What About Saved by Grace? Update: Please Read.

It seems to me your reasoning is of men's reasoning, not of the Lord's. When we read His word, we need to always keep in mind who is speaking, and scripture is the voice of the Lord from Genesis to Revelation. The world it was written to changes, but God does not change. It is the same God with the same salvation who speaks to different people. When we keep in mind the context of a scripture it helps with our understanding, but it never changes the principles of the Lord.

Our problem with understanding comes in seeing the consistency of the Lord's message, not in dissecting the differences. To dig deeper into the Lord's salvation of us, we need to see the sameness in the system God used before Christ lived as a man and after. The differences are clearly evident, how are they the same? When we understand that we understand salvation.

. I agree that ' saved ' has different meanings in the context. Like ' Endure to the end to be saved ' . Just like Mathew 19 , Acts 2 .38 ect they need to be understood in context. We look to Pauls letters for how we understand salvation today . Not in the four Gospels nor in Acts . Today it should be clear that we do not ' Endure to the end to be saved " nor ' Keep the commandments and go sell everything ' . Its also not Repent , and be baptized for the remission of sins, and receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Clearly Eph 1 ,13-14 clashes with this . 1 cor 15 .1-4 is the Gospel . Romans 10 ,9 and Rom 1.16 explain the Gospel also . They could not be preaching the Gospel before the Gospel even happened. Acts is the transition.

Could it be that the different approach was because Israel had had 1,500 years of dealing with God and His Oracles, but that the Gentiles were coming in ice-cold? Things like homosexuality, lies, fornication, philanthropy and the like were everyday matters for the Gentile, whereas, although they were Law-breakers, the Israelites knew morals and knew prophecy. Let's take two examples.

In Acts 2 it is; "Ye men of Israel ... REPENT!" Well, repent is to change the direction you are going. Our Lord Jesus had just fulfilled 33o plus prophecies before their eyes and they called for His blood. It was not as though Jesus was unknown. He was vying for Messiah with Israel. But the Corinthians were out and out heathen and polytheists as well. The wording of the gospel would be different. But the basic message is the same, as given by the Master Himself in Mark 16:15-16;

15 "And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned."

Matthew is different because it is not the gospel of grace that Matthew sets forth, but the gospel of the Kingdom. A man is saved SO THAT he may rule with Christ. To qualify for salvation one needs to believe. But to be found worthy of co-rulership with Christ is by how obedient you were.

Luke reveals Christ as a Man. So the gospel there is the gospel of grace - remission of sins "for all the world beginning at Jerusalem".

John deals with the remission of sins, NOT for the Kingdom like the Mark and Luke, but that men might (i) have God dwelling inside of them, (ii) that a corporate New Man might be God's House on earth, and (iii) in having the Triune God in the man, that man might be partaker of the divine life to display Christ.

Then, each of the letters addresses problems, but at the same time reveal Christ. Colossians is about the Head and His supply to His body. Ephesians is about the Body and what it is saved for. Philippians is about the personal experience of Christ to be intimate with Him ... and so on. So each mention of "saved" ties in with a specific theme. Man is made of three parts (Gen.2:7; 1st Thess.5:23), so there are at least three different "salvations" as each part has a different consistency. Then the character must be saved ... and so the spectrum of different "salvations" grows and grows.

But the foundational rule is that man could not save himself. Christ came as a worthy Man and did it by His Works. One hast to put trust in these Works to (i) be released from your sin and sins, (ii) to be reconciled to God, (iii) to be justified before God (not men), (iv) to experience a new and heavenly birth to become heirs AND have the Father's divine life to display Christ and be a "help meet" for Him. Even then, the full salvation depends on whether, after all this, you are found worthy of being a co-ruler with Christ when He sets up His Kingdom on earth when He comes.

"Salvation" is not a bedtime story. It is a vast and complex process to satisfy a 100% righteous God. Fortunately, knowledge of the whole process is not a prerequisite. Faith in a Person and His Work is.

And yet you mention no scripture or any explanation of that scripture ..

Would you agree that no one before Mathew 27 understood the Gospel how we understand it today? Baring in mind we cannot be saved today apart from believing in this ' good news ' 1 cor 15 . 1-4 / Rom 10 ,9

Repent = change of mind . It could lead to doing something but its still the mind not the action .

You say “they couldn’t preach the gospel before it happened". The gospel is grace, and grace happened at the beginning of time.

Lev. 17:11 For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls; for it is the blood that makes atonement for the soul.’

You say “We are to look to Paul to understand salvation.”

Paul was tried in court of not following the Lord and he was found not guilty, yet you say we are to listen to Paul rather than Christ. Paul was put on trial by the Jews as you read in Acts 24. He was pronounced innocent. Paul followed Christ. Scripture tells us Christ and the Father are one.

You speak of enduring to the end not being necessary for salvation. It is true that grace given to us is purely a gift, not something we earn. But scripture tells us of some things that determines whether or not we will receive this gift, and enduring to the end is one of them. It is written in scripture, and even you quote it.

I could probably go with that, but what do you think of Peter in Matthew 16? He believed and confessed.

I'm not saying if they had died before the death, burial and resurrection they would have been lost . No those that believed on Jesus were saved. But they were not preaching the death ,burial and resurrection for sins as we have to believe to be saved today .Peter believed Jesus was the Son and was saved by faith in what he understood . But not what we had to believe and understand.

where did I say we listen to Paul and not Christ ? we read Jesus in context, we read Paul in context.

False . Acts 2.38 is not the plan of salvation for all ages. Read the context and who Peter is speaking to . Its not the same in Acts 16.30 . its not the same in ANY of the verses you quoted . Thats why you finish with a false message that is perpetuated in every false Church .

One of the tragedies of Christendom that so many have isolated the Ephesian passage from the larger body of redemptive information. They emphatically declare that this text excludes water baptism as one of the constituents of the plan of salvation. Does that logic also eliminate the requirement to repent of sins?

Acts 17:30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:

Does reading in context mean that you don't accept scripture as written, but only "in context"? I accept that we understand scripture much better when we know what the words meant to the writers at the time it was written. Such as to know that they thought the heart functioned as we know the mind does, or what the problems were that Paul was addressing. But carried to an extreme "in context" means that we could change scripture by deciding on the context we wanted instead of humbly listening to scripture. I see you doing that.

Does reading in context mean that you don't accept scripture as written, but only "in context"? I accept that we understand scripture much better when we know what the words meant to the writers at the time it was written. Such as to know that they thought the heart functioned as we know the mind does, or what the problems were that Paul was addressing. But carried to an extreme "in context" means that we could change scripture by deciding on the context we wanted instead of humbly listening to scripture. I see you doing that.

How did the OP and everyone else miss the presentation of the gospel by Paul?

"Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you,which you received and on which you have taken your stand. 2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, and then to the Twelve. 6 After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep.7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, 8 and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.

9 For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. 11 Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed." 1 Cor 15:1-11

God gives us the grace to believe and repent. That is our justification. God saved us. (Romans 5:1)

Then we have a lifelong walk with God, being helped by the Holy Spirit, to grow more like Christ, as he makes us closer to the image of God. This is called sanctification, or being made into saints!

We will never be perfect on earth, so we need the final stage: glorification! When Christ returns, we will be glorified. That is when we will be perfect the image of Christ!

The gospel is found all over the NT, and prophecies about the Messiah from Genesis 3 to Revelation 22. Just read the Bible from cover to cover, and you will find the gospel and it's foreshadowing through the whole Bible!

One of the tragedies of Christendom that so many have isolated the Ephesian passage from the larger body of redemptive information. They emphatically declare that this text excludes water baptism as one of the constituents of the plan of salvation. Does that logic also eliminate the requirement to repent of sins?

Acts 17:30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:

What version is that? "God winked at"?

Acts 17:29 Being then God's offspring, we ought not to think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and imagination of man. 30 The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, 31 because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.”