Security of the Beliver.

[larryt]

Larry T,

Hi Mudcat,

Thank you for your reply. Accepted. I am going to try to focus on just our discussion, I do not want to get sidetracked, as I have not the time to spend much on the internet these days.

The first passage is one of the most misunderstood in the whole bible. And I am not one to say I have a lock on the understanding by any means. I have read many commentaries and even in them, assumptions are made that IMHO cannot be made. If I can I will try to give you my analysis of this passage in Hebrews first.

The scope of the book of Hebrews, if I might quote Matthew Henry is:

As to the scope and design of this epistle, it is very evident that it was clearly to inform the minds, and strongly to confirm the judgment, of the Hebrews in the transcendent excellency of the gospel above the law, and so to take them off from the ceremonies of the law, to which they were so wedded, of which they were so fond, that they even doted on them, and those of them who were Christians retained too much of the old leaven, and needed to be purged from it. The design of this epistle was to persuade and press the believing Hebrews to a constant adherence to the Christian faith, and perseverance in it, notwithstanding all the sufferings they might meet with in so doing. In order to this, the apostle speaks much of the excellency of the author of the gospel, the glorious Jesus, whose honour he advances, and whom he justly prefers before all others, showing him to be all in all, and this in lofty strains of holy rhetoric. It must be acknowledged that there are many things in this epistle hard to be understood, but the sweetness we shall find therein will make us abundant amends for all the pains we take to understand it. And indeed, if we compare all the epistles of the New Testament, we shall not find any of them more replenished with divine, heavenly matter than this to the Hebrews.

The highlighted part I think needs to be kept in mind as we look at this passage in particular.

Heb. 6:4 For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,

5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,

6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

I see 2 possible, opposite understandings for who it is that is referred to in the passage above.

On the one hand, it is referring to the possibility of believers falling away; and on the other it is referring to false believers that never were "born again" but had all the appearances of true believers.

First remember that this is address to primarily Hebrew Christians though it is applicable to all Christians. The question that can be asked at this point is: Where all OT Hebrews saved? I don't think so. Yet they all had light, tasted of the heavenly gift, partook of the Holy Spirit, tasted of the good Word of God, and the power of the world to come, "in a sense." In the NT, Judas would fall into this category, yet Jesus said specifically that He was a devil.

Emphasis mine, and I appreciate the thoughtful response.

I suppose I have wrestled with the verses in Hebrews cited above for a while now.

My background and previous teachings in the Gospel have been entirely supportive of the OSAS doctrine. It has only been fairly recently that I have changed that position.

At the time that I was looking at it, from that direction. It was my conclusion that the people being spoken of were those who had been put under the weight of conviction by the Holy Spirit and had rejected the calling to repentance and salvation.

I suppose after further examination, I realized that many are called by the message of the Gospel. Many don't answer the first time, either. There is no telling how many people have rejected Christ out of pride, more than once, to later come and know Christ. And I truly believe there is a point in which he stops calling and unbeliever and gives them over to their sin.... There is other scriptural support for that concept and it was there that I put these verses.

However, this really didn't 'fix' things for me. These verses were still bothering me. There was something I was missing there.

My thought is that these verses aren't addressing those whom God ceases to call. The reason being, is that the verses don't seem to be addressing that group. One of the key portions that made it troubling had to do with the words "renew them again unto repentance". The word renew, is a distinct implication to being made new, reborn.... what have you.

These verses apparently seem to be addressing those who were 'renewed' before. The realization changed the whole playing field in regards to that particular doctrine for me.

I suppose I have, at present, stopped trying to squeeze those verses into what I already believe, but rather let those verses taken at face value be part of what I believe.

John 6:70 Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?

Judas went out with the other eleven and even did miracles. Was he saved? I don't think so.

Was Judas saved would be a thread worthy topic by itself. (hint hint Larry) But, unless you feel that it would bring relevance to the table. I won't address it now.

I think there is evidence to support the premise that these are false believers.

No doubt, we find agreement here. I just can't use Hebrews 6:4-6 to support that specific thought.

I also think that there is enough evidence to support the premise that these are believers. That does not mean that we can assume that they will in fact loose their salvation though.

Now that is an interesting twist and I mean that sincerely. I am hoping you could discuss your thoughts on this track further. This seems to be worth fleshing out. Can one fall away and still retain salvation.......

I think this passage is a hypothetical question. Hypothetical questions are made to make a point. Let me explain.

In Heb. 5 the author is talking about the Priesthood of Christ and His suffering. He wants to go on to deeper meaning but the hearers are "dull of hearing" and need to be retaught the first principles. So what are the first principles? In Heb. 6:1-3 there are several mentioned: repentance, faith, ordinances, prophecy. Then in vs. 4-6 one of the most important first principles is that Christ only died once for the sins of His people. The emphasis is not falling away but Christ dying only once.

Look at the passage without the parenthetical thought.

For it is impossible......If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.

This is repeated and elaborated on in the rest of Hebrews.

Heb 7:27 Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people

[Guest shiloh357]

It is a belief called "covenental nomism" It is the belief that one is initially saved by faith but that works are necessary in order for salvation to be maintained. In this view, your good works are necessary to secure salvation. Ultimately, it makes the person and NOT Christ ultimately responsible for their salvation.

Those that believe that we are justified by works and not by Faith alone do not believe that we are responsible for our own salvation because #1 We are saved by faith in the death and resurrection of Christ and #2 we are only able to produce works through the ability given to us by the Spirit of Christ that lives inside of us. However we do believe the scriptures when it says...

James 2:24 You see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith alone.

James is not talking about being justified before God by works. James is talking about your work justifying your profession of faith in the sight of man. "Justify" is used differently in James than it is in Romans chapter 3. In Romans, it is used as a legal/forensic term. In Romans, it means "to declare as innocent." In James it means "to affirm or give evidence to." In Romans, justification is a legal declaration made by God. In James, it is the act of providing corroboration of one's testimony with corresponding action.

And yes, your system makes the person and NOT Christ responsible for salvation. You teach that man has to have good works in order to maintain or securre salvation. It leads to a devaluation of the blood of Christ and the finished work of the cross.

[oak]

Wow, major league players here, good minds at work. However I

[Teach]

This topic would normally be an offshoot of whether we have Free Will or not. And since I believe we have free will then I do not believe in eternal Security.

I think it is a lie of the Devil, as it lulls Christians into complacency and takes away accountability.

When Jesus performed His first miracle (Water into Wine) He was announcing to the world that that was His whole purpose which was to change the lives of individuals (Water pots, Vessels, 6 at that, the number of man created on the 6th day) by miraculously changing the water (John 3) into the Wine of the Spirit.

Later on He also stated that you can not put New wine into old wineskins. The old man has to be renewed or else the Wineskin breaks the Wine is spilt and the Wineskin perishes. Where normally the contents of a container are usually more precious than the container itself and if broken it is the content that is lost not as much as the container. i.e.: A bottle of milk, perfume.

In this case it is the wineskin that is lost or perishes which represents us.

And the word perish here is the same as in John(3:16)

We must offer ourselves daily in sacrifice to God and keep that old man into subjection which is what I believe Paul was saying about keeping the faith.

Somehow,

[Smalcald]

I have never heard of a theological system within Christianity claim that salvation is dependent upon their personal holiness or their ability to remain obedient and pure.

This is very sad and in my opinion a big part of the problem. People in todays church are not even taught of their need to be obedient to God's word or keeping themselves pure and unspotted by the world. Why would are children act accordingly when they are not being taught the truth.

This is false. This is an assumption you have made more than a few times, and it is false.

Say what you want but I know many that live in open sin and believe themselves to be going to heaven because they have been taught the lie of OSAS

Well there indeed are those who live in open sin and believe they are going to heaven and will not, Christ spoke of these very people, we know this will happen. The conjecture however that you are making that they do this becuase of a OSAS doctrine is a jump however.

Are we obediant to Christ because we want to be, or for some ot her reason, this is the question? Can a person who has faith in Christ stop battling thier own flesh? I don't think so. However battles will be won and lost, and it is hard to tell from the outside what is going on, the struggle is the key though.

[Teach]

Say what you want but I know many that live in open sin and believe themselves to be going to heaven because they have been taught the lie of OSAS

I've gone from a very well to do Pentecostal church to a Downtown (Feed the homeless, help the addicts and ladies of the night) Sally Anne Church. Both have people who think no matter what they do God will forgive them and save them in the end.

And the worst about that is they don't even mentioned repentance in the process.

God wants a relationship with those who love Him. If you get saved to escape the burning fires and then ignore Him and continue in your sin, Is thatLove for God?

Some are evry sincere in their walk with forsaking many things for Him and applying themselves dilligently to the Great Commission. Yet when it comes to that ONE thing that God is asking them to obey they choose to ignore.

Will that entail: "Depart from me I never knew you"?

[Rick-Parker]

Say what you want but I know many that live in open sin and believe themselves to be going to heaven because they have been taught the lie of OSAS

they have not been taught it is ok to live in open sin or to disobey God.

Yes they have, and worse of all they believe it, and worse than that you cannot tell them differently.

sorry, but this is hard to accecpt.

I realize I have not been in every church all over the world, but I have been in a lot in a lot of different places and I have never once ran into a church that said disobeying God and living for the world was ok.

My brothers ex-wife's dad teaches it. He is a pastor and teaches that we as men cannot keep ourselves from sin, further more all our sins were forgiving when we accepted Christ, so don't fight it fulfill the flesh. Even thought it may not be taught explicitly as this, this is the basic belief of all believers in eternal security.

You yourself Gators believes this.

#1 You believe that we as humans cannot become sinless in this world.

#2 That all our sins are forgiven past, present, and future the moment we accept Christ.

People who willfully sin after they "accept Christ" should be concerned about whether they were ever actually saved. Just because one says that they believe that Christ died for their sins does not mean that they will be saved. Without any outward signs of that salvation, they were never OSAS. Not works, either. But repentance, surrender and obedience are the signs. Please don't place all of us who believe that OSAS in the neat little package you are trying to, ezekiel33. We believe the bible, just as you do. Your truth is the same as ours.

[Smalcald]

So can a christian live in open sin and still go to heaven or not?

No not if they know it is sin and refuse to repent, that would indicate that they do not have faith; in that they do not seek forgiveness, to seek forgiveness one must repent, to repent one must believe and have faith.

But it all flows from faith. Now from the outside we do not know what is going on with the battle against the flesh. We cannot measure this very well; the key is that we ourselves do not want to fall into sin by an attitude of hypocritical piety which leads to judgementalism. For example take a person strugglin with the sin of drunkeness, a sin of the flesh, but also an addiction. So they try, they repent, but they fall, but they don't give up, they feel horrible repent and try again, this may happen for years before they are finally freed from this addiction, we must be carefull to help them in the struggle with the flesh, and not write them off. This is different from the person who say commits adultery and when confronted says, tough I am not giving her up and I will repent later.

Now the Church must step in when it witnesses cases of gross outward sin by members of a congregation, this is one of the purposes God left us a Church, this is the function of the office of the keys, to deny people communion or in extreme examples if the congregant refuses to repent they must be excommunicated for their own good until they repent and come to their senses and are welcomed back with open arms. We also have a duty to protect the Word of God, we cannot have deacons or ministers in outward rebellion against the Word of God and expect people to be evangelized by these men, but the same goes for all members of a Christian Congregation.

I do think the continuing breakdown of belief in the authority of the Church and our congregations has contributed to this problem, if there is no true Church on earth than nobody can really be in a position to be an overseer or deacon or Bishop as shown in scripture, thus no one has the authority to point out sin or to excommunicate and so forth as shown in scripture.

Now I have fully succeeded in changing the topic!

But anyway back to the question, a refusal to repent shows a lack of faith.

[Guest shiloh357]

QUOTE

James is not talking about being justified before God by works. James is talking about your work justifying your profession of faith in the sight of man. "Justify" is used differently in James than it is in Romans chapter 3. In Romans, it is used as a legal/forensic term. In Romans, it means "to declare as innocent." In James it means "to affirm or give evidence to." In Romans, justification is a legal declaration made by God. In James, it is the act of providing corroboration of one's testimony with corresponding action.

And yes, your system makes the person and NOT Christ responsible for salvation. You teach that man has to have good works in order to maintain or securre salvation. It leads to a devaluation of the blood of Christ and the finished work of the cross.

- I have to disagree on your exesgesis. James is speaking about what constitutes as saving faith on the foundation level, and Paul speaks about saving faith presuming the audience already knows what James was speaking about.

James' point is that faith like love, is operative in nature. That is why faith without works is as useless and "dead" as telling a cold and hungry person to be warm and well fed.

James's position is "show me your faith without works (which is impossible) and I will show you my faith by my works. James chapter two is not a treatise on salvation like John 3 and Ephesians 2. Saving faith is not in view at all.

The faith that Paul preaches as the base for our salvation as opposed to works is identical to the faith that James preaches. The two inspired authors write about the same faith in different stages.

- James speaks about what constitutes saving faith.

- Paul presumes the audience already has saving faith.

In other words James teaches us about initial justification, and Paul elaborates on James' teaching.

Sorry, but that is simply not so. We have two completely different contexts and two completely different objects in view in with respect to Romans 4 and James 2.

We both believe that Christ's sacrifice on the cross was perfect. We disagree on how this grace is applied to us, but we have the same grace in mind

Really, how do we disagree? What do you perceive my view to be?

[Guest shiloh357]

QUOTE

Really, how do we disagree? What do you perceive my view to be?

- Well first off we disagree on salvation, in that I do not believe we attain salvation until Heaven, but that we recieve initial justification here on earth. You, I presume, believe that salvation is attained here and experienced in fulness in Heaven. I believe that justification and sanctification are united, you do not. I believe justification and sanctification are processes' I presume you agree with sanctification but not with justification. Justification and sanctification are the graces of the cross, repentance and love are also.

Well I will begin. Salvation not a "thing" we attain. Salvation is a person. Salvation is eternal life. Eternal life is something we have right now. It is the very life God within us. Eternal life is not something we are waiting on. Salvation is an inner transformation wrought by the Holy Spirit within. Bible says that if any man is in Christ, He is a new creation. I am in Christ and He is in me. I have salvation because Jesus is Salvation, He is eternal life, and I have Christ, right now.

Justification is not a process. Justification is a one time legal declaration by God that one is innocent. Justification is NEVER presented as a process. Sanctification is both an event that occurs initally at salvation, but also is alsso a process in the life of a believer.

The Bible also does not say that Justification, sanctification love or repentance are "graces" of the cross. That sounds more like manmade religion and not the Bible.

Well I see what your saying but still have to disagree. The audience James is writing to are saved, yet they are failing at good works. If these good works are inseperable from saving faith I have to wonder how these individuals were sinning as they were but were still saved? Secondly James never say's that dead faith is fake faith, dead faith only means that it is not operative or incomplete, meaning that saving faith is completed and fulfilled by good works.

First of all you are imposing a lot of assumptions on to James and His reasons for saying what he said. James is saying that our works demonstrate our faith. Our faith is dead without them. Saving faith is demonstrated by works. James does not say that it is completed by good works. You are putting words into James' mouth and imposing your own theology on that book.

these people were claiming that they could be saved by faith alone

That is nothing but conjecture on your part.

QUOTE

Sorry, but that is simply not so. We have two completely different contexts and two completely different objects in view in with respect to Romans 4 and James 2.

- I think a dichotomy is necessary to preserve if works are a natural reaction to saving faith but I do not believe the contexts' allow this.

Proper exegesis would not try to force these two chapters together in the manner that you do. You have two different audiences, different purposes and occasions and two completely different messages by two different authors. You simply cannot pair them toether like that.

Paul is explaining how salvation for the Gentiles was made possible. How do uncircumcised Gentiles qualify for salvation. James is talking to Jewish believers and is exhorting them to do good works. How do we know that Abraham was a man of faith? How do we know that Rahab the Harlot was a woman of faith? We know because of what they did. Their works justified them. Their works did not justifty them in the sight of God, but their works affirmed or demonstrated their faith. We know their faith because of what they DID.

Abraham was just jusitified before God and his faith was credited to Him as righteousness 430 years before the law and 25 years before He was circumcised. Abraham simply beleived God and it was credited to Him as righteousness. Paul states that or faith is imputed to us as righteousness in the same manner as was done for Abraham in Romans 4:22-25