. But this applied only to the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law, which Jesus Christ abolished on the Cross:

Ephesians 2:15 Having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments . . .

 

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #366:

The teachers of the law and Pharisees sit in Moses seat so you must be careful to do everything they tell you.
But do not do what they do for they do not practice what they preach.
They tie up heavy loads and place them on men's shoulders, while they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them
Matt23:2-4

Matthew 23:4 For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.

Note that this can't apply to the New Covenant/New Testament law of Jesus Christ:

1 John 5:3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.

 

[stuart lawrence]

Matthew 23:4 For they bind heavy burdens and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men's shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers.

Note that this can't apply to the New Covenant/New Testament law of Jesus Christ:

1 John 5:3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.

I will just sum it up here, because you are just repeating the same things over and over despite being shown your error in underatanding
You say Jesus literal commands are not grevious.
you quote if we love Jesus we we will obey his commandments
You say if we don't obey Jesus Commandments we dont love him and are lazy.
You insist we are under a law of righteousness concerning Jesus literal Commandments.

Yet, you yourself do not even try and obey each and every literal command of Christ do you. So you testify against yourself and condemn yourself.
To be righteous under the law requires 100 percent perfect obedience of it. So you are guilty and condemned my friend according to your belief.
People who just reel off the letter from their heads, and make demands of others based on that literal letter, demands they in their own life do not even try to adhere to, will never understand the true message. It is impossible.
The Pharisees of Jesus day reeled off the literal letter, but they did not practice what they preached/ demanded of others, and neither do you.
And the Pharisees of course did not understand the message contained in the letter they endlessly quoted, as you do not either

 

[Bible2+]

stuart lawrence said in post #371:

To be righteous under the law requires 100 percent perfect obedience of it.

We are to be "perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Corinthians 7:1). But if we slip up and commit a sin, there is still a way for us to regain perfect holiness before God. For:

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The problem arises if we wrongly employ our free will to stop repenting from our sins (Hebrews 10:26-29), or to stop doing good works of faith (Romans 2:6-8), or to stop believing in Jesus:

Hebrews 6:4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,
6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.
7 For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:
8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

This shows that even Christians, who have repented and become partakers of God's Holy Spirit, can ultimately lose their salvation because of subsequently wrongly employing their free will to "fall away", to commit apostasy, to stop believing (like in Luke 8:13, 1 Timothy 4:1, and 2 Thessalonians 2:3), just as other scriptures show the same thing (John 15:6; 2 Timothy 2:12b, Mark 8:35-38, Hebrews 10:38-39, Matthew 24:9-13).

One way a Christian could be brought to the point where he commits apostasy would be if he finds a particular sin to be very pleasurable, so pleasurable and so fulfilling (in the short term) that he continues in it over time until his heart becomes hardened by the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:13), to where his love for God grows cold because of the abundance of iniquity (Matthew 24:12), to where he quenches the Spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:19), to where he sears his conscience as with a hot iron (1 Timothy 4:2), to where he begins to listen to the lies of demons and latch onto them, to the point where he departs from the faith (1 Timothy 4:1). In a wrong desire to continue in their lusts without repentance, Christians can reach the point where they're no longer able to endure the sound doctrine of the Bible, and instead seek out and latch onto other teachings which help to support them in their lusts (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

Another way a Christian could be brought to the point where he commits apostasy would be if he has a terror of being tortured and killed during a persecution against Christians, so that during such a persecution he renounces his faith in Jesus Christ and the Gospel in order to avoid being tortured and killed (Mark 8:35-38; 2 Timothy 2:12). Some Christians will fall away in this sense (2 Thessalonians 2:3) during the future Tribulation of Revelation chapters 6 to 18 and Matthew 24 (Matthew 24:9-13, cf. Matthew 13:21, Luke 8:13), when the Antichrist will take power over the earth, make war against Biblical Christians (not in hiding), and physically overcome them in every nation (Revelation 13:7-10, Revelation 14:12-13, Revelation 20:4-6, Matthew 24:9-13).

There will be no way to repent from committing apostasy (Hebrews 6:4-8) and worshipping the Antichrist and his image and willingly receiving his mark on the forehead or right hand, even if this is done just to keep from getting killed (Revelation 13:15-18). Whoever does these things, even if they had been Christians before, will end up suffering punishment in fire and brimstone forever (Revelation 14:9-12). So Christians must be willing to be killed, even by getting beheaded (Revelation 20:4-6), before they would ever do these things (Revelation 14:12-13).

This ties in with the fact a Christian can ultimately have his name blotted out of the Book of Life if he doesn't overcome to the end (Revelation 3:5, Revelation 2:26). An example of Christians ultimately "overcoming" (Greek: nikao, G3528) or "getting the victory" (nikao) (Revelation 15:2) is found later in the book of Revelation, in Revelation 15:2, which refers to those Christians who will be willing to be killed by the Antichrist instead of worshipping him to save their mortal lives during the future, worldwide persecution against Biblical Christians (Revelation 13:7-10, Revelation 14:12-13, Revelation 20:4-6, Matthew 24:9-13). Christians will be able to spiritually "overcome" the Antichrist and Satan by not loving their lives to the death (Revelation 12:11).

 

[stuart lawrence]

We are to be "perfecting holiness in the fear of God" (2 Corinthians 7:1). But if we slip up and commit a sin, there is still a way for us to regain perfect holiness before God. For:

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

The problem arises if we wrongly employ our free will to stop repenting from our sins (Hebrews 10:26-29), or to stop doing good works of faith (Romans 2:6-8), or to stop believing in Jesus:

Hebrews 6:4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,
6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.
7 For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:
8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned.

This shows that even Christians, who have repented and become partakers of God's Holy Spirit, can ultimately lose their salvation because of subsequently wrongly employing their free will to "fall away", to commit apostasy, to stop believing (like in Luke 8:13, 1 Timothy 4:1, and 2 Thessalonians 2:3), just as other scriptures show the same thing (John 15:6; 2 Timothy 2:12b, Mark 8:35-38, Hebrews 10:38-39, Matthew 24:9-13).

One way a Christian could be brought to the point where he commits apostasy would be if he finds a particular sin to be very pleasurable, so pleasurable and so fulfilling (in the short term) that he continues in it over time until his heart becomes hardened by the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:13), to where his love for God grows cold because of the abundance of iniquity (Matthew 24:12), to where he quenches the Spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:19), to where he sears his conscience as with a hot iron (1 Timothy 4:2), to where he begins to listen to the lies of demons and latch onto them, to the point where he departs from the faith (1 Timothy 4:1). In a wrong desire to continue in their lusts without repentance, Christians can reach the point where they're no longer able to endure the sound doctrine of the Bible, and instead seek out and latch onto other teachings which help to support them in their lusts (2 Timothy 4:3-4).

Another way a Christian could be brought to the point where he commits apostasy would be if he has a terror of being tortured and killed during a persecution against Christians, so that during such a persecution he renounces his faith in Jesus Christ and the Gospel in order to avoid being tortured and killed (Mark 8:35-38; 2 Timothy 2:12). Some Christians will fall away in this sense (2 Thessalonians 2:3) during the future Tribulation of Revelation chapters 6 to 18 and Matthew 24 (Matthew 24:9-13, cf. Matthew 13:21, Luke 8:13), when the Antichrist will take power over the earth, make war against Biblical Christians (not in hiding), and physically overcome them in every nation (Revelation 13:7-10, Revelation 14:12-13, Revelation 20:4-6, Matthew 24:9-13).

There will be no way to repent from committing apostasy (Hebrews 6:4-8) and worshipping the Antichrist and his image and willingly receiving his mark on the forehead or right hand, even if this is done just to keep from getting killed (Revelation 13:15-18). Whoever does these things, even if they had been Christians before, will end up suffering punishment in fire and brimstone forever (Revelation 14:9-12). So Christians must be willing to be killed, even by getting beheaded (Revelation 20:4-6), before they would ever do these things (Revelation 14:12-13).

This ties in with the fact a Christian can ultimately have his name blotted out of the Book of Life if he doesn't overcome to the end (Revelation 3:5, Revelation 2:26). An example of Christians ultimately "overcoming" (Greek: nikao, G3528) or "getting the victory" (nikao) (Revelation 15:2) is found later in the book of Revelation, in Revelation 15:2, which refers to those Christians who will be willing to be killed by the Antichrist instead of worshipping him to save their mortal lives during the future, worldwide persecution against Biblical Christians (Revelation 13:7-10, Revelation 14:12-13, Revelation 20:4-6, Matthew 24:9-13). Christians will be able to spiritually "overcome" the Antichrist and Satan by not loving their lives to the death (Revelation 12:11).

As I told you. Those who do not practice what they preach, those who demand of others what they do not demand of themselves cannot and do not understand the message contained in the letter of scripture.
They can reel off the literal letter, from their head, yet are blind to the truth. As this was the case 2000 years ago, so it is today

 

[Neogaia777]

The heart will be the dividing line and judgement, not necessarily sin...

Is thinking we can judge such matters, a sin...?

God Bless!

 

[Open Heart]

This is perhaps the most important question in all of Christian theology.

Catholics and Lutherans have worked this question out when it comes to initial justification. They both signed the Catholic Lutheran Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification back in 1999. Recently, the Methodists and REform churches endorsed the document. The Anglican communion is expected to endorse it later this year. Basically the old argument is over. No one "won." it was a semantical misunderstanding. Read the document for yourself.

Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification

 

[def]

Justification by faith and by works are related to the New Covenant, and this relationship is explained in 'Complexity Theory Connecting the Gospel'. The ebook can be downloaded for free at Smashwords: Complexity Theory Connecting the Gospel, an Ebook by Michael Chow