Posted on 02/20/2017 5:31:52 AM PST by metmom
A common question for many is, “Can I lose my salvation?” I’ve heard both sides of the argument, and only God truly knows a person’s heart, but I can share a few thoughts. The reason there is a debate is because the Scriptures teach that salvation is a gift from God that cannot be earned, but they also offer warnings about falling away. There should be a healthy tension between God’s sovereignty and man’s responsibility. This issue should not create a spirit of division, elitism, or theological superiority.
One school of thought suggests that salvation cannot be lost, as in losing your car keys, but that it can be left, as in walking away from it. This may be why Jesus spoke of the man who said in his heart “my master delays His coming; therefore, I will turn from living a godly life”. When the master returned unexpectedly, the servant was banished because he chose to turn from what he knew to be right.
In another passage, Jesus said, “You have left your first love,” when speaking to the church in Ephesus (Revelation 2:4). James 5:19-20 adds, if anyone wanders from the truth and someone turns him back, a soul is saved from death. If anything, these Scriptures, and many more, reinforce the fact that we have certain responsibilities.
(Excerpt) Read more at westsidechristianfellowship.org ...
You have no evidence of this!
And if this 'kid' was hit by a car that jumped the curb and killed him as he was leaving the church, I bet you'd say he was now in the arms of Jesus.
It's not the parts of the bible that I do not understand that bothers me; but the parts that I do!
And she didn't even eat the host or sip the wine!
You are absolutely right!
I'd bet that you don't either...
“...these shall follow...”
...and dragons; too!
So what Temple do you go to to offer your sacrifices for sin and have your Passover lamb sacrificed so you can observe that and all the other Jewish feasts?
When studying the Bible, it is important to let the scriptures guide your theology rather than impose an external theology on to the scriptures.
“For how can those who abandon their faith be brought back to repent again? They were once in God’s light; they tasted heaven’s gift and received their share of the Holy Spirit; 5 they knew from experience that God’s word is good, and they had felt the powers of the coming age. 6 And then they abandoned their faith! It is impossible to bring them back to repent again, because they are again crucifying the Son of God and exposing him to public shame.... 11 Our great desire is that each of you keep up your eagerness to the end, so that the things you hope for will come true.”
Either the writer of Hebrews was talking about Christians falling away, or he was being deceptive. And I don’t believe in allowing an external philosophy (Calvinism) to force me to conclude the writer of scripture is lying.
Galatians:
“8 In the past you did not know God, and so you were slaves of beings who are not gods. 9 But now that you know God—or, I should say, now that God knows you—how is it that you want to turn back to those weak and pitiful ruling spirits? Why do you want to become their slaves all over again? 10 You pay special attention to certain days, months, seasons, and years. 11 I am worried about you! Can it be that all my work for you has been for nothing?...8 In the past you did not know God, and so you were slaves of beings who are not gods. 9 But now that you know God—or, I should say, now that God knows you—how is it that you want to turn back to those weak and pitiful ruling spirits? Why do you want to become their slaves all over again? 10 You pay special attention to certain days, months, seasons, and years. 11 I am worried about you! Can it be that all my work for you has been for nothing?”
We are encouraged, again and again, to stay the course. Why would we need encouragement to stay the course if there was no possibility of doing otherwise?
And as a practical matter, it makes no difference. I had a friend in college, decades ago, who became a Christian. He led a number of others to Christ. He was active, involved, and NO ONE doubted his sincerity - including him. Three years later, he walked into the living room and told us he had become a Buddhist. He renounced the Gospel.
You can say he never truly converted. But he thought he had, and everyone who knew him thought he had. Then he renounced Jesus Christ!
As a practical matter, you cannot know - not when looking at someone else, and not when looking in the mirror - the true heart of anyone.
The description in Hebrews 6 is a beautiful description of a Christian:
“When you find men who have been enlightened, who have experienced salvation and received the Holy Spirit, who have known the wholesome nourishment of the Word of God and touched the spiritual resources of the eternal world...” - JB Phillips
“those once enlightened, having tasted also of the heavenly gift, and partakers having became of the Holy Spirit, and did taste the good saying of God, the powers also of the coming age,” - Young’s LIteral Translation
“been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come” - NASB
Those are concise yet beautiful descriptions OF A CHRISTIAN. “Partakers of the Holy Spirit” - that phrase defines a Christian.
How does scripture describe a non-Christian?
“dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. 3 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” - Ephesians 2
How can someone who hates God be a partaker of the Holy Spirit? The Holy Spirit IS God! Partaker: metochos : “participant, i.e. (as noun) a sharer; by implication, an associate:—fellow, partaker, partner”
” For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end;” - Hebrews 3:14
“Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. 13 But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end...”
“For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end...”
Y’all can believe Calvin if you wish. But the scripture is actually quite clear - IF you let it speak for itself.
I was making a stumbling play on Scottie’s sentence to Captain Kirk, in ‘The Journey Home’, when George and Gracie were beamed aboard the jerry rigged Klingon vessel.
This is a quote from today's message answering this question:
"I asked Jesus what will happen if someone will not obey, or listen to His requests"
all he has to do is read My message, then let him decide; daughter, all creation obeys Me ....The messages have been very helpful and enlightening and I offer the above in that spirit.Yes, the creation obeys You, but Your creatures, not all of them obey You!no .... not all of them obey Me; many of them are tempted, and want to win the approval of men rather than Mine .... many are more eager to please men before Me, their God; and for some, it is only self-interest that makes them disobey Me;others have not yet decided to put behind them their passions, their self-indulgences, they sin as much as they breathe;
I have talked about judging others and how their tongue will be the cause of their condemnation, yet, on this, I can add one more thing: the mouths that spit fire, by snapping on people, tearing them to pieces, these too will suffer since they grieve My Holy Spirit;
My Holy Spirit's ways are so different!
anyone led by My Spirit is given the grace to observe My Laws and My Ways which are gentle, loving and so perfect;
I am the Source of Love and Jesus is My Name; but the Evil one is the source of Evil and all wickedness ....
There is clearly a tension in the Bible between the passages you have cited and the ones that metmom has cited describing assurance of salvation. How do you reconcile the apparent disconnect?
Also, in the parable of the seeds and the sower, which soil represents those who are saved? Are there soils that at first appear to fertile, but then wither? What causes the withering? Is it not the nature of the soil, rather than external forces?
“Summary. Concerning election and predestination, we might use the analogy of a great ship on its way to heaven. The ship (the church) is chosen by God to be his very own vessel. Christ is the Captain and Pilot of this ship.
All who desire to be a part of this elect ship and its Captain can do so through a living faith in Christ, by which they come on board the ship. As long as they are on the ship, in company with the ship’s Captain, they are among the elect.
If they choose to abandon the ship and Captain, they cease to be part of the elect. Election is always only in union with the Captain and his ship. Predestination tells us about the ship’s destination and what God has prepared for those remaining on it. God invites everyone to come aboard the elect ship through faith in Jesus Christ. [Life in the Spirit Study Bible, pp. 1854-1855]”
The Captain of the ship is responsible for taking his passengers safely to the destination promised. He is NOT responsible if someone decides they want to jump overboard. Nor does he chain them to the ship...
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As usual, you, who profess to understand the scriptures, are completely without their message.
The message for today was transmitted in the Revelation, which was penned 23 years after the temple was removed.
Yeshua is my Passover lamb, but I still am required to recognize the order of Yehova’s calendar, from the establishment of the Aviv as its beginning each year, to know the times to watch for as commanded in Revelation 3:3.
Yeshua’s sheep will know when his events are near, because every one of them watches for them. They are not “Jewish Feasts,” as the hopelessly lost refer to them, but are Yehova’s appointed days.
There is but one of those events that are not known many days in advance by the siting of the new moon that precedes them. That event is the one that marks our day of redemption, the Day of Trumpets, which can only be known at the moment that it occurs.
Once the previous month is established, we do know that it will be approximately 29.6 days later, yet we still must watch to know.
Those that are watching know that his Jubilee, in which all of the rest of the land will be returned to Israel, is coming this fall. That is the commencement of the final Shabbat that has been appointed unto Israel; i.e. “Daniel’s 70th Sabbath.”
From there you can count “a time, and times, and a half of a time” to the beginning of Satan’s tribulation of the Saints.
This time is only of consequence to his sheep. To the rest of the world,it’ll only mean that those damned Torah keepers and Jews are finally getting what is coming to them.
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>> “if we do not give up” <<
Which means that at some point we have to have started.
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To use your analogy, are you saying that God doesn’t know who is going to get in the boat and stay in the boat? And that His Will is secondary to man’s will?
Not to mention how they get in the boat, being dead to their trespasses and sin.
It's all about that Spirit.
"...the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters..."
Nonsense!
The times are the only thing we are commanded to watch for, starting in Deuteronomy, where we are commanded to “guard the Aviv.”
Our “garment” is the righteousness of Yehova through the loving and earnest keeping of the Torah he has written on our hearts.
[6] “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years.”
IIRC, which some question to great extent, the documentary: *Patterns of Evidence*, site the discovery of a piece of red material within the remaining portion of the wall of Jericho.
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