Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works.

Read his next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

"...FOR good works." Not BECAUSE of good works. We obey because we're saved. Not in order to be saved.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works.

Read his next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

"...FOR good works." Not BECAUSE of good works. We obey because we're saved. Not in order to be saved.

---

That misunderstanding has lead to serious error.

If obedience is only something that happens after salvation is already secure, then its absence should not threaten salvation. That's literally how "Once Saved, always saved" became widely accepted.

If you were to argue "You're justified by faith alone, but you can lose your salvation later", then you've immediately reintroduced conditions (perseverance, obedience, remaining in Christ) that affect justification. But sola fide explicitly forbids that, because then justification would no longer be by faith alone.

I don't think you guys actually disagree with me. We may actually be in agreement at the level of lived faith, but disagreement at the level of theological architecture.

This is also a difficult conversation because sola fide isn't even monolithic within Protestantism. Methodists and Wesleyans explicitly reject OSAS and emphasize cooperation/perseverance/holiness, while Calvinist streams push OSAS or "perseverance of the saints." Even within traditions that affirm sola fide, they've heavily modified it. It's not a binding or uniformly understood principle, so it basically functions more like a family of related ideas than a single, coherent doctrine.

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works.

Read his next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

"...FOR good works." Not BECAUSE of good works. We obey because we're saved. Not in order to be saved.

---

That misunderstanding has lead to serious error.

If obedience is only something that happens after salvation is already secure, then its absence should not threaten salvation. That's literally how "Once Saved, always saved" became widely accepted.

If you were to argue "You're justified by faith alone, but you can lose your salvation later", then you've immediately reintroduced conditions (perseverance, obedience, remaining in Christ) that affect justification. But sola fide explicitly forbids that, because then justification would no longer be by faith alone.

I don't think you guys actually disagree with me. We may actually be in agreement at the level of lived faith, but disagreement at the level of theological architecture.

This is also a difficult conversation because sola fide isn't even monolithic within Protestantism. Methodists and Wesleyans explicitly reject OSAS and emphasize cooperation/perseverance/holiness, while Calvinist streams push OSAS or "perseverance of the saints." Even within traditions that affirm sola fide, they've heavily modified it. It's not a binding or uniformly understood principle, so it basically functions more like a family of related ideas than a single, coherent doctrine.

---

You are framing the argument against sola fide by using those who only "say" they have faith, but really don't. But these are not true believers. A true believer isn't going to use their salvation as a license to sin however they want. A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will. This is what I think you're missing, the effect of the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer. God wants love and obedience this way, not out of fear of losing salvation.

Your views are against Scripture, don't you see that? We're trying to demonstrate that to you, but you keep avoiding the questions going toward that. What is the cutoff point for the amount of works needed for a "living faith"? How can Jesus save at that cutoff level, but not a smidgeon below? If you say we can't know the cutoff level, then that would contradict Scripture, such as 1 John 5:13 which says we CAN know we are saved, and everywhere Jesus says that anyone who believes in him will have eternal life.... wouldn't it? Do you not see the problem with injecting works into the salvation equation? You don't seem to want to confront this, you just want to continue on with your beliefs, as if nothing happened. Don't you care whether your beliefs are true?

I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

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So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

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Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

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Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

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Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

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Justification by faith, not works.

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Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

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- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

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Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

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Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

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He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works.

Read his next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

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"...FOR good works." Not BECAUSE of good works. We obey because we're saved. Not in order to be saved.

---

That misunderstanding has lead to serious error.

If obedience is only something that happens after salvation is already secure, then its absence should not threaten salvation. That's literally how "Once Saved, always saved" became widely accepted.

If you were to argue "You're justified by faith alone, but you can lose your salvation later", then you've immediately reintroduced conditions (perseverance, obedience, remaining in Christ) that affect justification. But sola fide explicitly forbids that, because then justification would no longer be by faith alone.

I don't think you guys actually disagree with me. We may actually be in agreement at the level of lived faith, but disagreement at the level of theological architecture.

This is also a difficult conversation because sola fide isn't even monolithic within Protestantism. Methodists and Wesleyans explicitly reject OSAS and emphasize cooperation/perseverance/holiness, while Calvinist streams push OSAS or "perseverance of the saints." Even within traditions that affirm sola fide, they've heavily modified it. It's not a binding or uniformly understood principle, so it basically functions more like a family of related ideas than a single, coherent doctrine.

---

You are framing the argument against sola fide by using those who only "say" they have faith, but really don't. But these are not true believers. A true believer isn't going to use their salvation as a license to sin however they want. A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will. This is what I think you're missing, the effect of the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer. God wants love and obedience this way, not out of fear of losing salvation.

Your views are against Scripture, don't you see that? We're trying to demonstrate that to you, but you keep avoiding the questions going toward that. What is the cutoff point for the amount of works needed for a "living faith"? How can Jesus save at that cutoff level, but not a smidgeon below? If you say we can't know the cutoff level, then that would contradict Scripture, such as 1 John 5:13 which says we CAN know we are saved, and everywhere Jesus says that anyone who believes in him will have eternal life.... wouldn't it? Do you not see the problem with injecting works into the salvation equation? You don't seem to want to confront this, you just want to continue on with your beliefs, as if nothing happened. Don't you care whether your beliefs are true?

---

Your concept insulates sola fide from falsification by retroactively declaring every failure to be proof that faith was never real.

Paul, James, Hebrews, and even Jesus warn believers about falling away, enduring, and being cut off. This was instructed to those who had faith. It doesn't jive with "they never had real faith".

As for 1 John 5:13, John isn't offering unconditional assurance detached from how one lives. Why do you think that after reading in the same letter he says those who say they know God but don't keep His commandments are liars and those who persist in sin are not abiding in Christ? Again, this is told to those who have faith.

Paul himself says he disciplines his body lest he himself be disqualified. If Paul didn't presume, neither should we.

You said "A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will". This is faith and works, even if you don't want to use that language.
That's exactly what Scripture calls faith WORKING through love (Gal 5:6).

You want obedience to be real, necessary, and willed…but not allowed to be decisive for salvation, because then it gets labeled "works." What you're describing is salvation by grace through living faith, not faith in isolation.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

Doc HollidayPaul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works. said:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Quote:

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Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

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He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works.

Read his next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

"...FOR good works." Not BECAUSE of good works. We obey because we're saved. Not in order to be saved.

---

That misunderstanding has lead to serious error.

If obedience is only something that happens after salvation is already secure, then its absence should not threaten salvation. That's literally how "Once Saved, always saved" became widely accepted.

If you were to argue "You're justified by faith alone, but you can lose your salvation later", then you've immediately reintroduced conditions (perseverance, obedience, remaining in Christ) that affect justification. But sola fide explicitly forbids that, because then justification would no longer be by faith alone.

I don't think you guys actually disagree with me. We may actually be in agreement at the level of lived faith, but disagreement at the level of theological architecture.

This is also a difficult conversation because sola fide isn't even monolithic within Protestantism. Methodists and Wesleyans explicitly reject OSAS and emphasize cooperation/perseverance/holiness, while Calvinist streams push OSAS or "perseverance of the saints." Even within traditions that affirm sola fide, they've heavily modified it. It's not a binding or uniformly understood principle, so it basically functions more like a family of related ideas than a single, coherent doctrine.

---

You are framing the argument against sola fide by using those who only "say" they have faith, but really don't. But these are not true believers. A true believer isn't going to use their salvation as a license to sin however they want. A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will. This is what I think you're missing, the effect of the Holy Spirit in the life of a believer. God wants love and obedience this way, not out of fear of losing salvation.

Your views are against Scripture, don't you see that? We're trying to demonstrate that to you, but you keep avoiding the questions going toward that. What is the cutoff point for the amount of works needed for a "living faith"? How can Jesus save at that cutoff level, but not a smidgeon below? If you say we can't know the cutoff level, then that would contradict Scripture, such as 1 John 5:13 which says we CAN know we are saved, and everywhere Jesus says that anyone who believes in him will have eternal life.... wouldn't it? Do you not see the problem with injecting works into the salvation equation? You don't seem to want to confront this, you just want to continue on with your beliefs, as if nothing happened. Don't you care whether your beliefs are true?

---

Your concept insulates sola fide from falsification by retroactively declaring every failure to be proof that faith was never real.

Paul, James, Hebrews, and even Jesus warn believers about falling away, enduring, and being cut off. This was instructed to those who had faith. It doesn't jive with "they never had real faith".

As for 1 John 5:13, John isn't offering unconditional assurance detached from how one lives. Why do you think that after reading in the same letter he says those who say they know God but don't keep His commandments are liars and those who persist in sin are not abiding in Christ? Again, this is told to those who have faith.

Paul himself says he disciplines his body lest he himself be disqualified. If Paul didn't presume, neither should we.

You said "A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will". This is faith and works, even if you don't want to use that language.
That's exactly what Scripture calls faith WORKING through love (Gal 5:6).

You want obedience to be real, necessary, and willed…but not allowed to be decisive for salvation, because then it gets labeled "works." What you're describing is salvation by grace through living faith, not faith in isolation.

---

You're running away from the point - according to Scripture, we CAN know we are saved. According to your view of faith plus works, we CAN'T. This means something is wrong with your view. It's that simple.

You: "You said "A true believer has the Holy Spirit, which changes them, and they WANT to obey God out of love for him and out of duty as a Christian, from their own free will". This is faith and works, even if you don't want to use that language" - yes, but the obedience, i.e. works, is not what determines their salvation. You, however, are saying works in addition to faith IS needed for salvation. How are you not comprehending this?

Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

---

I'm saying your interpretation is wrong, not Jesus. Jesus words about Judas are from free will choices by having faith and then later rejecting it.

Your argument is that if someone doesn't persevere, they never had true faith. That doesn't make sense with warnings in scripture addressed to those who have faith: "Take heed lest you fall", "If you live according to the flesh you will die", "If you do not continue… you will be cut off" and "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling"

You have to argue that warnings are only for fake believers. If you don't believe that, then what are warnings addressed to believers for?

Molinism still argues justification as a legal declaration received by faith alone, insulated from obedience. I can't accept that.

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

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So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

Gain of Function Theology

This is a transcript of a discussion by Ad Crucem News, a confessional Lutheran source. I think it goes a long way towards explaining the issue I raised in my first post. It is pretty clear that this is affecting all the non Orthodox churches to one degree or another.

"HOST: Tracing that historicallydo you think, in our current moment, a lot of it comes out of 19th-century Germany in particular?
WOOD: Tthis is where it's not my expertise, but principally from reading and listening to Dr. David Scaerhe's been warning, as did Hermann Otten, for decades. Dr. Scaer has been teaching for half a century, and right at the start of his teaching at the seminaryand even as a pastorhe was warning that a new theology was being introduced into the Missouri Synod, and that theology was a variant of Barthianism that underwent a kind of gain-of-function amplification at Valparaiso University. And unfortunately, Fort Wayne was kind of the endowed chair of that gain-of-function continued amplification.

So yes: sourced from 19th-century Germany, imported into the United States, and then cultivated.
I don't understand all the nuances. I don't have a full grasp of the history, but I do wish our best minds would look at that path and know where it should have been cut offso we learn again.
And part of this is: we're very triumphant about the "Battle for the Bible." Did we actually win it? Part of the problem there is that friends/enemies distinction. We needed scorched earth. Everyone who subscribed to even the least part of higher critical theory and wasn't on board with the needed changes needed to gobecause it wasn't just at the seminary. It had already spread into the parishes.
You can see it in the laity catechized through the '50s, '60s, and early '70s. They're still alive today and they have a very different mindset than what you would expect Lutherans to believe, teach, and confess.
So clearly, that theology from the '40s was starting to be propagated, it made its way throughout the synod in various forms, and it needed to be crushedand we lacked the will to crush it..."

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

---

The next verse in no way suggests much less states that any of our works can contribute to saving us. As busty and I have pointed out over the course of this thread, works are an outcropping of our faith in Christ, and not a means to save us. Paul is quite clear on this point.

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

In your opinion, is there such a thing as a former Christian?

That is, someone who sincerely had a conversion experience, practiced the faith for a period of time and then subsequently lost their faith/apostasized/became an atheist/something else.

Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

---

I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

---

Your argument is that if someone doesn't persevere, they never had true faith. That doesn't make sense with warnings in scripture addressed to those who have faith: "Take heed lest you fall", "If you live according to the flesh you will die", "If you do not continue… you will be cut off" and "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling"

You have to argue that warnings are only for fake believers. If you don't believe that, then what are warnings addressed to believers for?

---

If someone doesn't persevere in faith, then by definition it isn't true faith. True faith perseveres. God knows who has true faith, and he seals them with his Holy Spirit. Jesus knows them, and he never will lose them. And that's how if you are a true believer, you can know you have eternal life. This is what Scripture tells us.

The verses you cited need to be read in the context of Scripture as a whole. They need to be read along with where Paul says true believers are SEALED with the Holy Spirit as a GUARANTEE of eternal life, and where Jesus says he will not lose a single person that was given to him by the Father. When you take all these things together, it's showing that true believers WILL continue in faith, WILL heed all of Paul's warnings; and if they fall into sin, they WILL inevitably repent.

This doesn't mean that warnings to true believers aren't necessary.... warnings are given so that those who are true believers will heed them. They're also given so that those who aren't true believers who don't heed them can't say they weren't fairly warned.

Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

---

I'm saying your interpretation is wrong, not Jesus. Jesus words about Judas are from free will choices by having faith and then later rejecting it.

---

Where do you get from Jesus' words that Judas had true faith and then later rejected it, as opposed to never having true faith to begin with? There is nothing there that suggests Judas ever truly believed. You are injecting your assumption into it. Jesus clearly says of Judas that he didn't believe and that he would betray him.

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

---

Molinism still argues justification as a legal declaration received by faith alone, insulated from obedience. I can't accept that.

---

Imputation isn't just a "legal declaration" of righteousness. Jesus DIED FOR OUR SINS, remember?? He paid the price FOR US, and we are given his eternal life in exchange. It isn't just a declaration, we are MADE righteous (imputed righteousness) because of Jesus' sacrifice. It would be like you sacrificing yourself to a lion that's chasing your family, so that the lion will eat you instead of them, and your family will be safe. Your family didn't become safe because of a "legal declaration" there, did they? No, a hefty price was paid, in their stead, so they wouldn't have to.

You're not understanding the gospel. One of the main reasons is because you deny substitutionary atonement. The "obedience" we need for salvation is to believe in Jesus and what he did for us, i.e. faith in that Jesus did ALL the work for us, and was perfect in obedience for us. Trusting in your own works in addition to Jesus' is failing to trust in the Jesus' completed work, and is placing the burden on you instead of you being freed by Jesus. It's a denial of the gospel.

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

---

How does faith plus works not do the same? Because without your works, you wouldn't be saved, therefore you earned something by your own performance that you can boast about.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

---

Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

---

Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

---

I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

---

Molinism still argues justification as a legal declaration received by faith alone, insulated from obedience. I can't accept that.

---

Imputation isn't just a "legal declaration" of righteousness. Jesus DIED FOR OUR SINS, remember?? He paid the price FOR US, and we are given his eternal life in exchange. It isn't just a declaration, we are MADE righteous (imputed righteousness) because of Jesus' sacrifice. It would be like you sacrificing yourself to a lion that's chasing your family, so that the lion will eat you instead of them, and your family will be safe. Your family didn't become safe because of a "legal declaration" there, did they? No, a hefty price was paid, in their stead, so they wouldn't have to.

You're not understanding the gospel. One of the main reasons is because you deny substitutionary atonement. The "obedience" we need for salvation is to believe in Jesus and what he did for us, i.e. faith in that Jesus did ALL the work for us, and was perfect in obedience for us. Trusting in your own works in addition to Jesus' is failing to trust in the Jesus' completed work, and is placing the burden on you instead of you being freed by Jesus. It's a denial of the gospel.

---

You do realize that arguing for penal substitutionary atonement requires a split in the Trinity right? It's also a misunderstanding of God.

If you argue that the Father pours wrath on the Son as God, you must argue in favor of Nestorianism.

With PSA: Either God punished God (which breaks the Trinity), or God punished a separate human Jesus (which breaks who Jesus is).

Christ is one Person, the eternal Son, subsisting in two natures without division or separation. There is no independent "human Jesus" alongside the Logos.

PSA asserts that God's justice requires penal punishment, and that this punishment is inflicted on Christ in our place. But punishment is not something that happens to a nature, it happens to a person. Natures do not bear guilt, incur legal liability, or receive judicial wrath. Persons do.

So who is being punished?

If the answer is the Son, then PSA requires that God pours penal wrath upon God, which introduces internal opposition within the Trinity and contradicts divine impassibility and simplicity. You break the Holy Trinity when you believe this.

If you argue that Christ's human nature bears the punishment, then you have an even bigger issue which is arguing against hypostasis. There is no human person Jesus alongside the divine Son. There is two natures that exist in one Person the Son (Fully God/Fully man).

Christ is an innocent man that offers to die for guilty men.
In Christ, we do not escape death, we die with Christ so that we follow Him through death unto resurrection."We were crucified with Christ", "We were buried with Him", "We will be raised with Him".
In the Garden, God does not say, "I will kill you if you eat."
He says, "You will surely die." Death is presented not as a penalty externally inflicted by God, but as the natural consequence of separation from the Source of life. God is life. To turn away from Him is to move toward death. Christ does not come so that God can finally kill someone instead of us. He comes to enter the death we brought upon ourselves and heal it from the inside. He takes on our mortal condition, goes all the way down into death, and then breaks its power by rising

Realitybites said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

In your opinion, is there such a thing as a former Christian?

That is, someone who sincerely had a conversion experience, practiced the faith for a period of time and then subsequently lost their faith/apostasized/became an atheist/something else.

---

A very good question. I don't know how to reconcile the idea that someone can lose their salvation with the numerous verses in scripture that say otherwise. My only conclusion is that there was no true conversion. The individual may have looked like he was a part of the faith but wasn't.

In other words, he was the seed that fell on stony ground. I believe Christ is clear in those verses that individual was never a Christian to begin with.

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

---

The next verse in no way suggests much less states that any of our works can contribute to saving us. As busty and I have pointed out over the course of this thread, works are an outcropping of our faith in Christ, and not a means to save us. Paul is quite clear on this point.

---

I didn't make the claim that they save us. I made the claim that faith and works save us. I'm arguing against dead faith and you can only know dead faith by whether works are present or not.

Maybe I can use an example to show you my concern:
A Christian starts habitually sinning and thinks to themself "I'll take care of it and stop eventually". They felt a little shame, but not enough to make them totally repent and change their behavior and they felt like they already have assurance of their salvation, so ultimately its not that big of a deal.

Does this person have true faith?
There's millions of people who go to Church every Sunday that are like this. Many of them had extreme zeal early on and over time they just felt assured and lost that care factor of their own behavior. Maybe they take sola fide to mean they just need to believe in Jesus and they're golden.

Its not even a matter of them defeating sin or not, its that their heart isn't all the way in. There's a big difference between someone trying and failing a thousand times a day and a guy that sort of cares.

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Doc Holliday said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

Mothra said:

---

Coke Bear said:

---

God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

---

The next verse in no way suggests much less states that any of our works can contribute to saving us. As busty and I have pointed out over the course of this thread, works are an outcropping of our faith in Christ, and not a means to save us. Paul is quite clear on this point.

---

I didn't make the claim that they save us. I made the claim that faith and works save us. I'm arguing against dead faith and you can only know dead faith by whether works are present or not.

Maybe I can use an example to show you my concern:
A Christian starts habitually sinning and thinks to themself "I'll take care of it and stop eventually". They felt a little shame, but not enough to make them totally repent and change their behavior and they felt like they already have assurance of their salvation, so ultimately its not that big of a deal.

Does this person have true faith?
There's millions of people who go to Church every Sunday that are like this. Many of them had extreme zeal early on and over time they just felt assured and lost that care factor of their own behavior. Maybe they take sola fide to mean they just need to believe in Jesus and they're golden.

Its not even a matter of them defeating sin or not, its that their heart isn't all the way in. There's a big difference between someone trying and failing a thousand times a day and a guy that sort of cares.

---

Again, I don't disagree with this. I was that guy, and I do wonder whether I was truly saved.

You're probably right that we aren't that far off from each other, as you suggested in another post. I just believe that scripture is very clear that works play no part in our saving us. That doesn't mean God doesn't have works prepared for us (he does) or that we aren't known by our fruit (we are). It just means nothing we can do saves us.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

- Typology can be fully concocted to fit what you already want to believe. I gave an example earlier of proving that Jesus is Satan based on Scripture describing both Jesus and Satan coming to earth like "lightning". It's a dangerous and foolish way to establish doctrine, especially that which you make necessary for salvation.

---

I'll stand with St. Ambrose, St. Athanasius, St. Gregory the Wonderworker, St. Ephrem the Syrian, and St. Cyril of Alexandria, that taught that Mary was the New Ark of the Covenant. They understood the typology. It's sad that many people today don't understand typology.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

---

- The woman in Revelation was "clothed with the sun" and had a "crown of twelve stars". This is representative of something FAR more than one person, even it were Mary. It fits more with the nation or religion of Israel (twelve tribes). In Revelation, women were represented as religions, churches, and belief systems. And the woman was described as being in "agony" over childbirth. Clearly, the pain from chidlbirth today hasn't been "greatly multiplied" from "agony", so this was obviously describing the same pain. And regardless of all this, the imagery of the woman in heaven, nor the ark being in heaven, DOES NOT SHOW THAT SHE WAS BODILY ASSUMED INTO HEAVEN. Any idiot can see this. Moses and Elijah appeared to the disciples with a body. So did Samuel in the Old Testament. This is a demonstration of how poorly you comprehend and reason, and therefore everything else you argue is likewise extremely suspect.

---

If you read my post carefully, I stated that Revelation is polyvalent. I'm sure that you understand that "polyvalent" means that it "several different meanings, interpretations, or functions depending on the context."

Many in the Church will agree that one of the possible interpretations of the woman is Israel.

Having said that, when one looks closely at the structure of Genesis 3 and Revelation 12, we see in Genesis, Adam, Eve (woman), Serpent (Satan), and an Angel (Cheribum). Compare that to Rev 12 where we have woman (the New Eve Mary), Jesus (man the New Adam), dragon (Satan), and Michael (angel). You are so hellbent on stating that the woman can ONLY be Israel, you can't see the parallels. To say that the woman, can't be Mary is arrogant and stubborn to the point of sinful pride.

The Agony of the woman (Mary) can also be seen as the agony that she suffered during Christ's passion.

I'll also stand with the Bishop Juvenal at the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD) that reported that Mary died in the presence of the apostles and her tomb was later found empty when St Thomas ask for it to be opened. Other Church fathers also believed in the assumption such as St. Epiphanius, St Gregory of Tours, St. Andrew of Crete, St. Damascene.

Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

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Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

---

The next verse in no way suggests much less states that any of our works can contribute to saving us. As busty and I have pointed out over the course of this thread, works are an outcropping of our faith in Christ, and not a means to save us. Paul is quite clear on this point.

---

I didn't make the claim that they save us. I made the claim that faith and works save us. I'm arguing against dead faith and you can only know dead faith by whether works are present or not.

Maybe I can use an example to show you my concern:
A Christian starts habitually sinning and thinks to themself "I'll take care of it and stop eventually". They felt a little shame, but not enough to make them totally repent and change their behavior and they felt like they already have assurance of their salvation, so ultimately its not that big of a deal.

Does this person have true faith?
There's millions of people who go to Church every Sunday that are like this. Many of them had extreme zeal early on and over time they just felt assured and lost that care factor of their own behavior. Maybe they take sola fide to mean they just need to believe in Jesus and they're golden.

Its not even a matter of them defeating sin or not, its that their heart isn't all the way in. There's a big difference between someone trying and failing a thousand times a day and a guy that sort of cares.

---

Again, I don't disagree with this. I was that guy, and I do wonder whether I was truly saved.

You're probably right that we aren't that far off from each other, as you suggested in another post. I just believe that scripture is very clear that works play no part in our saving us. That doesn't mean God doesn't have works prepared for us (he does) or that we aren't known by our fruit (we are). It just means nothing we can do saves us.

---

My takeaway is that I need to be violent. I'm called to be violent against sin and I need to put on the full armor of God and go to battle.

Every single day is a battlefield. I'm going to be tempted and I need to be prepared to violently resist it.

I know if I don't immediately flee from sin, I will engage and fall.
Falling is not defeat, refusing to get back up is. There's a moment when you're tempted by a passion and we make choice to cooperate with God or not. Do we immediately hand it over to God or are we captured by the passion and a slave to what pleasure that sin gives us?

Sometimes it's subtle. It's in the way we compare ourselves to others. Anger, not getting our way, not being grateful etc. Many don't even realize they're sinning. It's a very difficult thing to become that self aware for a lot of people, probably most.

Fasting, prayer, confession, and watchfulness (nepsis) train my will to say no. I can't fight sin without structure and without asceticism. If I can't say no to my flesh, then I will be too weak to say no to bigger things.

Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

---

So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

---

Yes, God is NOT subject to the sacraments, we are.

For instance, in Feb 2015, 21 men included 20 Egyptian Coptic Christians and one Ghanaian national, Matthew Ayariga, who chose to stand with them, declaring "Their God is my God" when asked to reject Christ. They were mostly poor laborers seeking work to support their families back in their home villages.

The non-Christian didn't have time to be baptized or take the Eucharist; however, the Church considers him a martyr of the faith and is in heaven.

For the other 99.9999% of the world post-Christianity, we are called to be baptized.

This is not a knock on you, but I, and others, have mentioned many times on here that Christianity is not an "either/or". It generally a "both/and".

God is not that rigid. He is equal parts mercy and justice.

---

What an interesting faith. So, just depends on how God is feeling that day I guess.

Can you tell me in scripture where it says God waives the requirements Catholics believe he requires of man for salvation? And are you sure that the Catholic Church is correct, and God waived those requirements for the men in question? Do we know for sure they were saved, despite not going through all of the steps Catholics deem necessary?

---

Salvation hinges on the state of the heart and the direction of the will. "Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart."

Behavior is the evidence of that orientation. Scripture constantly says we're judged according to our works. Not because works earn salvation, but because they reveal what we actually believe.

Do you know why Jesus said "Why do you call me Lord, Lord, and not do what I say?" Salvation doesn't rest on a private claim of faith. It rests on a life that either cooperates with God or resists Him.

I think there are a lot of people who genuinely believe Jesus is Lord. They go to church, they're sincere, and they're convinced Christianity is true. But knowing something is true isn't the same as surrendering yourself to it.

You have to die. You must die to yourself. There's a massive amount of effort on our behalf to do this.

I thinks clear in scripture that you must deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Him. Repentance, surrender, and transformation is often rebranded as "fruit" that may or may not show up, I don't buy that. Repentance, surrender, and transformation requires your willpower. It's a real, costly act of yielding yourself to God. Grace isn't coercive. God doesn't repent for you. He doesn't surrender for you.

Sola fide has to say repentance, obedience, and transformation are not conditions of salvation, only results that may appear later. That's the problem. You can say "true faith will produce repentance," but if the absence of repentance never falsifies the claim of faith, then faith has been reduced to an internal assertion. At that point, sola fide protects assurance more than it protects Christ's commands.

---

Your first 6 paragraphs are spot on. Galatians 2:20 is one of my favorite verses in scripture ("I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me"). Indeed, we must die to ourselves. And you are exactly right - Christians are called to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do, and are known by their fruit.

And then there's your last paragraph, which once again, badly misses the mark. I am a sola fide guy, and yet I believe everything you said in the first 6 verses. According to you, that's impossible. Yet, here I am. Here is my church.

You really need to learn more about sects other than Orthodoxy. What you think they believe and what they believe are two VERY different things.

---

Explain your understanding of sola fide to me.

---

Justification by faith, not works.

---

Gotcha.

Why not both? Why is it necessary for you to have a dichotomy?

"Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead"
"You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone"

---

- so are Paul and James in contradiction?

- so, Jesus came and died on the cross to remove obedience to the Law as the way to salvation.... only to institute another set of "rules" we must obey for salvation?

- and for maybe the hundredth time: if we are justified by works, then how much works justifies us? None of us can be perfect, so what's the cutoff point? And what is the basis for Jesus to be choose to save someone above that cutoff point, but someone just barely below the cutoff point goes to Hell? Is that justice?

Does any of this make sense? Does this really sound like the gospel?

---

Paul and James are only in contradiction only if there's a separation between faith and works.

---

Paul makes very clear, there is a distinction. Eph. 2:8-9.

---

He's making it clear that it's not solely works. That verse isn't making a sola fide distinction. His point is salvation doesn't originate in human achievement or merit. If you interpret this as a distinction between faith and works then you're contradicting James and the very next verse.

If I took James 2:24 "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" to mean that we're only justified by works, that would be inaccurate too.

I'm not arguing works only, nor faith only, I'm arguing faith and works. Its both in scripture.

Read Paul's next verse:
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them." (Eph 2:10)

We should walk in them and that takes our willpower.

I don't see a valid reason to separate what isn't separated in scripture. Paul rejects earning, James rejects dead faith, Jesus rejects calling Him Lord without obedience.

---

Paul says, "Not of works," not "not solely of works." You're reading something into the verse that just isn't there IMO.

---

Works alone would allow someone to say, "I earned this" or "God owes me." That's why Paul adds "so that no one may boast."

Are you claiming he's saying works have absolutely nothing to do with salvation? If so how do you reconcile the very next verse and James rejecting dead faith repeatedly?

---

The next verse in no way suggests much less states that any of our works can contribute to saving us. As busty and I have pointed out over the course of this thread, works are an outcropping of our faith in Christ, and not a means to save us. Paul is quite clear on this point.

---

I didn't make the claim that they save us. I made the claim that faith and works save us. I'm arguing against dead faith and you can only know dead faith by whether works are present or not.

Maybe I can use an example to show you my concern:
A Christian starts habitually sinning and thinks to themself "I'll take care of it and stop eventually". They felt a little shame, but not enough to make them totally repent and change their behavior and they felt like they already have assurance of their salvation, so ultimately its not that big of a deal.

Does this person have true faith?
There's millions of people who go to Church every Sunday that are like this. Many of them had extreme zeal early on and over time they just felt assured and lost that care factor of their own behavior. Maybe they take sola fide to mean they just need to believe in Jesus and they're golden.

Its not even a matter of them defeating sin or not, its that their heart isn't all the way in. There's a big difference between someone trying and failing a thousand times a day and a guy that sort of cares.

---

Again, I don't disagree with this. I was that guy, and I do wonder whether I was truly saved.

You're probably right that we aren't that far off from each other, as you suggested in another post. I just believe that scripture is very clear that works play no part in our saving us. That doesn't mean God doesn't have works prepared for us (he does) or that we aren't known by our fruit (we are). It just means nothing we can do saves us.

---

My takeaway is that I need to be violent. I'm called to be violent against sin and I need to put on the full armor of God and go to battle.

Every single day is a battlefield. I'm going to be tempted and I need to be prepared to violently resist it.

I know if I don't immediately flee from sin, I will engage and fall.
Falling is not defeat, refusing to get back up is. There's a moment when you're tempted by a passion and we make choice to cooperate with God or not. Do we immediately hand it over to God or are we captured by the passion and a slave to what pleasure that sin gives us?

Sometimes it's subtle. It's in the way we compare ourselves to others. Anger, not getting our way, not being grateful etc. Many don't even realize they're sinning. It's a very difficult thing to become that self aware for a lot of people, probably most.

Fasting, prayer, confession, and watchfulness (nepsis) train my will to say no. I can't fight sin without structure and without asceticism. If I can't say no to my flesh, then I will be too weak to say no to bigger things.

---

We are in complete agreement on this.

Mothra said:

---

Respectfully, I am not sure it's as much of a strawman is its just an inherent inconsistency in your faith. You tell us, these things are required for salvation. Unless they aren't. I understand that type of inconsistency may be something you've been able to live with. I couldn't ever get there.

---

It's not an inconsistency so much as it's an understanding of God's mercy. As I stated, the Catholic Church is rarely an either/or. It's a both/and.

I think that it's fairly simple. For most people today, they will hear the Gospel (believe), repent, and be baptized. That's all initial salvation takes. It's not rocket science.

But for some, they either:
A) Will never hear the Gospel; however, they live their lives in according to God's will. They have the possibility of entering heaven. (Invincible ignorance)
B) Those that hear the Gospel (believe), but never have the chance to be baptized (Baptism by desire) - the good thief (St. Dismas), those in auto accidents or dying a hospital, etc.
C) Those who are martyred for the Christian faith the 21st man killed by Isis (Baptism by fire)

Mothra said:

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With respect to sola scriptura, what you're really saying is, we have to turn to extra-biblical sources to justify our belief. So, to my question, it appears there is no written waiver in scripture. We just have to hope that God waived the requirements imposed on humanity, but just can't be sure.

---

Forgive my ignorance here, but I not exactly sure what you're saying here. I don't understand if the bolded part in what you are saying that the Church believes or something else. I also don't understand what you specifically mean by no written waiver.

I'll simply state my case in the positive

If sola scriptura means that the bible is our ONLY infallible source of faith, then Catholics reject it completely.

1) The Bible never makes this claim.
2) The canon of the NT was debated by the Church for centuries. The Church finally settled on a the NT (and OT canon but that's a completely different topic)
3) The Church is infallible in this declaration of canon else, if the canon is not correct, then the Bible is fallible.
4) An infallible document needs an infallible interpreter. Without it, it is worthless.

Mothra said:

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How about this - can you tell us what extra-scriptural sources you are relying on for the position that the men at issue didn't need to take the Eucharist or be baptized to be saved? Is there some writing outside of scripture that has led you to this belief?

---

I can turn to the CCC, the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
Baptism of Desire and Blood - CCC1258
Invincible Ignorance and Implicit Desire CCC 1260

I realize you don't accept the CCC; however, every page is filled with reference to sacred scripture, ecclesiastical documents, and quotes from the Church fathers. The Church has spent nearly 2000 years pondering these things.

Mothra said:

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I thought you were saying that these men were killed despite not performing the sacraments. Is that not the case?

---

I apologize if I wasn't clear. These 21 men were killed by Isis (in retaliation for Osama's killing) because they were Christian. The 21st man stated that (IIRC), "their God is my God." They killed him, too because he expressed the other 20's Christian beliefs.

My only point to the story was that these men, according to Church teaching, went directly to heaven because they were a martyr for the Christian faith.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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unanimous consensus among the early church fathers that icon veneration was forbidden.
This post of yours is an ALL OUT LIE.

The early church fathers overwhelmingly opposed using any image or statue - anything made by man's hands - in prayer, worship, and liturgy. This is just an incontrovertible fact. And this is exactly what icon veneration involves.

---

You exact quote was "unanimous consensus". That is NOT true! I called you out and had to qualify your statement. Sts. Cyril of Alexander, Basil the Great, Gregory the Great, and John of Damascus all agreed with icon veneration.

Your original quote was a LIE.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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You: "nothing in the bible says you can't make images". This isn't about just making images, it's about using them in worship, prayer, and liturgy. You've dishonestly mischaracterized the issue to attempt to justify your practice.

---

There is nothing wrong with using images in prayer. Do protestants not have crosses or a picture of Jesus in their churches? I'm pretty sure I've seen them in most of protestant churches I've been to.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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You are trying to use an example of objects God commanded the Israelis to make, but NOT BOW TO, PRAY "THROUGH", KISS, AND GIVE OFFERINGS to, as a tacit approval to make objects and then BOW, PRAY THROUGH, KISS, and GIVE OFFERINGS to them. Complete foolishness. You do realize what happened to that bronze serpent in 2 Kings 18, don't you?:

---

First, Catholics are forbidden to GIVE OFFERINGS to an object.

Second, there is nothing wrong with bowing to, praying through, and/or kissing an object. That's not worship. That's honor for the person it represents. It's the same as cultures that bow to one another or taking a knee to a girlfriend in proposal, asking a friend to pray for you, and/or kissing a picture of your family.

It's truly amazing that you can't understand this. In order to worship, one has to believe that object is God. No Catholic does that. I really feel sorry for your lack of desire to understand.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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"In the third year of Hoshea son of Elah, king of Israel, Hezekiah the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah. And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done. He removed the high places and broke the pillars and cut down the Asherah. And he broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the people of Israel had made offerings to it (it was called Nehushtan)"

God was pleased with King Hezekiah's iconoclasm.

---

Absolutely! The people of Israel were WORSHIPPING the bronze serpent. Catholics DON'T worship objects. We only worship God.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

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Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

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Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

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I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

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I'm saying your interpretation is wrong, not Jesus. Jesus words about Judas are from free will choices by having faith and then later rejecting it.

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Where do you get from Jesus' words that Judas had true faith and then later rejected it, as opposed to never having true faith to begin with? There is nothing there that suggests Judas ever truly believed. You are injecting your assumption into it. Jesus clearly says of Judas that he didn't believe and that he would betray him.

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Doc, I'd like an answer to this. You keep running away from points that show your view is weakly based. And you're not allowing yourself to challenge our own view because of it.

Realitybites said:

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Mothra said:

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Coke Bear said:

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God does not hold people to what they cannot do. i.e. the Good thief. He had no time to take the Eucharist.

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So, to be clear, if a person accepts Christ on their death bed and is physically unable to take the Eucharist, get baptized, etc., God just waives those requirements?

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In your opinion, is there such a thing as a former Christian?

That is, someone who sincerely had a conversion experience, practiced the faith for a period of time and then subsequently lost their faith/apostasized/became an atheist/something else.

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No, no such thing as a former true Christian.

If a "Christian" loses their faith, then it means they were never truly born again. They were never regenerate. A true believer is a "new creation" (2 Cor 5:117) in Christ who is sealed with the Holy Spirit. A new creation can't un-create himself and and "un-birth" himself to go back to being the creature before, any more than you yourself can un-create your existence and go back into your mother's womb and undo your conception.

Now, there can be true Christians who fall into sin, or who become so spiritually stagnant that they look and even act like they aren't believers, or they doubt they were never saved (which may be true), but true Christians always have that seed of life in them. It may have been quashed to almost nothing, but if given time and opportunity, will inevitably repent and become renewed. That's the difference. I hate to use an example from Hollywood, but it's like Superman giving up his powers to be a "regular" man, but in reality he never really changed who he really was, he still could "wake up" his inner Superman by going back to that green crystal he was given to become Superman again. He could never really "un-create" himself to being a regular man, he was always a different creature, and would always be "called" by that green crystal to come back.

Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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Doc Holliday said:

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I actually think you can solve this issue by contrasting Judas and Peter.

Both knew Jesus was Lord. Both followed Him. Both betrayed Him. It wasn't like Judas didn't see miracles and didn't understand who He was. Judas wasn't stupid. Peter was saying he would never betray Jesus before he did, that's the level of faith he thought he had.

The difference between them wasn't belief, it was repentance.

Judas felt remorse and shame and in part because he knew Jesus was Lord, but he turned inward and despaired. Peter wept, but he returned. One resisted grace, the other cooperated with it. This difference in behavior was after they had faith. That's dead faith vs real faith. One doesn't have works (repentance) the other does.

Peter's return required the will, choosing repentance, enduring shame, and allowing grace to restore him. Anyone who's gone through this knows that's a tremendous amount of effort and work.

Judas turned inward and despaired. One cooperated with grace, the other resisted it. So salvation doesn't hinge on merely knowing or even sincerely believing that Jesus is Lord. Judas had that. It hinges on whether, after failure, a person turns back in repentance and perseveres.

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Judas never truly believed. Jesus knew this, as seen in John 6:63-64 "It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe." (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.)

Jesus also said that Judas was the "son of perdition" who was "doomed to destruction" (John 17:12) This is not how you would describe someone who was a true believer.

Peter did truly believe, but made mistakes. But being true believer, it was inevitable that he would repent.

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Ah so you are a Calvinist aren't you?

You're defining a "true believer" as someone who inevitably perseveres, and then using Judas's failure to prove he was never a true believer. This is exactly the move I'm pushing back on, it's your go to and you just did it in the post prior to this one. This is the core logic of Calvinism's perseverance of the saints. "If someone doesn't persevere, they were never truly saved".

Then you argue that scripture is saying Judas was "doomed to destruction" in the sense of a divine decision made apart from his own response and willpower, that would also fall neatly into a Calvinist framework where God picks and chooses who he saves. It's an argument that God doesn't merely foreknow who will fall, He chooses who will be saved and who will not. So Judas wasn't tragically lost, but excluded from salvation by design.

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I'm not necessarily a Calvinist. But I do believe we have to take Scripture at its word and take it seriously. These words about Judas are from Jesus himself - are you saying he's wrong? I believe there is a way where we retain our free will, but our choice is still under God's sovereign will. Like the Trinity, this is too difficult a concept for us to wrap our minds around, and one which perhaps we will understand only when we are in heaven. It's also a deeply philosphical issue that needs its own thread, honestly. But what I can say here is that God KNOWING who will be lost is not necessarily the same thing as God CHOOSING or forcing who will be lost. Or that someone DOOMED to destruction is someone who is CHOSEN or forced for destruction rather than it being their own choice destroying them. Judas was doomed to destruction because God knew his free will would lead him to not believe. In the same way when we see someone who by their own choice is walking a path that is leading them off a cliff, and who won't heed warnings. We can say they are "doomed to destruction" because by their own free will they refuse to listen, and we can see the inevitable outcome.

You should look into Molinism, which is an alternative view to Calvinism, which preserves man's free will and God's sovereignty at the same time.

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Molinism still argues justification as a legal declaration received by faith alone, insulated from obedience. I can't accept that.

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Imputation isn't just a "legal declaration" of righteousness. Jesus DIED FOR OUR SINS, remember?? He paid the price FOR US, and we are given his eternal life in exchange. It isn't just a declaration, we are MADE righteous (imputed righteousness) because of Jesus' sacrifice. It would be like you sacrificing yourself to a lion that's chasing your family, so that the lion will eat you instead of them, and your family will be safe. Your family didn't become safe because of a "legal declaration" there, did they? No, a hefty price was paid, in their stead, so they wouldn't have to.

You're not understanding the gospel. One of the main reasons is because you deny substitutionary atonement. The "obedience" we need for salvation is to believe in Jesus and what he did for us, i.e. faith in that Jesus did ALL the work for us, and was perfect in obedience for us. Trusting in your own works in addition to Jesus' is failing to trust in the Jesus' completed work, and is placing the burden on you instead of you being freed by Jesus. It's a denial of the gospel.

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You do realize that arguing for penal substitutionary atonement requires a split in the Trinity right? It's also a misunderstanding of God.

If you argue that the Father pours wrath on the Son as God, you must argue in favor of Nestorianism.

With PSA: Either God punished God (which breaks the Trinity), or God punished a separate human Jesus (which breaks who Jesus is).

Christ is one Person, the eternal Son, subsisting in two natures without division or separation. There is no independent "human Jesus" alongside the Logos.

PSA asserts that God's justice requires penal punishment, and that this punishment is inflicted on Christ in our place. But punishment is not something that happens to a nature, it happens to a person. Natures do not bear guilt, incur legal liability, or receive judicial wrath. Persons do.

So who is being punished?

If the answer is the Son, then PSA requires that God pours penal wrath upon God, which introduces internal opposition within the Trinity and contradicts divine impassibility and simplicity. You break the Holy Trinity when you believe this.

If you argue that Christ's human nature bears the punishment, then you have an even bigger issue which is arguing against hypostasis. There is no human person Jesus alongside the divine Son. There is two natures that exist in one Person the Son (Fully God/Fully man).

Christ is an innocent man that offers to die for guilty men.
In Christ, we do not escape death, we die with Christ so that we follow Him through death unto resurrection."We were crucified with Christ", "We were buried with Him", "We will be raised with Him".
In the Garden, God does not say, "I will kill you if you eat."
He says, "You will surely die." Death is presented not as a penalty externally inflicted by God, but as the natural consequence of separation from the Source of life. God is life. To turn away from Him is to move toward death. Christ does not come so that God can finally kill someone instead of us. He comes to enter the death we brought upon ourselves and heal it from the inside. He takes on our mortal condition, goes all the way down into death, and then breaks its power by rising

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You're creating a false dilemma. You're building your view on a complete non sequitur. Penal substitutionary atonement does not "break the Trinity". Jesus gave up himself by his own free will. He was not forced. God accepted Jesus' sacrifice as payment for sin, because God is just. He allowed his Son to die for mankind because God is love. Jesus by his own will died for mankind out of love. Jesus' substitutionary atonement was perfectly in line with God's character, thus there was no violation of the unity of the Trinity.

God did not punish himself. He volunteered to take the punishment for sins himself. This is perfeclty in keeping with his character of justice and his character of love at the same time. There was no "internal opposition" to himself, there was only consistency with his character.

If you accept the Trinity without fully understanding it, then why all of the sudden do you hold God in contempt with himself because of substitutionary atonement, as if you're saying you fully understand the Trinity? You're letting your false dilemma, a complete non sequitur you've created and accepted in your mind, to deny substitutionary atonement which is what Scripture teaches.

Coke Bear said:

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BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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- Typology can be fully concocted to fit what you already want to believe. I gave an example earlier of proving that Jesus is Satan based on Scripture describing both Jesus and Satan coming to earth like "lightning". It's a dangerous and foolish way to establish doctrine, especially that which you make necessary for salvation.

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I'll stand with St. Ambrose, St. Athanasius, St. Gregory the Wonderworker, St. Ephrem the Syrian, and St. Cyril of Alexandria, that taught that Mary was the New Ark of the Covenant. They understood the typology. It's sad that many people today don't understand typology.

BusyTarpDuster2017 said:

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- The woman in Revelation was "clothed with the sun" and had a "crown of twelve stars". This is representative of something FAR more than one person, even it were Mary. It fits more with the nation or religion of Israel (twelve tribes). In Revelation, women were represented as religions, churches, and belief systems. And the woman was described as being in "agony" over childbirth. Clearly, the pain from chidlbirth today hasn't been "greatly multiplied" from "agony", so this was obviously describing the same pain. And regardless of all this, the imagery of the woman in heaven, nor the ark being in heaven, DOES NOT SHOW THAT SHE WAS BODILY ASSUMED INTO HEAVEN. Any idiot can see this. Moses and Elijah appeared to the disciples with a body. So did Samuel in the Old Testament. This is a demonstration of how poorly you comprehend and reason, and therefore everything else you argue is likewise extremely suspect.

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If you read my post carefully, I stated that Revelation is polyvalent. I'm sure that you understand that "polyvalent" means that it "several different meanings, interpretations, or functions depending on the context."

Many in the Church will agree that one of the possible interpretations of the woman is Israel.

Having said that, when one looks closely at the structure of Genesis 3 and Revelation 12, we see in Genesis, Adam, Eve (woman), Serpent (Satan), and an Angel (Cheribum). Compare that to Rev 12 where we have woman (the New Eve Mary), Jesus (man the New Adam), dragon (Satan), and Michael (angel). You are so hellbent on stating that the woman can ONLY be Israel, you can't see the parallels. To say that the woman, can't be Mary is arrogant and stubborn to the point of sinful pride.

The Agony of the woman (Mary) can also be seen as the agony that she suffered during Christ's passion.

I'll also stand with the Bishop Juvenal at the Council of Chalcedon (451 AD) that reported that Mary died in the presence of the apostles and her tomb was later found empty when St Thomas ask for it to be opened. Other Church fathers also believed in the assumption such as St. Epiphanius, St Gregory of Tours, St. Andrew of Crete, St. Damascene.

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451 AD. Four hundred years after Jesus. Thank you for finally admitting that Mary's bodily assumption is not from Scripture, and thus not apostolic.

And can someone believe that Jesus is really Satan from "typology", because Satan fell to earth "like lightning", and Jesus is also coming to earth "like lightning" as well? Typology is a way to find what you want in the bible by creating it yourself. I can do this with MANY other examples. It's a dangerous and completely foolish way to develop doctrine, especially doctrine that you make necessary for salvation. Mary's bodily assumption was a total invention that crept into Christianity over hundreds of years, as a way to elevate her to the same level as Jesus. Roman Catholicism's Mary is the re-emergence of the pagan mother goddess in a Christian disguise. Your heart inclines towards this kind of wicked corruption of Christianity, and that is a bad, bad sign.