What do you believe is required for Salvation?

Well said Luke.....Indeed a true Gospel Warrior!

Here is what the lot dont understand, The whole emphasis is upon what God does to us: not what man does, but what God does to us; not our hold of Him but 'His strong grasp of us'.

Brother Luke, scripture says "In no way be alarmed by your opponents" I appreciate your posts & will read some of those books & articles you suggested privately..... Keep fighting for the true faith dear brother!

Jesus Saves

 

Complete strawman. Your camp doesn't hold the patent on "what God does to us".

Only a calvinist would consider anyone not one an "opponent" instead of a brother You sound like a Sith Lord.

The "true faith" is salvation by grace alone through Christ alone...not your mechanics on how you arrive to that.

 

Even an "opponent" can be a "brother" in a theological disagreement. I don't know of any saved people who are instant theologions when they were born again. I didn't even know what election was when I was saved. The experience of salvation is God revealing to you that you are a sinner and that Christ is the sufficient provision for your salvation and embracing that revelation from God by repentance from sin and faith in Jesus Christ as revealed in the gospel. You may not believe in unconditional election but if you have received that revelation from God and embraced it with repentance and faith you are my "brother" even though you may be also my "opponent" in this particular discussion.

 

False. Unregenerate man can do many good things, Jesus himself said so.

Luke 6:32 For if ye love them which love you, what thank have ye? for sinners also love those that love them.
33 And if ye do good to them which do good to you, what thank have ye? for sinners also do even the same.

In verse 32 Jesus says sinners can love. In verse 33 Jesus says sinners can do good. No, he said sinners actually love and do good!

Loving people that love you is not evil, it is good. But Jesus is saying it is even greater to love those that do not love you. However, this does not negate that loving those that love you is good, it is. And doing good to those who do good to you is good, although it is even better to do good to those who do not do good to you. Still, it is always good to do good to anyone, anytime.

God said Cain could do well and would be accepted. I hardly believe God would accept something sinful.

Gen 4:6 And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen?
7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.

Cain was unregenerate, yet God himself said he could do well. Cain was not enslaved to sin, God said Cain would rule over sin.

When the scriptures say that every imagination of man was evil, that is not saying man is incapable of having good imaginations, it is simply stating the fact that at that time every man's imagination was evil.

Gen 5:5 And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

Genesis 5:5 does not say or teach that unregenerate man is utterly incapable of doing any good. You are teaching this verse to say something it does not say.

Matt 7:11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

We are all evil, we are all sinners, but Jesus said we know how to give "good" gifts. Jesus knew what he was saying, if unregenerate man is utterly incapable of doing any good things, Jesus would not have said this.

When Jesus said there is none good but God, he is speaking of perfect righteousness. No one but God is completely without sin. But that does not mean that unregenerate man is utterly incapable of doing some good things.

 

You are pitting scriptures against scriptures. You know very well that Jesus also said "there is none good but one and that is God" and that Paul said "there is none that doeth good, no, not one."

Therefore, in order to harmonize these scriptures there must be two different definitions of "good" or we have the Bible contradicting the the Bible.

In those contexts where it is clearly and explicitly denied that man can do "good" it has reference to the unregenerated man and in regard to the doctrine of justification.

In those contexts where it is clearly and explicitly stated that man can do "good" it is in the context of relative "good" as perceived by men or God produced "good" through regenerated men.

In the context of justification in regard to unregenerated men, it is a denial of intrinsic good or the ability to do anything from the right motive "the glory of God" as sin is "coming short of the glory of God."

In regard to relative goodness or comparative goodness among men there are certain "good" versus "evil" men and all levels in between.

 

In regard to relative goodness it is good that we close this thread after 35 pages of debate, well after a limit of 30 pages.