Salvation by faith and works : intellectually ridiculous?

In this Christians Christianity, God is the one who supplies the faith and belief. And there is a gradient. Some have greater faith and belief than othersHowever, there is no sense of level of faith being the deciding factor. The Bible only decribes 2 postions. In Adam/In Christ. And they are settled here not on the day of the judgement we will all face.The great thing about this Christians Christianity is that one doesn't have to stew until judgment to find out their lot. One can know it now. Which kind of matches the characteristic one would expect of a loving father when you think of it.

"Gave him a chance?". I may be wrong PY but it sounds a little like you were trying to meet God on your terms rather than his. He can't meet people on there terms for the terms will differ wildly.It is a narrow gate but there is ample room for you to pass through it - on his terms. That is the single biggest issue holding people from him. They won't come on his terms and so they invent their own useless one. And there are as many of those as people in the world before they find his way through the gate.A time may come. You might not realise it for what it is. If you ask on his terms then he will come and bring you through.God bless

FOR Purple Youko only: not necessarily for debate. If I may leave the last issue of ' whose fault is the fall' aside for now - it would (and has) take another thread(s) and is not an area for easy acceptance. For the moment suffice to say that:-the issue revolves around whether God could create truly free willed people whilst knowing what choice they would make. Or not. I hold that his knowing is not his pre-destining. But only God would be capable. Intellectual impossibility? You're not God (Hark the howls at that thought!!!)- if you are aware of your own guilt, it feels like your guilt, looks like your guilt and smells like your guilt then it probably is your guilt. I don't mean guilt imposed on you by Religion - just your own self aware guiltChange position: you don't do it. He does. Salvation is of God not man. I know this is counter intuitive and 'we' are exhorted to 'believe' and 'repent'. (in investigating this path one will inevitably come up against the paradox: I must chose but only his action will enable me to chose - sorry). That's what happened me and the closest Christian friends I have made. All very different stories: some slow, some like me, very fast. All the same m.o.The bit at the very pinnacle of crossover between in Adam/in Christ is an 'act of faith' This is not done in a vacuum - you'll have been brought there. My own experience was a cry to God because there was noone else I could turn to. Humility, end of self, submission ("God if your out there - Help!" oft times). The words must come from your own heart and come willingly ('willingly' in the sense that though in difficulty you don't have to speak them) perhaps even beseechingly. But he will have used our actions and situations (note "our") and arranged them in some way which makes it possible for us to say them - heartfeltedly. Arm twisting? Not really. He fights like a mother tiger for us alright - but never unfairly, never in a way that forces us into his kingdom. Its has all the majesty of a symphony: oftentimes confusing along the way but in the end it all comes togehter and we go "aha! - a master at work!" And there is music for a symphony written for everybody who has ever lived. The question is whether it gets played or not. And I cannot but know that we can say no.1 Cor 2:14 is simply stating a fact about the person in Adam. D'ya remember God telling Adam that "on the day....you will surely die" Well he didn't physically did he. But God doesn't tell lies either. It was in fact spiritual death that was being referred to then. And people who are dead cannot percieve things. We know that much. So a spiritually dead person will not perceive spiritual things. Thats the position: God is spirit and if you are dead spiritually then you will not perceive him. Intellectualising can be used as a tool in a person seeking and him finding you - but unless one becomes spiritually undead (hence the hackneyed, hated but ultimately spot on accurate phrase: born again) then one will never see (I was blind (dead) but now I see (alive))You are not doomed if you are spiritually dead. Everyone was born that way. When Jesus came to seek and save the lost it was the spiritually dead he came for. You are only doomed if you die spiritually dead (for you will have been offered life) While you live he knock and knocks and knocks. Listen PY: if someone had blabbered this bull at me 5 years ago I'd have told them where to get off. You can't make it happen in one sense. But you can want it to happen. If you want it to then no matter how far away you percieve yourself to be it is only a fraction away from him. He can bridge any gap in no timeDo remember this prayer. I remember praying it at one time and will probably pray it again. But on your side of the fence it has an eternal resonance:Lord I don't love you
I don't even want to love you
But I want to want to love youImagine proposing to your wife like that! Thats how far we can stray (nay further) and he will hear and respond - in his way. On his terms. In his time. Read the prodigal son parable again. Note that the father is ever-looking out for his son. And that which caused the son to look back was a connection he severed with his father. The father sits central to it all. Its late. In answering quickly (if not snidely) let me say that he never sinned once. Now hypothetically (at best) that means you're steeped in sin by breakfast. Comparing yourself to him is comparing apples and rotten pears. And your far nicer than me... Luckily its not a matter of being nice.As far as witholding salvation I must point to the bible: God wants that NONE should perish but that ALL would come to repentance. His wanting is not the same as his willing (which always comes to be). He sacrificed his son. He said to a thief on the cross "Truly Truly I tell you - today you will be with me in paradise. No acts, no good deeds, no time for getting ones act together. Saved through faith. And God given faith at that.If your heart/gut/soul/being wants him then come he will. Rely on works and who knows. A person may be under the impression that works need to be done whilst at the same time having at some point in their heart, seen their corruption and maybe even their lack of bargaining power and asked "Lord come". That they revert to works afterwards makes no odds. The deal once done is sealed. Nothing can separate. NothingIt makes more sense to me than works. Infinitely more sense. It magnifies God and reduces me. Take a look out the window. Whether 6 day or 4 billion years it remains a wonder worthy of my repositioning myself w.r.t. him.PY: an oft recurring expression from Godly people in the bible is, on exposure to God or even a whiff of him is to fall on their faces or burst out uncontrollably at his magnitude and power and grace toward us (comparitively) minisicule beings. That is our position. And you (as I did) wave your puny fist at him?Non sense mon ami

...trixies saving grace is that she says "seems"We all have our proof passages but to me it seems that supporting ones case (oh dear am I talking faith alone again?) on a single passage in scripture is fraught with difficulty, Not least: if one passage contains a proof (or even very strong suggestion) then what point the rest?My oft asked but never answered question regarding this particular passage is that it can be interpreted as a 'causal' to salvation (they did this therefore they are saved) VERSUS 'consequence' of having being saved (as a result of being saved they did this...) IOW God "recognises & declares & justifies publically" those who are destined for heaven as a result of his action in those whom he has saved. It has resulted in "good works"."Faith without works is dead"...another favorite of the 'works movement' can be seen consequentially also. The faith alone view: if a person isn't doing good works (to be defined by God not man) then they have not saving faith. Works consequential not causal to having being saved.Cause/consequence - which is it from these passages and why? I arrived at this point and was settled - until I read about pre-destination: God electing, pre-choosing, God having mercy upon whom he will have mercy. I ended (recently) at an intellectually satisfying paradox (if that in itself is not a paradox...)Where did you arrive and how do you cohere these contradictory ideas? "the law is a schoolteacher". To teach us what? "to lead us to Christ""Without the law there is no knowledge of sin"Trixie, this is fairly unambiguous stuff. The purpose of the law was primarily to make us aware that we cannot adhere to it - not an instruction to spiritually unreceptive (read: dead) people. It seems simple to me: if there was no law, how would we know we are sinning?No 'keep off the grass' sign? How would we know stepping on the grass caused it to whither and die.No 30mph sign? How would we know that going faster endangered people (the harming of which there is just punishment - even in this life)Wet Paint? We could ruin our clothes were it not for this simple warning. Now if the clothes weren't ours in the first place then you see transformation into law. Are you your own? Heartrending. You will your own strength into his legs but you can't can you? Your heart pours out in sheer love and it reaches such a crescendo that you would, in areas of your being, be willing to die rather than have your beloved go through a moments more pain or shame. Thats love. Self-sacrificial love. The best love of all loves.The Father hangs his son on a cross. His man-son. Pain, humiliation, torture, betrayal. His man-mother sits at the base of that cross and weeps as you did. The Father spits on his God-son. He rejects and despises him, holds him abhorrent. He does to his son what you could not to yours. The Father does this, and the Son accepts this: not because of any weakness in his own legs: for the son was the most perfect man/God there ever was. No... This loving Father puts the weakness of all the other legs in the race into the perfectly healthy and able legs of his own son. Then curses and rail at his sons coming last. And perfectly, the Son trusts and agrees with his Father. As he always didAll this? In order that the Fathers enemies: people who despise him and all he represents, can come into the same sort of loving that you pour out on your son. That they can be enabled to win the race and receive the greatest prize of all...p.s. and at the end of all that he re-transfers partial weakness onto the legs of the other racers and asks them to run again??I don't think so. If nothing else, it ruins a beautiful and perfectly heartrending story.This message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 01:58 AMThis message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 02:00 AMThis message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 02:18 AM

Much as it pains me to say so, it was but a speck of the total. Crucifixion was the most horrendous, legal punishment available at that time. Arguably the most barbaric ever (a prophecy: watch the dissent).

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CTS is a painful repetitive motion disorder and is much in the same bracket as RSI that secretaries taxi drivers and typists suffer from.
It directly affects the median nerve. This nerve travels from your forearm into your hand through a tunnel in the wrist. The tunnel is made up of 8 carpial bones of the wrist on 3 sides and the strong transverse carpal ligament in situated on the top. This tunnel is also home to the flexor tendons that move the fingers. A sheath called Synovium covers each flexor tendon. With repetitive flexing and extension of the wrist the sheaths can become inflamed and thick and creates excessive pressure on the tunnel. As the pressure continues to build it has no where to be dispersed and then causes pressure on the median nerve which produces the symptoms of CTS

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Now imagine someone hammering a nail through your wrist and through the median nerve. And then suspending you from it. Imagine designing a forearm knowing the pain that such violence would one day inflict on you.Physically, temporally, Jesus could pay no more. Not only did he suffer the cross, but he suffered as a man who had been betrayed by one he called a friend. He was the subject of a patently unjust trial. Now imagine the torment caused by that evil act against you. Imagine too, your own mother looking up at you and imagine the pain that the torture in her face would add to your suffering. Imagine doing it without protest. Willingly even. Imagine knowing about it beforehand and the terror of it causing you to sweat drops of blood and beg for your life. Imagine not running away. Imagine Brian - for that is all you would be able to do. Some man this man Jesus.Then there is the eternal God Jesus. One who enjoyed such perfect unity of relationship with his Father and his spirit that although 3 persons they are inseparable. Eternally inseparable. Even as a man subject to temptation just as we are, his love was such as to evoke nothing but perfect obedience to his father. Then something happens to this eternal perfect relationship. All the vileness of all mankind is assembled and laid on this God. Not a pretty parcel when you think of it. Then a perfectly holy father, holy meaning "in whom there is no darkness" (darkness should not to be confused with justness) who can do anything except act contrary to his nature pours out the wrath which sin deserves, on him who is in possession of it. He applies the just punishment for it all. Exacted in fullest measure without fear or favour. All in an eternal moment."My God My God why have you foresaken me?" Oh yes he can. God is spirit and you can't kill a spirit in the temporal sense of the word - they are created eternally and will last for eternity. However, one can die spiritually. Spiritual death ("on the day you eat of this apple") only means to be separate from a perfect relationship with God. Sin causes this separation. We were born in it and are born thus, spiritually dead, separated from God. Either we accept Jesus spiritual death on our behalf or die clutching our sin to ourselves. If the latter, then we too will suffer an eternal moments wrath poured out in fullest measure.How long does a moments punishment last when you exist in eternity Brian. You don't know? Then perhaps it would be wiser to hold on with the dismissal bit until you have a little more evidence. Wiser still, avoid finding that evidence and choose the intellectual insult of not being able to know something about Gods ways.This message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 10:22 AMThis message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 10:29 AM

Exhibit A: bible is accurate used to refute a point Exhibit B: Bible is inaccurate used to refute a point Seeing as we have time to kill until a faith+work=salvation adherent shows up maybe you could explain which side of the fence you'd to rest at for the purposes of discussion. I'm getting dizzy here

Whats do you reckon would have been the everyday Hebrew word for the section of the body that joins the hand to the wrist? The bit through which the median nerve passes.Without googling it, what is the common English name today? Me I call that area my wrist.As I understand it, nailing a person through their hand would result in the nail ripping through fairly boneless, insubstantial hand flesh and working its way up and out between the bones of the fingers. This due to the weight of a body ill-supported by knees nailed in the crooked position.You can try it at home Brian. Stand with your own knees in the crooked position and tell us how long before they start to tremble. 5 minutes? 10? The support under the feet was sloped downwards too. So as to ensure that the victim had to push against the nails pinning him there (presumably these were as strategically placed for maximum pain as those through the wrists)Placing a nail through soft flesh in the joint between wrist and hand you hang the victim by a support which is well capable of taking a mans weight. And maximise pain for much longer than you would were people with ripped-through hands to continually fall off their crosses.I read the bible. It doesn't clash with my knowledge as an engineer From Wiki on crucifixionThis message has been edited by iano, 19-Apr-2006 09:07 PM

"When you (plural) pray, don't pray like them (plural) but pray like this.."'Our' doesn't mean everybody. It means you (plural). You might not believe me (never take a single verse and form a doctrine from it applies as much to me as you) so... Sonship, and thus claiming fathership... is conditional. Not universal.When the word 'you' is used in the NT it is necessary to decide (with biblical backup) to whom the you refers. In the epistles 'you' very often means those who are being addressed. Christians. The letters were written to Christians Firstly the issue of universal fatherhood needs to be addressed. I have above and am open to discussing it further. If it can be established that fatherhood isn't universal then the model you posed has to be set to one side. This doesn't mean there aren't other avenues open to you - just not this one.I believe that "God has mercy upon whom he will have mercy" I also believe that "God wants that none should perish" How this (to our minds) paradox is resolved in his realm I do not know. Our purpose must never be the assumption that all is reconcilible within the bible. We have plenty of biblical warrant to suggest the contraryGod predestines & our choice. If we have difficulty with the idea that God can predestine those whom he knows will chose for him then we might well look to eternity. If that concept boggles our minds then we have sufficient to hold up our hands and say we don't know - for things can patently be resolved in a realm beyond our understanding. If that is reasonable then...We can only accept the apparently contradictory things his word says in one way. By faith: he says it, I can't resolve it, I believe it. Why? Because he says so. Faith in him. There is no other way to reconcile such things...

I can (as well as you can) make a sheep>son hence son>father connection. But I cannot make a goat>son hence son >father connection.Whilst there would be a certain amount of amusement in watching you try, it would mostly be bemusement...(Psst Ringo, your a pain in the arse at times but I genuinely do like you. If you bugger of now I'll pretend I never noticed your post. Ah sugar...I HATE saying it but what I'm really trying to say is...I forgive you)ps: in the unlikely event that you accept my foregiveness then make also the created > son connection tooThis message has been edited by iano, 20-Apr-2006 12:22 AM

All nations = everybody who has ever lived no matter what country they were born in?

the game being played is "make the connection"But if you don't want to play...

Both true. Now the next connection. God was in the position of father when he created us all.God named himself "I am" at one point. Not father. Why do you suppose God is alwaya and at all times father?

I did ask you before how it was you differentiated between a causal and a consequential interpretation of Matthew 25. Your answer? iF none then cool but don't please quote it again - I've heard it a zillion times but never an answer. Everybody will stand before him to be judged. Christian and non alike. But judgement isn't a trial - it is a declaration of judgement. If one is a Christian one can expect one result. If not another. All people will stand. But the innocent (or rather: made innocent) know already what the judgment will entail. If you were innocent but had to face judgment then you can be confident of what will happen (assuming a judge who is in possession of all the facts of course) I don't see the father of all connection in any case. Can you be more specific?

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8 Therefore don't be like them, for your Father knows what things you need, before you ask him.

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Them/you. Father pertains to the 'you' - not the 'them' I agree. But are the 'them' just as much sons as are the 'you' Where is the link that implies this? Get this first from Luke 10: "desiring to justify himself". Patently this is not what one should be doing. What does justifying oneself involve. Getting into the nitty gritty of law abiding. He asks thus "Give me it precisely, exactly what it is I should do?" Implying "when I've done it I'll be (having done so myself) be justified"Then Jesus gave him the nitty gritty. Don't skim the parable Trixie. your from Edinbourgh right. You might be a Ranger or a Celt. Your a Celt for now. Off the the saturday twice yearly battle - green in your hand. Tinnies with the boyz and the tribal of the conflict. Stand off in the train station and fights with the Sashnach. Your boyfriend takes a head to the nose and some creep in blue feels your assNow pick up the fat bellied, sick encrusted Ranger supporter who is slumped dead with drink in the luggage compartment of the dour, dank British Rail carriage your travelling in and take him to your home in a taxi. Let him sleep it off and give him some soup when he wakes - for you know what it is to wake from such a state.In your dreams? Well that was the relationship between a Jew and a Samaritan in those days. Jesus is speaking to those who are enabled by him to do such impossible things. For those in whom he does not dwell such actions towards a Ranger are impossible. We in whom he dwells still have free will - that never changes. And our free will screams NO at the slob on the floor of the train. He exhorts us to do as he says. And enable that impossible.On your own you cannot. And if it is that your house is a haven for pot-bellied drunk Rangers fans then let me know - I'll think of another exampleThis message has been edited by iano, 20-Apr-2006 01:30 AM

I agree. But what I was hoping for what the father in the first place bit. Father of all in the first place.Your doing good Ringo but your>not >putting >together>a>connected>case.If it has to rely on a mystery at some point then say so will ya?

My mate was on a plane flying back from a visit to Israel. He overheard a convesation going on behind him. It was an orthodox jew in grief with the steward serving drink. The Jew hadn't enough cash on him for the beer. Easy as pie my mate turns around and offers to pay for the beer. "If looks could kill! He looked at me as if satan himself was offering to by him a drink" Orthodox Jews consider gnetiles as they always have. As dogs.I'm curious as to your taking it as sectarian. Its as if you imagine that sectarianism doesn't exist. Well it does Trixie. And the UVF merchant is asked to pick up the IRA guy who has been set upon by the RUC. Your a celt Trixie. A green as green celt. They exist. And you in green - for you know what they are like are asked to pick up an blue as blue.Well, do ya punk? Only if your father of all doctrine worked. Jesus talking to those that are already his and exhorting then to live as him is quite a different issue. Being saved doesn't mean you sit on your arse. You are exhorted to work. But just not to earn your salvation. You already have that.This message has been edited by iano, 20-Apr-2006 02:17 AM