When are Christians forgiven?

No, I don't believe that you can or else we all would lose it and never be able to get it back. Eternal life is just that eternal.

Thanks for your honesty. I had not put much thought into this either when I first heard this presented to me. I had been taught all my christian life that we had to confess or else lose fellowship with God. Only when I was challenged otherwise did I really notice that the NT was void of any discussion about being in and out of fellowship with God for a saved person. It either said we were In Christ, or not in Christ there is no alternative.

I do urge you to study God's Word about it. Please don't take my word for it, always search His Word!

This statement is not all together false. If we sin, it should greive us, but only to serve one purpose, as a reminder that we are not walking in the Spirit. The sin we commited has no punishment, for Christ's blood is covering that sin. The conviction of the Holy Spirit is there to simply remind us, discipline us if you will, that we are walking in the flesh not the Spirit. So now what? How do I "get back" to walking in the Spirit? I just do it.

Confessing means merely agreeing with God that it is sin. Confession does not require penance or begging nor does it require us to ask for something we already have. We have already been forgiven, so confessing simple means saying "Yes, that is sin and that has no part in my life because I am a child of God. I need to repent of that sin and return to walking in the Spirit."

What punishment did I receive for that sin? From God, there was none. I will always have to reap the consequences of sin, which will cause hurt and so forth, but there is no more punishment for sin in a child of God.

As I mentioned before, repentance is an action, not a time of retrospection. No where are we instructed to spend time going over and over all the sins we have commited. God knows them, he just wants us to stop them and move on. So repent simply means to turn from that behavior.

I am not sure how some of you raise children, but with mine, I discipline them when necessary, but I never break my fellowship with them. Even if they are doing something that I don't agree with, they are still apart of my family and welcome in my home. Though I may not tolerate the behavior, my love and fellowship with them is based upon that love alone, not the works that they do for me. How much greater is God's love for His children, whom he accepted by Christ's sacrifice alone and that alone will be sufficient to keep them in His family.

I thank you for the discussion. May God's grace bless you as you study for yourself how true believers are always in fellowship with Him!

~Lorelei