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God chooses who gets saved, not ourselves, and it is His will that Hi sown are eternally saved and secured!
So you've been made righteous, have you, Van? Sinless perfection? Or do you believe in the Roman catholic doctrine of imparted (as opposed to 'imputed') righteousness?As demonstrated in post # 77, no verse says or suggest we were declared righteous. OTOH, we were made righteous in Christ.
And non-believers will be judged according to their deeds and punished accordingly.
he chooses us to salvation before we were even born!Did anyone say God does not choose who He saves? Nope
So yet another obfuscation post.
LOL, yet another denial that (1) God and God alone credits the faith of believers as righteousness.
What verse says we were "declared righteous?"
Romans 5:19
For as through the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous.
To 'justify' is to declare righteous (c.f. Proverbs 17:15; Isaiah 5:23 etc.).
Abraham was saved when he believed God's promise of a Seed (John 8:56). His faith led him to works (Hebrews 11:8), but the faith came first (Romans 4:1-5).But do we equate justification which is based on our actions (i.e., Abraham's faith and works) with being justified through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus?
Would you care to expand on this a little, or point me to where you have already done so?I think this is the major stumblingblock for most, because they do not distinguish the difference.
We must distinguish between the righteousness that is temporal, and applies to man's existence in this realm, and the righteousness which is of God, and that imputed to man based on what Christ did.
Thank you. You too.God bless.
Abraham was saved when he believed God's promise of a Seed (John 8:56).
His faith led him to works (Hebrews 11:8), but the faith came first (Romans 4:1-5).
Would you care to expand on this a little, or point me to where you have already done so?
We all know unsaved people who have done good deeds, lived outwardly moral lives etc., but if they are saved by such deeds then Christianity is false and we should stop preaching it at once.
However, we are told that 'Those who are in the flesh cannot please God'
Agreed, from an eternal perspective in relation to his eternal destiny.
But, he was not eternally redeemed and would not be until Christ paid his sin debt (the death due Abraham for his sin).
He was justified, and while that equates to being "saved" from an eternal perspective," it should not be equated to being saved through Christ. Or, as I mentioned, being justified through Christ.
He was not reconciled to God, though called a friend of God, just as David was not, though said to have the heart of God. God was in Christ Jesus reconciling the world unto Himself, showing that the world was still in need of reconciliation.
Agreed.
But before his faith was...
...the intervention of God.
Be glad to, and I'll start with the referenced Scripture:
James 2:21
King James Version (KJV)
21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar?
Now we all know that the context is not speaking from an eternal perspective, for the context refers to man's relationship to each other, so here Abraham is justified before other men by his works, not that he was saved eternally because he obeyed God's command to offer up Isaac. So his justification is from a temporal perspective, rather than from an eternal. It is what Abraham has done, not what Christ will do for him by which he is justified by God.
This one is going to be a little harder to consider:
Romans 4
King James Version (KJV)
1 What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?
Paul defines the context from the beginning...as pertaining to the flesh, or in other worlds, this is a temporal context, not an eternal context.
2 For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God.
As mentioned before, Abraham's justification relates to his relationship to other men.
3 For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.
And I will offer but one question: do we not see that again Abraham is justified...by something he has done?
Rather than what Christ has done for him?
Now consider:
Romans 3:23-26
King James Version (KJV)
23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;
26 To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
The Redemption Christ wrought on the Cross and in the Resurrection stands apart from all other redemptive events in Scripture. It stands alone and apart from all atonement, justification, and remission of sins we see recorded. The righteousness attributed to Abraham through his belief and obedience should be, in my view, distinguished from the justification received by those who have believed on the name of Jesus Christ (and specifically that He died in our stead and is capable of atoning for our sins).
This knowledge was not known to Old Testament Saints, thus they were not justified through the redemption which is in Jesus Christ.
Okay, that is a short assertion of what I am saying.
Your thoughts?
No-one is "saved" from an eternal perspective (eternally redeemed) apart from faith in Jesus Christ. I have never intimated that anyone at any time can be saved through works, whether they be "good deeds" or the works of the Law.
But, we distinguish this Age, now that the Gospel Mystery is revealed to men, as different from those dispensations which preceded it. Just as it says above, "To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness," whereas under Law...
...whose righteousness would have been the model?
You guessed it...Abraham. And he was.
And that is specific to this Age, for...
Romans 4
King James Version (KJV)
1 What shall we say then that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found?
Hope that clarifies my question.
God bless.
Perhaps you place time and space as shackles upon God who made them for human accountability and His own.
God did not offer what was or might happen in the future, but what was already.
Therefore, before the world ever was, Christ was already presented as the light.
Abraham and the rest did not have to wait for the Cross
for such was not a part of their own understanding.
The OT revelations of the cross were given over centuries long after Abraham lived.
As such, Abraham in no manner was justified by works, but by promise of God.
That the justification of Abraham resulted in works is that evidence (sign) that the promise of God was sure and certain.
7It was also given to him to make war with the saints and to overcome them, and authority over every tribe and people and tongue and nation was given to him. 8All who dwell on the earth will worship him, everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who has been slain. 9If anyone has an ear, let him hear. 10If anyone is destined for captivity, to captivity he goes; if anyone kills with the sword, with the sword he must be killed. Here is the perseverance and the faith of the saints.
How could names be written before the crucifixion?
Because the Crucifixion that took place in HUMAN time and space was not contained and confined to time and space from God’s perspective.
No names could be written, if redemption was not already factual from the Father's perspective.
See there is never a time when one is added,Its very simple, God is Omniscient.
However, your proof text stands a little criticism, because you are not considering that all men are written in the Book of Life.
Before you object, ask yourself, "Doesn't one have to be in there in order to be blotted out?"
One passage:
Psalm 69:18-28
King James Version (KJV)
18 Draw nigh unto my soul, and redeem it: deliver me because of mine enemies.
19 Thou hast known my reproach, and my shame, and my dishonour: mine adversaries are all before thee.
20 Reproach hath broken my heart; and I am full of heaviness: and I looked for some to take pity, but there was none; and for comforters, but I found none.
21 They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.
22 Let their table become a snare before them: and that which should have been for their welfare, let it become a trap.
23 Let their eyes be darkened, that they see not; and make their loins continually to shake.
24 Pour out thine indignation upon them, and let thy wrathful anger take hold of them.
25 Let their habitation be desolate; and let none dwell in their tents.
26 For they persecute him whom thou hast smitten; and they talk to the grief of those whom thou hast wounded.
27 Add iniquity unto their iniquity: and let them not come into thy righteousness.
28 Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous.
In view is the enemies of Christ.
And they are in the Book of Life.
Also an interesting subject, thanks.
God bless.
See there is never a time when one is added,
Nor, even “blotted out” but is only suggested by the psalmist who had no authority over either adding or taking out.
Again, each of these does not show a name actually removed.On the contrary, it is not just a "suggestion" of the Psalmist, but something that will happen:
Exodus 32:32-34
King James Version (KJV)
32 Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin--; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written.
33 And the Lord said unto Moses, Whosoever hath sinned against me, him will I blot out of my book.
Revelation 22:19
King James Version (KJV)
19 And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which are written in this book.
Unless one overcomes (defined by John in 1 John 5:1-5):
Revelation 3
King James Version (KJV)
5 He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels.
God bless.
Again, each of these does not show a name actually removed.
Exodus asking to be blotted is not actually being blotted, it was an expression of concern, not of consequence.
Revelation 22 is not removing salvation but a statement concerning the blessings of that salvation.
Romans 8 would stand in violation of this Revelation verse without such consideration.