Good stuff Allan!
JDale
Prevenient Grace
Discussion in 'Baptist Theology & Bible Study' started by reformedbeliever, Apr 12, 2007.
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What jdale said ^ :thumbs:
It's so refreshing to see Scripture exegesis the way the Bible meant. -
Hey JADALE and Webdog ! Way to to go ! You all really know how to turn Scripture on its head !
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Also, is corporate dealing with only the group as a whole or is individuals also being recognized here? I don't think you will try to say that the corporate deals only with the group and not individuals will you? Thanks brother. I'm interested. I've heard this argument before, but maybe you can explain it better for me. I don't see how we can leave out individuals within the group. Also, I don't see how you can say that God's purposes is not salvation. We will see. Don't think I am not going to bring the other side of this argument into the equation. :) -
25. As He says also in Hosea, "I WILL CALL THOSE WHO WERE NOT MY PEOPLE, 'MY PEOPLE,' AND HER WHO WAS NOT BELOVED, 'BELOVED.' "
26. "AND IT SHALL BE THAT IN THE PLACE WHERE IT WAS SAID TO THEM, 'YOU ARE NOT MY PEOPLE,' THERE THEY SHALL BE CALLED SONS OF THE LIVING GOD."
27. Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, "THOUGH THE NUMBER OF THE SONS OF ISRAEL BE LIKE THE SAND OF THE SEA, IT IS THE REMNANT THAT WILL BE SAVED;
28. FOR THE LORD WILL EXECUTE HIS WORD ON THE EARTH, THOROUGHLY AND QUICKLY."
29. And just as Isaiah foretold, "UNLESS THE LORD OF SABAOTH HAD LEFT TO US A POSTERITY, WE WOULD HAVE BECOME LIKE SODOM, AND WOULD HAVE RESEMBLED GOMORRAH."
30. What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, attained righteousness, even the righteousness which is by faith;
31. but Israel, pursuing a law of righteousness, did not arrive at {that} law.
32. Why? Because {they did} not {pursue it} by faith, but as though {it were} by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone,
33. just as it is written, "BEHOLD, I LAY IN ZION A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE, AND HE WHO BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED."
Is this calling a national calling? Is it not to salvation? Isn't righteousness being made right with God? Is it not a legal act by God?
You have not convinced me Allan. Good try though. -
I believe that the ability to have faith is given -- that all men have awareness of God -- that the Holy Spirit operates from outside all men drawing them -- that they can believe whereupon God gives them faith.
See, Calvies miss this totally. They can go direct to sanctification without ever establishing their justification because they are "passively" elected.
skypair -
skypair -
I would suggest it was the religious leaders. And when we talk here about the Gentiles accepting Him, we are basically noting the same thing -- religious leaders. And if there come an apostacy, it will be from the same place.
I don't think you have chosen a good passage to prove your point, rb.
skypair -
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What do you think one of the 'fruits' of the Spirit is... peace.
Put to death the 'old man' and live in Him and you will have it.
As much as we need to recognize 'God which worketh in us' we also need to recognize He calls us to 'work out your own salvation with fear and trembling'.
I guess what I would like to point out is that 'all' works finds it's foundation in Him. God working in us enalbes our working and co-working with God. What appears to be a contradiction (that grace elicits freedom) is a call to action that attests the ground of its action. We can work because God is working in us.
No stage of saving faith, not the slightest motion, is a matter of merited goodness. God comes our way not when we merit it, but before we merit it. precisely while we are yet sinners. God is helping us come to the desire to do the good through prevening grace, then to enable a result of good action from that good will.
God comes personally to humanity in the form of a servant. This calls each hearer of the gospel to have that mind that was also in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God counted not equality with God as something to be grasped (Phil. 2:1-6). This is the mind in which we are called to share. This pivotal Christoplogical passage concludes with the imperative, which calls us to work out our own salvation, not that salvation is our work but that it involves our free response to grace. We are to work because it is God who is working in us to enable our working.
Meanwhile, believers learn to cooperate daily with grace by the means of grace: by searching the Scriptures, which attest the history of grace; by attending fellowship at Church; by making use of the ordinances of God; by becoming attentive to conscience; by sharing in common prayer, godly admonition, and good council.
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(1) I used the term "awakening" not as though it is an abrupt, alarm clock moment where the HS drags us kicking and screaming out of our spiritual slumber, but as a gradual "enightenment" -- a gradual coming to the light, sensing and seeing the Truth of the Gospel. Though the event of salvation is immediate in terms of receiving Jesus, Prevenient Grace" is that process of becoming aware and awake to the Gospel, enabling us to trust Christ.
(2) I believe all men have a general awareness of God -- Natural Revelation, common grace, and even conscience can and do declare that their is a God. Man can supress even that much knowledge -- and be lost. Should man response positively, the HS will, I believe, give more "light." I do NOT think, however, that a "general awareness" of God can bring one to salvation in and of itself. ONLY Jesus saves.
(3) In speaking of OT Saints I was referring to their "completeness" in spiritual matters. If you are speaking eschatologically, then Romans 9-11 clearly demonstrates that God has a purpose for Israel in the future tense. Those who have died in faith in the past tense, however, while they will be present in the MK, will not be returned to "the flesh" in the temporal sense. They will have their resurrection bodies in the MK. Thus, no "sanctification" of those bodies is needed. Those Jews who believe (and survive) during the Tribulation period -- along with the Tribulation Saints among the Gentiles -- will enter the MK in their fleshly bodies, and will be heir to (and in need of) sanctification -- even during the Kingdom Age.
Of course, that may be a discussion for another thread -- on Eschatology...
JDale -
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skypair -
And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself. - Jn. 12:32
I honestly don't preclude a possible conflation of graces or activity of regeneration with hyper-calvinist or even moderate Calvinist soteriology in comparison with Arminian soteriology. The two are actually very similar 'except' for the more elaborate teaching of grace and sunergia. -
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Let me think about how to express this with sensitivity.... :love2: -
Hello bound.
Eph 2:10 For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
LK 17:7 "Suppose one of you had a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Would he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, `Come along now and sit down to eat'? 8 Would he not rather say, `Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink'? 9 Would he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do? 10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, `We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.' "
I'll come back later as I was trying to reply to Allan.
john. -
If those who have never heard the gospel respond positively to the light they have in these three arenas, it is my belief that "prevenient grace" will bear them along, drawing them toward the Gospel. If they supress or resist the light they are given, then they are held eternally responsible for their failure, though they may never actually hear "the Gospel" (Romans 2).
JDale -
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RB:
If they respond to "the light they have" and become Scientologists or or New Agers, well, then they've supressed their knowledge of God -- the witness of their conscience, common grace and natural/general revelation, have they not? As Romans 1 testifies, " though the knew God, they glorified Him not as God...."
The only change I would make to the sentence you wrote above is, "If someone responds [positively] to whatever light they have....then they will eventually have the opportunity to hear the Gospel." Then, Prevenient Grace having enabled them to believe, they may -- or may not.
JDale
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