Thoughts on faith or works based salvation?

[ralliann]

so Abraham did have the Law of Moses, which is the law of faith.

No he did not. Moses law was more than 400 years after Abraham.
Moses had Abraham's law of faith, and it was retained when Moses gave additional law

 

[Jasper10]

While I agree that we can't keep God's law perfectly, nowhere does the Bible say that the only purpose of the law is to prove that we can't obey it perfectly. You have refused to quote where the Bible says that that is the only purpose of the law or even where it says that it is one of its purposes, yet you claim that you have done that, which is lying to me. I did not claim that I can keep it perfectly.




I also did not claim that the purpose of doing good works is to plug the gap. In Isaiah 64:6, it is not God speaking, but rather it is the people complaining about how they thought that God viewed their works because He was not coming down and making His presence known. The reality is that God does not command dirty rags, but rather the righteous deeds of the saints are like fine white linen (Revelation 19:8).



Relying on our own strength is not relying on anyone else, so relying on what God instructed is not relying on our own strength, but rather it is the way to rely on God. The way to come to God is not by refusing to follow His instructions for how to come to Him. I have not claimed that we don't need God because I can do it all myself. In Matthew 11:28-30 and Jeremiah 6:16-19, God's law is described as the good way where we will find rest for our souls, so that is the way to know the peace that He offers.



While the Bible says that Jesus gave himself to pay the penalty for our sins, it does not say that the only purpose of the law is to prove that we can't keep it perfectly. Doing good works has nothing to do with trying to be good enough.

You are trying to associate yourself with individuals who agreed with Isaiah who said all works are like filthy rags.If all works are like filthy rags then no works will save you.You don’t agree with Isaiah and have your own interpretation of what the bible is saying so why are you referring to verses which do not apply to you? You have divided yourself from such people.You are like a thief and robber who climbs into the sheep fold just as Jesus explained in John 10:1

Be quiet.

 

[splish- splash]

If you look in a Bible instead of a commentary you will find that Salvation is offered through Jesus shedding his blood for our sins, Salvation is not our works, Jesus said you must be born again, the evidence is Jesus is in them, New birth a new creation in Christ, that person knows others can only look for fruit, God so loved the world that he offers it to any one that believes, anyone that comes to Jesus in Faith God takes there faith and gives the gift of Righteousness, The gift of eternal life which is Christ in you

Then you are free to be thankful and show your love, But you must be born again is the evidence or you wouldnt be able to show the light and the love of christ to a dark and dying world because he wouldn't be in you and you would still be a child of the devil and no matter how many works you think you do wont have any bearing on your salvation

I may not have put this as well as you would have wanted, but I think I do know that our works can not save us but Christ. I will ask you this though, if Christ takes over doesn't this impact on even our deeds?

I believe it does.. The works that manifest simply come from our transformed hearts. Otherwise, we are justified by grace through faith. The works part becomes a natural result in Christ Jesus.

Ephisians 2:8-9
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.
.

 

[Soyeong]

Repent from the fact that we have already sinned? you just made that up.....Look

Someone who has not sinned does not need to repent, so the fact that someone needs to repent means that they have already sinned and therefore that they have not had perfect obedience. If we need to have perfect obedience, then repentance won't change the fact that we have not hd perfect obedience and the fact that we can repent after we have not had perfect obedience means that we do not need perfect obedience.

All have sinned! Jesus came to save sinners. Only the Blood of Jesus can take away sin

What meaning are you applying to repentance that saves, Its nothing to do with trying to stop sinning or anything to do with obedience to the Law

Our salvation is from living in transgression of God's law, so living in obedience to it is intrinsically part of the concept, I don't see how you claim that it has nothing to do with obedience to it.

I could say to you anything not of faith is sin then you are in quite a bit of trouble, But Jesus came to take away our sins, The new covenant in his blood, the blood atonement, Turns sinners into saints, Transforms them from the kingdom of darkness to light, Gives The gift of Righteousness, the gift of eternal life = Christ in you

I completely agree that anything to of faith is sin, so I don't see how that Eans that I am in quite a bit of trouble. Moreover, in 1 John 3:4, whatever is in transgression of God's law is sin, and in Romans 3:31, our faith upholds God's law, so whatever is in transgression of God's law's is also not of faith. In Jeremiah 31:33, the New Covenant still involves following God's law and in Matthew 19:17 and Luke 10:25-28, obedience to God's law is the content of His gift of eternal life. Likewise, to say that God is righteous is to say that He does what is righteous and it would be inaccurate to describe God as righteous if He did not choose to do what is righteous, so the gift of righteousness is the gift of becoming someone who chooses to do what is righteous in obedience to God's law.

None of that is achieved through odediance to the law its through faith in Jesus,Christians are not under the law and are dead to the law because is the law that shows sin and Jesus has paid for their sin and they are under grace, the law cant define them as sinners when they are dead to the law

But when someone is born again and has God working through them they can show Gods love to the world, Love is the fulfillment of the Law

Remember the weightier matters of the law judgment, mercy, and faith, it also says without faith it is impossible to please God

We we do not earn salvation/righteousness/eternal life as a wage as the result of obeying God's law, that does not mean that living in obedience to it is not intrinsically part pf the concept. In Psalms 119:29-30, David wanted to put false ways far from him, for God to be gracious to him by teaching him to obey His law, and he chose the way of faithfulness by choosing to obey it, so this is what it means to be under grace and this has always been the one and only way of salvation by grace through faith. In Exodus 33:13, Moses wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to walk in His way that he might know Him and Israel too, and in John 17:3, eternal life is knowing God and Jesus, so again that is salvation by grace through faith. God is trustworthy, therefore His law is also trustworthy (Psalms 19:7), so the way to have faith in God is by obeying what He has instructed, while it is contradictory to think that we should have faith in God, but not have faith in what God has instructed.

In Romans 6:14, Paul described the law that we are not under as being where sin had dominion over us, which does not describe the Law of God, which is a law where holiness, righteousness, and goodness have dominion over us (Romans 7:12), but rather it is the law of sin where sin had dominion over us. Furthermore, in Romans 6:15, being under grace does not mean that we are permitted to sin, and sin is the transgression of the Law of God (1 John 3:4), so we are still under it and obligated to refrain from sin. We need to die to the law of sin in order to be free to obey the Law of God, not the other way around.

Again, in 1 John 3:4-10, those who do not practice righteousness in obedience to the Law of God and not born again. Love is the fulfillment of the Law of God because everything in it is an example of what it means to love. For example, if we love God and our neighbor, then we won't commit idolatry, theft, murder, adultery, kidnapping, rape, favoritism, and so forth for everything else commanded in the Law of God. Indeed, without faith it is impossible to please God, and the Law of God is His instructions for how to have faith, which is why Jesus said that faith is one of the weightier matters of the law.

 

[Soyeong]

Perfect obedience is never too late for sinners who turn to Christ. That's the main reason why Christ died so we die to Sin and live to God.

If we can be counted as having perfect obedience to God's law without actually having lived in perfect obedience to it, then we are not required to live in perfect obedience to it.

 

[Soyeong]

No he did not. Moses law was more than 400 years after Abraham.
Moses had Abraham's law of faith, and it was retained when Moses gave additional law

I cited verses used to show that Abraham lived in obedience to the Mosaic Law, so if you disagree without showing how I have misunderstood those verses, then you are disagreeing with those verses. Both Abraham and Moses walked in God's way in obedience to His law and spread the Gospel of the Kingdom by teaching others how to do that.

 

[Soyeong]

You are trying to associate yourself with individuals who agreed with Isaiah who said all works are like filthy rags.If all works are like filthy rags then no works will save you.You don’t agree with Isaiah and have your own interpretation of what the bible is saying so why are you referring to verses which do not apply to you? You have divided yourself from such people.You are like a thief and robber who climbs into the sheep fold just as Jesus explained in John 10:1

Be quiet.

While it is good that you are citing the Bible, you are blatantly taking what you are citing out of content by attempting to apply them to me. I have made no attempt to associate myself with those in Isaiah 64;4 who said that their works are like filthy rags. If you are saying that correctly obeying what God has commanded is filthy rags, then you are saying that God commands filthy rags, but God the reality is that God's commands are holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12) and the righteous deeds of the saints are like fine white linen (Revelation 19:8). I did not disagree with Isaiah but spoke in regard to how it should be correctly understood. It continues to be absurd for you to suggest that obeying what God has instructed is trying to go over the wall instead of through the gate.

 

[ralliann]

I cited verses used to show that Abraham lived in obedience to the Mosaic Law, so if you disagree without showing how I have misunderstood those verses, then you are disagreeing with those verses. Both Abraham and Moses walked in God's way in obedience to His law and spread the Gospel of the Kingdom by teaching others how to do that.

Moses law was 430 years after Abraham. The law which was before was not done away. The law of faith.

 

[Jasper10]

While it is good that you are citing the Bible, you are blatantly taking what you are citing out of content by attempting to apply them to me. I have made no attempt to associate myself with those in Isaiah 64;4 who said that their works are like filthy rags. If you are saying that correctly obeying what God has commanded is filthy rags, then you are saying that God commands filthy rags, but God the reality is that God's commands are holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12) and the righteous deeds of the saints are like fine white linen (Revelation 19:8). I did not disagree with Isaiah but spoke in regard to how it should be correctly understood. It continues to be absurd for you to suggest that obeying what God has instructed is trying to go over the wall instead of through the gate.

Jump over the fence if you want to Soyenog. Your choice.

 

[Soyeong]

Jump over the fence if you want to Soyenog. Your choice.

I've said nothing about wanting to jump over the fence.

 

[Soyeong]

Moses law was 430 years after Abraham. The law which was before was not done away. The law of faith.

There are many examples of God's laws being given prior to when they were given as part of the Law of Moses, such as in Genesis 39:9, Joseph knew that it was a sin to commit adultery, and this is part of the law of faith.

 

[Jasper10]

I've said nothing about wanting to jump over the fence.

You have confirmed that you will be jumping over the fence because you don’t believe that you need Jesus to pay for all of your sins and you will be doing a few good works to make yourself feel a bit better and in order to reconfirm to yourself that you are good enough to enter heaven.

 

[Soyeong]

You have confirmed that you will be jumping over the fence because you don’t believe that you need Jesus to pay for all of your sins.As I say,your choice.

I believe that I need Jesus to pay for all of my sins. For some reason you feel free to just make up things about what I believe and to speak against what you've made up without regard to what I actually believe.

 

[Jasper10]

I believe that I need Jesus to pay for all of my sins. For some reason you feel free to just make up things about what I believe and to speak against what you've made up without regard to what I actually believe.

But you feel the need to throw in a few good works as part of Christ dying for all of your sins because you believe that imperfection definitely needs to contribute a bit.That’s tying to rob Christ by saying his sacrifice alone wasn’t good enough.As I say,your choice.

 

[Soyeong]

But you feel the need to throw in a few good works as part of Christ dying for all of your sins because you believe that imperfection definitely needs to contribute a bit.That’s tying to rob Christ by saying his sacrifice alone wasn’t good enough.As I say,your choice.

Again you keep making up things about what I believe that have no basis in reality. You simply choose to ignore what I've said about what I actually believe and just attack positions that you have arbitrarily decided that I believe even those I don't actually believe those things.

 

[ralliann]

There are many examples of God's laws being given prior to when they were given as part of the Law of Moses, such as in Genesis 39:9, Joseph knew that it was a sin to commit adultery, and this is part of the law of faith.

Nobody is saying it wasn't prior. I just was not Moses law.

 

[Jasper10]

Again you keep making up things about what I believe that have no basis in reality. You simply choose to ignore what I've said about what I actually believe and just attack positions that you have arbitrarily decided that I believe even those I don't actually believe those things.

I am not making things up at all. You have now said that you believe that Jesus died for all your sins. So are you going to add to that with some of your imperfect works then before you think you will be entering heaven? Leave the imperfection out of it. If you add that to perfection it will taint perfection and perfection won’t be perfection will it. It will be imperfection;.

God can't look on imperfection and that is why you will be thrown out of the sheep pen.

You do works willingly from a genuine grateful heart because you know what it cost to save you. Something you were totally incapable of doing yourself. You don't do works to earn your way into heaven. If you are trying to do this then it is robbing Christ by claiming his sacrifice wasn't quite enough and you believe you need to add a bit which you don't. This is why Christ said what he said in John 10:1.

 

[biblelesson]

14What good is it, my brothers, if someone claims to have faith, but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you tells him, “Go in peace; stay warm and well fed,” but does not provide for his physical needs, what good is that? 17So too, faith by itself, if it does not result in action,f is dead.

18But someone will say, “You have faith and I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. 19You believe that God is one.g Good for you! Even the demons believe that—and shudder.

20O foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is worthless?h 21Was not our father Abraham justified by what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22You see that his faith was working with his actions, and his faith was perfected by what he did. 23And the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,”i and he was called a friend of God.j 24As you can see, a man is justified by his deeds and not by faith alone.

25In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute justified by her actions when she welcomed the spiesk and sent them off on another route? 26As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.

James 2 BSB

Here is an example of the works James was speaking of. I will use a worldly example.

Suppose you are the head of an organization and you just hired two people of the same skills and education, and perform their work in the same way, and both claim to have faith in Christ.

On the surface they seem to match in character, which one of the companies mission is to act with high standards upholding the integrity of the agency.

Then one day both employees are given a special task: to use their accounting skills, and draft up contracts to raise funds for the organization.

One employee’s dealings is honest, the contract is clear and all parties benefit.

The other employee, however used an accounting trick to funnel extra funds into his pocket, that was not at first obvious, not until a skilled employee caught it. That employee was then fired.

So what was the works in this situation? Honesty and integrity. The honesty the one employee had was from the heart and proved he dealt righteously. He didn’t have to do anything to be honest, it was his honest love and faith in Christ Jesus that compelled him to do right, which showed his works of righteousness.

Feeding someone or giving warm clothes is from the heart, it’s the heart that compels you to help a person in need, which for a believer are works of righteousness led by the Holy Spirit.


Some people do it to be noticed, and want recognition, but it is evident they are not led by the Holy Spirit - these are those that say they have faith but they show no works (the work of the Holy Spirit). They will appealed to Jesus, but Jesus will tell the angels to bind their hand and feet and throw them in outer darkness. These are not able to produce the works James is speaking of even though they will complain that they did the work; but they lack the Holy Spirit.

Those under the Mosiac law was only required to sacrifice an animal to be excused for sin, they didn’t necessarily have to change. That was their problem. They had an excuse, bulls, goats, calfs, birds, etc. that the priest sacrificed for them.

We are under the New Testament and have the laws written in our hearts sealed by the Holy Ghost, and we no longer walk as Israel walked. Our old man has been crucified, and we are to walk in the Spirit, in the new man, that is, the Spitit of Christ, and it is the power of God’s Spirit that proves our work - that shows our faith by our works.

James 2:18 KJV, ​

“Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.”

The parable of the wedding guest in Matthew 22 is speaking of the same thing - the wedding garment is the Holy Spirit which proves our works.

Matthew 22:10-13 KJV
10 So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together all as many as they found, both bad and good: and the wedding was furnished with guests.

11 And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment:

12 And he saith unto him, Friend, how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment? And he was speechless.

13 Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

 

[Soyeong]

I am not making things up at all. You have now said that you believe that Jesus died for all your sins. So are you going to add to that with some of your imperfect works then before you think you will be entering heaven? Leave the imperfection out of it. If you add that to perfection it will taint perfection and perfection won’t be perfection will it. It will be imperfection;.

God can't look on imperfection and that is why you will be thrown out of the sheep pen.

You do works willingly from a genuine grateful heart because you know what it cost to save you. Something you were totally incapable of doing yourself. You don't do works to earn your way into heaven. If you are trying to do this then it is robbing Christ by claiming his sacrifice wasn't quite enough and you believe you need to add a bit which you don't. This is why Christ said what he said in John 10:1.

You spoke about what I believe when I have never said those things and do not believe then, so yes, that is making things up. Doing good works as nothing to do with trying to add our works to what Jesus did. In Titus 2:11-14, our salvation is described as being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renounce doing what is ungodly, so God graciously teaching us to do these works is itself the content of His gift of saving us from not doing them, which has nothing to do with adding our works on top of what Jesus did. Furthermore, in Titus 2:14, Jesus gave himself to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people of his own possession who are zealous for doing good works, so becoming zealous for doing good works in obedience to God's law is the way to believe in what Jesus accomplished through the cross (Acts 21:20), which again is in accordance with what he accomplished, not adding to what he accomplished. While it is true that only those who do good works in accordance with the will of the Father will enter the Kingdom (Matthew 7:21), doing these works has nothing to do with trying to earn our way into heaven because there can be many difference reasons for why our entrance into heaven requires us to choose to do the Father's will other than in order to earn it as a wage. I'm not trying to earn my way into heaven, but you refuse to listen to what I am saying.

 

[Soyeong]

Here is an example of the works James was speaking of. I will use a worldly example.

Suppose you are the head of an organization and you just hired two people of the same skills and education, and perform their work in the same way, and both claim to have faith in Christ.

On the surface they seem to match in character, which one of the companies mission is to act with high standards upholding the integrity of the agency.

Then one day both employees are given a special task: to use their accounting skills, and draft up contracts to raise funds for the organization.

One employee’s dealings is honest, the contract is clear and all parties benefit.

The other employee, however used an accounting trick to funnel extra funds into his pocket, that was not at first obvious, not until a skilled employee caught it. That employee was then fired.

So what was the works in this situation? Honesty and integrity. The honesty the one employee had was from the heart and proved he dealt righteously. He didn’t have to do anything to be honest, it was his honest love and faith in Christ Jesus that compelled him to do right, which showed his works of righteousness.

Feeding someone or giving warm clothes is from the heart, it’s the heart that compels you to help a person in need, which for a believer are works of righteousness led by the Holy Spirit.


Some people do it to be noticed, and want recognition, but it is evident they are not led by the Holy Spirit - these are those that say they have faith but they show no works (the work of the Holy Spirit). They will appealed to Jesus, but Jesus will tell the angels to bind their hand and feet and throw them in outer darkness. These are not able to produce the works James is speaking of even though they will complain that they did the work; but they lack the Holy Spirit.

Our desire clouds our judgement so that we can't be sure if something is truly good or if we just think that it is good because we desire it, so we have the choice of whether we are going to learn on our own understanding of good and evil or whether we are going to reject our own understanding in favor of trusting in God with all of our heart to correctly make that distinction through His instructions (Proverbs 3:1-6). So that is what it means to have faith, why our works show whether we are leaning on our own understanding or have faith in God to correctly make that distinction through His instructions, and why James said that he would show his faith by his works.

To describe someone as having a character trait is to describe them as being someone who chooses to take actions that express that trait and it would be inaccurate to describe someone as having a character trait if they chose to not take actions that express it, so it is inaccurate to say that he was honest and that he didn't have to do anything to be honest, especially when your example was of him doing what is honest by how he wrote the contract.

The Bible often uses the same terms to describe aspects of God's nature as it does to describe aspects of the nature of God's law, such as with it being holy, righteous, and good (Romans 7:12), or with justice, mercy, and faithfulness being weightier matters of the law (Matthew 23:23), and this is because it is God's instructions for how to act in accordance with those aspects of His nature, which are also known as fruits of the Spirit. When we act in accordance with an aspect of God's nature, we are expressing our love for that aspect of who He is, so everything that God chose to command was specifically commanded in order to teach us how to love a different aspect of His nature, which is why there are many verses in both the OT and the NT that connect our love for God with our obedience to His commandments, such as with Jesus saying that if we love him, then we will obey his teachings, but if we don't love him, then we will not obey his teachings (John 14:23-24). So it is not so much that our love for Jesus compels us to do what is righteous, but that doing what is righteous is the way to love that Jesus is righteousness.

Those under the Mosiac law was only required to sacrifice an animal to be excused for sin, they didn’t necessarily have to change. That was their problem. They had an excuse, bulls, goats, calfs, birds, etc. that the priest sacrificed for them.

We are under the New Testament and have the laws written in our hearts sealed by the Holy Ghost, and we no longer walk as Israel walked. Our old man has been crucified, and we are to walk in the Spirit, in the new man, that is, the Spitit of Christ, and it is the power of God’s Spirit that proves our work - that shows our faith by our works.

In Romans 3:19, the Mosaic Law silences every mouth and holds the whole world accountable to God, but if there was anyone who was not under it, then that would not be the case, rather God is sovereign so we are all under His law. In Exodus 20:6, God wanted His people to love Him and obey His commandments, so obedience to God has always been a matter of the heart and if the Mosaic Law allowed for people to be excused of their sin while they didn't necessarily have to change, then God would not have cared if they honored Him with their lips while their hearts were far from Him, but that is something that God has always disdained (Isaiah 29:13). A rich person would be missing the whole point if they thought that they had the freedom to sin all they wanted as long as they were willing to pay the price of a sacrifice. The book of Exodus ends with the glory of God descending on the tent of meeting and with the problem of no one being able to draw close while Leviticus begins with God calling out instructions for how to draw close, so Leviticus is essentially a book about how to draw close to God, and if someone were offering sacrifices while neglecting to repent and draw close to God, then again they were missing the whole point. It is like Isaiah 1:11-15, where the problem was not with offering sacrifices, keeping God's holy days, and prayer, but that they were doing those things while their hands were full of blood. Likewise, in Psalms 51:16-19, what God wanted was not sacrifices, but a broken and contrite heart, then God will delight in sacrifices, so a sacrifice was just the means of expressing a broken and contrite heart, which is what God wants.

The New Covenant involves God putting the Mosaic Law in our minds and writing it on our hearts (Jeremiah 31:33), which is so that we will walk as Israel walked in obedience to it, which is also why the Spirit has the role of leading us to obey it (Ezekiel 36:26-27).