Posted on 12/21/2013 11:13:29 AM PST by GonzoII
There you go again talking sense:) Loved your post. God Bless!
When they were in heaven, why would "salvation" even be a relevant matter?
The very essence of eternal life is being in a true relationship with the True Father & True Son:
3 Now this is eternal life: that they KNOW you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent. (John 17:3)
Surely, they so "knew" the Father & the Son?
Nor is there any record in Scripture that God offered a means of salvation to the angels.Therefore, the fallen angels were never saved from their fallenness so could not lose what they never had.
True, but again, I was referencing pre - fall; not post fall.
“.. that I shall lose none of all those he has given me..”
I have always been amazed at how one could be so certain of not losing their salvation because of verses like this one - that are based on the subjective mood. The Greek is carefully crafted so that misinterpretations can be prevented. Here “I shall lose none” denotes uncertainty... which is contradictive of your own certainty! No, God is not willing to lose even one that He has given Christ, but that doesn’t mean He doesn’t. He lost Judas in spite of His will to the contrary. (John 17:12)
This thread ended last Christmas! Been on a vacay??? ;o)
Still, I'm glad you asked. It really isn't just a few verses where "moods", tense, audience, condition, etc. influence the meaning of God's message and the assurance He gives to us. The central theme throughout the WHOLE Bible is that of God's grace. Judas never WAS a believer in Jesus. The Gospels are full of the fatal flaws of his so-called discipleship and his rejection of who Jesus was. Could he have gone and betrayed Him the way he did had he been a genuine believer in Jesus as the Messiah?
The assurance of our salvation comes NOT from what we have done or do, but in what Christ has done FOR us. A gift is by its nature free, unearned, undeserved, unmerited and given to us by God because of His great love. All the works we do can never pay the debt of the smallest sin we have committed.
And also, the context requires that at the date of writing, there were many Hebrews still alive who experience the cessation of the Old Covenant and its repetitive symbolic bloody sacrificial atonement rituals wholly fulfilled by God's complete satisfaction by the sacrifice, resurrection and ascension of the God-Kan Jesus; with the New Covenant having been immediately instituted.
Some Hebrew/Jews were able to make the transition from the old to the new, in either case of which salvation consusted of faith alone in Jehovah/Jesus alone. But other Jews, who through their life under the Law-based obedience to God were exposed to all the conditions listed in Hebrews 6:4-6, both in the old or in the new ways God dealt with mankind, rejected the subsitutionary death of Christ as their passage to Heaven, and thus had no other alternate options. Going back to the Law-based ritual sacrifice could no longer obtain God's forgiveness under it, and their rejection of Christ as a savior closed out all their options. Therefore, they had no way back to God after committing sin.
And that is still true of unbelieving Jews of this day. Their expectation is for a kingly messiah to come; and He will, but not to save unbelieving Jews who were/are blinded to the consequences and stipulations of the Cross-death of the itinerant preacher of righteousness.
We Gentiles can read Hebrews as a source of instruction on how God dealt with Jews (see Rom. 15:4), and benefit from the opening of God's kingdom to all the world and no longer just Jews, but it is wrong try to to apply the Jew-directed transactions of God as applying to regenerate Gentile of today across the board.
The pure Catholic heresy exposed.
One of the most valuable posts ever on Freerepublic! Thank you, Race for joining in.
Tim can’t be a convert. His plummet into Catholicism, the religion thereof not being Christianity, proves he was never a Christian sealed with GOD’s Holy Spirit. Perhaps that is why you like his spittlegeist so much?
Don’t take the mark of the beast when it is commanded to you, even if your Catholic Priest uses signs and lying wonders to emphasize his authority. Remember soon, don’t take the Mark.
+1
I come back here once every 3 or 4 months, forgot abou this post
:)
See you in the clouds, Bro.
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