"If this idea is correct, than perseverance is a continuation of belief that produces an action. When one quits believing, one ceases to act. If it is by faith that we are saved, then we must assume that it is only by un-faith that one is un-saved."
And if you are 'un-saved', because you unfaithed yourself, and you happen to kick the bucket due to unfortunate timing, well then you are toast, no pun intended. I extended the thought b/c I wanted to confirm w/ you I'm on the right road about how to see this...from what you're stating.
"And if you are 'un-saved', because you unfaithed yourself,..."
What I mean is this: a typical protestant wants to sense that he/she indeed is 'alive' in Christ. But many of them grow up learning that 'faith' doesn't exist without works, due to that NT Book James, which entirely ignores Christ, but for verse 1.
As a result, they get steeped in works ideas from day 1. Some end up thinking it leads to faith, but most don't; most simply hit the works road b/c they can't bear the thought of being lonely. I've seen the ultimate family weapon exercised to control thinking and behavior used over and over: rejection.
So, to pursue acceptance they get good at Pharisee type works. At minimum, they get regular, predictable, confirmation it leads to acceptance by family and peers at church. And then many of them, way too many, go on to lead secret lives. Instead of aynomously checking out religion threads on FR (which would be a fruitful expenditure of time), they instead enter the front door of the porn shop next door to browse. Sorry, I meant the porn shop in the bonus room, the one plugged into the router.
There is this idea out there that Christ isn't real enough to defeat that secret life, that he doesn't have enough to offer, doesn't have what it takes, to overcome those temptations, now just a few keystrokes away. That he is not tangible enough to help us create an environment where those temptations largely and simply evaporate.
Why do these secret lives develop? Why? Because works doesn't banish loneliness after all. So all kinds of weird behaviors and habits grow, all designed to address that loneliness, that built in hunger of being on the 'inside'.
(btw, I'm not really arguing w/ you nsachen. I'm presenting a frame of reference, in the hopes I will have revealed to me why some of the orthodox don't seem to struggle w/ this works/faith idea.)
Anyway, there is this black and white reality in my experience: giving up works, and accepting by faith alone, that I am not going to hell, but going home (indeed, that I'm already there in a sense, but that goes down all kinds of time roads I won't go into) leads inevitably to those very works James so heartily encourages us to pursue.
Works are the intrinsic artifact of regeneration in other words....
The orthodox position seems to imply that regeneration is a myth.