- Apr 9, 2002
- 31,914
- 1,529
- 18
- Faith
- Seeker
- Marital Status
- Married
- Politics
- US-Republican
Hi, I normally wouldn't post stuff like this here, but this grew out of a conversation here, and I thought I'd seek feedback.
Here, I think, I begin to see the problem.
You're asking what you have to do.
The goal here is not to find the bare minimum and pursue it! To do this is in fact to reject God's grace.
If you are gratefully receiving God's grace, then you will do things. You "have to", not in the sense that it is demanded of you, but that it is inevitable that you will wish to.
To put the question as you do here is to go back to the question of how we can earn salvation. The answer "since we can't earn it, we don't have to try" is just as misleading as any other answer that purports to tell you how much you have to do to obtain salvation.
As soon as you begin to express the question in terms of what the requirements are, you start expressing the notion that this salvation is a lot of work and it'd be nice to get saved so we can go get some golf in while the weather's nice.
Nothing we do can ever be enough to earn salvation, so obviously, we don't need to earn it. We can't earn it, so if we needed to, we'd be in a lot of trouble.
However, that doesn't mean that we don't have to try.
Imagine, if you will, a six-year-old child who has just caused an accident that destroyed a $200,000 sports car.
He cannot pay for the car. He has $2.73 in his piggy bank. No money he has is enough to cover this cost.
So he can't pay. And if the car owner is a good person, he won't try to sue the kid or his parents.
But... Imagine that, instead of just not paying, the kid offers the man his $2.73. Is this enough to pay for the car? No.
But it is enough that we know, from this action, that the child is the sort of person who would pay, if he could.
Works do not buy heaven, but if you don't do works, it means you not only can't pay, but don't want to. It means that, if the man gave you a check for $200,000, you wouldn't sign it over to him to "pay for his car", recognizing forgiveness and responding to it appropriately; you'd just keep it and buy a whole lot of bubblegum.
Which means that, until you're the sort of person who offers what you've got, you're not getting anything more.
Except, of course, for purely unmerited grace.
...
So, any feedback? I've been wrestling with how to express this relation for a long time.
That sounds good. So, I don't have to do anything then. Just recieve the gift through the works of Christ.
Here, I think, I begin to see the problem.
You're asking what you have to do.
The goal here is not to find the bare minimum and pursue it! To do this is in fact to reject God's grace.
If you are gratefully receiving God's grace, then you will do things. You "have to", not in the sense that it is demanded of you, but that it is inevitable that you will wish to.
To put the question as you do here is to go back to the question of how we can earn salvation. The answer "since we can't earn it, we don't have to try" is just as misleading as any other answer that purports to tell you how much you have to do to obtain salvation.
As soon as you begin to express the question in terms of what the requirements are, you start expressing the notion that this salvation is a lot of work and it'd be nice to get saved so we can go get some golf in while the weather's nice.
Nothing we do can ever be enough to earn salvation, so obviously, we don't need to earn it. We can't earn it, so if we needed to, we'd be in a lot of trouble.
However, that doesn't mean that we don't have to try.
Imagine, if you will, a six-year-old child who has just caused an accident that destroyed a $200,000 sports car.
He cannot pay for the car. He has $2.73 in his piggy bank. No money he has is enough to cover this cost.
So he can't pay. And if the car owner is a good person, he won't try to sue the kid or his parents.
But... Imagine that, instead of just not paying, the kid offers the man his $2.73. Is this enough to pay for the car? No.
But it is enough that we know, from this action, that the child is the sort of person who would pay, if he could.
Works do not buy heaven, but if you don't do works, it means you not only can't pay, but don't want to. It means that, if the man gave you a check for $200,000, you wouldn't sign it over to him to "pay for his car", recognizing forgiveness and responding to it appropriately; you'd just keep it and buy a whole lot of bubblegum.
Which means that, until you're the sort of person who offers what you've got, you're not getting anything more.
Except, of course, for purely unmerited grace.
...
So, any feedback? I've been wrestling with how to express this relation for a long time.