Good morning Rippon
I have never pretended to fully understand this issue.....but the Bible’s coverage of the subject of salvation, seems to be placed into two categories:
(1)Salvation from our perspective:
(2)Salvation from God’s perspective:
Our perspective of salvation is future tense.............
Acts 16:31
“And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”
While God’s perspective of salvation is past tense.........
Romans 8:29
“For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate [to be] conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.”
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The fact is, a person must exercise faith in Christ, in order to be saved.
But when you look deeper, you learn that God foreknew that you were going to exercise this faith, therefore God elected to save you before you were born.
Therefore, from God’s perspective we were saved, before we were saved.....
John 17:6
“I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world: thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have kept thy word.”
We(the elect), were the Father’s, and at salvation He gives us to Christ.