Contendah, my Friend,
You tell me, "Those scriptures you cite are some of the ones you use in attempted defense of your OSAS belief, but do not have anything to do with how a lost person gets into Christ to begin with--which was the subject of this discussion."
My Friend, let's take a look at those Scripture verses which YOU say have NOTHING to do with salvation:
Ephesians 1:13, "In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the Gospel of your salvation -- having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise."
That verse tells me that the person who hears the Gospel, and through hearing that Gospel -- believes in the finished work of Jesus Christ -- is saved, indwelled, and sealed by the Holy Spirit. Sound like salvation to me.
Ephesians 4:30, "Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption."
This verse tells us that when that person who heard the Gospel and believed was saved -- that person was indwelled and sealed by the Holy Spirit until the day of redemption -- the day that believer dies in this mortal body or is raptured from this mortal body.
Ephesians 2:8-9, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast."
This Scripture passage tells us that, by the grace of God this believer has been saved through faith in Jesus Christ -- plus NOTHING else, for it is a gift from God and not a result of any work that believer could do or may have done.
John 6:47, "Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes has eternal life."
Then, Jesus affirms those Ephesians passages when He tells us that the person who has believed in Him HAS eternal life.
John 10:28-29, "And I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand. My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand."
Then, Jesus puts a cork in the bottle when He tells us that NO ONE, not even the believer himself/herself -- can snatch that believer out of God's hands. That, my Friend, is most certainly salvation. And, that is most certainly eternally secure salvation.
So, yes, these Scripture passages do complement and complete those you suggested in bringing the message of salvation to the lost of the world.
God bless, have a wonderful, blessed day,
Bill
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You begin, Bill Gray, by craftily distorting what I said in the post to which you offer your lame reply.
You claim that I define certain scriptures as having "NOTHING to do with salvation:"
What I actually referred to was certain scriptures that "do not have anything to do with "how a lost person gets into Christ to begin with."
There is a difference between the two and I shall exemplify that difference by citing you to an example from scripture, namely Hebrews 3:1 and 3:12-15.
The chapter begins (v.3) with an address to "holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling." Thus there is absolutely no question about whether saved persons (“Christian believers,” to employ your preferred frame of reference) are being addressed here.
Does Paul consider these "holy brethren" to be saved unequivocally, unconditionally, without any concern that such "holy brethren" could lapse into a condition that could separate them from their first love and cause them to depart from the God to whom they committed their lives and souls when they first became Christian believers? Verses 12-14 powerfully suggest otherwise. Thus I reproduce them below in whole from the KJV: Note that this warning is addressed to “brethren” (v. 12), there being absolutely no doubt that the persons addressed are the same as those “holy brethren” of v.3.
12. Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.
13. But exhort one another daily,. While it is called “Today,” lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
14. For we have become partakers of Christifwe hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end....”
Is Paul wasting ink and paper describing something that could not possibly happen? There is no credible way to deny that those “holy brethren,” those Christian believers, were saved persons. In no way would the inspired apostle describe unsaved persons as “holy brethren.” Yet he clearly contemplates the possibility of their acquiring “an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God.” Those “believers” could become unbelievers, thereby “departing from the living God.”
If it were indeed impossible for those “holy brethren” to lapse into unbelief, what would be the sense of Paul’s warning?
Why would the apostle caution them to exhort one another “lest any of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin” if it was impossible for them to be so deceived?
The “holy brethren” were ”partakers of Christ”, but that ethereal status was conditional. That “if” in verse 14 expresses something that is conditional. That is what “if” is always about, Bill. A thing that is absolutely certain is not qualified by “if,” but Paul here uses the conditional if as he defines what is involved in continuing to be “partakers of Christ.”
In the remainder of his discourse, in the later part of chapter 3 and continuing into chapter 4, Paul crafts an analogy between those Israelites who failed to enter into the promised land because of their disobedience (4:6) and those of his “holy brethren” whom he warns thusly (4:11): “Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall after that example of disobedience.” “[T]hat rest” to which the apostle refers is obviously the rest he describes in 4:9: “There remains therefore a rest for the people of God.” That ‘rest” can be nothing but the ultimate salvation of those to whom God gives eternal salvation. But Paul clearly admits of the possibility that some of those “holy brethren” could “fall after that example of disobedience.” Again, is the apostle contemplating something that can not possibly occur? Is he describing something that is impossible of happening, but that nevertheless the “holy brethren” to whom he writes need to be so very diligent about avoiding?
Bill, you and others of the OSAS persuasion are fond of citing Ephesians 1:13 as a proof text for your Calvinistic perseverance belief. You wrote above:
“Ephesians 1:13, "In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the Gospel of your salvation -- having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise."
That verse tells me that the person who hears the Gospel, and through hearing that Gospel -- believes in the finished work of Jesus Christ -- is saved, indwelled, and sealed by the Holy Spirit. Sound [sic] like salvation to me.
I would encourage you to continue reading through verse 14 to get the full sense of what the apostle is teaching here. The apostle writes this:
1:14. Which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of his glory.””
The “earnest” to which Paul refers is the Greek ”arrabon”, a word that Thayer (1963 printing, page 75) defines as “money which in purchases is given as a pledge that the full amount will subsequently be paid.” The pledge here is God’s promise of salvation, but that pledge is an inherent element of a covenant, the New Covenant in Christ. God’s covenant includes promises upon which God will deliver, but those promises are not unconditional. A covenant, by definition, involves at least two parties, each of which has obligations defined in the terms of the covenant. God will keep his part of the covenant that he makes with Christian believers, but it remains possible, as we have seen above from Hebrews 3 and 4, for man to violate his part of the covenant, thus invalidating the covenant, as in “departing from the living God” (Hebrews 3:12).
Paul once more in the book of Hebrews confirms the possibility of apostasy. Hebrews 6:4-6, without question (other than the desperate, circumlocutory contrivances perpetrated upon it by Calvinists) describes the sad fate of those who “fall away”:
- 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,
- And have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come,
- If they shall fall away, to renew them again to repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.
With conscienceless shabbiness and patently dishonest hermeneutics, the OSAS crowd will try to torque these verses as describing those who “were never saved in the first place,” notwithstanding that such persons were at some time “partakers of the Holy Ghost,” that same Holy Ghost (Holy Spirit) that is “the earnest of our inheritance.”
Go figure.