But as
Romans 12:9 says, even our faith is imparted to us by God. And it is not
our faith that saves us but the
object of our faith: Jesus Christ. As Paul stated in his letter to Titus, "He (God) saved us."
I've heard this before. Of course it's God that saves us...but through our faith. If one does not have faith, he can't be saved. I don't understand this line of reasoning... but it doesn't seem very important to me. Jesus saves, that's all that matters. He saves us if we have faith in him.
Yes. I don't take the Calvinist view that God forces us into his kingdom. But it is only because God has first acted positively toward us, and enabled us to respond to the Gospel in kind (2 Timothy 2:25), that we may do so.
Although 2 Timothy 2:25 could be discussed a little, I won't since I think basically we agree on this.
God makes the first move -- always. He reveals Himself to everyone...then it's up to each individual person to accept His offer of salvation.
The verse does not speak of revealing, but of drawing. God draws men to salvation. If He does not, as Jesus says, no man can come to him.
Uh oh! I was afraid of this. Words can be so deceiving.
I have no more time but will respond when I get back home...
This entirely misses (or ignores) my point which was that, whether or not one believes the medicine is helpful, it is
still one's own medicine.
Yes, it is correct. I have not confused what Paul wrote about concerning the Jews (and you have not shown that I have).
If a person drifts from God, there's a good chance they were never saved. But if they were truly saved and have drifted, doing so no more dissolves their membership in God's family than the profligacy of the Prodigal dissolved his membership in his father's family (which it didn't). Our adoption into God's family is entirely contingent upon Christ, not us. God accepts us because of His beloved Son, period. The redemptive work of Jesus at Calvary was perfect, fully satisfying God's justice, and cannot be added to or improved by anything we might or might not do.
And since the foundation of our salvation and acceptance by God is the perfect and unchanging Saviour, our acceptance with God never changes.
Is
Matthew 10:33 speaking of people who are saved and then deny their Saviour? I don't think so. It is the lost who have denied and will deny Christ, not the saved.
2 Timothy 2:12-13
12 If we suffer, we shall also reign with him: if we deny him, he also will deny us:
13 If we believe not, yet he abides faithful: he cannot deny himself.
Again, it is the lost who reject, refuse, disavow (all legitimate synonyms for "deny") the Saviour, not those who have been truly born-again. (
1 John 2:19)
This isn't what the verses say, however. As Paul wrote to the Philippians, God (not us) begins a work in each of His children and He (not us) will bring that work to completion. (
Philippians 1:6) This is repeated by Paul in his letter to the Thessalonians. The God who wants to sanctify completely His children and make every part of them blameless, Paul writes, is faithful to do so. Our salvation is God's work and our practical sanctification is His work. And this work God has promised to fulfill and complete.
He does this whether or not I want Him to. Imagine if God had waited for rebellious sinners, alienated from and at enmity with Him, as Scripture says, to turn of their own accord, and humble themselves, and receive His love, grace and forgiveness.
He'd still be waiting! God is always taking the initiative with us, moving us in directions we often don't want to go. I see in this just how little my desire and ability to please God has to do with my relationship with Him. In fact, without God, I would have neither the desire nor the ability to do His will. (
Philippians 2:13)
How did He save us when we were totally separated from Him by our sin, at enmity with Him in our minds and hearts and so completely alienated from Him? Despite our terrible condition, He still manages to save us. You see, w
e aren't what is important,
He is.
No, we have free will. But He makes us able to exercise that will positively toward the Gospel.
And we only want heaven if God has persuaded us to want it. Again, God is the crucial factor, not us.
No, it doesn't
always mean this. Where did you get this idea from?
Well, hang on, now. To whom was Jesus speaking and when? He was speaking to unsaved Jews, primarily. and he said what he did in
Matthew 5:13 before he had died on the cross and made it possible for people to be born-again. So, no, he wasn't speaking to "US," that is, saved people when he spoke of the "salt of the earth." There were no saved people at the time.
Which deflects my question.
But as the parable of the Prodigal makes clear, the Prodigal's sonship was very beneficial to him. He gained an inheritance, and when he had used it all up, he was able to return to the loving, fully-accepting arms of his father.
How does
verse 14 start? "If
any man's (or anyone's)...
Verse 11: "No man"...
Verse 15: "If
any man"...
Verse 12: "Now if
any man's..." Seems pretty clear to me that Paul was speaking in a very general sense and not specifically about teachers.
No, it doesn't. I already pointed this out to BobRyan in this thread:
I see the term "dead" used in a number of ways in the New Testament:
It is used figuratively.
Matthew 28:3-4
3 His countenance was like lightning, and his clothing as white as snow.
4 And the guards shook for fear of him, and became like dead men.
It is used literally.
John 11:14
14 Then Jesus said to them plainly, "Lazarus is dead."
It is even used in connection with non-biological things.
Hebrews 6:1
1 Therefore, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection, not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,
I don't see, then, that there is the reason you suggest for thinking that, when the father in the Prodigal parable says that his son was "dead," that he meant "dead in trespasses and sins."
I'm afraid you do - though, you do so one step removed from conversion. You don't say one can be saved by works, but you do say that salvation can only be maintained or preserved by good works. This is, to quote BobRyan, "a distinction without a difference." If your works are necessary to the retention of your salvation, then your salvation is works-dependent. This is works-salvation which Scripture flatly denies.
To analogize: Imagine a judge who casts a serial murderer into prison with the declaration, "I am keeping you in jail for the rest of your life!" The murderer is jailed and is never released. Who has actually kept the murderer in jail? The judge? Or the staff at the prison? The prison staff, of course. Whatever the judge has claimed about his role in the convict's fate, the practical reality is different. You seem to be thinking in a similar way. God says, "I save sinners!" but you think that, really, you are kept in God's kingdom - you are saved - by dint of your own efforts. You give lip service to
Ephesians 2:8-9 but think and live practically in contradiction to these verses. At least, that's how it looks to me. Am I mischaracterizing your position?