Posted on 01/05/2010 9:46:47 PM PST by the_conscience
Romans 3: 11 there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God.
Me either..I have to trust Christ !~
The problem is you need to read the book in context
May I quote James to you? No where does Jesus say or imply that one is saved by works. The book of James was written to a converted church , not heathens seeking salvation . It tells them how their conversion is seen by the unsaved world . It is not about becoming saved or being saved. It is about the fruit of your salvation. Jam 2:17 Even so faith, if isay,Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.
This is an amplification of the teaching of Jesus that we know a tree by the fruit it bears. It is how we know the saved from the unsaved. It does not declare that the man has faith ...but that he SAYS he has faith. This letter addresses a hollow profession of faith , not a saving one .]Can a hollow profession save him?[ NO, any more than works can save.This scripture says to the church that this faith is non existent , it is dead.
The bible is clear that it is God that gives the faith and it is God that ordains the works of the saved/B>
Eph 2:10 For we are his workmanship, [b]created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
Hbr 13:21Make you perfect in every good work ]to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom [be] glory for ever and ever. Amen.
Phl 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of [his] good pleasure
Works Have no part of our salvation, they are fruits of it..
Is that all you got? A couple of ad hominems, and that's it? Perhaps you're shooting blanks because that's all that's in your bag.
It's kind of disappointing. I'd hoped that you might dial it down and engage in an actual conversation. If you read through my posts, I've only presented what the Church teaches as I understand it. I've also said in several posts that I accept my limitations of my own understanding of Church teaching.
But what I don't accept are attempts to philosophically undermine what I believe to be Church teaching. If you thought I was wrong in my understanding of things, politely posting the content of relevant, recent magisterial documents might have influenced my thinking.
In answering with little more than ad hominems, you make it appear that you don't have anything else with which to dispute what I've said. As well, a reasonable inference from your posts is that I somehow “deserve” to be treated thusly. No, in fact, it ISN'T an inference. You said it pretty much directly.
To be “deserving” of such treatment, it would be necessary that I'd knowingly done evil.
Yet, I've done no such thing. And, in explicitly raising the issue of my own limits, it is unreasonable to impute it to me.
It is a grave lack of charity to impute such a thing where there is no evidence for it, and where there is actually evidence against it.
It saddens me that you've chosen to behave in this way.
God bless you. I'll keep you in my prayers.
sitetest
Interesting thought. I was just pondering if the unforgiveable sin might have been man exercising free will in denying The Gospel. I appreciate you input.
What a blessing to be able to pick up a Bible, read it, pray about it's meaning, and discuss passages with fellow believers. It's hard to visualize a world where these things were punishable as crimes.
Oh the irony...
What do you all think of what Calvin says about itin the Institutes? I thought it was okay.
Of course. Some don't even want to state our position accurately. They're not interested in truth, they're interested in victory, even if it's a bogus and illusory victory
Uh oh. We're in trouble.
(feeling my way here ...)
Then we have to ask if "good" is just another word for "God wills it." Is there an idea of "good" that is validly or usefully different from the idea of God.
The OTHER side is: How can we say God is God if he must conform to a standard of Justice, Goodness, Beauty, etc. Is that making some concept(s) or "ideas" or "forms" superior to God? (which is absurd)
Lewis works the problem in Mere Christianity, I think.
It has to do with reason and especially with the fallibility of human reason. It's not USEless, but it's certainly imperfect "for now we see only in part."
I think it also leaks into questions of conscience. If somebody tells me that God wills that I blow up a plane full of mothers and children I don't need special revelation to know something is wrong with that.
I'm not familiar with what Calvin said...
You need ask yourself why the calvinists God did not put parameters on Hitler and Mao if we have limited freedom?
I read through this and don’t see your point in spite of the numerous Bible quotes you offer in your postings.
I perceive a subtle form of quietism in the position that one need not do anything but accept grace.
The whole of salvation is Gift-and-Response. There is the Giver but He does not give to us without asking for a response. (”Could you not watch one hour with Me?”)
And the response of the one receiving the gift—salvation and the gifts of the Holy Spirit accompanying salvation—are the fullness of love exchanged between God and man.
To act is to “work”, for all of one’s being is engaged in acting. To respond to God’s love is an act and and act that is necessary in our filial relationship with God—our sonship with Him.
If all is grace, as St. Paul writes, then grace would lie fallow if we didn’t act by responding to it.
It is work to respond to grace. It is work to love our neighbor. It is work to avoid sin. It is work to live the Beatitudes. It is work to “take up our cross and follow Him”
Don’t you think that following Christ is work?
Or are we to only receive and never give? and isn’t it work to give?
We are justified and sanctified through God’s mercy and our response to His mercy. Responding is not an idle act—it is work.
Work hasn’t been understood properly here.
Yup, them Cathlick Kirk banned Catlicks from reading the bible or Farmer John’s Almanac. They also banned eating chocolates on Mondays and grapes on Tuesday.
The will, I think, is a critical aspect of being human. The problem for those who deny will is that they have to show how their notion of salvation doesn’t involved a loss of what it is to be human.
It’s all very well to run the potter v. pot analogy but that only works because human potters have the faculty(ies) of choice and will, though they are broken.
And let’s not forget Big Macs on Friday.
Here, however, let us give the true definition... I say, therefore, that he sins against the Holy Spirit who, while so constrained by the power of divine truth that he cannot plead ignorance, yet deliberately resists, and that merely for the sake of resisting."
Amen
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