Featured Faith

There are now many threads on this subject here at the BB, Austin, and it's been hashed out on many occasions....
But I'll post a few replies for those who may be new to this forum or haven't seen those many threads about faith and where it comes from as yet.

The only thing that I can do given where I am in my understanding of the Scriptures,
is to say that the person who posted that ( most probably unintentionally ) is making God's grace dependent upon something that man has or does;
Which makes God a respecter of persons, in that God would then respect what that person did or possessed in order to grant them His grace.

In business circles, we would say that if someone offers us a deal, then in order to "seal the deal" ( or complete the exchange ) one has to take advantage of it...
and we are then rewarded according to our efforts or assent as part of the agreement.
It's no different with any other offer, salvation or otherwise...
If it has to rely on something from the other end, then it's a reward, not a gift.

However...
With a promise ( not an offer ), it comes with no strings attached.
The person receiving it would not have to do anything to possess it, except to passively receive it.

Furthermore,
Romans 11:7-8 tells us that if we as men mix our works with God's grace, then it is no more grace...
But instead, it is works.

I'll say it again so that I make myself clear...

If salvation were a cooperative effort between God and men,
then it's a market deal instead of a gift, as the Scriptures so plainly declare in Romans 6:23.
Market deals are based on merit and de-merit...
Profit and loss, etc.


Not on goodwill, and not on love.

 

@AustinC
I'm often reminded of where many get this idea in the Scriptures that if they do something for God,
He will do something for us.

One of those places is here:

" Then he called for a light, and sprang in, and came trembling, and fell down before Paul and Silas,
30 and brought them out, and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?
31 And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house." ( Acts of the Apostles 16:29-31 ).

However, just because the Scriptures say this, makes it no less true even if God's grace has to come first, before we have faith.
According to God's word, if a person truly believes on Christ ( and the Bible gives us more details in other places that help to define more fully why one believes and why one does not ), then they will be saved...

But there's more to it, and every word of God counts ( Matthew 4:4, Luke 4:4 ).
We as believers must meet every "condition":

We as believers in Jesus Christ are saved IF...
We don't fall away,
We keep His commandments,
We grow in both knowledge and grace,
We are led into all truth,
We continue ( make progress ) in the word ( John 8:31 ),
We hear His words ( John 8:43-47 ),
We walk after the Spirit ( Romans 8:1 ) and not the flesh,
The Holy Spirit really is in residence ( Romans 8:9 ).
We continue in the faith, grounded and settled and be not moved away from the hope of the Gospel ( Colossians 1:23 ),
Bear true spiritual fruit ( John 15:1-6 ),
Love those who love God ( 1 John 2:9-11 ),
Do not love the world and its ways ( 1 John 2:15-17 ),
We exhibit true repentance from the heart ( see Psalms 51 ),
Purify ourselves as He is pure ( 1 John 3:3 ),

and many others.

Sound impossible?
It is,
unless a person has the Spirit of God in them by which they will grow into spiritual maturity and also mortify the deeds of the body ( Romans 8:12-13 ).

Therefore, all of the above is evidential and not conditional, because for it to be all of grace, it must be the evidence of God's work in a person,
not the result of our own efforts.
They are things that must, at some point, be present or take place in the life and walk of someone who professes Christ...
Or they are not saved.

If it were the other way around, then it would be of works...
We as men trying our level best to gain and keep God's favor by performing an act or set of acts in order to be rewarded with, or merit, His grace and mercy upon us as rebellious sinners.

 

@AustinC :
Election to salvation ( 2 Thessalonians 2:13 ) is true, and it is the basis for God saving anyone ( Romans 8:28-30, Romans 9:13-24, Ephesians 1:3-14, Ephesians 2:1-10 ).

Those who have been born again are the recipients of the greatest gift known to us as sinful and rebellious men...
The privilege to know God and His Son, eternal life ( John 17:2 ).

It is a completely unmerited gift in that it cannot be earned in any way, shape or form, and must be freely given and freely received.
Any other way, whether "by faith" or by keeping the Law, makes God a debtor and not a giver of gifts ( Romans 4:4 ).

Therefore, faith follows the new birth and must follow it.
It cannot be used to gain entrance into His sight, and no amount of men crawling all over themseves or making empty promises to believe in a vain attempt to pry eternal life out of His hand and an escape from the Lake of Fire, will ever make a difference to Him.

He will have mercy and compassion on whom He wishes, not on whom we wish ( Romans 9:14-18 ).
Acts if the Apostles 16:14 is true, and God has to open the heart before anyone will receive His words.
Philippians 1:29 is true, and believers are given to both believe and to suffer for His sake.
It's a gift of God.


I'll leave you with this:
" John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven." ( John 3:27 ).
That describes eternal life in it's nature...

A gift from Heaven.

 

the problem is that you conflate the salvation of God with mans response to Gods salvation. They are not the same then you work to mischaracterize our view based on your misunderstanding of scripture

 

That is your opinion, Mark, and I respect that.
I don't see where I'm conflating anything... but since we've never agreed on this, we'll have to agree to disagree, and leave it at that.

You claim mischaracterization, Mark, and I claim an unbiased observation.
You claim I'm conflating, I claim I'm seeing things straight.

We are at an impasse as always,
yet I wish you well, and thank you for your comment.

 

While we were yet sinners, God provided the Lamb!

 

If you want to be smarty pants about it, Grace is ever present it was required for every human life created.

But if you’re trying to say regeneration precedes faith you’re wrong.

Galatians 3
1O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you? 2This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?


Gee Paul we got the spirit before the faith why didn’t you?

 

He didn't.
He was born again before he believed God's words.

1) Acts of the Apostles 16:14. <--- Jesus Christ manifested Himself to Paul on the road to Damascus, just as He opened Lydia's heart so that she would listen to Paul's words many years later.
2) Romans 10:8-10, Galatians 3:2. <--- Hearing of faith.
3) Ephesians 1:13. <-------- After belief, sealed ( indwelt with ) Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption ( Ephesians 4:30 ).

He also told the churches in the epistles how and why they were saved:

Romans 8:28-30.
Romans 9.
Romans 10:8-20.
Romans 11:1-6.
Ephesians 1:3-14.
Ephesians 2:1-10.
2 Thessalonians 2:13-14.
2 Timothy 1:9.
Titus 3:5-7.

 

Got struck blind after zapped and born again right? Pointless....

 

Yes, he did.

Before that, he was terrorizing the church of God,
and after the Lord changed his heart, he preached the Christ whom he had formerly persecuted ( Acts of the Apostles 9:1-20 ).
That, my friend, is the miracle of God's grace.


In order to see the kingdom of God, one must be born again ( John 3:3 ).
Paul was blind, but then he saw...
Then he was struck blind, but still "saw" the Lord Jesus for Who He is.

Which kind of "seeing" is the most important?

 

No point in convincing him via blindness if he was already born again.

No point in Jesus asking why he was persecuting him.

He had to be confronted to repent.

 

He wasn't convinced via the blindness, utilyan.
The Lord Jesus made him physically blind because He revealed His glory to him...

But Paul was spiritually blind ( Ephesians 4:17-19, Romans 1:18-32, Romans 3:10-18 ) before the Lord removed those "blinders" to the reality of his situation on the road to Damascus.
All of mankind is like this, until the Lord graciously reveals Himself to His elect, chosen in Him from the foundation of the world ( Ephesians 1:4-5 ).

Sure there was.
Everything the Lord does or says is with purpose.

The fact that He confronted Paul personally, shows His love for him, personally.
See Matthew 11:27, James 1:18 and many others.

On that we agree.

No one who is not confronted by the word of God and believes it,
will ever be convinced to repent.

But it's not our repentance that saves us...
It's His grace and purpose in Christ, that does:

" who hath saved us, and called [us] with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began," ( 2 Timothy 1:9 ).


If repentance is what gains us God's favor, then our actions ( not God's grace and mercy ) are what save us....
That is salvation by works, not salvation by grace.

Faith is yet another evidence ( Hebrews 11:1 ) of God's work in a person, and it is stated by Scripture to be a fruit of the Spirit ( Galatians 5:22-23 ).

 

Not rational. Ephesians 2:1-8, ". . . through faith . . . ."
Romans 10:17, ". . . faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God. . . ."

Besides there is not knowledge of any kind without faith in it.

 

I agree.

To you it is crazy talk and not rational...
But neither is believing in the work of God and His every word from a precious Book that most people think is full of contradictions and "fairy tales".

I maintain that faith does indeed come by hearing...
But how does hearing come, and to whom does it come?
Please see John 8:43-47.
To those who are "of God".

The Lord Jesus used a qualifier when He was speaking to the crowds He preached to...
" He that has ears to hear, let him hear."( Matthew 11:15 ).

God's children do many things by faith, and they are the ones who have ears to hear His words.
But "getting saved" is not one of the the things they do by faith.

That is what election completely rules out...
Our efforts at pleasing him are nullified, making it dependent upon Christ's efforts at pleasing Him, and that ( Christ's pleasing the Lord through His own efforts ) being counted as righteousness and imputed to us as believers.

We believe because He gave us ears to hear.
We then believe on Christ, and that is counted as righteousness.

All glory goes to God, and we rest on nothing except His mercy and grace to us ( Titus 3:5-7 ) as sinners.

Agreed.

 

@AustinC :
To respond to the OP:

As I've always stated since joining this forum ( and interaction here has caused me to learn much ),
if faith, repentance, belief on Christ or anything else that accompanies God's gift of eternal life is in any way taken and used to procure or merit God's favor on a person, that constitutes taking the benefits of God's saving a person and making them the cause of it.

This is in error, and makes God's grace into works.
Not the works of the Law, but works nonetheless.

Any effort that we make apart from God performing a work in a person of His own free will ( and uninfluenced by anything that we as men are, do, possess, etc. ), is not grace.
It not only violates Romans 11:5-6 and Romans 4:4, it makes the Lord a respecter of persons in the process.


This is my last reply in this thread.



I wish you well, and may the Lord bless you in many ways.

 

". . . through faith . . ." does not merit salvation, " . . . it is not of yourselves . . . ," Ephesians 2:8
Romans 4:3-5, ". . . For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. . . ."

 

You conflate the source (John 1:3) of the written word with the given written word itself. And you say I am wrong.

It does not matter what I say to you. What the word of God says is really what matters. Jesus said, John 17:17, ". . . Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth. . . ."

As for Romans 10:17-18, it speaks of God's given revelation thought His creation. Which He spoke into existence.

The truth is there is no knowledge of anything without some kind of faith in that knowledge. Faith is something everyone has something of.