[boatbums]

However, all you can use 1Cor. 3 for is to support a time when works will be tried by fire to see what sort they are, burning up the flammable ones, but the fire is not purging them so they can enter Heaven, as it is not works being burned up that gets one the reward. It is those whose works abide who get a reward (indicated to a crown of rejoicing: 1Thess,. 2:19; 2Cor., 1:14; Phil. 2:14-16), and those whose works are burned shall be saved despite this. If this was teaching the reward was Heaven then those whose fruit did not remain would be the subject of reward. Instead this is speaking about reward for service, for those who are already in Heaven.

That was an excellent post! All this time, the Catholic Church used this verse to prove Purgatory even though the word does not exist anywhere in Scripture, but all along the meaning was clearly NOT speaking of this "place of cleansing" that they insist exists. The fire burns up the wood, hay and stubble and the person is NOT rewarded for what gets burned up, only what remains - the gold, silver, precious gems. These works being tested "by fire" are NOT sins - venial or otherwise - because He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. (Psalm 103:10). And also Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. (II Tim. 1:9)

[daniel1212]

Amen, although the latter verse is speaking about election, and does not reject works as the manifestation by which saving faith is manifested and saints rewarded for. As God is faithful and true. And far from marginalizing works, while the Reformers (incld Luther) stressed their importance, and today evangs manifest more commitment in this area then their institutionalized counterparts.