What Type of Calvinist am I -discussion thread

[sawdust]

Tell me then what you say saving grace is.

Saving grace is the power given to hear the Gospel, suppressing the flesh so you can make a decision from your own free will..

 

[Arial]

Saving grace is the power given to hear the Gospel, suppressing the flesh so you can make a decision from your own free will..

Do you have anything to support that?

 

[sawdust]

Please address what I said. I showed you what regeneration was and how one is placed in Christ by hearing the gospel and believing it. Until one is regenerated they won't believe the gospel when they hear it.

Give your definition of regeneration.

The rest of my post went completely ignored. This has become a very tiresome and disturbing habit of many on the forum. It effectively ends all constructive dialog.

I'm not bothering to respond to everything you say when you fail to recognise the absurdity of your position in the first instance. You effectively have God saving you so you can hear the Gospel and be saved. The scripture may as well say "regeneration is the power unto regeneration".

There may be a world out there where that makes sense but not for this black duck. May I suggest you keep an eye out for a white rabbit.

Have a nice day.

 

[sawdust]

Do you have anything to support that?

I already gave you the process. You said the Spirit's ministry was for the Church not the world as the scripture states.

 

[Arial]

I'm not bothering to respond to everything you say when you fail to recognise the absurdity of your position in the first instance.

That is an excuse. If you say what I say is an absurdity then it should be easy enough to disavow me of my absurdity by addressing what I say point for point.

You effectively have God saving you so you can hear the Gospel and be saved. The scripture may as well say "regeneration is the power unto regeneration".

This is not true. You are the one conflating regeneration and actual union with Christ through faith. Not me. I am making a distinction between them.

 

[Arial]

I already gave you the process. You said the Spirit's ministry was for the Church not the world as the scripture states.

The Spirit's ministry is for those God is giving to Jesus. His elect. Both before and after salvation.

 

[sawdust]

That is an excuse. If you say what I say is an absurdity then it should be easy enough to disavow me of my absurdity by addressing what I say point for point.

This is not true. You are the one conflating regeneration and actual union with Christ through faith. Not me. I am making a distinction between them.

What do you think is salvation?

 

[sawdust]

The Spirit's ministry is for those God is giving to Jesus. His elect. Both before and after salvation.

The scripture says His ministry is to the world not the elect.

 

[Arial]

The scripture says His ministry is to the world not the elect.

Where?

 

[Arial]

What do you think is salvation?

Salvation is a union with Christ through faith. In that, because of His having satisfied the just wrath of God against our sins by being our substitute, we are justified before God through faith, (trusting in the person and work of Jesus alone), reconciled to God, and saved from His wrath unto eternal life in HIs kingdom.

 

[sawdust]

Where?

John 16:8
And when He (the Spirit) has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

 

[sawdust]

Salvation is a union with Christ through faith. In that, because of His having satisfied the just wrath of God against our sins by being our substitute, we are justified before God through faith, (trusting in the person and work of Jesus alone), reconciled to God, and saved from His wrath unto eternal life in HIs kingdom.

Being in union with Christ is Election. Being born from above (regeneration) is salvation.

 

[Arial]

Being in union with Christ is Election. Being born from above (regeneration) is salvation.

The rebirth (regeneration)is given to those God elects, and because of regeneration one believes the gospel when they hear it. If the Holy Spirit regenerates a person they will hear and they will believe. And because they believe it they are saved---in union with Christ. Are you confusing regeneration with sanctification?

 

[Arial]

John 16:8
And when He (the Spirit) has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

How did I know that was the scripture you would give? This is what He does to the world. His mission is applying the work of Jesus to a person, and sealing and ministering to those who God has given to Jesus. He is the agent of the new birth. John 3.

 

[sawdust]

The rebirth (regeneration)is given to those God elects, and because of regeneration one believes the gospel when they hear it. If the Holy Spirit regenerates a person they will hear and they will believe. And because they believe it they are saved---in union with Christ. Are you confusing regeneration with sanctification?

No I'm not confusing anything. You keep ignoring it is the Gospel that saves. Regeneration is the result of believing the Gospel. it is being made spiritually alive ie. saved from death which is the result of Adam's sin for which Christ died. Being in union with Christ is what God chooses to do with those He has saved after the Cross. Consider Rahab. Was she in associated with Christ or Israel to enjoy the promised salvation? Between Moses and John the Baptist, if you were a believer, you had to be in union with Israel to enjoy salvation. That was their election.

 

[sawdust]

How did I know that was the scripture you would give?

Don't know. Maybe because you have already decided I'm wrong before you even hear what I have to say? But I will say it again the ministry is to the world, not the elect only.

 

[sawdust]

The rebirth (regeneration)is given to those God elects, and because of regeneration one believes the gospel when they hear it. If the Holy Spirit regenerates a person they will hear and they will believe. And because they believe it they are saved---in union with Christ. Are you confusing regeneration with sanctification?

Again you put salvation before the Gospel. If you are spiritually alive you have been saved! It's not saved, Gospel, saved.

 

[makesends]

God creates the soul, He doesn't create corruption that's why the heart is not corrupted at birth, it is neutral, neither good nor evil. The sin nature is in the flesh. Romans 7 deals with this. We are intrinsically flawed (sinners) from birth. We are not intrinsically evil from birth.

Total Depravity is the doctrine of being locked into that system of corruption without any way out by our own means. As Paul says "who will deliver me from this body of death." (Rom.7:21-25)

It is the flesh that is against the Spirit not the mind per se. Rather, the mind set on the flesh is against the Spirit of God. Without grace and the Spirit of God at work in the world, the mind has no choice but to be governed by the flesh. No matter how much you may not want to sin? You will sin because the flesh demands "self first" in all things.

It is not at birth, that God creates the baby. Your sequence of logic is, uh, hanging out past the cliff in your cloud of dust...

 

[Arial]

Again you put salvation before the Gospel. If you are spiritually alive you have been saved! It's not saved, Gospel, saved.

They all work together in unison but are distinct. All part of the same thing of God saving (giving to Christ) but are distinct. In God's economy it does not have to be a visible to us, process such as you are seeing it. I.e. Step 1. Then step 2. Then step 3.

 

[Arial]

You keep ignoring it is the Gospel that saves.

Jesus saves. The gospel is the good news of who He is and what He did for us. Believing those things is what places us in Him.

Regeneration is the result of believing the Gospel. it is being made spiritually alive ie. saved from death which is the result of Adam's sin for which Christ died.

If that is what you believe then you will need to give me your definition of what you say regeneration means. Not what it is, what it means. In scripture we see it called the new birth in John 3. So I am asking you to take the full set of passages of Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus and give an expository explanation of them.

And then explain to me how one can believe the gospel when they are spiritually dead? Would they not have to be quickened to life first? Eph 2:1-5 would appear to say exactly the opposite.



And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body[a] and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.[b] 4 But[c] God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved

Being in union with Christ is what God chooses to do with those He has saved after the Cross.

Believing is the union with Christ. Acts 16:31; John 1:12. In Eph 1-2 "in Christ" is repeated over and over. "We were chosen in Christ." "We are predestined in Christ." "we are sealed by the Spirit in Christ." Romans 5:12-14. Those who are saved are in Christ. They are not placed there after they have been saved.

Was she in associated with Christ or Israel to enjoy the promised salvation? Between Moses and John the Baptist, if you were a believer, you had to be in union with Israel to enjoy salvation. That was their election.

And it did not actually make anyone a "believer" of give eternal life. They were brought into the covenant community, with God as their God, but salvation to eternal life was still only through faith. It was not election unto salvation.