Featured Is Faith "requirement" to be saved by God?

Wrong question. A better question is, "How can one believe if he is dead."

 

How can they reject if dead?

 

Okay, Brother Larry, here are some deep questions for you to ponder on:

1.) Adam and Eve were both spiritually dead when God searched them out in the Garden, correct? How were they able to commune with Him in their "dead in sins and trespasses" state? Remember, God drove them from the Garden, "Lest they eat of the Tree of Life and live." God spoke with them, and they spoke back, and them spiritually dead.

2.) How was Cain able to speak with God when God asked him where was his brother Abel? Cain even communed with Him, and he was also, "dead in sins and trespasses". God went so far as to place a seal upon him to protect him, and he was "dead in sins and trespasses".

3.) How was the rich man in hell able to speak with Father Abraham, and him spiritually, AND physically dead? How was Father Abraham able to speak with a "corpse" that had/has no chance of ever being quickened, and yet Father Abraham communned with him?

4.) How was a spiritually dead soul able to "feel the flames", and him being dead? How was he desirious of one drop of water(shows you that a "corpse can thirst, Brother Larry), and him a corpse?

5.) And lastly, how can a spiritually dead soul even sin? It's in a "dead state", and it can do nothing. If it can do nothing, then it can't even sin. Sure, in your system, it's a condemned sinner, but it can't sin anymore.

 

Its really very simple. Offer an ice cream cone to a corpse.

The point is not that they are dead in every way, brethren. The point is that they are dead IN SIN.

All that lives is the natural man that CAN NOT receive the things of the spirit of God.

All that lives is that part of sinful man which is NEVER subject to the law of God neither indeed CAN IT BE.

All that lives is that which is enmity with God at all times and unceasingly renders the man incapable of seeking after God.

All that lives is moral fiber which is thoroughly saturated with evil and renders even the BEST deeds that the unregenerate does, deeds which some of you might consider "righteous", as nothing but filthy leprous rags in the eyes of God.

This is what the Bible clearly teaches.

P.S. If you need me to provide the verse references due to the fact that you are unfamiliar with them, you probably should not be debating this any way. You ought to be familiar enough with these passages to recognize my reference to them immediately.

 

We are saved by grace through faith. Thus we must have faith before we are saved. We are saved on the basis of faith. When God credits our faith as righteousness, He sets us apart in Christ.

Calvinism is false doctrine, at least the TULI part. They say no one seeks God at any time, adding "at any time" to scripture. An invention of men. What scripture is actually saying is no one is seeking God when they are sinning, and we all sin so no one seeks God all the time.

Election is not unconditional, but conditional, God chooses those rich in faith, i.e. those whose faith He credits as righteousness. James 2:5, Romans 4:5, 2 Thessalonians 2:13.

Calvinism's limited atonement states that Christ did not die for the whole world, that He did not lay down His life for all, and that God does not desire all men to be saved according to His purpose and plan.

Calvinism's Irresistible grace is demonstrated false by Matthew 23:13 which has men entering heaven and therefore supposedly under the influence of irresistible grace, yet they are blocked by false teachers.

 

The cross is simply a symbol, but Christ's life blood sacrificed on the cross provides the propitiation (means of salvation) for the whole world. 1 John 2:2.

Yes, we agree, we get no credit for placing our faith in Christ, but it is God who credits our faith in Christ as righteousness or not, Romans 4:5.

God crediting our faith in Christ during our lifetime provides the basis of His election of us individually, 2 Thessalonians 2:13.

 

http://www.baptistboard.com/showthread.php?p=1844981#post1844981

 

The first part is good. I'm not sure what you said in the second

The Bible says that man doesn't seek after God(not doesn't seek after God some of the time like some try to insert in, nor "no one is seeking God when they are sinning") both are additions to Scripture.

Our faith is a means as you said. We are saved by God's grace(Eph 2)

 

This is a typical Calvinist post. The Bible says no one seeks God. It does not say at any time or some of the time. Therefore the scope of the statement is left to be discerned from the context. The context is we all sin and therefore we are all under sin. Therefore no one seeks God when they are sinning is the concept being taught. The Calvinist view is absurd, reflecting sloppy bible study.

 

No, it's a quote from Psalms and it means that no one seeks after God. Just as it means that no one is righteous.

 

I posted the following on another thread. It presents my belief on the role of Faith in Salvation.

 

That is pure eisegesis.

The idea in the text is not that no one seeks God while they are sinning. That is absolutely NO WHERE in that text. That is the epitome of sloppy bible study.

The idea is that no one seeks God because everyone is a sinner.

While men are nothing more than sinners, they do not ever seek God. They must become something else besides just sinners. They must become something they were not born to be. That's why they must be born again. When they are born again then they are something else besides just sinners. The sin nature survives but a new nature is born. The new nature, battling the old nature, DOES seek after God.

But until a man is born from above he does not seek God at all- period.

The Bible repeats this truth over and over.
The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God.
The carnal mind is enmity with God and is not subject to the law of God NEITHER INDEED CAN IT BE.
The heart is desperately wicked deceitful above all things, who can know it.
The imaginations of mans heart is only evil continually.
The plowing of the wicked is sin.

The anti-calvinist mutilates the Bible in his relentless pursuit to resist the Doctrines of Grace.

 

FTR, there is no such thing as Doctrines of Grace in the bible, meaning teachings/plural. There is the Doctrine/singular of Grace, meaning teaching/singular, Ephesians 2:8,9.

 

picky, picky Particularly since you don't believe the Doctrine/Doctrines of Grace!!:tear:

1. It is God the Father who foreknew and chose His people before the foundation of the world [Ephesians 1:4]. That is grace.

2. It is God the Father who predestinated that His people would be conformed to the image of His Son that they might be adopted as His children [Ephesians 1: 5] and become heirs and joint heirs with Jesus Christ [Romans 8: 16, 17]. That is grace.

3. It is God the Son who humbles Himself, take upon Himself the form of man, Jesus Christ, and sheds His blood on a Roman cross to pay the penalty for the sins of those whom the Father has chosen to salvation [John 17; Philippians 2:6-10].That is grace.

4. It is God the Holy Spirit, who applies the work of the Jesus Christ to those chosen by God unto salvation so that none are lost [John 6: 37, 39, 40, 44].That is grace.

5. It is the Triune God who, in time, will regenerate, call, justify, and glorify those whom He chose to Salvation before the foundation of the world, therefore, they can never fall away or lose that Salvation [Romans 8:28-30].That is grace.

 

For the record that's pure baloney.

 

FTR, it states we were chosen in Him before the foundation. How can we be in Him, and yet be under condemnation at the same time?

 

So Ephesians 2:8,9 is pure baloney?

 

As the preacher said there is nothing new under the sun.

No one will be saved any differently than this one will be; Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ. (Why will be.) These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of, and embraced, and confessed, that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

Faith is a noun. Their persuasion, embracement, and confession wasn't the faith. That was their feelings toward their hope and what was to far away to be really seen. Their Faith was the Promises which they understood to require eternal life therefore they knew they were strangers and pilgrims in the flesh and so confessed. The promise is, the hope of eternal life of which they are still dead not having received, (it would require resurrection/regeneration).

Faith is the substance of things hoped for.

Jesus the Christ born of the virgin Mary is the only man child, a living soul, that was born, lived and then died and has been resurrected to life and is still alive, that is received, "the hope," eternal life. That gift of eternal life is, grace, the gift of God the Father to his only begotten Son who was sinless, yet died for your and my sin. Jesus by death, shed his blood, became the faith they had died in. When he died they, (the ones called by God) were then justified by faith being God the Father raised him from the dead. Since his death and resurrection those called by God are justified through the Faith.

That is what Paul is speaking of in Gal. 3 when he speaks of, before the faith came and then, after the faith did come.

That is the faith one hears of by which one receives the promise of the Holy Spirit. Gal 3:2. The Holy Spirit of God is where eternal life comes from. We are presently sealed (sanctified, set apart) by the Holy Spirit, Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of his glory. We will then be; For we that are in [this] tabernacle do groan, being burdened: not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life.

And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.

Abraham and all the called.

Eternal life at the appearing of Jesus and his kingdom.