TibiasDad
Active Member
It is not meritorious, it’s just a required action. It does not mean we have earned it. Why can’t Calvinist seem to grasp the difference between a required action and a works mentality?
Doug
The doctrine of election
- Thread starter The Rogue Tomato
- Start date
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
Thats works
TibiasDad
Active Member
No, it is a required action! It doesn’t make it meritorious, because God cannot be obligated by anything outside of himself and we never can deserve salvation.
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
Thats works, far from grace
TibiasDad
Active Member
Can you be saved and not believe!
Does God require belief?
Can God be obligated by anything outside of himself?
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
Yes, one doesnt believe until after they are saved. Thats what they believe, that Christ saved them
TibiasDad
Active Member
Cart before the horse…John 3:18 says the cause of being condemned and not being condemned is belief or the lack thereof alone!
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
A lost person cant believe, the Gospel is hid to them that are lost, and they believe not 2 Cor 4:3-4
3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
A lost person has their mind blinded and the gospel is hid from them. The word hid καλύπτω is in the perfect tense, a completed action in the past with a ongoing or present state of being. As long as the person is lost, the gospel is hid, concealed, knowledge witheld, covered over, and they believe not.
brightfame52
Active Member
A lost person cant believe the Gospel
TibiasDad
Active Member
It is hidden from us because we are lost not the other way around; Satan tries to keep us from the truth of the gospel lest we be saved. We are born lost; to those who are presently perishing, the gospel is hidden!
The perfect tense does not indicate when the hiding begins, only that it has begun at some point (logically in the past) and is still occurring at the point of the writing.
Moreover, the Perfect tense does not and cannot project beyond the present tense moment; in other words it does not imply that it will necessarily be hidden from a presently unbelieving person in the future.
That’s why he says it is hidden from them who are actively perishing.
“This is why it is said:
“Wake up, sleeper,
rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you.” (Eph 5:14)
(“Wake up O sleeper” is a present tense, imperative mood, active voice, which means that prior to Christ shining on us, we must, in the light of the Gospel preached to us, wake up and believe what we have been told. This means we are made able to comprehend what the Gospel is telling us so as to be able to respond to it [wake up/rise up] and have Christ shine on us with salvation.)
Being lost, necessarily proceeds the remedy for being lost being hidden.
Doug
TibiasDad
Active Member
brightfame52
Active Member
You believe in a salvation plan that God will save you if you do what is required. Thats a works base, law base salvation, not Grace at all. The word required:
"Required" means something is essential, necessary, or mandatory, often dictated by rules, laws, or specific conditions. It indicates a binding obligation, such as "required reading," or a necessary component for a purpose. Synonyms include compulsory, mandatory, needed, or stipulated.
Salvation is by Grace not works, laws and requirements ! Christ fulfilled all requirements in and through His Faithfulness in all Covenant engagements for God to be merciful and gracious to His People.
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TibiasDad
Active Member
And you think that “required” means meritorious and it doesn’t: regardless of what I do, I do not deserve what God does because God cannot be obligated to act by anything I do. If he acts, it is simply because he chooses to do so for his own reasons.
Rom10:9If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. 11As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.”
It says “if you” X “you will be saved”; that is, by definition, conditioned on our doing X.
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
No matter how you spin it you promote salvation by works, requirements, law. Thats as anti gospel of grace as it can get.
TibiasDad
Active Member
yes, but that saving faith is granted to us by the Holy Spirit, as He regenerates us then unto salvation
TibiasDad
Active Member
We are granted to believe, but not granted/given belief. We are persuaded by the Holy Spirit to believe. Whether we choose to believe is our own choice.
We are “granted” or given the gospel, which grants us the responsibility and opportunity to believe what we have been told.
Doug
brightfame52
Active Member
I answered that to you about a half dozen times. No matter how you spin it, you promote works salvation, law keeping. I hope you know you need to keep the whole law now because you reject Grace.
TibiasDad
Active Member
Nope, I am saved by grace through faith and I fulfill all the righteous requirements of the law by living by the Spirit, for by the law, no man shall be justified.
I don’t deserve salvation and God didn’t have to save me, therefore it is by grace I am saved when I believe!
Doug
