We must have continuing faith

[~candice~]

This is stemming from a chat discussion and is being posted with the express understanding of those involved (myself and Shiloh357).

Faith is the conduit by which we access salvation by grace. Grace is the saving agent. Faith is how we access it. Now, if faith is the conduit, I maintain that continuing faith must be maintained in order to maintain access to His saving grace. In other words, if you have no faith at a given point in time, you have no access to salvation by grace, regardless of what faith you have had in the past. That necessarily makes me OSNAS. It means I believe that a person can move temporally from faith to faithlessness (and back again), and also infers that this move cuts a person off from His saving grace.

So, using this as the framework, how is it possible for a person to move from faith to faithlessness and yet not cease to have access to His saving grace? Related, who maintains our faith? Us, or Him, or both? This not asking who maintains our salvation, but who maintains our faith.

[Smalcald]

Well I believe it is possible based on scripture to reject His grace, even if at one time we may have thought we had faith ( I don't know what that means theologically).

However what you describe I don't think is possible. We can reject faith but we don't create faith, if we maintained our faith it would be a work. God by His grace calls us directly, as scripture says we were dead, but the dead can't save themselves by doing anything.

I don't think we fade in and out of faith in our life, we would live in a constant state of terror if this was the case anyway. I do think we can pro-actively refuse to submit to His will for our life though.

[OneLight]

Purposely rejecting Christ is not the same as "losing faith". The term losing faith is wide open for defining. Does one "lose faith" when they are completely engulfed by discouragement brought on by outside influences, as in losing a job, spouse cheating, robbed, raped ... etc? Is "faith" just a fickle emotion one feels one day and not the next? Or is "faith" something that we are fed in spirit by His word and His Spirit? I chose not to accept the first two explanation and hang onto the last. To me, losing faith is kin to not having such a fire for the Lord. In this case, it is because I chose to not walk in a close relationship with Christ, yet I still know He is God. He is still able to keep me when this is the case. I can be "at the ends of my rope" and still hanging on by a string, not willing to let go, and He is able to keep me.

On the other hand, if I deliberately deny Him in my mind and heart, making a conscious rejection of the possibility that He even exists, even after once believing, I can lose my salvation by rejecting it. This is not losing anything, but making a decision to turn away. This also makes me OSNAS.

So in answering the base of your question, if I am reading it correctly, no, one can not lose faith and lose salvation. One cannot "lose" salvation, it has to be a fully committed decision on ones part.

[other one]

Well I believe it is possible based on scripture to reject His grace, even if at one time we may have thought we had faith ( I don't know what that means theologically).

However what you describe I don't think is possible. We can reject faith but we don't create faith, if we maintained our faith it would be a work. God by His grace calls us directly, as scripture says we were dead, but the dead can't save themselves by doing anything.

I don't think we fade in and out of faith in our life, we would live in a constant state of terror if this was the case anyway. I do think we can pro-actively refuse to submit to His will for our life though.

If you only think you have faith, it would seem that you only thought you were saved and never really were.

The whole subject is so dependent on what salvation really is, for we know that there are people who think they are saved and the Lord rejects, and there are others that are doing things that Paul says they turn over to Satan for the destruction of their bodies so that the soul can be saved....... it's really rather confusing to me. We say that salvation is grace given by God and it is freely given, but there are those who were doing iniquity and Jesus rejects even though they were doing miracles and casting out demons.

If we don't follow Jesus's teachings and live by his commandments it is possible that he will withhold grace. We know that we can do nothing to deserve salvation...... we also know that we can't do anything to achieve it by ourselves...... but do we expect Him to give that salvation to just anyone who says Lord Lord. Scripture says no.

So,,,, what is the answer????? I can at least feel safe if I do make Him my Lord and live by the things he told me to do in his word, develop a relationship through the Spirit so that I know he lives within me....... and leave the theology to someone else. By doing the best that I can..... and leaving the rest to Him, what will come is what will come.......

Can you achieve salvation doing less than this..... i don't know...... and I surely don't intend to find out.

[Guest]

This is stemming from a chat discussion and is being posted with the express understanding of those involved (myself and Shiloh357).

Faith is the conduit by which we access salvation by grace. Grace is the saving agent. Faith is how we access it. Now, if faith is the conduit, I maintain that continuing faith must be maintained in order to maintain access to His saving grace. In other words, if you have no faith at a given point in time, you have no access to salvation by grace, regardless of what faith you have had in the past. That necessarily makes me OSNAS. It means I believe that a person can move temporally from faith to faithlessness (and back again), and also infers that this move cuts a person off from His saving grace.

So, using this as the framework, how is it possible for a person to move from faith to faithlessness and yet not cease to have access to His saving grace? Related, who maintains our faith? Us, or Him, or both? This not asking who maintains our salvation, but who maintains our faith.

Hello,

Many years ago a brother in Chirist and who also became a very good friend shared with me Romans 7 & 8. There were two things that really struck me quite hard as it seemed inconceivable that anyone would ever care this much. Romans 8:26 & 27 speak of how in my weakness, the Spirit himself intercedes for me. I really didn't know the extent of how far God's love goes. I only knew what He did at the cross. Please don't misunderstand me, my day at the cross was one I'll never forget, but what followed was the beginning of learning how to live a very different life than the one I was accustomed to. The following verses (#28 -30), were so completely different from what I had known in my life. God would finish what He began in me. He wouldn't throw me out the door(if rebellious and unwilling to listen to Him). To me, that was a big one! All I had known was rejection due to my behaviour. It was and still is difficult for me to imagine that God would still love me after all I've done. I mean the idolatry, turning from Him to trust something else. During those times, I still knew what I was doing was completely opposite of what God would want from me. Yet He still loved me. The fact I can sit here today and share of Who I believe keeps my "faith," I believe is a testimony to His saving grace, as stated in verses 28-30. It's all Him, there is nothing I can do expect listen to His voice and follow.

I wanted to ask, but what does OSNAS mean?

I hope I was clear in my answer to your question.

God bless,

Randal

[Guest shiloh357]

Faith is the conduit by which we access salvation by grace. Grace is the saving agent. Faith is how we access it. Now, if faith is the conduit, I maintain that continuing faith must be maintained in order to maintain access to His saving grace.

You maintain based upon what express scriptural support? Nothing in Scripture says that.

In other words, if you have no faith at a given point in time, you have no access to salvation by grace, regardless of what faith you have had in the past. That necessarily makes me OSNAS. It means I believe that a person can move temporally from faith to faithlessness (and back again), and also infers that this move cuts a person off from His saving grace.

I think the key word here is "infer." You are making inferences about what you think the Bible says, but you need to build a systematic platform from the Scriptures.

So, using this as the framework, how is it possible for a person to move from faith to faithlessness and yet not cease to have access to His saving grace? Related, who maintains our faith? Us, or Him, or both? This not asking who maintains our salvation, but who maintains our faith.

That is the wrong question.

You are trying to make salvation depend on YOU staying faithful. If at any time you are no longer faithful, the grace pipeline spicket is turned off. That is not how salvation works.

You are making faith the agent of salvation by making salvation depend on your level of faithfulness. I think you are confusing saving faith with faithfulness. Continuing faith or "faithfulness" is the result of salvation, not how it is maintained. As I said in chat, salvation is maintained on the server side by a faithful God who keeps His promises even when we fail. It is His grace that picks us up, forgives us and sets us back on the right course. He keeps us; we do not keep ourselves.

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.

(Eph 2:8-9)

Notice the phrase "and that not of yourselves." The act of being saved does not have its source with you either in your faith or in what you do. It's source is solely the grace of God. Your faith was what let you say "yes," to the Gospel. It really has nothing to do with you in terms of how salvation was engineered or how it works in your life. You simply receive it, the Holy Spiirit transforms your heart and plants a desire within you to live in holiness toward God.

From the Greek, the concept of salvation has the connotations of deliverance, healing, restoration, security and preservation. All of that comes from His grace and is offered to us freely. It is a 100% free gift; it is ours for the asking. None of that hinges on us having all of our ducks in a row and living in perfect faithfulness. If living in perfect faithfulness was what it takes, then Jesus wasted His time on the cross.

None of us live in perfect faithfulness all of the time. If salvation depends on us being faithfulness every minute, no one could be saved.

[mizzdy]

This is stemming from a chat discussion and is being posted with the express understanding of those involved (myself and Shiloh357).

Faith is the conduit by which we access salvation by grace. Grace is the saving agent. Faith is how we access it. Now, if faith is the conduit, I maintain that continuing faith must be maintained in order to maintain access to His saving grace. In other words, if you have no faith at a given point in time, you have no access to salvation by grace, regardless of what faith you have had in the past. That necessarily makes me OSNAS. It means I believe that a person can move temporally from faith to faithlessness (and back again), and also infers that this move cuts a person off from His saving grace.

So, using this as the framework, how is it possible for a person to move from faith to faithlessness and yet not cease to have access to His saving grace? Related, who maintains our faith? Us, or Him, or both? This not asking who maintains our salvation, but who maintains our faith.

Faith is a gift given to those who come to know Him and who receive Him. I cannot see it as the conduit to access salvation by grace, grace is a freely given covering over us. Grace at its very root in Hebrew means covering like a tent covering us giving us protection. Our faith is like the tent peg that anchors us in Gods protection. Also in the root of faith is 'aman' 'amen' may come to mind when seeing that root word, its used to descripe Moses as the 'nursing father' in Numb. 11, that was a weird one when I saw that but it shows in its context that Moses was like a nursing father, all were dependant on him to teach, nurture the assembly, in a nutshell the faith that is given to us is nurtured and grown by the Father as we come into more and more understanding of Him and His ways. Faith is key to salvation and necessary but if we look at it as the conduit then those with less faith have less access to Him and His salvation. Using the tent analogy if we walked out from under the tent we would lose His protection yet we can still maintain faith that He exists, many acknowledge His existance yet have no faith in His promises or Messiah.

There is nothing short of denying Him and Yeshua that could make us lose our salvation, the only part, I beleive, we have in our salvation is our confession of who He is. God maintains us, keeps us close to Him, we can continue to grow, learn, serve yet we cannot do a thing to maintain our salvation it is fully in His hands. We certainly have a part in the relationship, we need to keep in prayer with Him, keep learning and growing in His ways yet salvation is that free gift given to those who confess and repent that brings us under His covering of grace. Not sure if that helps in anyway or not.

shalom,

Mizz

[rollinTHUNDER]

This is stemming from a chat discussion and is being posted with the express understanding of those involved (myself and Shiloh357).

Faith is the conduit by which we access salvation by grace. Grace is the saving agent. Faith is how we access it. Now, if faith is the conduit, I maintain that continuing faith must be maintained in order to maintain access to His saving grace. In other words, if you have no faith at a given point in time, you have no access to salvation by grace, regardless of what faith you have had in the past. That necessarily makes me OSNAS. It means I believe that a person can move temporally from faith to faithlessness (and back again), and also infers that this move cuts a person off from His saving grace.

So, using this as the framework, how is it possible for a person to move from faith to faithlessness and yet not cease to have access to His saving grace? Related, who maintains our faith? Us, or Him, or both? This not asking who maintains our salvation, but who maintains our faith.

Do you have any scripture to support this, candice?

It seems that once someone is saved he or she would remain saved,

unless, maybe, they all of a sudden quit believing and renounced their faith.

I've never heard of this happening, but I'm sure that stranger things must have happened. And, if so, would the Lord force someone to remain in Him against their will? I would highly doubt it.

[~candice~]

If faith is given by Him, and maintained by Him, and we have no part in it whatsoever, how is this any different to the hyper version of predestination calvinism pushes? To be honest I don't believe we have no part in salvation, I do believe we need to keep having faith.

[Guest shiloh357]

If faith is given by Him, and maintained by Him, and we have no part in it whatsoever, how is this any different to the hyper version of predestination calvinism pushes? To be honest I don't believe we have no part in salvation, I do believe we need to keep having faith.

You have no part in how salvation is engineered and you have no part in maintaining it. Your "part" if you want to call it that, is to receive it. That is all. Salvation is a work of God from start to finish. He does not partner with you. Your faith does keep you saved. Salvation is a gift. It is not a pipeline supply. It is a free gift of God's grace.

Of course we need to keep having faith, but not because we have to have faith to maintainn salvation. You are not good enough to maintain salvation. As Christians, our faith does not serve as the agent of salvation. It is simply the manner in which it is received. God is the one who works it in us. We are saved because the righteousness of the law is being fulfilled in us (Rom. 8:4). Jesus dwells in us in the person of the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit who testifies that we are children of God.

If salvation depends day to day on me having enough faith, then my assurance depends on my faithfulness to God or suffers to do the lack, thereof. If that is the case, there is no assurance from one day to the next that I am still saved. Where is the line? How far can your faith waiver before you cross the line? Do you have a Scriptural measure for that?