Featured Am I Now IFB?

I need some help identifying where I sit in terms of Baptist doctrine.

I have been spending my free time debating apologetics, bible, and doctrine for a year on an apologetical Facebook group. My views on doctrine have changed as a result, as I have delved deeper and deeper into the Word. I want to know where I am on the Baptist spectrum of doctrine. I think I am now in line with independent fundamental Baptists, but I'm not sure. My old SBC church was definitely unhappy with my current doctrine and thought me too much like the IFB.

The big thing is I gave up believing "once saved, always saved" as I delved into the Word. I believe unrepentant sin on our part can lead to apostasy and if that is unrepentant, hell. I know free will Baptists are the same, but I was told IFB are that way too by a deacon at my old SBC church.

I prefer the NASB and Interlinear now, and I am strongly against very "thought-for-thought" translations like the Message.

I want nothing to do with Rick Warren and similar Seeker Driven programs or teachings. The reason is complicated but has to do with what I perceive as giving into the culture of the world.

I believe women should not preach, teach, or hold authority in church except over children and other women.

I hold to God's foreknowledge and predestination of people to the faith, but I believe God wants all saved and that this paradox is alright because God's ways are so much higher than our comprehension.

I hate Charismatic Influence and want none of it in church.

I believe very strongly in church discipline.

I am not dispensationalist.

 

I must disagree, since there are many warnings about apostasy in scripture. Nearly every new testament book has at least one such warning. Jesus issues several warnings Himself about apostasy and a hell for Christians that did not love Him by obeying His commands.

 

From a Calvinistic stance, yes any not faithful unto death were always meant for hell. I believe in the capacity to make choices against God's will. This leads to the conclusion people chose to respond to the Gospel, but can choose apostasy against the will of God.

 

Ok, I learned in apologetics a lesson. Let's describe what we mean by "apostate" and "saved."

I view those that deny the faith when faced with persecution and those that let love of this world make them useless Christians as being apostates.

They were saved by accepting the Gospel and they later choose to trodden the blood and deny the Cross. By "saved" I mean they believe in Jesus with a mustard seed of faith.

Those two tests of denying the faith out of fear or pain and being useless due to sin are what I mean about apostate. The key is that most agree with me on what an apostate is and disagree on whether they were ever saved.

A further breakdown of this would be best for the Arminianism vs Calvinism board.

 

I kind of get what you are saying. I often wonder at how many who claim Christian love this world more than Jesus Christ and their neighbors.

My story leads me to believe I had faith in Jesus Christ as an apostate myself. First let me share my story of coming back to Jesus Christ.

I was lost in sin for 10 years after coming to a mustard seed of faith out of Deism in early college, I would have called it atheism back then but that was dishonest of me to do. I became a Christian and was doing great for several months, reading the Word, growing in a southern baptist church, learning to avoid going against my conscience, being vocal about my faith at college.

However, 9 months after becoming a Christian I made the worst decision of my life and became a Charismatic. Three and a half years ago I came to a much deeper point of faith. I was losing any vestige of faith rapidly at that point as the number of years of torment due to illnesses added up with no relent in sight.

I read 1 Corinthians 15 and realized I didn't look forward to the resurrection since I was an apostate doomed at the Judgment. I was going against my conscience out of habit, I was a liberal Christian in a liberal seminary studying to be a liberal pastor (despite starting as a southern baptist), I was a false prophet because I had the "gift of prophecy" and was so in my heart and to those that would listen, I was a false teacher, and I preached a false Gospel that hated anything to do with childlike faith in Jesus Christ. I argued that faith was wrong and that what we could not prove should be ignored in Christianity. I came to the conclusion I was damned, and felt tremendous conviction from that point forward until I put faith back in the Word, to include Jesus Christ.

I struggled with self-righteousness for a month, thinking I was good and deserved heaven despite growing conviction otherwise. After a month of stark raving mad terror at death and what I faced, I allowed myself to accept my doubts in Jesus Christ and His Word one night and chose to have faith again, without going purely on what I could prove.

Wow, I changed fast as I abandoned sin after sin and realized that I had to go back to a conservative faith. I studied the bible carefully, putting it into practice. However, Charismatic influence would be my final hill to die on it seems. I am still tempted to go back to Charismaticism, and I am still finding things to abandon that I was so used to.

That said, how do I know I am saved? Because I love Jesus Christ by obeying Him (John 14:15 and this is the key point of 1 John). Because He disciplines and rebukes me from my errors (Hebrews 12:4-17). My belief is that if I stay in Jesus Christ, keep the Faith, run my race of faith, make every effort to obey Him, then He will reward me for my faith that is alive with good fruit.

Perhaps I am seeing things from the day to day instead of eternity, which most people here seem to be doing.