Was Faith a Gift?

If I were your rich uncle (The Father) and gave you a Cadillac (Christ) by parking it in front of your house (His death for mankind, the atonement) and left the keys in it for you to use and enjoy (believe and be saved, believe not and perish), that's it as far as I'm concerned (God absolved of man's responsibility in rejecting it). If you never get in the Caddy and derive the benefits from it (reject His gift), it's your loss. (Hell)

 

I strongly disagree that we have nothing to do with salvation. We have to repent and come to faith according to scripture.

 

I always find it interesting that people are so afraid of works salvation that they tend to make them outlawed in the believer. First we are saved unto good works. Second while we are saved by grace through faith we will be judged by our works. Third while works do not save they are required in the process for salvation if one counts exercising faith and repentance as works. We do not get saved by doing nothing.

 

Your "third" is off as Scripture states faith is never a work regardless of it's origin and how it is defined.

I do agree there is no "doing anything" as even if there is this nebulous gift of saving faith given, WE are still the ones who need to apply it. The debate boils down to the origin, not whether we are the ones exercising it...as we are.

"Grace is not opposed to effort, grace is opposed to earning"

 

if you mean by everyone having the same chance to believe everyone can experience the base evidence of a Creator by the creation then i agree. If by everyone having the same chance you mean everyone has the same amount of revelation above being able to see the creation then the statement is false. Not everyone gets the same amount of evidence and revelation. Some like us here in this country have churches just about on every corner. There is TV, street preachers, and individual witnessing, but there are those who have never heard the gospel or had any revelation of God other then what is seen in the creation. In fact the bible even expalins that not all have heard or will hear.

 

Hah! I knew there was more than doctrine we had in common!

Check the itty bitty thumbnail pic on my profile, my wife and I are holding some nice flatheads we caught on trot/limbline a couple years ago (I turned the big one loose, it was full of eggs).

 

I couldn't get the picture to expand but I could see that one of them was as big as your leg.

The biggest I have caught is not that big. But I have friends who go a lot more regular than me who have caught 60 pounders.

 

[SIZE=+0]It happened because we are sentience beings, but not because we start the process. It is true while all men are dead in their sins and trespasses and cannot rise from the dead on their own, God in His mercy begins the process at His calling to each individual as He sovereignly chooses where we can rise enough to accept or deny His offer. We are the ones who takes what He gives and in repentance and faith He in return completes the work unto salvation.[/SIZE]

 

Your rebutal is to a post I did not write. You need to re-read my post.

 

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[SIZE=+0]No I think that I have it correct, not closer. You are correct that God is the author and finisher, but not the the enforcer. We decide if we want to come or not. Once enlightened we are left with the choice. Read Hebrews 6 and see that once enlightened if we fall away it is then impossible to be renewed again unto salvation.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=+0]He enlightens and we choose. If we fall away after being enlightened we cannot return because it would crucify the Lord anew.[/SIZE]

 

That is certainly the position one has to take if they hold to hyper Calvinism, but that is not what scripture teaches. He does not enlighten those who cannot accept and the warning to those in Hebrews to come all the way would be wasted unless they could.

 

:thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

here is what i wrote;

I always find it interesting that people are so afraid of works salvation that they tend to make them outlawed in the believer. First we are saved unto good works. Second while we are saved by grace through faith we will be judged by our works. Third while works do not save they are required in the process for salvation if one counts exercising faith and repentance as works. We do not get saved by doing nothing.

I did not say that works save. I said that ifyou say faith and repentance are works then works are required in the salvation process yet they are not what saves.We are saved through them, not by them.