Question of Revelation and Galatians, OSAS

Gal 1 insists that there is only ONE Gospel in both OT and NT ages - not TWO -- not one for OT and another for NT.

Gal 3 says it was THIS Gospel that was preached to Abraham.

Gal 5 shows the real life failure of those who were "SEVERED from Christ" and "FALLEN from Grace".

John wrote Rev and the book of John. In John 15 he identifies the problem of those who are REMOVED from Christ - who then die and are burned in the fire.

In Rev 12 and 14 it is the "PERSEVERANCE of the saints" that shows the successful case of the Gospel in the Christian life.

In Rev 3 Christ is on the OUTSIDE and the sinner is "alone and on the inside" - the sinner must CHOOSE to open the door and THEN fellowship with Christ results (i.e. Salvation).

in Christ,

Bob

 

Hi Guys, I have been away from the BB since last November. It seems this topic of OSAS will be debated until Jesus comes. I could go into the scriptures that have been cited and show a different perspective but I would rather address this issue from a standpoint that is not discussed often but can really clear things up quickly. Think about "election". We see in the NT references like "elect", "chosen", "ordained", "chose", "predestined", etc... Believers are the elect of God. We did not choose God for as sinners we would do no such thing. God has chosen us. When I really think about that I almost tremble because I was and am so unworthy of that calling. I don't know why he chose me but he did. From the beginning of the OT to the end of the new God has chosen those who are his. He chose Isreal, he chose Paul, etc... Follow this now it is soooo important. God would never choose someone he knew was not spending eternity with Him. It would make no sense at all. What God has chosen he would and does choose forever. He knows everything. The elect are His forever, there is no logic in any other thinking about that. Lets say Peter denied God, Oh wait he did but he was chosen. Had he died before he repented of that denial he would still be in heaven. You see, we all will fail in our lives. We are that needy. Luther said: "We are beggars, it is true". Be amazed and thankful you are God's elect and go and serve His creation, especially His people.

All Scripture must be viewed from this perspective and then you can start to see what the verses mean. Looked at without thinking about "election" can cloud our understanding.

In Love and Truth,
Brian

 

There are lot of condition passages with warning in Revelation.

1# Revelation 2:4-5 "Neverthless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love. Remember therefore whence thou are fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else, I will come unto thee quickly, and will REMOVE thy candlestick OUT OF HIS PLACE, except thou repent."

'First love' speak of the beginning of salvation.

OSAS argued, 'person is not saved at the first place.

Like as they argued, Judas the Iscariot was not saved at the place.

But, Christ tells us, a truly just person can leave from the first love. Many just people(believers) can fall away. Christ commands us that, we must repent and back to the first love and works. OR, Christ will come on us quickly(speak of 'thief in the night' at His coming), and Christ would remove{/B] us out of his place(speak of God's kingdom), means we can be removed away and cast away into lake of fire, unless, if we repent.

2# Revelation 2:10-11 "Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer, behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried; and ye shall have tribulation ten days: be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life. ***He that hath an ear, let him HEAR what the Spirit saith unto the churches, He that overcomethSHALL NOT BE HURT OF THE SECOND DEATH."

It tells us, anyone of us is facing persecutions or tribulations in a short period. We must be endure through persecutions and suffering till death, then shall receive the crown of life. Rev. 2:11 warns us, we have an ear, LET us KNOW the warning. If we overcoming them in our life till at our death, then we shall not suffer the second death - lake of fire. OR, if we fail to overcome them in our life at death, we shall suffer second death in the lake of fire!

3# Revelation 2:16-17 "Repent; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will fight against them with the sword of my mouth. He that hath an ear, LET HIM HEAR what the Spirit saith unto the churches, To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it."


This telling us, If we do not repent, then Christ will come upon us quickly, we have an ear, LET US KNOW the warning, if we overcomeing them, Christ shall give us eterna life, and our name will be written in the book of life. IF we fail to ovecome them in our life, and we shall not have eteernal life, and our name will not be written in the book of life.

4# Revelation 2:25-29 "But that which ye have already hold fast till I come. And he that overcometh, and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power ovee the nations: And he shall rule them with a road of iron; as the vessels of a potter shall they be broken to shivers: even as I received of my Father. And I will give him the morning star. He that hath an ear, LET HIM HEAR what the Spirit saith unto the churches."

Christ tells us, we must hold fast till He comes, and we must overcome the wold, and keep His commandments. If we do them, Christ shall give us as rulers and to be reign with Christ on new earth. Or, if we fail to overcome them, and not keep His commandments, we will not reign with Christ on new earth, and we will be cast away in the lake of fire. We have an ear, we MUST KNOW the warning.

5# ***Revelation 3:2-6 "Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to di: for I have not found thy works perfect before God. Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. IF therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee. Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy. ****He that overcometh; the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before his angels."

This passage warn us, we must watch and ready, and repent. Or, Christ shall come upon us quickly as thief, and if we fail to overcome the world in our life, Christ will REMOVED our name out of the book of life, and cast us away in the lake of fire. We have an ear, WE MUST TAKE HEED AND KNOW the warning.

Tomorrow, I will post more list of Revelation on condition.

See, Christ talked of conditional with warning, it is apply to us as church. If we fail to endure, hold fast, overcome, and repent, then our name will be removed out of the book of life, and cast away in the lake of fire.

There are lot of conditional warnings kin Revelaiton. No way, we can afford to neglect or twist what Christ saying. We have to accept and take heed Christ's words.

In Christ
Rev. 22:20 -Amen!

 

Don't take the messages that were given to the various churches and try to apply them to the individual.

 

Why does "he" who has "an ear" have to "hear" (those are all individual) what the Spirit has said if it was directed not at the individual, but at the "church"?

Tali good to hear from you. The struggles with security come from a fundamental lack of understanding of what salvation is and what it is not. Already you have seen two people on this thread that believe a person can be saved and then a person can be unsaved.

You will also have people that believe that a person can not stop believing and therefore will always be saved because they will always believe and more people that will say that a Christian can't commit certain sins, because that would prove they were unsaved in the first place and all sorts of things like that.

The language of Scripture is such that faith leading to the reception of everlasting life (saved) is a moment in a person's life where they believe/trust that Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, died and shed His blood on their behalf a sinner. Scripture says that the very moment a person believes this they are saved. It never says they are saved until they stopped believing or they prove they really and truly believed if they don't do certain things.

It just simply says that if you believe you are saved. That's really the end of the discussion when it comes to receiving everlasting life. All the work was done on your behalf, you merely have to believe in the provision that was made for you. If you do you are saved.

You can never become unsaved, because God does not require that you continue to believe this although the vast majority do, it is not a requirement.

I would be more than happy to discuss this more indepth with you offline. Feel free to email me! God's blessings to you and your family!!! I hope they are well.

 

Wonderful- is this the part where we take out our scissors and cut out the pages of scripture that are full of warnings to the saints about "being severed from Christ" and "falling from Grace" and "forgiveness revoked" etc?

Because if it is - I don't think i want to walk out on that limb with you on this one.

But imagine this for just a second - suppose we read your suggested idea above - and then when turning to the Bible we found that all those warnings about falling from Grace and being severed from Christ "were not in the Bible at all" -- what a wonderful thing we would have in that case. It would be a Bible that fits the solution you proposed.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Hi Bob, its been a long time. Somehow I didn't think you would be on my side of the fence. :tongue3: Yes, there are verses of warning but also so there are plenty of verses on security. I can hammer the warning verses and you can beat up on the security verses and we are left with needing to understand conceptually what God is teaching us and what God's character is. You didn't refute what I said in concept. You just eluded to the fact that there are warnings in the Scriptures. My main thing is that we are chosen of God and that God would not chose someone who He knew would be lost. The elect are the elect. I would like to have you deal with just that concept. We know the multitude of times that the elect words are used and so there is a great need to understan what it means. Understanding this can be difficult because of its implications but it does tie together all the other Scriptual concepts that Christian seem to disagree on. I'll give you the chance to respond just to that issue, as I stated. To believe a Saved person can be lost is to believe that God elects some to Glory but then they never make it to Glory and that God elcts people to something He already knows they won't obtain. Bob, help me to grasp that belief because I just can't figure out how I would make that work in my logical understanding of things.

In Christ,
Brian

 

Briguy - surely you would admit that were this a Calvinist-vs-Arminian thread I would be arguing something like -

God knows ALL - he knows who will persevere firm until the end and he also knows those who like the man in Matt 18 will be fully forgiven - fail to forgive others and then have forgiveness revoked.

God is not willing for ANY to perish but for ALL to come to repentance.

God loved Adam and Lucifer as much as He loves us - and this did not stop Him from Creating them nor allowing them to fall into condemnation. God has sovereignly chosen to create a "free will system".

God sent His son as the "Atoning Sacrifice" for OUR sins and not for OUR sins only but for the sins of the whole world 1John 2:2

etc etc.

So I am simply coming back to the point that it is the warning texts of scripture that warn against losing salvation that are at issue when one is arguing for OSAS because it is specifically THOSE texts that debunk that idea.

I don't see any way around dealing with them to argue the case of OSAS.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Briguy,

God knows who are elect.

But, not all elect people will go to heaven.

Matthew 24:24 warns, watch out for false prophets, false teachers, will do miracles, if possible to deceive the very elect. This tells us, it could be happen to any elect that, they might be deceived.

In 2 Peter 1:10-11 say, "Wherefore the rather, brethren, GIVE DILIGENCE to make your calling and election sure: for IF ye do these things, ye shall never fall. For so an ENTRANCE shall be ministered unto you abundantly INTO the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."

Peter tells us, we must be serious and business to make our call and election be sure, for IF we do these, so, we shall not fall away. Or, if we fall away, then we would be doubt of our call and election.

Clear this is conditional.

Also, Peter says, if we do these things, then we shall received blessing and reward into everlasting life with Christ.
Or, if we fall, then we shall not have eternal life with Christ.

Bible teaching us that, we must be endure and obey the Bible, to follow Christ's commandments till the end, and to make sure our call and election, lest us be fall away.

In Christ
Rev. 22:20 -Amen!

 

Deafpostrib, Thanks for your post. It seems to me that you have made what I think of as the Catholic mistake. You have placed conditions on grace which by nature has to be unconditional. You seem to have put the keeping of your salvation in your own hands. Frankly, if my remaining saved is actually up to me then I am scared to death. I am saved and kept saved by the faithfulness of jesus not by my own faithfulness. My faith will waiver off and on until I am with Jesus. As it says in Hebrews, Jesus is our anchor, sure and steadfast. He saved me and keeps me saved because only He is perfect and is able to do that. Paul said he did what he did not want to do. Peter denied jesus 3 times. Thomas saw the miracles
yet doubted to the point of placing his fingers in Christ's wounds. We are very weak and that is why jesus had to come. He did a complete job for He is SURE and STEADFAST, we are never either while we have these bodies. Hope that made sense and fit with my other posts. We are called to service once we are saved and we are told there are rewards for that service. We are warned that we need to show our love for God to others. Working out our salvation comes after we have salvation, it does not lead to it. Oh, one other thing. The Greek word for "IF" is also the same word for "when". I am having a mind blank so if it is not when it is a similiar word like that. anyway, that may be a way to read the scripture you posted with a more proper meaning. If the intended meaning is "if" I could certainly offer a different interpretation of the verse that keeps in line with what i have said.

Bob, which "warning verse" do you think presents the biggest stumbling block to OSAS? Give me the verse and I will address it. I would then like to present you with a verse that I believe proves what I have said and would like you to respond. Hope that is OK. Finally, I don't think you really addressed the end of my last post when I said what believing as you do forces a person to say about God, that being that God elects those for Glory but they dod not see Glory.

Oh, that reminds me that the verse that was posted on the elect is not saying the elect could be deceived to the point of losing salvation, it just points out the strength and determination of the enemy. The elect cannot be touched for we are in the very HAND OF GOD.

In Christian Love,
Brian

 

Maybe Peter was wrong?:type:

Nope - that can't be it -- he had to be right.

Good post.

in Christ,

Bob

 

Ok ... Pick any one of the these 3

1. Matt 18 "Forgiveness revoked".

2. John 15 "branches removed from Christ and burned"

3. Gal 5:4 Severed from Christ -- fallen from Grace



Or else pick this one --


Best argument – to date: (Against “no-perseverance” group of OSAS)

MMAN –

II Pet 2:20-22, "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."

http://www.baptistboard.com/showpost.php?p=1034131&postcount=9


SOME of the OSAS people claim to believe in eternal hell and to believe that this failure to persevere simply means that you are “OSAS Saved anyway but without persevering”.

Question:
HOW can it be WORSE? Worse to live with Christ forever than burn in hell forever??

First of all it is very much "ok with me" to have me address your texts proving OSAS. Turnabout is fair play.

As for God "choosing" - Israel was chosen by God with forever promises of His Word and His Spirit - and yet they failed.

This is not because God did not know the future - it is because God promotes free will as central to His creation.

Lucifer,
Adam,
Israel,

All very good examples of God's chosing - and God's selecting free will.

in Christ,

Bob

 

If knowing the commandments is what saves a person I guess everybody that has ever heard it is saved. Hey, even the devil knows it!
It is not enough to know it. Ye must be born again!
Luke 11:24 When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he saith, I will return unto my house whence I came out.
25 And when he cometh, he findeth [it] swept and garnished.
26 Then goeth he, and taketh [to him] seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there: and the last [state] of that man is worse than the first.

When someone hears the Word and acknowledges it as such, they know the Holy commandment. No doubt, during this time the unclean spirit departs or as verse 24 states this is the time when the unclean spirit is gone out of a man.
If the individual doesn't receive Christ into their heart at this time and be filled with the Holy Spirit, the unclean spirit will return. Upon his arrival he finds the person swept and garnished, or as Matthew 12:44 states; Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth [it] empty, swept, and garnished.
He heard and knew the Father's will, yet failed to accept Christ into his heart. Since the devil returned and the heart was empty, the devil invited seven other spirits to join in.
No wonder when a person rejects Christ their lifestyle waxes worse and worse.

So, Bro. Bob although someone may know the way of righteousness is Jesus Christ as in II Pet 2:20-22 that doesn't mean they are saved and the unclean spirit returning with seven of his buddies is equivalent to the dog returning to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returning to wallow in the mire.

 

II Pet 2:20-22, "For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them


here we see this is "knowing Christ" and also "Knowing the way of righteousness" and also "knowing the holy commandment".

If "knowing Christ" is "still being lost" then you have spun Peter's warning into a warning to the LOST about the danger of becoming lostER.

But the Bible never presents its gospe message as being a message about the "the optimum way to be lost" - yet this is exactly the kind of spin that you need to put on the text if your going to cling to OSAS no matter what the text says.

in Christ,

Bob

 

II Peter 2:17 These are wells without water, clouds that are carried with a tempest; to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever.

The these of verse 17 are the same they of verse 20.

Peter himself admits theyare empty.

In fact if you look at the statements made about the they of verses 20 through 22, after verse 9 where he states, "The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations," you'll find that there are alot of uncomplimentary things said about the they of verse 20. Doesn't sound like a saved lot to me!

 

It is clear that Peter points to their present state as being lost. that is not the part that is denied by those who cling to OSAS.

It is their FORMER state where they KNEW Christ and so had fully ESCAPED the defilements of this sinful world that OSAS needs to deny. For Peter shows that they go from that SAVED state to THEN return to a sinful life EVEN after having escaped and having come to the knowledge of Christ so that NOW they are "clouds without water" and they are in fact in a WORSE condition than if they never had escaped - never had come to a knowledge of Christ.

To focus on their PRESENT lost state only - is to ignore their FORMER state where they HAD ESCAPED the defilements of this sinful world via the Gospel "Good News" of coming to a saving knowledg of Christ (which is in fact the only way of escape).

 

I guess you don't pay very good attention.
Luke 11-26 Then goeth he, and taketh [to him] seven other spirits more wicked than himself; and they enter in, and dwell there: and the last [state] of that man is worse than the first.

 

Again you are ignoring what the text says --

1. the demon possessed state -- LOST
2. The CLEANSED state - NO demons, victory - freedom - SAVED
3. The Demon Possessed state - LOST

The Bible is not trying to argue for "a BETTER way to be LOST" - this is not the point of the Gospel!!

Rather the Gospel is God's means used to "seek and SAVE the Lost".

When you spin Peter's statement about "ESCAPING the defilement and sin of the world through the knowledge of Christ" into "JUST another way to be LOST" you stand scripture on it's head!

IF you are unbiased objective and serious about accepting the scripture given in 2Peter 2 -- then SHOW any place in all of scripture where the Gospel message is "Escaping the Defilements of the World through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is simply another way to remain LOST"!

Rather than merely ASSUMING this horrific doctrinal position - why not SHOW that it is EVER taught in scripture before latching onto it in a "deny-all for OSAS" attempt??!

in Christ,

Bob

 

Peter is very clear about this.

Any time your doctrinal bias forces you to spin the Gospel around when IT speaks of "having ESCAPED the defilement of the sinful world through the knowledge of Christ" into "just another LOST condition" you have a glaring red flag indicating your doctrinal error.

How could this POSSIBLY be missed??

How steeped in man-made tradition does one have to be to "not notice that"???

in Christ,

Bob