Not By Works
- Thread starter dcontroversal
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We CERTAINLY do!
I tell the Lord I am honestly trying my best not to be combative, but this is a horrible definition of faith, and in effect makes human intellect, and ability to understand and be "persuaded" omit God from the equation.
I'm going to have to extricate myself from this discussion, as you are clearly not being persuaded on God's gifts to us. And I am astonished on your understanding of the Gospel.
I truly wish God's blessings on you.
Here I think is the issue
When you say bekief/faith is a requirment, it looks like your saying we must earn our salvation. But thats not the case.
It’s better to say God loved the whole world. That he sent his son to die for that world
That whoever recieves him in faith will never perish but has eternal life,
I can not earn salvation by believing “its the work of good we believe” - spoken by Jesus.
So I can not take credit. God gets all the credit
I disagree
God is fully capable of making a dead human understand enough to trust in him. Romans 1 makes it very clear. That it is us who hide the truth from ourselves. God hides nothing. He is there for all to see, And he will help us understand the hard parts. while he draws us to himself
Yes I understand and agree.
It is my understanding "faith" and "belief" in Greek are the some word, one being a noun and the other a verb.
Certainly nothing we can do to earn our salvation, we do not add to the work of Christ Jesus in any way, however, believing IN/
trusting IN Jesus for the gift of salvation can only happen if one hears the Gospel, the Good News of the work of Christ Jesus for each
individual person and they accept the gift.
How can a person accept a gift unless they believe (think and are persuaded) it is real? Makes no sense to me.
I appreciate your elaboration, this is was the standard view across most evangelical churches, not sure what has happened.
Ugh... not what I was talking about.
In color theory, white is the color of all wavelengths together. When you see a white object, all color wavelengths are reflected off of that object. When every color reflects from the object, there's no color left. Therefore, white is the absence of color in the object, while our eyes see all the reflected colors.
Link
So acting responsible 'makes' us righteous?, or we act righteous because of Christ transforming us?
We can not even think of acting righteous (love) until we are first loved by God
We love because he first loved us.
I always ask myself when i think of these discussions. Was the tax collector acting righteous when he fell to his knees and called out to God with faith of a mustard seed?
Or was he brought to the point of being poor in spirit (Literally Bankrupt) and in this state, Acted out of desperation. “Lord have mercy on me”
I would not call that an act of righteousness, Nor would I call this a good deed, nor would I call this the tax collector saving himself. I Definately would bot call this saving himself.
Is that what I wrote? Good twist and straw manning my words.
It is quite inescapable that people are called to believe throughout scripture.
Here is one in case you missed it...
And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who approaches Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.
Hebrews 11:6
John 20:31 “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.”
John 1:12-13 “Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
Ephesians 1:13 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit…”
John 1:12-13 “Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
Ephesians 1:13 “And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit…”
There is a righteousness before God (absolute) and only by the imputed righteousness of Christ through faith, and there is a righteousness before men (which is relative).
It was simply a rhetorical question.
Not inescapable but imperative.
Let me ask again, "So acting responsible 'makes' us righteous?, or we act righteous because of Christ transforming us?"
I am sorry I do not know what you are asking.
Scripture is clear.. the call is to believe on Christ Jesus and his completed work on our behalf.
Upon trusting in, believing in Christ Jesus for the gift of salvation we are made righteous.
We are considered legally righteous in the eyes of God. We aren't in practice righteous.
" ,, not by works of righteousness we have done, but according to His mercy, He saved us.."
I'm asking "Does acting responsible make us righteous" OR "Do we act righteous because Christ is actively working in us (sanctifying us)? It's really not a difficult question, more like Salvation 101.
Some have a name for that...Simultaneously justified and sinner...("Simul Justus et Peccator")
