“Grig It is the clear teaching of the Bible that Jesus atoned for our sins and redeemed us from the curse upon us because of our sinful nature.”
But I am talking about exaltation which is in addition to salvation from sin and death and is related to our conduct in life.
I disagree with the idea that a person once converted is pre-forgiven and has no need of repentance and has a guaranteed spot in heaven. Paul later told the Corinthians that “Now I rejoice, not that ye were made sorry, but that ye sorrowed to repentance: for ye were made sorry after a godly manner, that ye might receive damage by us in nothing. For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation” (2 Cor 7:9-10)
In Hebrews it even teaches that a person who was once converted can fall away to the point where they are unable to come back:
Heb 6
4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,
6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.
In Rev 2 you have:
Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write...Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent. (v1, 5)
and
And to the angel of the church in Pergamos write;... Repent; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. (v12,16)
and
...thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols. And I gave her space to repent of her fornication; and she repented not. Behold, I will cast her into a bed, and them that commit adultery with her [that would be the servants of God mentioned above] into great tribulation, except they repent of their deeds. (v20-22)
It is very clear from this that even after someone if reborn, they can fall, and they need to repent of sins they commit or suffer consequences. Hence, members should consider themselves on the path, not at the destination, lest in pride they fall. We always have our free will, there will always be temptation in our mortal life and the chance to choose the downward path.
” Grig - “And again, if you read 1Cor, you will see Paul is very, very clear that fornicators like the member he ordered excommunicated are to be cast out of the church and will not be in heaven unless they repent.”
MHGinTN - That is not what Paul taught in chapter five of first Corinthians. ... ICor5:5 to deliver up such a one to the Adversary for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.”
Excommunication delivers them to the Adversary and hopefully the experience brings them to repent that their spirit might be saved. Paul goes on after this to clearly explain (using the imagry of levening) that the influence of a sinner like this can be a cancer in the church. He tells them to purge out the old leven (v7) and in v13 to ‘put away from among yourselves that wicked person’
If you look a little further:
1 Cor 6
9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind,
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you:
Fornicators will not inherit the kingdom of God, even those what were numbered among the Christians at Corinth. Christ came to save you FROM sin, not to save you IN sin.
Matt. 24:13 But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.
Mark 13:13 ...but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.
As to your interpretation of Revelations, well, you might have fun reading the additions Smith made to Revelations in his 'Joseph Smith Translation' of the King James Bible. He fabricated better than you so you might want to learn from your master the more 'refined' deceits to use.
As to your earning Salvation, good luck with that contradiction to God's Word ... there was never a candlestick in the Mormonism religion (you do realize what the candlestick signifies, right?) for God to remove it, so I suppose Mormons think themselves safe.
As to your 'interpretation of Hebrews --"In Hebrews it even teaches that a person who was once converted can fall away to the point where they are unable to come back"-- it does not teach that the one was converted merely that they tasted of ... and once the taste is rejected, the meal cannot be consumed lest they crucify again the body and blood. One is reminded with your posts 'ever learning but never coming to a knowledge' (as in relationship of 'faithing', the action word which imparts His Righteousness because you can have none of your own effort; Abraham faithed, he acted upon his belief, he didn't just believe and sit down to wait; God told him to get up NOW and walk the land promised, after Lot left him to follow what God had at the first instructed him to do) ...
And finally, I like your offering on 'levening', and clearly Paul taught that for the benefit of the fellowship in 'The Way'.