All articles

From Kristos Vocabulary Booster

Stephen M. Adams wrote:
> wrf3@stablecross.com (Bob Felts) writes:
> >Stephen M. Adams wrote:
> >> lsenders@hotmail.com writes:
> >> >Stephen M. Adams wrote:
> >> >
> >[...]
> >>
> >> >Security of the believer is taught in Rom 8.
> >>
> >> Others are covering this issues. My point is quite clear -
'justification
> >> by faith alone' is clearly, unambigously and absolutely refuted by
James.
> >
> >I can show you that it clearly, unambiguously and absolutely isn't
> >refuted by James. We can begin with a question: what is the source
of
> >the work that you do to demonstrate your faith?
>
> Are you admitting, then, that 'faith without works is dead' and that
such
> workless faith can not save? In other words, there is no salvation
without
> faith AND works?
>
> That is quite clearly what James says.
>
I think you cut the header off too soon as this is not one of my
replies. But still, I will give an answer.

No. It is not what you reduce it to say. What James is contesting is
the Jewish perception that works are necessary to one's salvation.
James' is arguing that it is faith which produces works, not works
which produce faith. A true faith has a man regenerated, that is "a
new man." Therefore, even as Christ's transfiguration decloaked His
true inner reality, even so works are external evidences of the already
transfigured inner man.

John 3:3 Jesus answered and said to him, "Truly, truly, I say to you,
unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God."

Regeneration first occurs, then man "sees" the kingdom and is
constrained by faith to respond to the call of the Father. Faith is
not an act of the will for their is a distinct difference in
consciousness between the consent of belief and the consent of the
will. The consent of belief is in a measure a forced consent.
"Volitions look to the future and represent our desires; beliefs look
to the present and represent our findings." (Warfield, "Studies in
Theology" Vol 9, p. 315.

> >> It doesn't force us to do them, or even to believe. After
> >> all, Paul says the that it's a *gift* that is given freely. If
it's
> >> a gift, it can be rejected, discarded, sold, etc.
> >
> >Was the resurrection of Lazarus a gift to him? Could Lazarus have
> >rejected it?
>
> There is absolutely no way to know the answer to this question.
>
> Do you think that raising Lazerus from the dead is exactly equivalent
> to salvation??
>
In a sense, yes. His coming forth from the grave was not an act of the
will. It was a constraint of the call of God. Thus it is equivalent
and nicely illustrates the natural man who is spiritually dead and
requires the call and constraint of God to regenerate him unto
salvation. And because salvation is not then a thing merited, no
demerit may absolve it. Therefore, salvation is secure to the one who
is truly born again because "it is all from Him, through Him and to
Him."

Quoting Packer,

"For to Calvinism there is really only *one* point to be made in the
field of soteriology: the point that God saves sinners, God -the Triune
Jehovah, Father, Son and Spirit; three Persons working together in
sovereign wisdom, power and love to achieve the salvation of a chosen
people, the Father electing, the Son fulfilling the Father's will by
redeeming, the SPirit executing the purpose of Father and Son by
renewing.

*Saves* -does everything, first to last, that is involved in bringing
man from death in sin to life in glory; plans, achieves and
communicates redemption, calls and keeps, justifies, sanctifies,
glorifies.

*Sinners*- men as God finds them, guility, vile, helpless, powerless,
unable to lift a finger to do Gods will or better their spiritual lot.

*God saves sinners* -and the force of this confession may not be
weakened by disrupting the unity of the work of the Trinity, or by
dividing the achievement of salvation between God and man and making
the decisive part man's own, or by soft-pedalling the sinner's
inablitity so as to allow him to share the praise of his salvation with
his Saviour. This is the one point of Calvinistic soteriology which
the "five points" are concerned to establish and Arminianism in all its
forms to deny: namely, that sinners donot save themselves in any sense
at all, but that salvation, first and last, whole and entire, past,
present and future, is of the Lord, to whom be glory for ever; amen."

"Introductory Essay", p. 6.

((( s.r.c.b-s is a moderated group. All posts are approved by a moderator. )))
((( Read http://srcbs.org for details about this group BEFORE you post. )))