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Author Topic:   Salvation by faith and works : intellectually ridiculous?
tsig
Member (Idle past 2908 days)
Posts: 738
From: USA
Joined: 04-09-2004


Message 121 of 172 (305852)
04-22-2006 4:50 AM
Reply to: Message 13 by jar
04-18-2006 10:32 AM


Re: asking
How doctrinally sound do we have to be to ensure our faith is in the correct JC?
Ask the thief on the cross.
I would like to but he dosen't seem to a posting here. You do.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 13 by jar, posted 04-18-2006 10:32 AM jar has replied

Replies to this message:
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Brian
Member (Idle past 4958 days)
Posts: 4659
From: Scotland
Joined: 10-22-2002


Message 122 of 172 (305853)
04-22-2006 5:19 AM
Reply to: Message 118 by Phat
04-22-2006 2:20 AM


Re: Approaches to Understanding the Spirit
Hi phat
Methinks we should be concentrating on the fact that He loves all of us and desires that none perish!
If He really does desire this then none of us will perish and the faith v. works debate is redundant.
Brian.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 118 by Phat, posted 04-22-2006 2:20 AM Phat has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1940 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 123 of 172 (305875)
04-22-2006 7:45 AM


OP OP OP OP OP OP anyone?
Would any faith+works=slavation adherant like to get back to dealing with the OP?

  
jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 124 of 172 (305886)
04-22-2006 9:25 AM
Reply to: Message 121 by tsig
04-22-2006 4:50 AM


Re: asking
Once again, you replying to me?

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

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 Message 121 by tsig, posted 04-22-2006 4:50 AM tsig has not replied

  
riVeRraT
Member (Idle past 415 days)
Posts: 5788
From: NY USA
Joined: 05-09-2004


Message 125 of 172 (305899)
04-22-2006 10:46 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by iano
04-18-2006 6:15 AM


matter of heart
Sorry jano for jumping in here late. I have not read through the thread because my time is limited, but I did want to share with you how I see it, as I ask the same questions to myself. Finding the answers has helped me define my faith. I share with you the same question.
One may be judged simply on our performance in relation to two golden rules given by Jesus:
Since we don't know who will get into heaven, and I think the bible says we will be surprised at who we find there. I think God will judge us based on what we know.
How can you love God, if you don't know who He is?
What if the reason you don't know who He is, is because a priest molested you or something?
Salvation may consist of a more complex route: when a person believes, they receive the Holy Spirit as a guide/assisting power as to how a person should obey Gods laws fully.
I have questioned the Holy Spirit for sometime now, as to why it took so long for me to really feel His power.
But I do realize that the Holy Spirit was always there. Life is always about whether I am following Him or not. Not whether I recognize it or not. I only felt the power of the Holy Spirit 2 years ago, but I never felt like I was ever going to go to Hell.
But I am not an evil person. I can't speak for those who are truely evil at heart, and where they might be going. I have done intentional evil things in my life, but I always felt regret (repentance). I think God was always forgiving me.
I know we should forgive to be forgiven, but I never really carried to many grudges, only a hand full. After feeling the power of the Holy Spirit,I dropped those grudges as well. That's were freedom comes in.
When you know the truth (the Holy Spirit) the truth will set you free.
I no longer had to carry the weight of what those people did to me. I locked myself in my own prison of anger, by not forgiving people.
If not, can anyone explain the mechanisms of (partially) self-dependant salvation which excludes this intellectual insult. Assertion is okay so long as it contributes to completing the mechanism.
There is way to much for me to explain in just one post, but I can narrow it down to it is actually a matter of heart.
Think about how God sees you. Only you and Him now the real you.
Now think about He sees everyone else. We can't understand those relationships, just people cannot know the real us.
Our experiences in life shape us into who we are, and what we say. But there is always the inner sense (liberals call it the greater good) of the Holy Spirit. Following your heart, right and wrong, and feeling bad for what you do is what gets you in heaven. It's strictly between you and God, and we are not to even try and judge it from the outside.
Jesus came to save, not judge.
So then how do we judge evil, good, or someones heart? Isn't it all relative? What one thinks is good, another thinks is evil. Isn't it really about what is in your heart, and what God sees in you?
I once had a vision, it was in church when we all were praying as a group. There was 75 people there. They were all seeking God.
The vision was that we all were stepping into the light, but I could see all the dogma of the world being stripped away from us, and we were all naked spirits. We were in a holding room as we adjusted to our new selves, and as we looked at each other, we all were with the same feeling, and there was now hate, or bad feelings, or predetermined judgements when looking at each other, and we were all glad to be there. We were looking at each other and saying, hey, your naked too! It was like a cleansing right before we stepped in. I could see no-one being sent to hell. There was much love

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Phat
Member
Posts: 18262
From: Denver,Colorado USA
Joined: 12-30-2003
Member Rating: 1.1


Message 126 of 172 (305904)
04-22-2006 11:26 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by iano
04-18-2006 6:15 AM


Back on Topic per PD's request
Iano, in OP writes:
My time here has exposed me to people who hold the view that salvation is achieved by something other than just faith in the finished redemptive work of Jesus Christ (salvation by faith alone). These views, although they vary alot all seem to put salvation in our hands to a greater or lesser extent. In essence, our choices determine our destination.
Phat writes:
I see only a debate on whether salvation is a done deal for all or whether it is a gift of God. Are you talking about the sheep/goats bunch?
Example 1
One may be judged simply on our performance in relation to two golden rules given by Jesus: love God, love neighbour as self - irrespective of what we have believed about God or Jesus or anything else in the Bible.
Phat writes:
This would make sense in that not everyone has read the Bible upon time of death!
Example 2
Salvation may consist of a more complex route: when a person believes, they receive the Holy Spirit as a guide/assisting power as to how a person should obey Gods laws fully. Whilst the person receives guidance/power, they may chose to disobey and the extent of the disobedience/adherance determines their eternal destination.
Phat writes:
Salvation is a gift. Since we did not earn it, we cannot lose it. Any goats care to question this? Sheep? Anyone?
Logical conclusion from self-influenced salvation
Irrespective of the nature of self-influenced salvation the following seems inescapable. In the end, God will have to draw a line between who has conformed/obeyed/loved him and others or at least tried to, sufficient to enter heaven - and who hasn't.
Phat writes:
You are talking Sheep/Goats judgement again, arn't you.
No one would I hope, say that they obey all Gods laws at all times. One may say one tries to do so to the best of their ability but that appears to be leave open the possibility for any level of trying - surely if one fails then one has, per definition, tried as hard as one can at that moment yet failed.
God is in a position to measure everything up and to draw such a line. This raises the spectre of the person who just scrapes into heaven and the person who misses it by a gnats whisker obtaining those positions even though on Gods paper they are nigh on neck in neck.
Phat writes:
As pertains to Gods paper all that I recall is the book of life...and it seems to me that some names were blotted out! (Which means that all names once were there! This would seemingly indicate that salvation could be lost, but I personally dont believe that it can.)
Intellectually ridiculous?
Given that say: 60 billion people have lived and died thus far, we might suppose that the very last occupant to earn Hell may have looked at a woman with lust in his heart for a total of only 0.1 second more than the person who just scrapes into Heaven - other sin/not obeying/not loving God and neighbour being equal.
Is this not lunacy?
Phat writes:
It is lunacy to think that God keeps some sort of +/- scorecard for us. I think that if some do lose their salvation, it would be on a wide range of differential in how ones heart used the knowledge given it..
If not, can anyone explain the mechanisms of (partially) self-dependant salvation which excludes this intellectual insult. Assertion is okay so long as it contributes to completing the mechanism.
I dunno, Ian. Can you make a brief and concise comment? I think that it is important for us to do our best on a daily basis.
We need not be smug or pious about our internal perception of our salvation or the lack thereof...I share the good news as I believe it, and I think that all of us at EvC have differing perspectives.
In the end, the ball is in Gods corner and not ours.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by iano, posted 04-18-2006 6:15 AM iano has not replied

  
Phat
Member
Posts: 18262
From: Denver,Colorado USA
Joined: 12-30-2003
Member Rating: 1.1


Message 127 of 172 (305906)
04-22-2006 11:41 AM
Reply to: Message 13 by jar
04-18-2006 10:32 AM


Re: The LOL's are sure to follow soon...
Jar writes:
I believe that salvation has been given to all, everyone, believers and non-believers, Satanist and Muslim, Atheist and Agnostic, Buddhist and Taoist. GOD will judge each individual on how they behaved while alive. And GOD will make some judgement.
But the criteria will be on what someone actually does, or even more importantly, what someone does not do. Loving GOD is not a matter of what you believe, it's what you do. This is the message found throughout the Bible, and has been shown here at EvC consistently when those who try to build the case for Faith only by quotemining and others bring in the rest of the material found adjacent to the quotemined section.
I think what Ian is trying to get at is for us to attempt to judge salvation as if from Gods perspective! (No easy task! )
For instance, if the little things count toward a saved destination, at what point does the judge weigh the differences? If I spend my life helping my neighbor carry in groceries, giving my best advice to errent posters, and speaking out my conscience on matters of national importance, yet I also have a few bad days where I cuss out the slow driver, ignore a few of the least of these, and grumble and complain...upon what overall standard will I be judged?
Is it a quantifiable good points/bad points tally? Is it a snapshot of my heart that only God can judge?
I replied to Ringo in this message and basically agreed with him on the salvation for all philosophy. I think what is being discussed by Ian is the idea that we can lose our salvation.
I dont think we can, since we never earned it to begin with.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 13 by jar, posted 04-18-2006 10:32 AM jar has replied

Replies to this message:
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 Message 130 by smak_84, posted 04-22-2006 12:16 PM Phat has replied

  
ringo
Member (Idle past 411 days)
Posts: 20940
From: frozen wasteland
Joined: 03-23-2005


Message 128 of 172 (305909)
04-22-2006 11:51 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by iano
04-18-2006 6:15 AM


iano writes:
... the person who just scrapes into Heaven....
Lately, I've been thinking of heaven and hell as a continuum rather than a dichotomy.
The works-only people (the sheep) would be up at the "heaven" end, with all the "nice" people. Mother Theresa would give them a nice cup of tea, or some hot soup, because she wants to, not because she has to.
The faith-and-works people would be in the middle, with all the other faith-and-works people. That would be punishment enough for them, constantly bickering about whose faith was stronger and who just scraped past whom. They would be a "transitional species" between sheep and goats.
The faith-only people (goats) would be down at the "hell" end with all the nastiest people in the world. Hitler would be constantly yelling at them and Dahmer would be trying to eat them.
You gets what you pays for.

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This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by iano, posted 04-18-2006 6:15 AM iano has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 136 by iano, posted 04-22-2006 2:31 PM ringo has replied

  
jar
Member (Idle past 393 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 129 of 172 (305910)
04-22-2006 11:54 AM
Reply to: Message 127 by Phat
04-22-2006 11:41 AM


Re: The LOL's are sure to follow soon...
The key is what you don't do, even more than what you do. And we will only find out if we succeeded after we die.

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

This message is a reply to:
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smak_84
Inactive Member


Message 130 of 172 (305915)
04-22-2006 12:16 PM
Reply to: Message 127 by Phat
04-22-2006 11:41 AM


Re: The LOL's are sure to follow soon...
We cannot earn salvation...Jesus accomplished that by becoming the most perfect sacrifice - the Lamb of God (notice the echos of the passover in Exodus - a male, unblemished Lamb - the fulfillment of the Old Testament). As such, salvation is made possible, but since we still have free will we can accept or reject it.
Further as Jesus says, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." Mt 7:21.
This just explains that faith alone is not enough. Not everyone who calls upon the Lord shall be saved, but they must also do the will of the Heavenly Father. What is this will? "When I was hungry, you gave me food, when I was thirsty you gave me drink." Sound familiar? Hyppocrites (those who profess faith, but do not live it) are not much better off than those who don't believe in the first place (granted they have an advantage, but they don't have it all).
No matter how much logic and reasoning and evidence anyone presents here, no one will understand without prayer. I'm serious here. Pray to God and ask Him to reveal His answer. If you ask earnestly and steadfastly, He shall find a way to let you konw. I've seen it happen.
This message has been edited by smak_84, 04-22-2006 11:19 AM

This message is a reply to:
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Phat
Member
Posts: 18262
From: Denver,Colorado USA
Joined: 12-30-2003
Member Rating: 1.1


Message 131 of 172 (305916)
04-22-2006 12:20 PM
Reply to: Message 130 by smak_84
04-22-2006 12:16 PM


Re: The LOL's are sure to follow soon...
Actually, those who know better do not have any advantage.
Would it not make more sense that a person who did not know would be given a break more than a person who did know and yet failed to behave correctly?

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DeclinetoState
Member (Idle past 6437 days)
Posts: 158
Joined: 01-16-2006


Message 132 of 172 (305933)
04-22-2006 1:31 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by iano
04-18-2006 6:15 AM


Going back to the OP
quote:
My time here has exposed me to people who hold the view that salvation is achieved by something other than just faith in the finished redemptive work of Jesus Christ (salvation by faith alone).
Dismissing works can also get into something that, IMHO, is intellectually ridiculous.
For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.
James 2:26 (KJV)
A Blue Letter Bible commentary on Jehovah's Witnesses' appeal to James 2:26 as a Bible teaching that salvation is through faith and works leads to John 6:29:
Jesus answered and said to them, "This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent."
(NKJV)
I think that the BLB discussion gets us into a circular situation. James says you must have faith and works. The BLB response is that the "works" are simply faith. In other words, unless I'm terribly mistaken, to be saved you must have faith and . . . faith.

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
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iano
Member (Idle past 1940 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 133 of 172 (305947)
04-22-2006 2:14 PM
Reply to: Message 130 by smak_84
04-22-2006 12:16 PM


Counting sheep and goats...
We cannot earn salvation...Jesus accomplished that by becoming the most perfect sacrifice - the Lamb of God (notice the echos of the passover in Exodus - a male, unblemished Lamb - the fulfillment of the Old Testament). As such, salvation is made possible, but since we still have free will we can accept or reject it.
Agreed (pre-destination notwithstanding)
Further as Jesus says, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven." Mt 7:21.
Agreed. Note 'says to me' here because your next sentence....
This just explains that faith alone is not enough. Not everyone who calls upon the Lord shall be saved, but they must also do the will of the Heavenly Father.
whilst...
And everyone who calls on the name on the Lord shall be saved".
Joel 2:32/Acts 2:21/Romans 10:13
"says to" (conversing) and "call on" (beseechs) are not the same thing.
What is this will? "When I was hungry, you gave me food, when I was thirsty you gave me drink." Sound familiar?
Sound familiar? That would be an understatement if you stayed around here for a while.
Question about Matthew 25 for you, which I haven't ever got an answer for here yet. Is this description of the actions of the sheep a cause of them being saved or a consquence of them having been saved?
IOW: is the fact that they did good works result in their salvation or is it that they were saved (by calling on the name of the Lord) and as a result of that did good works - the works being a consequence of salvation declared by God in his public declaration (demonstrating to all assembled his justice)
The faith alone viewpoint is that good works will necessarily follow as a result of the action of God who now dwells withing the believer. eg:
Philipians 2:12-13 ...continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, 13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.

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 Message 130 by smak_84, posted 04-22-2006 12:16 PM smak_84 has not replied

  
iano
Member (Idle past 1940 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 134 of 172 (305950)
04-22-2006 2:26 PM
Reply to: Message 132 by DeclinetoState
04-22-2006 1:31 PM


Re: Going back to the OP
James says you must have faith and works
No he doesn't. He says "faith without works is dead" If there are no works then the faith is dead. It isn't faith. If there are works then there is faith. Works are a marker for faith. If one has faith one will have works. Works a consequence of faith
That is faith alone position:
If saving faith > works WILL follow.
philipians 2:12 writes:
Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for it is God who works in you to will an to act in order to fulfill his good purpose
"Work it out" might make one think that we have to "figure it out". It doesn't. It means "express it (out)" It means "let the fact of your salvation be worked out of you. God is working in you to will and to act so work (express) out what he is working into you"
"With fear and trembling". It doesn't say craven fear. It can mean with awe, wonder, humility. Fear and trembling can be even pleasurable. Take a roller coaster ride or experience sexual excitement

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by DeclinetoState, posted 04-22-2006 1:31 PM DeclinetoState has replied

Replies to this message:
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iano
Member (Idle past 1940 days)
Posts: 6165
From: Co. Wicklow, Ireland.
Joined: 07-27-2005


Message 135 of 172 (305951)
04-22-2006 2:27 PM
Reply to: Message 130 by smak_84
04-22-2006 12:16 PM


OP OP OP OP OP OP
Btw: any view on the situation in the OP smak?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 130 by smak_84, posted 04-22-2006 12:16 PM smak_84 has replied

Replies to this message:
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