Did Jesus Die on The Cross for The Just/Elect/Saved Whose Names Are Written in The Book of Life OR
- Thread starter MerSee
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No! To "hear" in the spiritual sense in scripture is to understand. How can anyone believe the truth when they cannot even understand it!? See Rom 3:10ff. Also John 3:1-3. The minds of the unregenerate are in darkness! In fact, unregenerate sinners themselves are called DARKNESS (Eph 5:8)! No light can penetrate that darkness, apart from God's supernatural work (2Cor 4:6).
As I have said many times before, and proved from Scripture, Jesus died for everyone. It is absurd to think that the sacrifice of God's Son would be only partially applicable.
What is it about this that you don't (or won't) understand???
John 3:16-18, "For this is the way God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world should be saved through him. The one who believes in him is not condemned. The one who does not believe has been condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God."
It is entirely dependent on a person's belief! If you believe that Christ died for your sins, you will have eternal life. If you don't then you will die. But the offer applies to everyone, because Christ died for everyone.
If you don't understand that then you have clearly missed the Gospel and denied the salvific power of God.
It's tragic that you don't understand God! Again, God loves the world!!!!! Your fixation on sheep and goats has blinded you to the truth.
Whoever believes in Jesus IS saved...not will be saved. Read carefully the last clause in your quote above. "He who believes on me HAS eternal life." This kind of language supports the Reformed Tradition of salvation, for at minimum faith and life are concurrent. Not just future.
Also, no one CAN come to Jesus, unless the Father draws him. And who does the Father draw if not all those who the Father gave to his Son in eternity (Jn 6:37) It's not the Word of God that draws people, it's God himself!
You haven't proved anything. I don't see in the above passage where it says God sent his Son into the world to die for each and every person. You, sir, are reading that into the text. You're assuming that the term "world" is used in the universal sense, correct? Well, then let's run with that assumption for a moment. How would you reconcile Jn 3:16 which you think is saying that God loves each and every person in the world with numerous other passages that teach just the opposite, i.e. God hates sinners!? If your interpretation is correct, then we have more than a few contradictions in scripture.
Also, the offer and the extent of atonement are two separate issues; for many are externally called (made the offer) but few are chosen (Mat 22:14). It is eminently more logical that Christ died for the few who where known by the Father and chosen by Him in eternity, and not for all who were merely externally called who he knew in eternity would never accept his offer. Why would Christ die for those he NEVER KNEW in eternity (Mat 7:23)? This is patently absurd.
And I have not missed the supernatural, salvific, effectual power of God -- because without this kind of power no one could be saved. It is the Arminian camp that diminishes that power and makes God's will contingent on his creatures' wills, and makes the creature more powerful than the Creator since he's able to overcome God's resurrection power. In the Arminian scheme the creature is sovereign and more powerful than God.
Further in Arminianism the Christian believer most certainly has something to boast in, doesn't he? After all, what makes the Arminian believer different than his unbelieving counterpart? The believer's superior will power? The believer's superior intellect? The believer's superior wisdom? Of what do you boast in, sir? It can't be in God or the Cross or Christ because the Arminian believes that our eternal fate, our eternal destiny rests utlimtately in our own choices, correct? God sends no one to hell; unbelievers send themselves! AND God forces no one to believe the Gospel, so all Arminian believers had to FREELY make that decision for themselves, right? The Arminians certainly have much boast in, don't they?
As stated yesterday, I would repost my New Birth Analogy here that I posted on another thread. However, I did revise it some by including more scripture references than previously, and I edited out my specif reply to a poster on that thread.
As stated yesterday, there is a strong analogy between physical and spiritual birth. Please note these parallels:
1. Just as physical birth requires two people of the opposite sex to procreate, likewise scripture teaches that God's elect are born of the Spirit and the Word (Jn 1:13; 3:5-6; 6:63; Tit 3:5; 1Jn 3:9; 4:7; Eph 5:26-27; 1Pet 1:22-25).
2. The source of all Wisdom is God. The three persons of the Godhead are always spoken of in the masculine gender. And God's Wisdom is revealed to the world in his Word, and Wisdom itself is spoken of in the feminine gender (Prov 1:20-21); also the noun "truth" itself is in the same gender.
3. Just as a man and a woman are different from each other physically, likewise so the Spirit and the Word differ. The Holy Spirit is a living personality graciously bestowed upon God's elect and subjectively experienced by all believers in time and space (Rom 8:16; Heb 10:15; Jn 16:8-11), whereas [Gospel] Truth is objectively revealed to all in the holy scriptures but only received by those who have been made alive by the Spirit.
4. In John 3, The Holy Spirit is likened to the wind by Jesus, as He mysteriously and secretly goes hither and tither as he sovereignly wills. Conversely, God's objective Truth is either sought out by the sons of men as the Spirit leads them, or by us "pillars of the truth" as we seek out unbelievers, as He leads us, so that we can reveal Gospel Truth to them.
5. Physical life begins at conception, concealed in the woman's womb -- that life not being revealed to the world until many months later when actual birth takes place. Likewise, everyone us, whether we realize it or not, have had our own personal "on the road to Damascus" conversion experience, whether that experience was so subtle and nuanced that it went undetected (or virtually so) by us, or whether we had a more dramatic experience along the lines of the apostle Paul whereby we were more acutely aware of our conversion. Who can say that a believer cannot be conceived of the Spirit some time before he came to faith, and that the Spirit wasn't "concealed" in us until such time that we manifested our spiritual birth to the world by our confession of sin to God and confession of faith to the Gospel truth to the world? Many of us could have been spiritually alive as concealed "embryos" up until the time of our profession of faith in the Truth, at which time our spiritual birth was initially revealed to the outside world, as well as to ourselves. We very likely moved spiritually from the stage of "embryo" to "fetus" to a "babe in Christ" to maturity -- keeping mind that even at the initial stage we were made alive! Spiritual Life begins at conception, just as it does physically! The New Birth, on the other hand, is the ultimate manifestation of that Life to the world as our testimony to God's grace.
Finally, in regard to this analogy, I think Cornelius in Acts 10 makes for a highly interesting and intriguing case study that raises more than a few questions.
As stated yesterday, there is a strong analogy between physical and spiritual birth. Please note these parallels:
1. Just as physical birth requires two people of the opposite sex to procreate, likewise scripture teaches that God's elect are born of the Spirit and the Word (Jn 1:13; 3:5-6; 6:63; Tit 3:5; 1Jn 3:9; 4:7; Eph 5:26-27; 1Pet 1:22-25).
2. The source of all Wisdom is God. The three persons of the Godhead are always spoken of in the masculine gender. And God's Wisdom is revealed to the world in his Word, and Wisdom itself is spoken of in the feminine gender (Prov 1:20-21); also the noun "truth" itself is in the same gender.
3. Just as a man and a woman are different from each other physically, likewise so the Spirit and the Word differ. The Holy Spirit is a living personality graciously bestowed upon God's elect and subjectively experienced by all believers in time and space (Rom 8:16; Heb 10:15; Jn 16:8-11), whereas [Gospel] Truth is objectively revealed to all in the holy scriptures but only received by those who have been made alive by the Spirit.
4. In John 3, The Holy Spirit is likened to the wind by Jesus, as He mysteriously and secretly goes hither and tither as he sovereignly wills. Conversely, God's objective Truth is either sought out by the sons of men as the Spirit leads them, or by us "pillars of the truth" as we seek out unbelievers, as He leads us, so that we can reveal Gospel Truth to them.
5. Physical life begins at conception, concealed in the woman's womb -- that life not being revealed to the world until many months later when actual birth takes place. Likewise, everyone us, whether we realize it or not, have had our own personal "on the road to Damascus" conversion experience, whether that experience was so subtle and nuanced that it went undetected (or virtually so) by us, or whether we had a more dramatic experience along the lines of the apostle Paul whereby we were more acutely aware of our conversion. Who can say that a believer cannot be conceived of the Spirit some time before he came to faith, and that the Spirit wasn't "concealed" in us until such time that we manifested our spiritual birth to the world by our confession of sin to God and confession of faith to the Gospel truth to the world? Many of us could have been spiritually alive as concealed "embryos" up until the time of our profession of faith in the Truth, at which time our spiritual birth was initially revealed to the outside world, as well as to ourselves. We very likely moved spiritually from the stage of "embryo" to "fetus" to a "babe in Christ" to maturity -- keeping mind that even at the initial stage we were made alive! Spiritual Life begins at conception, just as it does physically! The New Birth, on the other hand, is the ultimate manifestation of that Life to the world as our testimony to God's grace.
Finally, in regard to this analogy, I think Cornelius in Acts 10 makes for a highly interesting and intriguing case study that raises more than a few questions.
Who wrote the Bible? God Himself did. Read carefully.
No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.
- John 6:44-45,47
There is life eternal for every man that comes to Christ.
It all happens the same time the moment you hear the Gospel.
Tell me something. do you believe the Reformed doctrine over what Jesus, John, Peter, and Paul said?
John 12:32 And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.
The Greek word for "all" in verse 32 is πάντας that means Everybody
You cant hear the Gospel Spiritually without being born again, regenerated. Faith is fruit of the Spirit Gal 5:22
I penned it myself. It's a stanza in a poem entitled...God Is...
But it does not follow logically that Christ died for every man on the planet, including the vast majority who never come to Christ.
But universal terms are quite often USED in speech in a limited sense. We must determine their usage by the three-fold context of scripture: Immediate, Intermediate (the book in which any given passage is found) and the Macro (any other book outside the passage under consideration).
I take it that you believe that Jn 3:16 is teaching that God loves each and every person in the world?
No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me. Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.
- John 6:44-45,47
There is life eternal for every man that comes to Christ.[/QUOTE]
I agree God loves the "world" -- just not every single person in it; for numerous scriptures teach that this same God also hates sinners. And sinners, too, are part of the world, are they not? How are you going to reconcile your interpretation with this fact?
Also, you have to understand how the original audience of John's would have understood "world". John was writing primarily to Jews, so how would have the Jews of the first century understood the term "world"? Do you know? I do.