The god of Calvinism's arbitrary decision.

[makesends]

We are saved by grace through faith...that clearly means that faith is the avenue by which we are saved by grace. So faith comes first.

No. It is through faith that we are saved, and that, by the grace of God, and not of ourselves...

We have access by faith into grace. Again, we enter into grace because of faith. So, faith comes before we are recipients of grace.

If I was to follow your reasoning for Eph 2:8,9, for this verse, it would render just the opposite. You are wrong...

The opposite, and the lack of, grace, is works. If you are saved in any way by works, then it is not grace, and you are not saved. We are saved by grace, i.e. the mercy of God unmerited by the recipient of that mercy. We find that by faith, and that too is the gift of God. Please demonstrate to me how YOUR integrity of heart and constancy of decision and knowledge and understanding of what is being undertaken, and strength of desire and love for God, by you when you were still at enmity with God, is shown in Scripture to effect your salvation. If your salvation hinges on what you decided, and not on what God decided, then you are on already shaking ground, sinking sand.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and credit to you that you understand what I am saying.

If you don't, I believe it is because you have blinders on.

How would it sound to you if I was to say the same thing to you?

 

[justbyfaith]

No. It is through faith that we are saved, and that, by the grace of God, and not of ourselves...

If I was to follow your reasoning for Eph 2:8,9, for this verse, it would render just the opposite. You are wrong...

No, because we are saved by grace through faith. Do you understand what the word "through" means? Maybe you should look it up.

Romans 5:2 says the same when it teaches that we have access by faith into grace...we enter into grace through faith...faith is the avenue by which we enter into grace...and therefore faith is first.

The opposite, and the lack of, grace, is works. If you are saved in any way by works, then it is not grace, and you are not saved. We are saved by grace, i.e. the mercy of God unmerited by the recipient of that mercy. We find that by faith, and that too is the gift of God. Please demonstrate to me how YOUR integrity of heart and constancy of decision and knowledge and understanding of what is being undertaken, and strength of desire and love for God, by you when you were still at enmity with God, is shown in Scripture to effect your salvation. If your salvation hinges on what you decided, and not on what God decided, then you are on already shaking ground, sinking sand.

Salvation is all of God when I call on His name (Romans 10:13). That is my part. God does the saving when I ask Him to do it (see Matthew 7:7-8).

There does not need to be an "integrity of a decision" in my calling on His name. All there needs to be is a decision. God does the rest.

How would it sound to you if I was to say the same thing to you?

You can say the same thing to me; however I have my eyes in my head and you don't have your eyes in your head. So, it would not affect me in the slightest if you thought that I had blinders on. I can see clearly what is meant by these scriptures. You have yet to understand them.

 

[makesends]

No, because we are saved by grace through faith. Do you understand what the word "through" means? Maybe you should look it up.

Romans 5:2 says the same when it teaches that we have access by faith into grace...we enter into grace through faith...faith is the avenue by which we enter into grace...and therefore faith is first.

Ok, I'll play; then maybe you can follow what I'm saying. Through faith we have access to the grace —true indeed! Now, demonstrate where this is by decision of man. Well, it isn't. Therefore, the faith too is by the grace of God.

Just a side note, I will give you credit. Most self-determining people want to argue that the faith is not the gift of God, but that the grace is. You've got it just the other way around. But the grammar has it that they both, and the salvation, are.

Salvation is all of God when I call on His name (Romans 10:13). That is my part. God does the saving when I ask Him to do it (see Matthew 7:7-8).

There does not need to be an "integrity of a decision" in my calling on His name. All there needs to be is a decision. God does the rest.

So you've never doubted that you really decided —that it wasn't just an emotional moment? You didn't even know just what you were committing to, not to mention that your works belies your decision. Does not your repeated rebellion tell you that your salvation is not of yourself?

You can say the same thing to me; however I have my eyes in my head and you don't have your eyes in your head. So, it would not affect me in the slightest if you thought that I had blinders on. I can see clearly what is meant by these scriptures. You have yet to understand them.

Do they never open further to you, or do you see them clearly as you claim? The standard by which one measures others, will be stretched out against that one. This applies both to me and to you.

 

[justbyfaith]

Ok, I'll play; then maybe you can follow what I'm saying. Through faith we have access to the grace —true indeed! Now, demonstrate where this is by decision of man. Well, it isn't. Therefore, the faith too is by the grace of God.

grace comes through faith...so grace is by the faith of man.

Just a side note, I will give you credit. Most self-determining people want to argue that the faith is not the gift of God, but that the grace is. You've got it just the other way around. But the grammar has it that they both, and the salvation, are.

Ephesians 2:8-9 does not necessarily denote by its grammar that faith is the gift of God.

So you've never doubted that you really decided —that it wasn't just an emotional moment? You didn't even know just what you were committing to, not to mention that your works belies your decision. Does not your repeated rebellion tell you that your salvation is not of yourself?

What repeated rebellion?

I know that I have in fact sinned since becoming a Christian...however I would say that my life as a believer has been characterized by obedience.

Do they never open further to you, or do you see them clearly as you claim? The standard by which one measures others, will be stretched out against that one. This applies both to me and to you.

The old "I'm rubber and you're glue" tactic?

That won't work because I understand the verses in question and can clearly point out where your misunderstanding lies. It is that you don't understand the meaning of the word "through"...

And it is that you don't see that when it says that we have access by faith into grace, that we come into grace through faith...and that therefore faith is a stop on the way to entering into grace...it is in fact the avenue by which we enter into grace.

I think that it is plain for anyone to see who has an I.Q. over 70...

However, the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God.

 

[ReverendRV]

It remains that if anyone receives Christ, they will be born again.

I take issue with the idea that we are born again before receiving Christ.

Receiving Christ is the catalyst for being born again.

We ask Christ in...He comes in.

He does not come in before we ask Him.

Would you Conflate the New Birth, with the Circumcision of the heart?

 

[ReverendRV]

We are saved by grace through faith...that clearly means that faith is the avenue by which we are saved by grace. So faith comes first.

We have access by faith into grace. Again, we enter into grace because of faith. So, faith comes before we are recipients of grace.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and credit to you that you understand what I am saying.

If you don't, I believe it is because you have blinders on.

Are you Tom?

We have access to a Subsidiary Grace, through our Faith; not access to the Preliminary Grace of Illumination or Regeneration, through our Faith...

 

[Arial]

Right. No one can steal this love away because I don't believe in Calvinism.

If I did, there would be a significant reason to doubt my salvation and thus the love of the Lord towards me.

Is the display of obtuseness real or is just maintained so you can keep on attacking Calvinism and Calvinists? No matter how wrong you have to be as to the actual theology and doctrines in it, in order to do so?

If you believed the theology of and doctrines in Calvinism, there would be no reason to doubt your salvation. You would know what it is you believe about Jesus, and you would know that the only reason you do believe is because God elected you to salvation and brought you to that belief in Jesus by regeneration (a new creation in Christ),so that when you heard the gospel you believed it. You would rest in the reconciliation that Jesus made for you with God, knowing it was God who did it, and not your own wonderful and wise self, who has a fallen heart at enmity with God, and deceitful above all else.

All those who are saved should from time to time contemplate just how poor and needy we are, and recognize that we never operate independently of God but always are in need of His fountain of grace and mercy. Stop relying on our own righteousness and remember whose robe we wear. That daily we need to feast on the Bread of Life and come to Him for the living water to drink.

If you were a Calvinist you would not be always turning to what you did that caused God to save you, trusting in what you did for your security. You would simply trust God. That is one of the things I am most grateful for. I can trust Him and not myself. I know how wretched, prone to unfaithfulness, and unreliable in the things of God, I am. But it is not me up to God, it is God down to me. That is His love. And He is faithful, perfectly and always and in all things.

 

[Arial]

If I believed that the Lord did not choose me, even though I chose Him, I would be angry with Him and would cry out for eternity from hell that His decision to condemn me was unjust and that He is going to have to live with that knowledge for all of eternity.

If you were a Calvinist you would not consider this to even be an issue.You would know that you wouldn't choose Him and were turned away. You wouldn't even be thinking of salvation in terms of your own choices. When you make the statement you make above, do you not see that it is you who is the center of the universe and not God? So much so, you tell Him in what ways He must be, and in what way He must relate to you, and your feelings on any given subject or action. He must define things according to you.

Of course He chose me because He looked down the annals of history and saw that I would choose Him (Romans 8:29, 1 Peter 1:2).

Rom 8:29 You have determined what is meant by foreknew by what you already believe and have been told for it is another of the alterations made to fit, that is taught in the free will camp. Rather than the proper way to determine the meaning of the scripture, which is from the whole counsel of God and through not predetermining what you want something to mean. If foreknew meant God looked down the annals of history and saw that you would choose Him, it makes a nonsense mockery of the other words used. "called" and "according to His purpose" in verse 28. "Predestined," and "called" in verse 30.

1 Peter 2:2 Foreknowledge according to your definition would make a nonsense mocker of the words, "elect," in verse 1, "chosen." "through the sanctifying work of the Spirit" in verse 2. And His purpose in "to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with His blood."

The way you use foreknowledge has God doing only what you already will do yourself. And picking you on that merit. It takes God pretty much out of the picture. As you said earlier, tosses the ball into our court, and works His purposes according to us.

 

[Eleanor]

One might understand that faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God (Romans 10:17) and then choose to cultivate faith by exposing one's self to the word.

One might be motivated to do that because he understands that faith is needed if one is going to avoid eternal flames.

Trust me, that doesn't work.

You can't make yourself believe what you don't really believe.

 

[Eleanor]

Faith comes before grace in salvation according to Romans 5:2 and Ephesians 2:8-9.

You are saved by grace. . .through faith (Eh 2:8-9).
Grace is the source, faith is the means.

No grace, no faith.

 

[Arial]

It does not cause me to doubt my salvation.

It would if I actually believed in Calvinism; but since I don't, my assurance remains intact.

If you actually believed Calvinism as it is, and not as you say it is, you wouldn't doubt your salvation. Except possibly and times and for short seasons, as sometimes God does a marvelous and strengthen work in us through that, or sometimes He may use it to pull us back to our first love and our worship and dependence on Him. To our being once again aware that He keeps us, we do not keep ourselves. A way of checking our foundation and finding it unshakable. For any to say they are immune to all doubts ever, is to be taking God for granted.

I am so grateful that it is Him I trust with my salvation, as only He is trustworthy, and that I am not left to trust in myself.

I believe all of those things; but am told that if this belief is rooted in the flesh, it will avail for me nothing.

If it was rooted in the flesh, it wouldn't actually be belief. Think that through.

But I would say that if you believe that it is not your choice that saves you, it may be a salvational issue. Because you may not do what is necessary to procure salvation.

That is a complete misunderstanding of what salvation does. A person who does not do what is necessary of one who has been saved, has not been saved. Nothing is necessary to procure salvation but faith in Jesus and that is a gift of God, Eph 2:8-9. Jesus did all the work necessary for salvation. What we do is believe in what He did and that it is applied to us through faith. Being in Christ (the Vine. "I am the Vine, your are the branches") through faith produces the fruit of the Vine. It is not until we are placed in the Vine that we even know we need to repent, or what we need to repent of.

You have being completely dependant on yourself to produce the necessary fruit of salvation in order to be saved.

This is true because God is love and He loves everyone...He is not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance...and this is not conditioned on them believing or being of the elect.

However, He does save people because they believe and does not save them before they believe.

If God is not willing that any should perish according to the way you are interpreting that scripture, then you have a God who is powerless to do what He wills to do. Not only that, but one who has determined that the work and death of Jesus is entirely dependant for effectiveness on human creatures. A God who puts their will above His and above the substitutionary work of His Son. Does that seem reasonable?

 

[Arial]

Right...I have shown that my faith was not meritorious.

It was meant to say that you have not shown that your faith is not meritorious. I will edit it.

If that is the case, then I did not need to do those things; for I was saved apart from them.

Do you see how the doctrine of Calvinism is conducive to a person not doing what it takes to procure salvation?

What a pile of illogical arguments you post.

You did not need to do those things in order to be saved. Someone who is saved, will do those things. I don't see where you give any glory to God, it is all about what we do and who we are. I see no evidence that you have any idea what God Himself works in us. It is as though Jesus suffered and died and rose again and all the rest of your walk in Him is up to your. As though He saved (correction you saved, He only did the necessary work and at unimaginable cost to Himself, but you gave it its power by choosing Him) and then left us as orphans.

 

[Arial]

One might be motivated to do that because he understands that faith is needed if one is going to avoid eternal flames.

Is that all that matters about salvation? Is that the only thing it does?

 

[Eleanor]

We are saved by grace through faith...that clearly means that faith is the avenue by which we are saved by grace. So faith comes first

No, grace is the (first) cause, which operates through the avenue (means) of faith.

"It is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not of yourself, of the gift of God." (Eph 2:8-9)

Grammatically, the subject is grace, the verb is saved and the object is you. . .the means (through which grace saves) is faith.

We have access by faith into grace. Again, we enter into grace because of faith. So, faith comes before we are recipients of grace.

No, grace stands as an eternal great fountain into which, during time, we have access through faith.

 

[Eleanor]

Is the display of obtuseness real or is just maintained so you can keep on attacking Calvinism and Calvinists? No matter how wrong you have to be as to the actual theology and doctrines in it, in order to do so?

If you believed the theology of and doctrines in Calvinism, there would be no reason to doubt your salvation. You would know what it is you believe about Jesus, and you would know that the only reason you do believe is because God elected you to salvation and brought you to that belief in Jesus by regeneration (a new creation in Christ),so that when you heard the gospel you believed it. You would rest in the reconciliation that Jesus made for you with God, knowing it was God who did it, and not your own wonderful and wise self, who has a fallen heart at enmity with God, and deceitful above all else.

All those who are saved should from time to time contemplate just how poor and needy we are, and recognize that we never operate independently of God but always are in need of His fountain of grace and mercy. Stop relying on our own righteousness and remember whose robe we wear. That daily we need to feast on the Bread of Life and come to Him for the living water to drink.

If you were a Calvinist you would not be always turning to what you did that caused God to save you, trusting in what you did for your security. You would simply trust God. That is one of the things I am most grateful for. I can trust Him and not myself. I know how wretched, prone to unfaithfulness, and unreliable in the things of God, I am. But it is not me up to God, it is God down to me. That is His love. And He is faithful, perfectly and always and in all things.

To repeat: "Winner, winner, chicken dinner."

 

[Arial]

There does not need to be an "integrity of a decision" in my calling on His name. All there needs to be is a decision. God does the rest.

Then what does believe in your heart mean? You are right in saying there does not need to be "integrity of decision." There is no decision mentioned or necessary in order to be saved. The wind blows where it will and no one knows where it comes from or where it is going.

 

[Arial]

I have an unction from the Holy One (1 John 2:20) and do know all things according to the definition of that in the verse.

So now you are appealing to the logical fallacy of, "I justbyfaith, have had God speak to me and tell me that I know all things according to that scripture, and therefore I am right, and you are wrong." Can you prove this unction from the Holy Spirit that you speak of?

 

[Eleanor]

It seems to me that there is an idea brewing here...
That someone might come to Christ, believing in Him and following Him, but that it might be all of the flesh and therefore would be to no avail for the believer.
I will say again that the thief cometh not but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy (John 10:10).
And that this concept in Calvinism is conducive to a person doubting their salvation and also to satan stealing the love of the Lord from a person's heart.
Because, I love Jesus because He saved me from hell.
But I am told here that He may not have saved me because my faith might have been carnal.
So, the possibility that I am not of the elect is not conducive to assurance of salvation.
Nevertheless, the scripture says,
1Th 1:5, For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.
I will say again that we love Him because He first loved us (1 John 4:19).
But you are preaching that maybe He didn't love some of us.
How is that conducive to us falling in love with Jesus?
Someone here has said that if my faith is carnal, it will not save me; and that therefore one might have faith that is not unto salvation.
But if only a faith that is not carnal will save, then there is something meritorious about that faith.
And if one might have a faith that is not unto salvation, how can one have real assurance of salvation?
I believe that the Spirit bears witness with my spirit that I am a child of God; though initially, my faith may have indeed been based in a sinful instinct of self-preservation.
But because of that, my faith is not meritorious.
I feel that some of you are judging my salvation because I have shown that my initial faith was not meritorious.
But my assurance is based in the word of the Lord.
I know that I know that I know that I am saved; because I have done what is prescribed for salvation in Hosea 14:2, Romans 10:9-13, and Acts 2:38-39.
In the last thing, the Holy Ghost is absolutely promised to those who fulfill the condition of the promise; and so is remission of sins.
There is no possibility of it being a carnal faith; because it is faith in an absolute promise of holy scripture.
However, the initial reasoning, in obtaining that promise (by fulfilling its condition), might be considered to be a carnal faith (based in a sinful instinct of self-preservation).
Nevertheless, God keeps His promises and is trustworthy (for it is impossible for God to lie).
So, even if someone wants to cast disparity on my salvation by saying that it was not valid for that it was not meritorious,
I know whom I have believed and am convinced that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him against that day.
I stand on the word of the Lord and I base my salvation what it teaches.
I have not only confessed with my mouth Jesus as Lord, believing in my heart that God hath raised Him from the dead; and not only have I called on the name of the Lord; but I have been baptized in His Name.
Therefore, based on the promise of Acts 2:38-39, I know that I know that I know that I have been given remission of sins and the gift of the Holy Ghost.

I have an unction from the Holy One (1 John 2:20) and do know all things according to the definition of that in the verse.

Self-proclaimed authority here?

 

[Arial]

Self-proclaimed authority here?

Yep.

 

[ReverendRV]

You get to the City by Subway through the Tunnel...

We're Saved by Grace through Faith...