Now you're toying with me. :) I thought I understood that Catholic belief was that salvation is finally achieved through God's grace and the lifelong taking of the sacraments. I thought the sacraments were required for final salvation. Is the last statement meant to introduce a new concept of salvation or are you just messing with my mind? (LOL!)
Really? What's the point of it [baptism to a Baptist]?
We believe that salvation is completely achieved by the acceptance by the believer of Christ as Savior and Lord into his or her heart. To us, believer's baptism is very important, and is required for church membership. We see it as a public obedience to God, Jesus did it, said we should do it, so we should do it. It is an important symbol of regeneration, however, baptism does not save because the one to be baptized is presumed to have already been saved.
"He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels." (Rev 3:5 - implies that one's name CAN be blotted out.
Thanks for this and the following verses. I'm not sure I buy this one as support, though. Sure, God can do anything, but here He is specifically saying that He will not blot out a name. Of course, He can, but it doesn't imply that He will
"And the LORD said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book. Therefore now go, lead the people unto [the place] of which I have spoken unto thee: behold, mine Angel shall go before thee: nevertheless in the day when I visit I will visit their sin upon them." (Ex 32:33-34)
This verse, OTOH, is much more "troublesome". I looked it up in my NIV and there is no issue of translation. The footnote I have says that this OT "Book" is a book of the physically living, and that being blotted out means an untimely death. The NT "Book" in Revelation is the Book of Life that I am familiar with. By itself, this explanation doesn't exactly rock my world, so I admit I can't say about this one. Dr. E or Harley (or anyone), can you add anything to this?
Perhaps something terrible will happen and I will lose my faith in God's Providence.
Nah, never happen. Hey, I'm a Protestant, I know these things. Trust me. :)
Final perseverance cannot be merited. I think this line of thinking helps keep us humble and not overconfident.
I always applaud the seeking of humility. I think this is where my side takes some unfair criticism from others for being arrogant, etc. There is nothing in our beliefs that involves resting on our laurels because we already have a "ticket". We also do not believe that we can be sure because we declare it so. We just honestly believe that there are many promises in the Bible that lead to surety. Our approach, when clearly appropriate, is to take a plain meaning of the promise and then to rest in joy and thanksgiving.
I don't get the idea that the battle is over when I read the Scriptures, just because of my Baptism/sinner's prayer. If I am saved irrefutably on that day for eternal life, what is the point of sanctification?
I agree that the battle is not over once, in my view, salvation is achieved. In fact, the new believer can be sure of an increase in attacks by satan. One beauty of salvation is its simplicity, another is that it begins the lifelong process of sanctification with the new help of the Spirit.
God's ordinance is that we be sanctified and grow ever closer to Him throughout our new Christian lives. We believe the Bible is simple enough for a child to understand (that which is needed for salvation) and deep enough to envelop the greatest thinkers of all time. With the new help of the Spirit, many of the mysteries of the Bible can be discovered, and we will lead better, more Godly, and happier lives while on earth.
The sacraments are the pre-eminent means of receiving God's graces, although they certainly are not the only means. Catholic spiritual writers constantly vouch for the effectiveness of the Sacraments in one's walk to become more virtuous. Considering that we must become Christ-like, to become Holy as God is Holy, the sacraments are "required" normatively, but not absolutely. It is through the Eucharist where we recognize and partake in the work of Christ most fully. I am not introducing a new means of salvation - it is quite old! Christ commissioned His Apostles with the power to forgive sins and to visibly connect the faithful to that heavenly offering of Christ's sacrifice to His Father eternally.
We believe that salvation is completely achieved by the acceptance by the believer of Christ as Savior and Lord into his or her heart.
Perhaps I am mistaken, but is your definition of salvation focusing on a past event? We call that first event (we - Baptism, you - Sinner's Prayer) "initial justification". In a sense, we are "saved", but as in anything else in life, we can become "unhealed" (to save means to heal). Because we have been healed once doesn't preclude another onslaught of disease or sickness. I believe the Scriptures bears this out when it discusses perseverance, fighting to the end, running the race, etc.
The ongoing process of sanctification, I believe we agree with. However, we also understand that during our walk, we may turn away from God through deadly sin. Thus, we believe we require a "rejustification". In other words, we must be made righteous in God's eyes again. This doesn't mean that the mark the Spirit left on us after Baptism has left us. But we must reconcile with our Father, just as the Prodigal Son did.
And finally, when Catholics say "we are saved", they are normally refering to that moment when we "stand" before the Throne of God and are judged based on how we responded to God's grace, much like Matthew 25:31-45. As a sidebar, our response is a cooperation with God - we can do nothing good without Christ abiding within us. Thus, our good deeds are actually mine AND Christ's - sort of like an amalgamation of two persons. Thus, we can say we cannot boast and that they are not our works alone that save.
Regarding the "books", the OT books are probably more refering to books of life as you mention. Psalm 69 discusses these books, as well. However, most Bible scholars believe that there is a spiritual connection in the OT between the Promised Land (dirt) and the Promised Land (heaven), as well as death (our body) and death (the second death) in the NT. The OT speaks of typology that foreshadows a deeper meaning in the New. At any rate, there are other verses that discuss how we can lose "salvation", such as:
"For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries" (Heb 10:26-27)
There are enough verses along these lines that would make the concept of losing salvation difficult to "explain away" so often. It is a re-occuring theme.
There is nothing in our beliefs that involves resting on our laurels because we already have a "ticket". We also do not believe that we can be sure because we declare it so. We just honestly believe that there are many promises in the Bible that lead to surety. Our approach, when clearly appropriate, is to take a plain meaning of the promise and then to rest in joy and thanksgiving.
I admit that I find that a bit of a contradiction. Perhaps part of the misunderstanding comes from our different definitions of what it means to be saved. Has God's grace become effective on the person who has faith to move mountains but has not love? Paul says that faith is worthless (1 Cor 13:2). Is worthless faith going to achieve eternal heaven for us? Would you say that God expects that His gifts are used by our display of love for our neighbor? James is not impressed with such "faith", either, nor is John. And Jesus, well, Matthew 7:21 tells us we must DO the will of the Father. Our faith should lead us to do good, otherwise, it is worthless faith. If it doesn't, then what?
This is where I am lost by the "once saved - always saved" doctrine. Paul admits that faith alone DOESN'T save, but requires LOVE. Even ALL FAITH, he says, can be worthless.
I agree that the battle is not over once, in my view, salvation is achieved.
Ah. What battle is left to fight then? NOTHING can separate us from the love of God, correct? But ourselves... I believe that God's promise should give us full confidence that Satan can not pry us out of God's Hands. But I do believe WE can turn away - perhaps a gradual falling away, or maybe one particular extreme event. But if we continue to fight a battle and cannot fail, what is the battle's purpose?
We believe the Bible is simple enough for a child to understand
Yikes! Then why so many different opinions on even KEY elements of the faith? The very basic message is not difficult to understand, but the Scriptures themselves require some understanding of past interpretations. I think it is a mistake to "re-invent the wheel". I think it is too easy to take for granted what our pastors and priests teach us.
With the new help of the Spirit, many of the mysteries of the Bible can be discovered, and we will lead better, more Godly, and happier lives while on earth
Certainly, as long as we have a humble heart ourselves. Being humble requires that we also take into account the Church's interpretation on Scripture. We realize that the Spirit has been operative in the past Church members, and the same Spirit is operative in us today. Thus, if our prayers lead us to interpret something that is out of line with what the Spirit has taught the Church throughout history, as we being humble? Is the same Spirit going to lead us to different, diametrically opposed understandings of the same verses? The Spirit of Truth works within us, but not to lead us astray from what He tells everyone else.
Brother in Christ
Forest Keeper-By itself, this explanation doesn't exactly rock my world, so I admit I can't say about this one. Dr. E or Harley (or anyone), can you add anything to this?
God’s decrees were established before the foundations of the world. Man acts out these unchanging decrees. However, from our perspective we feel that we are capable of changing the decrees of God which is simply not true. There are several places in scriptures that talks about names being blotted out or erased from the Book of Life (Ps 69:28, Rev 3:5). OTOH we know that the Book of Life was written before the foundations of the world (Rev 13) and those whose names are in the Book of Life are saved. If one argues that names can blotted out of the Book of Life then the passage in Rev 13 is completely false; peoples names were not written from the foundation of the world and scripture is in error. And that is something jokus will find hard to explain.
If one starts from the premise that all those who are going to be saved have their names in the Book of Life then the other verses in Psalms and Rev 3:5 poses no problem. They are nothing more than an exhortation by God to do what He has already decree. They are not idle chatter on God’s part but true Christians are motivated by these exhortations to love and good works; understanding that God runs the show-not us.
It’s like God ordaining Moses to carry His message to the Egyptians and then seeking to kill him because Moses failed to circumcise his sons. God knew what would happen and what it would take to motivate Moses (actually in this case Moses’ wife) to do what was proper. Or it could be likened to God casting Jonah into the sea (Jonah 2:3) and then bringing him up from the pits (Jonah 2:6). It was only after God threatened Jonah with death was Jonah willing to do the things of God. (BTW-Note that Jonah doesn’t say it was the sailors who threw him into the sea or that he, Jonah, made a choice to be thrown into the sea which many today would claim. Jonah rightfully and accurately stated that it was God who caused the events to happen.)
The verse jokus provided is nothing more than an exhortation from God similar to the exhortations of Moses or Jonah. We are never to take our salvation for granted even though it has been granted us. And true Christians will never take their salvation for granted, persevering to the end. It has nothing to do with our salvation for this was written in the Book of Life before we even existed.