Understanding The Protestant /Catholic Divide

Nope. We love God for free. The priority is Love above all. We don't harp on qualifications for salvation, I don't need a signed certificate from MOM with a promise she won't shoot me. We don't use the bible like a how to protect yourself from God book.

Canon 1.
If anyone says that man can be justified before God by his own works, whether done by his own natural powers or through the teaching of the law,[110] without divine grace through Jesus Christ, let him be anathema.

Canon 2.
If anyone says that divine grace through Christ Jesus is given for this only, that man may be able more easily to live justly and to merit eternal life, as if by free will without grace he is able to do both, though with hardship and difficulty, let him be anathema.

Canon 3.
If anyone says that without the predisposing inspiration of the Holy Ghost[111] and without His help, man can believe, hope, love or be repentant as he ought,[112] so that the grace of justification may be bestowed upon him, let him be anathema.



LOVING God is the highest treasure there is. Loving God does not earn me salvation, loving God has not even earned me 5$.

The most important thing. I say Love God and Neighbor. Someone else stands up and says.....WELL thats not going to earn you spiritual disneyland. And its like they SOLD OUT God for "HEAVEN". Its like woosh.....over their head.

Our "heaven" isn't tomorrow. Jesus Christ is alive NOW. Where is the satisfaction with God?

Is it until we see pearly gates and with an angel masseuse.....oh hey maybe God isn't so bad after all.....

What exactly is a higher reward than loving God?

 

Well I hope this clears everything up, if so, we’ll leave it at that then.

 

It isn’t that everything in your posts is wrong, it’s that your posts are generally wrong about what protestants actually say. Your posts generally misunderstand protestants, or at least Baptists.

Again, the overarching “nuance” is that, for the Christian, everything, that is, every good thing, is a product of God’s work in us rather than our own. Salvation produces works of righteousness, not the other way round.

We bear “the fruit of the Spirit—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control”—as the Holy Spirit empowers. See Galatians 5:13ff.

13 You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesha]">[a]; rather, serve one another humbly in love. 14 For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”b]">[b] 15 If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.

16 So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whateverc]">[c] you want. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law.

19 The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20 idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.​

 

When asked what one must do Jesus could have said, "If God likes you then you will be saved and if he hates you then you will be damned, so just sit back and cross your fingers" END OF GOSPEL.

Jesus never says this.

Again this is about what people teach ABOUT Jesus VERSUS what Jesus teaches himself.

Matthew 7
24“Therefore, everyone who hears these words of Mine, and acts on them, will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25And the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and yet it did not fall, for it had been founded on the rock. 26And everyone who hears these words of Mine, and does not act on them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. 27And the rain fell and the floods came, and the winds blew and slammed against that house; and it fell—and its collapse was great.”

Matthew 6
19Therefore, whoever nullifies one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven.

That is just two verses out of 150 verses saying the ball is in your court.

 

2 Peter 1

5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.

The reason you have to add goodness and love to your faith is, without it faith is worthless.

James 2

22You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected;

Can a broken faith save you?


Why not take Jesus word for it rather than undermine and ignore his own words? Did Jesus say the whole truth or not?

Luke 10

25And behold, a lawyer stood up and put Him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” 26And He said to him, “What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?” 27And he answered, “YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND; AND YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.” 28And He said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.”


And here is Jesus example of love not even a Christian by some folks standards:

Luke 10

30Jesus replied and said, “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he encountered robbers, and they stripped him and beat him, and went away leaving him half dead. 31And by coincidence a priest was going down on that road, and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32Likewise a Levite also, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33But a Samaritan who was on a journey came upon him; and when he saw him, he felt compassion, 34and came to him and bandaged up his wounds, pouring oil and wine on them; and he put him on his own animal, and brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35On the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, ‘Take care of him; and whatever more you spend, when I return, I will repay you.’ 36Which of these three do you think proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell into the robbers’ hands?” 37And he said, “The one who showed compassion to him.” Then Jesus said to him, “Go and do the same.”


“Go and do the same.” Is not spoken to SAVED folks.

The problem is if a person has a SELFISH view of reward. OH.... good works, loving your neighbor and loving God.....thats not going to earn me my immortality. A person's focus on SALVATION being more important than GOD and his commands.

John 14

15“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.

^its worthless for the selfish, Its EVERYTHING when God means everything to you.

 

That is not contra-protestant per se. There is not only the selfish attitude to deal with but the arrogant attitude—both are fueled by pride. Again, the issue is about the source. Are these things added or increased by ourselves, or rather is God the source of everything good in us?

Consider what Paul says in these verses.

6 Now, brothers and sisters, I have applied these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, so that you may learn from us the meaning of the saying, “Do not go beyond what is written.” Then you will not be puffed up in being a follower of one of us over against the other. 7 For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not? (1 Corinthians 4:6-7)

9For I am the least of the apostles and am unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not in vain. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. (1 Corinthians 15:9-10)

28We proclaim Him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfectf in Christ. 29To this end I also labor, striving with all His energy working powerfully within me. (Colossians 1:28-29)​

Bottom line, one emphasis is on “working out our salvation with fear and trembling” (cf. Philippians 2:12), the other on the source of the ability to do that. If both are really agreed to and really present, then where is the disagreement? But the latter must come first, and the former necessarily follow. Hence, the glory goes to God alone.

 

Grace saves us, not love!

 

Guys, I thought we covered this already. Yes you need to believe in Faith, but you also need to show the evidence of Love, good works.

I gave the scriptural evidence of people who had great faith enough to do miracles and acknowledge Jesus as Lord, yet were condemned. These were believers, of great faith. How many miracles have you performed by your faith recently.

Later on in Matthew we see how people are judged, by their Love or lack of Love. By what good works they did or didn’t do for others.

“Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ 23 Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’”

Many, Jesus says. He isn’t kidding. Many have made an idol of this new “ Faith alone “ idea.

It’s not enough to believe in Faith dudes, you have to carry out the commandment to Love by good works.

“ When I was hungry, you gave me food “

It’s important you get this guys and not be part of the “ Many “ that Jesus talking about.
Don’t be those dudes that have huge Faith to move mountains, but have not Love, because it’s clashing noise that ends nowhere.

Scripture warns people that what you for others, you do for Jesus, and what don’t do for others, you don’t do for Jesus.

Protestants need to reacquaint themselves with Love and it’s importance.

This is why I will be running a workshop called “ The greatest of these is Love “ , to help introduce Protestants to the supremacy of Love. It’s a bit like deprogramming a hard ideology that borders on pathology. Introducing Love to Faith alone is a delicate matter, and the sufferer goes through convulsions of proof texts, writhing in apologetics. But if you can guide dudes to admit that the greatest of these is Love then you can start to see the Faith alone fever break.
Then you can move onto Hope as an essential for Salvation which you have in the follow up workshop, which completes the Trinity of essentials for Salvation.

 

“If you try to create your own faith and your own love, you will be nothing but a clanging gong tooting your own horn. ”

I’m not talking about works, I’m talking about good works, works of Love inspired by Grace. That comes from ongoing cooperation with the Grace to Love.

There are dudes that don’t act out of Loves inspiration, that’s the problem. They have faith and believe, but they don’t cooperate with the grace to Love each day. In the over emphasis on “ Faith alone “ they forget good works, Love.

Love is good works, not works, that’s where you getting confused.

 

You have to have the ongoing cooperation with grace to Love throughout your life. Good works are God’s works by grace done through us.

Many believers are ignoring those inspirations of Love and not doing the good works grace is inspiring them to to do.
You can’t ignore Christ’s commandment to Love others as as He Loved them and expect salvation.

That’s why the warning from Paul about having a Titanic Faith that can move whole mountains means nothing without Love, good works.

That’s why even dudes who had huge Faith enough to perform many miracles were still condemned by the Lord.
These dudes were Faith alone, they didn’t have the Love demonstrated by good works, they ignored the daily graces to do good works, Love.

This is the deadly trap, and why the Lord says “many “ will say Lord, Lord on that day.
This is why I worry about it, hearing dudes parroting “ Faith alone” totally blind to the Love side of grace cooperation.
Start thinking about Love guys, if you don’t have the Love you should, pray for it. You need to continually receive the grace daily to Love others, we are poor and have nothing and God is rich beyond measure in it.

I wish I could hear Protestant pastors talk about Love, but they aren’t and that’s the real worry. It’s all one sided emphasis.

Faith and Love together guys, Faith and Good Works, Faith and Grace Works.

Please understand what I’m saying, I thought we settled this before mate.

 

Look up the word grace.

God is Love.
Grace... Like gracious. Try finding out what the hebrew word means.
Try taking love out of grace and see where grace stands.

There is a reason GOD IS LOVE.

 

As previously pointed out, there is no dearth of ignorance in these posts Cathsplaining “faith alone.” There is no question that love is the greatest, that without love all else is for naught.

Protestants often harp on John 3:16 as a starting point. “For God so loved the world….” As a continuation, they harp on the two greatest commandments: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength,” and Love your neighbor as yourself.” (See Mark 12:28-34.)

So to not merely insinuate but to outright state that ignorance of this is somehow widespread among protestants, and not found among Catholics, is beyond bizarre. To put the shoe on the other foot, how would it sound if someone suggested that Catholics need to be deprogrammed from the ideological pathology that love means LGBTQ-P? Yeah, I thought so.

 

A perfectly good topic on the differences between Catholic beliefs and Protestant beliefs degrades into yet another "Calvinism vs Arminianism" exchange of sound bytes. At least HALF of the Protestants would agree with you about synergistic salvation (men cooperating with God to be saved). All of the General Baptists would. None of the Particular Baptists would. All Methodists would. Lutherans and Presbyterians would be split.

The point is monergism (God saves us in spite of ourselves) is not really a Protestant distinctive.

 

I’m only giving my honest perspective, it seems to me to border on pathology, simply because they repeat the same line over again like a mantra, and they are totally blind to the really important point.
It’s got to be one of the hardest things to get across to people, I don’t know another way to describe the situation frankly.

To try to be forthright up front about it, but I’m only a garden contractor, so I can only state it as I see it in simple terms flat out.
I’m not out to upset people, but someone has to step up and at least say something to stop the carnage out there.