Matt. 25:30

The New Testament was written in Greek. I am pleased to read that you believe that in order for the Holy Spirit to very accurately communicate the New Testament to us it is required that we either learn the Greek language or study the New Testament with someone who does and can interpret it for us!

 

Yes, of course it is! Most Bible scholars have always taught that, but they also taught that “real” Christians can become apostate, fall from grace, and be damned for eternity.

 

Thank you for this information. I suppose I will have to buy Mr. Faust’s book and check out all of his references one by one to find out who really taught what. Fortunately I already own books by most of the authors that you and others have mentioned to me, so checking out the references will not require too many trips to libraries.

 

That would indeed be helpful. Direct quotes by the authors, along with the title and edition of the book and the page number would be most helpful.

 

I “believe that a man who just "reads his Bible and studie it many times" can have sound doctrine, in spite of his lack of a college education and lack of Greek.”

Absolutely!

So have I!

Indeed there is!

God gave us the Bible and the ability to understand it, and He is not a respecter of persons. Anyone with normal intelligence can study the Bible and understand the essential doctrines. Therefore, if a teaching is not found throughout the history of the Church, one can be sure that it is a false teaching. If the opposite teaching is found throughout the history of the Church, with no mention of an opposing teaching, one can be even more sure that it is a false teaching.

Absolutely not !

Hal Lindsey is a first class screwball that got fired a couple years ago by his senior pastor for insubordination! His theology is less sound that a bag full of Jell-O. As for Jack Van Impe, I have heard him preach (many years ago), but I have never read any of his books. S. S. Craig’s name keeps popping up in Free Grace circles, so I shall have to read what he has to say.

 

Dear Sir,

Perhaps you misunderstood my statements . The doctrine of "Kingdom Exclusion" (otherwise known as "Millennial Exclusion”) was not taught by ANY of the Ante-Nicene Church Fathers. According to this doctrine, naughty Christians will not enter the Millennial Kingdom, but they will spend eternity with Jesus after the 1000 years have passed. Polycarp, like all of the Ante-Nicene Church Fathers, believed that naughty Christians were in danger of spending eternity in hell (as opposed to simply missing out on the Millennial reign of Christ), a much worse punishment than that imagined by J. D. Faust or Zane C. Hodges . The contemporary concept of eternal security does not appear in any Christian writings until the 15th century, although Augustine suggested the general concept in some of his final writings, but these writings are generally considered to be substantially inferior to his earlier writings and are very seldom quoted.

The doctrine of "Kingdom Exclusion" (otherwise known as "Millennial Exclusion”) is exclusively a consequence of people who believe in eternal security trying to reconcile with that doctrine warnings of future punishment for sinful behavior on the part of Christians . All of the Ante-Nicene Church Fathers believed that future punishment to be eternal rather than temporal (during the millennium).

 

Jim ,

From whence cometh the words "good education?"
I do not recall using that phrase in this forum.

If I were to use that expression in this forum in reference to a 21st century adult Christian living in the United States, I would mean by that expression an education that is distinctly better than that of the average a 21st century adult Christian living in the United States. Depending upon the context, the adjective “good” could delineate such a person having a distinctly better than average education, but less than an “excellent” education, or it could be used more broadly to include an “excellent” education, or it could be used to describe such a person having an “excellent” or even better education.

As for the education itself, the gooder the better!

Good night, Jim!

 

John 5:24. "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life. NASB-U

John 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. KJV-U

The Greek verb translated here "believes" ("believeth") is in the Greek present tense, a tense that is different from the English present tense. The Greek present tense connotes continuous action. Those who fail to continue to “believe" have no assurance of salvation in this verse.


The fact is that the OSAS doctrine as it is taught today was not taught for 1500 years, and for the first 400 years the unanimous view of the Church was conditional security. Even during the dark ages which followed, the church did not revert to eternal security.

For 400 years the Church flourished and grew by leaps and bounds with not one person so much as whispering the concept of eternal security. For the past 50 years the false doctrine of eternal security has been broadcast over the airwaves and the Church is in trouble. Is this just a coincidence? Is it not at least possible that the false doctrine of OSAS is responsible for many of the problems facing the church today, such as the divorce rate among evangelicals which has, in the last 50 years, grown by ten fold to where it is higher among Evangelicals in the United States than it is among the general population in this country?

It is precisely because of the rapid deterioration of the Church that J. D. Faust and other OSAS preachers and writers have gone back to the Bible and noticed the very stern warnings to Christians who choose to live in sin. For the most part they refuse to acknowledge that these warnings have to do with the eternal damnation of believers who forsake Christ (as the Ante-Nicene Church Fathers believed and taught), but they feel very strongly that the Church today needs to be warned of the dangers of sin. Zane Hodges does not go as far as J. D. Faust, but even he sees and writes about the need for Christians to be warned that they shall suffer loss if they choose to live in sin.

An important part of Bible teaching is refuting error. But it is not the fault of the good teacher that error needs to be refuted; it is the fault of those who are teaching the error . I know for certain that the Bible does not teach OSAS. I know this from simply reading the KJ Bible as a young person many years ago; I know this from many years of very careful and prayerful exegesis; I know this from the many years of discussion with my collogues; I know this because OSAS was not taught until the 15th century.

If OSAS is correct, the Bible is so extremely difficult to understand no one understood it until sometime in the 15th century! The teachings of OSAS discredit the understanding of every Christian and Bible scholar who lived prior to the 15th century; they discredit the understanding of the large majority of Christians and Bible scholars alive today; and they discredit the Bible and the Author of the Bible by teaching that the Bible has failed to be understandable.

Nonetheless, you choose to believe what you want to believe and even 700,000 pages of very careful, prayerful exegesis proving that OSAS is a false doctrine will not change your mind . You believe that the Bible clearly teaches OSAS even though church history proves for an absolute, undeniable fact that the Bible DOES NOT clearly teach OSAS. Indeed, church history proves for an absolute, undeniable fact that the Bible clearly teaches conditional security but modernists have become blind to the truths of God’s word.

OSAS advocates like to shout, “Sola Scriptura!” but that doctrine is not even mentioned in the Scriptures. What absolute hypocrisy! If we are to discern Biblical truth solely from the Scriptures without the help of church history, teaching “Sola Scriptura!” is excluded because that concept is not found anywhere in the Bible.

 

Jesus is Lord,

I was just now viewing your profile,

“I was lost, He found me.” I find this to be an interesting concept. Jesus “found” you. Where were you hiding before He found you?