Did Jesus Die on The Cross for The Just/Elect/Saved Whose Names Are Written in The Book of Life OR

I agree completely. with that. But we were discussing what someone needs to be saved, not what one needs to do to grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. By your theory, it sounds like all those who lived before the birth, death and resurrection of Christ needed to both have Jesus appear to them and have Jesus share with them what He was going to do to save the world. Otherwise how do you see them having a personal relationship with Christ. What do you believe pre-Jesus of Nazareth humans needed to experience in order to be saved?

The bare minimum as I understand it was to believe in the light they had been given. That is, whatever God had revealed to them they needed to embrace and acknowledge, and keep in their knowledge the God so revealed. that is what Romans 2 says.

Romans 1
0 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,

23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.

24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:

25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.

26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:

27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.

28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;

29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,

30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,

31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:

32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

Let's look at Romans 7, remembering that the definition of "dead" , which you shoe-horn into selective verses to make them "teach" your doctrine, is "unable to hear, see, understand or do anything."

Rom. 7
4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.

According to your definition, Christians have become dead to the law: unable to hear, see, understand or do the law..

5 For when we were in the flesh, the motions of sins, which were by the law, did work in our members to bring forth fruit unto death.

According to your definition, when Christians were previously living in the flesh, before regeneration, the law produced pathEma,, influencesvia sin to make them break the law.

6 But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

According to your definition, now the regenerate Christian cannot be influenced by the law because the law is now dead, so the law cannot see, hera, understand or do anything in the Christian's life.

7 What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.

The knowledge of sin came by hearing the law, nit by being conceived. Before we hear any moral law, there can be no awareness of sin.
,.
8 But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For without the law sin was dead.

According to your definition, without the law, sin had no abiltiy to see, hear, understand or do anything in my life.

9 For I was alive without the law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

Since sin had no power over me before the law came, I was not yet slain by the law, so I was spiritually alive without the law before the law enabled sin to kill me. It was only when the commandment cam that sin subsequently rose from its powerless death. According to your definition of dead, sin, being dead, could not raise itself from death. Only God can have raised the dead sin to life. So your definition of dead/death makes God the one who empowered sin to use the law to kill me. According to you God gave sin life and gave sin a weapon to kill me with.

10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.

However, Paul says the law was decreed for life, nit for death. So, your definition creates a contradiction in God's word.

11 For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me.

Had not God given life to dead sin, the law would not have become a weapon that dead sin could use. But according to your definition, of death, God awakened sin in order that I would become dead: unable to see, hear, understand or do anything spiritual that pertains to God.

12 Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, just, and good..

Paul says that the law is holy, just and good. But your definition But you have made it into a weapon God devised to deliberately render me deaf, blind and completely unable to do His will.

13 Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful.

Paul refutes the logical entailments otf your definituon of dead. Sin was not dead by your definition, but dead by the general definition of separated from life.. Sin was not attached to my life before I sinned against they law. It was then that sin began to live parasitically, by commandeering parts of my my living body and mind. I let sin in. God did not put sin in me. God allowed it so that I might learn how despicable sin is out there and now also in here.

14 For we know that the law is spiritual: but I am carnal, sold under sin.

The law set good goals for and limits onto society. But now that I have allowed sin to get into me, I find I am not wise or self-disciplined enough persistently refuse to obey sin's influence,.I am like a slave. I am intimidated by fears to do things that are against my will. And whatsoever I am obeying, to that I am being a slave.

15 For that which I do I allow not: for what I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I.
16 If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law that it is good.
17 Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I find not.
19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me.
22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man:
23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members.

The sin parasite acts like a computer virus, and hinders me from fulfilling my desires to consistently keep the moral laws I have been given.

24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

Accoprding to your definition of dead, the unregenerate man given a moral law discovers that He can neither see, hear, understand or do anything spiritual pertaining to God.

But wait a minute. If he cannot see, hear, or understand anything pertaining to God, how does he know that he cannot see, herar, undestand or do anything spiritual pertaining to God? He cannot possible discover that spiritual truth. until God forst regenerates Him. But he does not ask, "Who has regenerated me and delivered me from this body of complete inability to see, hear, understand and do anything spiritual pertaining to God?"
he asks "Who will deliver me from the body of this complete inability to see, hear, understand and do anything spiritual pertaining to God?""

So, he is still unregenerate and dead when He cries out for deliverance from this insidious virus pervertingb His life.

25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.

Then he discovers the gospel, and how Jesus frees us from our separation

According to your definition, this must be about physical death, where the body cannot see, hear, understand or do anything at all. Dead mans dead. Right?
. But really it is deliverance from a physical body separated from God's life because the sin virus has infiltrated and sabotaged the body's ability to remain connected to God through submission to the spirit and soul of the unregenerate.man who has had his conscience activated by hearing and understanding some moral law..

Your special pleading reading of "spiritual death" and "spiritually dead" into the biblical revelation , if applied consistently,, creates this spaghetti of nonsensical doctrine.

This is the challenge I place before you.

Please show us a way to make us forget what those two verses are saying.

1 Timothy 4:10That is why we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe."

1 John 2:2He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.

This is your poor assumption.

Everyone responds in some way to the Gospel. They either believe it or reject it. This isn't difficult to establish from scripture.

Can you show me a place in scripture where salvation occurred where the activity of God is not present?

THat's an awful theory, and not in the Bible.

The question is do those who respond positively (not a decision, persuaded by) the Gospel message do so only because God provided spiritual hearing to them first?

This seems to be your position, but if not you can clarify.

You are still conflating an enabling of God with persuasion. Individuals who have their nature changed choose as freely as those whose nature's are unaltered. They merely choose according to their new nature.
I do believe hearing is engendered in the new nature.

A few things: First you and Mr. Studier are trying to make Romans 1 say far more than it is. The Gospel of Truth, by which men must be saved, is not revealed in Natural Revelation (NR). The Gospel is only revealed in Special (divine) Revelation. What is revealed in NR is what Paul explicitly says.

A few things: First you and Mr. Studier are trying to make Romans 1 say far more than it is. The Gospel of Truth, by which men must be saved, is not revealed in Natural Revelation (NR). The Gospel is only revealed in Special (divine) Revelation. What is revealed in NR is what Paul explicitly says.

Now, Rufus?

This is the challenge I place before you.

Please show us a way to make us forget what those two verses are saying.

We are making some gains, lol

So the power and truth inherent in the full and real Gospel message is not sufficient, God must enable hearing, have their nature changed first so a person is persuaded.
In your paradigm then without God the personal Gospel message in and of itself is meaningless gibberish to the natural man.

The natural man can believe all kinds of things, even other truth or some part of the truth, but he is unable to believe the reality of Christ Jesus and His purpose here on earth, complete rubbish to the natural man, even the natural man who has some understanding of God and Jesus and actually believes those to be realities but perhaps has not been given the full personal gospel message.
Nope, nope he cannot believe any further it is utter foolishness to him until his heart is changed.


@Cameron stated:
Everyone responds in some way to the Gospel. They either believe it or reject it.

So then I can understand you to mean that those who accept the Gospel were helped by God to accept, corrrect?

Firstly in looking at your entire post which I'm not yet quoting, I'm going to ask you & the rest of us to stop the insults. I'll use the NIV for your benefit and because it picks up this sense of the word:

NIV 1 Peter 2:23 When they hurled their insults at him (Jesus Christ), he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly.

NIV 1Peter 3:8-12 Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble. 9 Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing, because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing. 10 For, "Whoever would love life and see good days must keep their tongue from evil and their lips from deceitful speech. 11 They must turn from evil and do good; they must seek peace and pursue it. 12 For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil."

NIV 1 Cor 5:11 But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer (same word), a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.

NIV 1 Cor 6:9-11 Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men 10 nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers (same word) nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

A few things: First you and Mr. Studier are trying to make Romans 1 say far more than it is. The Gospel of Truth, by which men must be saved, is not revealed in Natural Revelation (NR). The Gospel is only revealed in Special (divine) Revelation. What is revealed in NR is what Paul explicitly says.

In a discussion with a friend in seminary, he once started with, "where does a thought come from?"

I was listening to a guy recently who by no means professes Christ, but through a lot of introspection he had come to the point of realizing that the best version of himself is found in not taking the advice of his first 4-5 thoughts. When you understand this about him, it's fascinating to watch his delayed processes in discussions at times.

Contradictions are always absurd. And for this I make no apology.

the Natural Man's heart suppressed the truth because the Natural Man doesn't want to retain the one true God in his knowledge. In other words: Natural Man doesn't want to KNOW God! So, how is it possible for the unregenerate to believe in someone they hate and don't want to know!?

Finally, as pointed out recently from Jn 14:17, the Holy Spirit was always "with" the OT saints. The OT saints not only were guided by the Word but were also under the influence of the Holy Spirit.

It was a real soul stunner.

Next I'm going to ask you to stop the straw-man activities. I most certainly have not ever said that the Gospel is what you're calling Natural Revelation. Nor have I seen @PaulThomson say such a thing.

There are some things to discuss in this regard due to the close context in Rom1 of Paul talking about the Gospel and what you're calling Natural Revelation.

Most Christians would benefit from such a process to make certain they know who and what they are listening to.

If you want to lay out the Scriptures, I'll look at them.

This looks like the 'natural man" from 1Cor2:14 is the man Paul is speaking of in Rom1 who, as you put it, "doesn't want to retain the one true God in his knowledge."

Were the Jews among the "natural man" who didn't want to retain the one true God in his knowledge"?



John 14:17 is speaking of (1) all Jews as "OT saints" or (2) Jews who were "under the influence of the Holy Spirit" and thus not "natural man" and thus = "OT saints" or (3) Jesus' disciples He is talking to in John 14:17 and they are "OT saints" or ?????

Who are the "OT saints" under the influence of the Holy Spirit?

Putting together the two quotes of what you said, the "OT saints" "under the influence of the Holy Spirit" were not "Natural Man"? Were they regenerate pre-Christ?