What is Grace?

Archangel said:

You just contradicted yourself. You said the Samaritan woman had some "expectation" of a Messiah, but this doesn't amount to "expecting" Christ.

What makes you an expert on what the Samaritans believed 2000 years ago? The woman said she knew the Messias or Christ would come, and the people of her town said they "believed" he was the Christ. This word Messiah comes from Daniel, so how can you say they didn't believe Daniel? Scripture itself shows your argument error.

If she had not believed the OT, she would not have believed Christ.

John 5:46 For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me.
47 But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?

Here Jesus asks the Jews that if they did not believe Moses's writings, how could they possibly believe on him, which absolutely implies one must have believed the OT to believe in Jesus.

Someone who has never heard the scriptures or of Jesus cannot possibly believe them or on him, that is plain common sense. But you cannot believe in Jesus and not also believe the OT, because the OT is about Jesus.

John 1:45 Philip findeth Nathanael, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.

Luke 24:27 And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

You can't say you don't believe the OT scriptures and also say you believe in Christ. You either believe all the word of God, or you don't.

 

Transorming

His word is transforming and changing us to the person God wants us to be.

 

You have to be regenerate BEFORE you can "embrace" the gospel. Otherwise, you WOULD reject it. Man is fallen. The gospel is spiritually discerned. The reason so many reject it, is because they have not been regenerated into accepting it.
I seen one poster saying that you are regenerated AFTER hearing the gospel. Then denied the saving power of the Gospel. Made no sense whatsoever.

(John 6:44) No one can come to Me, unless the Father who sent Me draws him first.

Fact is, one cannot believe and embrace the gospel if they are lost or (un regenerate). The Holy Spirit enables you to believe it upon hearing. That in itself, gives God ALL the glory.

Glory be to Him in the Highest, Christ Jesus our Lord!

 

Christ be the glory in the highest we are regenerated by the words of Christ because simple they are Spirit and life, but it gives two roads, two paths believe and be saved or don't and be condemned.

God has hidden the truth from the wise and learned. Those who come are the one's who listen and learn. The Father draws through the words of Christ which was not His own but the Fathers.

We can follow the crowd, but following a crowd does not mean we are drawn by the Father.

Glory to God the Father through Jesus Christ who Brought us the word, who wants all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth and we are the messengers.

We are dead men all of us, unregenerated before Jesus.

Praise be to Jesus in the Highest for if it wasn't for Him, no one will be, would be, or can be saved.

 

You believe that because that is what you have been taught, but that is not what the scriptures teach.

John 5:40 And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life.

Jesus shows here that you must come to him to have life (be regenerate). Coming is the same as believing as Jesus shows in John 6.

John 6:35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

The scriptures use many words to show what faith or believing is. Charles Spurgeon said he grasped the meaning of faith when he read this verse:

Isa 45:22 Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.

To believe on Jesus means to trust him, to rely upon him, to cast yourself upon him. And that is what "looking" to Jesus means also.

Now, back to John 5:40. Notice that Jesus said these persons would not come to him, that is to come in faith relying upon him, that they might have life. So, you see, you have to believe to obtain life.

John 20:31 But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.

This verse is very plain, it shows you must believe to get life. So, you must be spiritually dead when you believe, and upon believing are made alive.

Let me ask you this, when Jesus healed the sick, were they healed before they believed, or healed after they believed?

Matt 9:27 And when Jesus departed thence, two blind men followed him, crying, and saying, Thou Son of David, have mercy on us.
28 And when he was come into the house, the blind men came to him: and Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, Yea, Lord.
29 Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith be it unto you.

These blind men believed in Jesus, they called him the Son of David. They believed him to be the promised saviour that would come from David's seed.

And then in verse 28 Jesus directly asks them if they believe. Were they healed yet? No. Only AFTER believing did he heal them.

Our soul is no different. We are blind, we are sick. But if we come to Jesus in faith, only then does he heal us. If we were already healed, we would have no need to come to him.

And this is what Charles Spurgeon himself said, departing from Calvinism in this sermon.

We are not regenerated to come to Jesus, we come to be regenerated or have life.

Do you see what Spurgeon wrote here? He said it would be ridiculous to preach faith to a man who is already regenerated.

No, you must come to Jesus, that is believe in him to obtain life. Therefore faith comes before regeneration.

 

I keep forgetting that you have absolutely no sense or understanding of context. If you would have read the second paragraph and further you would have seen that I was saying the Samaritans had some expectation of a messiah, but not the divine messiah that is spoken of in the prophets. So, let me make this very plain for you: The Samaritans would have expected some type of messiah, but they would not have expected Jesus Christ as we know of Him from the entirety of the Old Testament.

You know...I also keep forgetting you were absent from Bible school the day they taught Bible. That the Samaritans held only to the Pentateuch (or the books of Moses) is common knowledge. Any good study bible, in fact, should make reference to this. You can even find this on something as simple as Wikipedia.

The funny thing here is that by denying the common knowledge that the Samaritans believed in the Pentateuch, you are setting yourself up as "an expert" in what the Samaritans believed 2000 years ago while hypocritically chiding me for the same thing...but I digress.

Actually the word the KJV translates as "Messiah" in Daniel 9:26 (and Daniel 9:25) is the word משיח which is literally "anointed one." This word appears in many contexts and it most definitely appears before Daniel. The word is not unique--it does not always refer to "Messiah" in the New Testament fulfillment. What is more the Septuagint (LXX) does not use the word "χριστος" anywhere in the Daniel passage, χριστος being the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew משיח.

So, in short, scripture is actually showing your argument to be false.

Notice that Jesus referred to "Moses," not "Moses and the Prophets." This is significant since, obviously, Jesus Himself knew that the Samaritans believed only in the Pentateuch.

Of course, Moses (ie. the Pentateuch) tells of a coming prophet. However, Moses leaves this largely undeveloped. We have to wait for David and the establishment of the Davidic dynasty to see that the Messiah would be King (that doesn't happen until the books of Samuel). We have to wait for the prophets of Jeremiah, Isiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, etc., to see what to expect of this Messiah.

Since the Samaritans didn't read or give any credence to anything after Deuteronomy, they did not know of the Messiah that the entirety of the Old Testament points to. In other words, they had no expectation of who we know as Jesus Christ.

A bit of a lesson here: Jews do not equal Samaritans. They are as different as night and day.

Certainly, Jesus should and does reference the Old Testament (outside of the Pentateuch) with Jews. But, in that tricky thing called "context"--dealing with John 4--Jesus is not talking to a Jew, but to a Samaritan who would not know anything outside of the the Pentateuch.

Again, you are dealing with apples and oranges. In the verses above, Jesus is talking to Jews, not Samaritans.

But, since you make this claim: "Someone who has never heard the scriptures or of Jesus cannot possibly believe them or on him, that is plain common sense," I will point out to you that you have now contradicted yourself, specifically your statement here:

So, on the one hand you say: Someone who has never heard the scriptures or of Jesus cannot possibly believe them or on him, that is plain common sense and on the other you say: I am not exactly sure how God saves those who have never heard of Christ. If these men recognize there is a God in heaven and look to him in trust, I imagine they are saved

Which is it?

The Archangel

 

The same could be said of the Jews, many expected him to set up a literal kingdom and defeat all of Israel's enemies.

And today we are looking for Christ's return, yet no man can say with 100% accuracy all the events that will happen in the future.

The Samaritans believed he would be the Saviour of the world, that would include them.

John 4:42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.

Why don't you just accept what the scriptures say?

Well, this shows the problem, you trust in the teachings of fallible men and even Wikipedia more than the scriptures.

Again, look up the word Messiah. It is only found in Daniel, so obviously these particular Samaritans believed Daniel.

That's not the point. If you don't believe the OT scriptures, you won't believe Jesus either. Jesus IS the Word of God.

Rev 19:13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.

Now, I'm not saying a true believer cannot be in error. You may completely believe the scriptures but be wrong on some doctrine. That is a different matter altogether. But you can't be someone who absolutely disbelieves the OT and believe in Jesus.

Well, glad to see you were honest enough to show that I was speculating and made that clear in my statement.

This is not a question unique to me, even well known scholarly Christians have asked this for centuries. How does a person who has never heard of Christ be saved? Can they be saved? Can little children who die before they are old enough to understand the gospel be saved?

Christians have been asking this for centuries, so what I said is nothing unusual at all.

All I know is this, the scriptures say all men are without excuse. The scriptures speak of "that which may be known of God is manifest in them" and that God has "shewed" it unto them. So all men have some revelation of God.

Rom 1:19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

So, this is pure speculation on my part (but other Christians have made this same speculation), that if a man comes to know and believe there is a just God in heaven who created all, and trusts in him, he would be saved.

A.H. Strong wrote: (Baptist Reformed preacher and theologian who founded the Rochester Theological Seminary)

I do not know the answer to this question. But surely it crosses the mind of any thoughtful person.

In fact, here is a whole page with many quotes from Christian scholars on this subject.

http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/469

So, you attempt to smear me, but Christians have been asking these questions for centuries. Perhaps this question never occured to you. You probably can't find that in Wikipedia.

 

Scripture

Luke 13
Repent or Perish
1Now there were some present at that time who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. 2Jesus answered, "Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other Galileans because they suffered this way? 3I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish. 4Or those eighteen who died when the tower in Siloam fell on them—do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? 5I tell you, no! But unless you repent, you too will all perish."
6Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree, planted in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it, but did not find any. 7So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I've been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven't found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?'

8" 'Sir,' the man replied, 'leave it alone for one more year, and I'll dig around it and fertilize it. 9If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.' "


We want to talk about things we cannot understand, We need to pray to God and ask Him what we can change and not to worry about what we can't and know the difference. How ever that saying goes.

 

I don't obsess on this subject, but I think every thoughtful Christian asks this question at one time or another. And it is not wrong to ask questions, else how can we learn?

Here is a pretty good article by Rudolph Gonzalez, dean of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s William R. Marshall Center for Theological Studies in San Antonio, Texas.

http://www.4truth.net/site/c.hiKXLb...ing_Those_Who_Have_Never_Heard_the_Gospel.htm

So you see, this is a very common question asked by many Christians.

 

The Samaritans only hold the Pentateuch as canonical scripture. She would not be reading Daniel. Jesus would have specifically spoken to her on the basis of the Five Books of Moses.

 

You can say whatever you want, she spoke of the Messias (Greek form of Messiah), which is only shown in Daniel.

Look up Messiah in your concordance. Where is it found?

Dan 9:25 Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, and threescore and two weeks: the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.
26 And after threescore and two weeks shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary; and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.

These are the only two instances in all the OT of the word Messiah. The Samaritian woman said she knew that Messias, who is called Christ would come, and when he did he would tell them all things.

So, how in the world can you claim this woman did not believe the prophesy of Daniel? Maybe many Samaritans did not, but she did, as well as many in her city. For what did she ask them? "Is not this the Christ?". And they affirmed later that he was.

I don't care what scholars say, this Samaritan woman believed in the promised Messiah, as so did many other Samaritans.

John 4:25 The woman saith unto him, I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.

John 4:28 The woman then left her waterpot, and went her way into the city, and saith to the men,
29 Come, see a man, which told me all things that ever I did: is not this the Christ?

John 4:42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.

It is so obvious that this woman and these other Samaritans believed in the promised Messiah, it is incredible that anyone could deny it. I would not listen to any teacher who cannot see the obvious.

And what you do not realize, is that these men fulfilled Jesus's prophesy about his sheep. His sheep were those who believed the OT scripture. And so when they heard the words of Jesus, they recognized his voice, they knew he was the Son of God and spoke the words of God.

John 10:3 To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out.
4 And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice.
5 And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers.

How do Jesus's sheep know his voice? You have to have heard someone's voice before you can recognize it. Jesus is the Word of God, all the scriptures from Genesis to Revelations are his words. These Samaritans had heard the OT scriptures and believed them. And when they heard Jesus speak they recognized his voice as the Word of God.

John 4:42 And said unto the woman, Now we believe, not because of thy saying: for we have heard him ourselves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world.

If a person did not believe the OT scriptures, they would not believe Jesus either.

John 5:45 Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father: there is one that accuseth you, even Moses, in whom ye trust.
46 For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me.
47 But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?

These Jews claimed to believe the writings of Moses, but in verse 46 Jesus shows they did not. For if they had truly believed Moses and the OT scriptures, then they would recognize his voice and believe him also.

 

No, the same thing cannot be said of the Jews expecting a literal kingdom in Jesus' day. Those Jews had wrong expectations of the Messiah. Those Jews are called unbelievers.

The Samaritans had no understanding of Christ because they didn't believe in any of the Old Testament outside of the Pentateuch. Those Samaritans are called unbelievers.

Again, you are demonstrating your ineptitude of context. If you will notice, the passage you quote comes after (as in not before) this:

"39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word."
​

So, it is after the testimony of the Samaritan woman (which was after Jesus spoke to her) and it is after Jesus Himself stayed with the Samaritans and spoke to them over the course of two days.

The Samaritans came to know Christ as the Savior after meeting Him, not before--that is what the scripture says.

If something as "common" as Wikipedia knows that the Samaritans only held to the Pentateuch it is "common knowledge."

That the Samaritans held to the Pentateuch only is not "teachings of fallible men." Rather it is a simple fact of History.

You know, it's funny...on the one hand you claim to be KJV only (the word Messiah being in the Old Testament only two times and those being in Daniel 9:25-26) but earlier you referenced the meaning of the word Messiah and talk about "Greek." You said here: Messias is the Greek form of Messiah predicted in Daniel

Unfortunately, your above quote only serves to demonstrate that you have no clue as to what you are talking about.

First off the Greek equivalent of the word you are referring to is "Christos," not "Messiah." In Greek, Christos means "anointed one." In Hebrew the word Masiah (pronounced "Maa-shee--ach," with phlegm on the 'ach.') means "anointed one." The word translated "messiah" in Daniel 9 is the word Masiah and that is not the first occurrence.

In fact, this word is used 117 times in the Old Testament. It refers to priests, kings, etc. It is used of anyone who was anointed. Incidentally, that word is only used 4 times in the Pentateuch and it never refers to one coming in the future. It always is used referring to the anointed priest. What is more, of the 117 uses of the word 114 occur before Daniel 9.

The translators of the KJV were inflecting their own interpretation of the literal meaning of the word onto the text. So, it would appear you are basing your interpretation on the teachings of men, not the text itself.

No. That Jews do not equal Samaritans is exactly the point. You are applying a "Jewish" context to a "Samaritan" passage. Since the Samaritans didn't hold to the entirety of the Old Testament and the Jews did, the context of talking to these people or groups individually is completely and totally different.

I'm not attempting to smear you. Why would I do that when you don't need any help in that endeavor? You yourself have made two contradictory statements:

These are your own words. Notice that in your first quote above says "I am not exactly sure how God saves those who have never heard of Christ." You may not be exactly sure of the mechanism, but what your own words affirm is that you believe God will save persons who have never heard of Christ. If you were speculating, as you claim you were, you would have said "I am not exactly sure if God saves those who have never heard of Christ."

Unless you misspoke, your struggle is not if God will save those who have never heard of Christ, your struggle is how He will do it, because you, by your own words, have shown us you believe God will, in fact, save those who have never heard of Christ. And that is heresy, pure and simple.

The Archangel

 

Amazing, you are totally oblivious to scripture. The woman said she knew the Messias who is called Christ would come. She went into the city and told everyone of Jesus and asked, "Is not this the Christ?". And then when these Samaritans heard Jesus speak they said they indeed believed he was the Christ, the Saviour of the World.

Amazing how that can go in one ear and out the other.

 

First, I am not what you call KJVO. I am not a follower of Ruckman and his teachings. But I believe the KJB is the only accurate translation in English.

People who believe in the KJB believe in the original languages. But as you well know, there are two different sources of Greek manuscripts, the line from Antioch, and the line from Alexandria, the Received Text and the Critical Text. The KJB is the only English Bible that came from the Received Text. This is the source I believe. I believe the Critical Text originating from Alexandria to be corrupt.

 

The Gospel is not just words, it is the Sacrifice of Christ that saves- The death (the shedd blood) the burial, and the resurrection. If one could be regenerated without the Gospel Then why did Christ Die for our sin???? You cannot separate Christ's Sacrifice on the Cross and the glorious Power of His Resurrection from the Regenerating work of the Holy Spirt who imparts the Christ life to us at the moment of belief.

 

I agree with this statement.... however this does not equal regeneration before Salvation....it equates to the fact that the Holy Spirit is convicting sinners and convinceing men/women of their need to be saved.

 

First, there is no reason to think that she spoke to Jesus in Greek. All the New Testment books were written in Greek, but that does not mean that every direct quotation was initially verbalized in Greek. Most of the Gospel dialog was likely originally uttered in Aramaic.

Second, the Hebrew term of the Daniel verses you cite is mashiyach (Strong's #4899) and it means 'annointed' or 'annointed one' (and is translated thus in the KJV 37 times, four of those in Leviticus). The woman at the well probably pronounced an Aramaic equivalent of mashiyach, NOT messias. The Greek term for 'annointed' is xristos (Strong's #5547), Christ in English. According to John 1:41 (KJV) --

He first findeth his own brother Simon, and saith unto him, We have found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, the Christ. ​

More accurately, there is only two instances of the English word "Messiah" in the KJV's Old Testament text.

 

I agree and have said this before. This is why I say the scriptures themselves prove that a translation does not have to contain error, or the original Greek autographs would contain error, because they are often a translation from Aramaic. And in the OT, the Hebrew text was often a translation from another language such as Pharoah's and Joseph's words in Egyptian, or the words of Nebuchadnezzar. I seriously doubt Nebuchadnezzar was speaking in Hebrew when he spoke to Daniel.

So what? You are doting over words now. She knew and believed the prophesy of Daniel, and so did the other Samaritans in her town. Or do you wish to correct the scriptures and take out the word "Messias" here? You don't have to be a scholar to understand she is speaking of the Messiah spoken of by Daniel.

Again, so what? Do you think that people are ignorant that our scriptures have been translated into English?

I don't understand why some here seem to attack the scriptures. It says "Messias", and I believe that is what it is supposed to say. If you believe God preserved his inerrant word, then what it says is what it is supposed to say. Matthew Henry did not have a problem with this passage and said the Samaritans expected the Messiah spoken of by Daniel.

Matthew Henry didn't question whether the translation was correct or not.

 

What is truly amazing is how you can ignore historical fact in a feeble attempt to deny how wrong you actually are. That the Samaritans believed only in the Pentateuch is an historical fact that is attested to by many, many sources. Interestingly enough, the passage (John 4) attests to this as well. Why did the Samaritans worship on Mt. Gerizim? Because they had their own version of the Pentateuch that named Mt. Gerizim, rather than Mt. Ebal as the place to build an altar.

In the Old Testament, it was forbidden to build your own temple, place of sacrifice, etc. So, that the Samaritans worshiped on Mt. Gerizim, and not Jerusalem, is proof that they did not believe in anything outside the Pentateuch. You are hopelessly wrong.

I will repeat my former question which you so conveniently forgot to address:

These are your own words. Notice that in your first quote above says "I am not exactly sure how God saves those who have never heard of Christ." You may not be exactly sure of the mechanism, but what your own words affirm is that you believe God will save persons who have never heard of Christ. If you were speculating, as you claim you were, you would have said "I am not exactly sure if God saves those who have never heard of Christ."

Unless you misspoke, your struggle is not if God will save those who have never heard of Christ, your struggle is how He will do it, because you, by your own words, have shown us you believe God will, in fact, save those who have never heard of Christ. And that is heresy, pure and simple.

The Archangel

 

Tomato--tomatoe

To say in one breath that you are not KJVO and then to state that the KJV is the only accurate translation is both hypocritical and characteristically double-minded.

The Archangel