Have you accepted Jesus as YOUR personal Lord and Saviour???

[rev_kevin]

I do not use the word very often except when discussing the concepts and biblical truths with those who do use the word. While we agree, we make it a habit to not use words too often that do not appear in scripture. Its a choice to be sure but in my estimation most people do not know what they believe about this issue and I prefer the substantive discussion involving it. Now chances are if you have orthodox Christian beliefs concerning the relationship of Christ, God, and the Holy Ghost (and I am sure you do) we believe the same thing. On to the topic at hand though
In my experiences, Baptists have almost set up everything around this one phrase “have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior”? The problem is the phrase does not exist in scripture. Not really in any form. It is quite possible, although I cannot be sure only God knows, that since you have asked millions of people to do say or do something not found in scripture you (Baptists) have endangered people with your extrabiblical traditions. I have personally seen “sinners prayers” that do not contain the gospel but Baptist catch phrases like “I ask Jesus into my heart” and other phrases not found in scripture.
Maybe you are okay with that and feel like it is sound theologically. I do not.

I respect your opinion. On the other hand there are many things that other religions say or believe that are not in the Bible. Not everything has to be “Scritpure” for it to be right to say. For instance, “Trinity” is not in the Bible but we chose to use the word anyway. Accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, Jesus is our Savior and accepting him is a personal decission that only you can make. He is my personal Savior as a individual and he is your personal Savior as a individual. Can you accept Jesus for someone eles besides yourself? No you can’t. Your heart is the life of everyone here on earth. The heart is a sign of love. Asking Jesus into my heart is saying your are my life, you are the one incharge of my life, without you I would die. You give me life and thats what the heart does. I don’t see how we are endangering anyone by saying these things.

 

[Rightlydivide]

I respect your opinion. On the other hand there are many things that other religions say or believe that are not in the Bible. Not everything has to be “Scritpure” for it to be right to say. For instance, “Trinity” is not in the Bible but we chose to use the word anyway. Accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, Jesus is our Savior and accepting him is a personal decission that only you can make. He is my personal Savior as a individual and he is your personal Savior as a individual. Can you accept Jesus for someone eles besides yourself? No you can’t. Your heart is the life of everyone here on earth. The heart is a sign of love. Asking Jesus into my heart is saying your are my life, you are the one incharge of my life, without you I would die. You give me life and thats what the heart does. I don’t see how we are endangering anyone by saying these things.

What must someone do to be saved? Can you answer using verses only?

 

[brkn1]

Baptists have almost set up everything around this one phrase “have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior”? The problem is the phrase does not exist in scripture. Not really in any form. It is quite possible, although I cannot be sure only God knows, that since you have asked millions of people to do say or do something not found in scripture you (Baptists) have endangered people with your extrabiblical traditions. I have personally seen “sinners prayers” that do not contain the gospel but Baptist catch phrases like “I ask Jesus into my heart” and other phrases not found in scripture.
Maybe you are okay with that and feel like it is sound theologically. I do not.

Have you read any scripture, especially by Paul, that points to a believer being “in Christ”?

Many seem to think that the word “heart” might only be speaking about the actual fleshly heart. Such thinking is the result of not understanding the spiritual things of God, as explained by Jesus when He said, “…The words that I speak unto you, (they) are spirit, and they are life”. The flesh was not being spoken of.

The Holy Spirit indwells a believer, but one must ask, "what part of a believer does He indwell? The answer must be the imperishable spiritual heart of the believer. This is the essence of the believer’s being, which God placed there to make that individual soul identifiably unique from other created souls. The flesh can be destroyed physically, but the spiritual heart of a created soul will still remain.

Philip asked the Ethiopian eunuch, “If thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayest” (be baptized).
It is the spiritual heart which must receive and “believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” (Acts 8:37)
There is salvation in no other than the Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus will also spiritually indwell a believer’s spiritual heart through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
That is how a believer can be described to be “in Christ”.

 

[rev_kevin]

What must someone do to be saved? Can you answer using verses only?

Acts 16:30 “…Sir, what must I do to be saved? They replied, Believe on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved…”

1 Corinthians 15:2 “And it is this Good News that you are saved if you firmly believe it…”

1 Peter 1:3 “All honor to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for it is by his boundless mercy that God has given us the privilege of being born again.”

 

[brb3]

The answer must be the imperishable spiritual heart of the believer. This is the essence of the believer’s being, which God placed there to make that individual soul identifiably unique from other created souls. The flesh can be destroyed physically, but the spiritual heart of a created soul will still remain.

Philip asked the Ethiopian eunuch, “If thou believest with all thy heart, thou mayest” (be baptized).
It is the spiritual heart which must receive and “believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God.” (Acts 8:37)
There is salvation in no other than the Lord Jesus Christ and Jesus will also spiritually indwell a believer’s spiritual heart through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
That is how a believer can be described to be “in Christ”.

The Protestant Baptists teach one must exercise their ‘free will’, thru faith, and invite Christ to renew their heart. It’s not formulaic, we don’t control Christ … but, as Phillip told the eunuch and as Luke teaches in Acts … if invited by a contrite sinner, Christ will transform stony hearts. Baptism by the H.S. … enables an ‘abiding’ covenantal relationship to develop. Covenant relationships are by definition personal.

This is what Billy Graham taught in his Evangelism ministry. It is very effective and efficacious. It is right from the Gospel of repentance & grace… that ‘old time’ religion, that the Primitive Church knew.

 

[brkn1]

The Protestant Baptists teach one must exercise their ‘free will’, thru faith, and invite Christ to renew their heart. It’s not formulaic, we don’t control Christ … but, as Phillip told the eunuch and as Luke teaches in Acts … if invited by a contrite sinner, Christ will transform stony hearts. Baptism by the H.S. … enables an ‘abiding’ covenantal relationship to develop. Covenant relationships are by definition personal.

This is what Billy Graham taught in his Evangelism ministry. It is very effective and efficacious. It is right from the Gospel of repentance & grace… that ‘old time’ religion, that the Primitive Church knew.

Our free will has no part in our being saved.
Jesus said, “…, that no man can come unto Me, except it were given unto him of my Father.” (John 6:65) This verse proves that even the desire to come to true faith in Jesus is a gift and not something our free will can produce.

An earlier verse has Jesus saying, “No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:44) Again, I only see God’s will involved here.

A preacher might use the invitation method as part of his program and the Holy Spirit might choose to go along and bring that person to a saving faith, but neither the preacher nor the sinner has any “free-will” say in whether that sinner will eventually be saved by the preaching, invitation, or personal request to be saved etc.
Salvation is God’s work.
Free will comes into play after a believer is saved as he later serves God. A believer has to answer for that stewardship, but that stewardship can never be what saves him or salvation could not correctly be called a gift.

 

[AmateurPianist]

Absolutely, blazer. To most evanjellyfishes, the communion of the saints is Billy Sunday, Billy Graham and Jerry Falwell, and the faith once delivered was the Second Great Awakening.

Umm…I am evangelical and proud of it.

The ignorant and prejudiced trashing of evangelicals in this thread is as disgusting as the ignorant trashing of Protestants that occurs regularly here.

And yes as a matter of fact I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Saviour since you are asking (the only fault I really find with this phrase is that it can become Christianese).

 

[brb3]

Our free will has no part in our being saved.

A preacher might use the invitation method as part of his program and the Holy Spirit might choose to go along and bring that person to a saving faith, but neither the preacher nor the sinner has any “free-will” say in whether that sinner will eventually be saved by the preaching, invitation, or personal request to be saved etc.
Salvation is God’s work.

Free will comes into play after a believer is saved as he later serves God. A believer has to answer for that stewardship, but that stewardship can never be what saves him or salvation could not correctly be called a gift.

You need to re-think your position ! God calls all sinners … re-read John 3:16 — where St. John makes this abundantly clear.

You suggest above that we come to God as ROBOTS … and thereafter, gain our freedom & FREE WILL. Please reconsider you understanding on Salvation.

Salvation is personal, because it is FREELY available to all who DETERMNE to trust and be healed by Christ. Your position makes it very IMPERSONAL, robotic, predetermined, etc.

 

[po18guy]

It is quite possible, although I cannot be sure only God knows, that since you have asked millions of people to do say or do something not found in scripture you (Baptists) have endangered people with your extrabiblical traditions.

In all truth, my brother, the use of ‘bible alone’ is itself an extra-biblical tradition. The bible nowhere claims that it is the sole rule of faith, or even that it is complete as to the deposit of faith which was handed on to the Apostles. The bible teaches us that it is* incomplete*: Luke 3:18, John 20:30, John 21:25, Acts 2:40, 1 Corinthians 11:34.

All Christians use the extra-biblical’ tradition of the table of contents. Nowhere does the bible proclaim or speicify its own contents. Church councils, lead by the ‘extra-biblical’ Holy Spirit did that.

May the peace of our risen Lord and Savior Jesus Christ be with you.

 

[po18guy]

You need to re-think your position ! God calls all sinners … re-read John 3:16 — where St. John makes this abundantly clear.

You suggest above that we come to God as ROBOTS … and thereafter, gain our freedom & FREE WILL. Please reconsider you understanding on Salvation.

Salvation is personal, because it is FREELY available to all who DETERMNE to trust and be healed by Christ. Your position makes it very IMPERSONAL, robotic, predetermined, etc.

Amen! If there is any pre-destination, we do it to ourselves through unrelenting hardness of our hearts. God does not create only to punish and destroy. Once creation was completed, God looked upon it and saw that it was “very good” (Genesis 1:31). We are clearly taught that salvation is offered to all (Hebrews 5:9), has been made visible to all (Titus 2:11) and that all are called to it.

 

[AmateurPianist]

Is the phrase “personal Savior” in the Bible? Since that is a rhetorical question, it isn’t, cite what verses you believe support the use of the word please. I am looking for verses that use the phrase “accept” and “savior” in the same sentence for starters.

Since you ask…

The word Saviour appears several times in the Bible describing Jesus Christ. 2 Timothy 1:10, 1 Timothy 4:10 are examples.

The word “accept” as far as I know is not used in the Bible in relationship to Jesus Christ. The word “receive” is (John 1:12). I have heard both “receive” and “accept” in this phrase. I personally consider the word “receive” to be preferable, but in my opinion this is in the category of “straining at gnats and swallowing camels”.

The word “personal” as far as I know is not used in connection with the words Savior or receive. However, if you read the book of Acts, when the apostles preached to the multitudes, they demanded a personal response to the message preached. For example Peter in Acts 2;38 uses the phrase “let each of you”.

Let he who does not use a phrase that is not explicitly found in the Bible cast the first stone here.

(like I said this phrase can become Christianese…but that can happen to any phrase).

 

[AmateurPianist]

You need to re-think your position ! God calls all sinners … re-read John 3:16 — where St. John makes this abundantly clear.

You suggest above that we come to God as ROBOTS … and thereafter, gain our freedom & FREE WILL. Please reconsider you understanding on Salvation.

Salvation is personal, because it is FREELY available to all who DETERMNE to trust and be healed by Christ. Your position makes it very IMPERSONAL, robotic, predetermined, etc.

Amen!

 

[po18guy]

The word “accept” as far as I know is not used in the Bible in relationship to Jesus Christ. The word “receive” is (John 1:12). I have heard both “receive” and “accept” in this phrase. I personally consider the word “receive” to be preferable, but in my opinion this is in the category of “straining at gnats and swallowing camels”.

Faithful, believing Catholics both “accept” and “receive” our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament at communion, which is the most perfect relationship on earth with the Risen Jesus Christ. A relationship with our Lord is mental, physical and spiritual. Only Holy Communion with our Lord satisfies all three requirements.

May the peace of our Risen Jesus Christ be with you.

 

[AmateurPianist]

Faithful, believing Catholics both “accept” and “receive” our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament at communion, which is the most perfect relationship on earth with the Risen Jesus Christ. A relationship with our Lord is mental, physical and spiritual. Only Holy Communion with our Lord satisfies all three requirements.

May the peace of our Risen Jesus Christ be with you.

And that is fine.

I for one am not going to gripe about straining at gnats with respect to us evangelicals and then turn around and do the same thing to Catholics.

May the peace of our Risen Jesus Christ be with you too.

 

[twopekinguys]

A lot of non-Catholics ask: Have you accepted Jesus as YOUR personal Lord and Savior? This question has quite irritated me for quite a while NOT because of the fact that Jesus is my saviour but it stresses that we OWN Jesus… I would like to believe that Jesus IS NOT OURS but WE BELONG TO JESUS!!!

This passage is taken from the bible and I hope all of you can meditate on it!!!

John 15:16
**You did not choose me, but I chose you **and appointed you to go and bear fruit–fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.

I can’t help it, but I have to relay this story.

I am the Lay Director of RCIA for our parish, and was getting ready to head to church for the Easter Vigil on Saturday.

I had to get there extra early, to check on some last minute details, changes, instructions, all that sort of thing. We had 21 people coming into the church that night, so you can only imagine some of the confusion that could have happened.

So, here I am, fresh out of the shower, getting my suit ready, etc. etc., and here is a persistant knock at the door. I go to the door, and here is a gentleman from one of the local Baptist churches, Bible, and tracts in hand.

I take a deep breath, and pray “Jesus, is this really necessary right now?”. Well, the gentleman asked me:

Q: Do you know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior,

A: I just kind of chuckle and said “Yep, sure do. Probably more than you know.”

Q: Do you have a church home?

A: Yep, sure do.

Q: Do they have Easter services?

A: Yes, 3 on Sunday, and I am getting ready for our Easter Vigil services right now.

Q: What Church?

A. St. Joseph’s Catholic Church.

Insert long pause here…lol

I asked him to give me a minute to tie my tie, and get my jacket, and I would be more than happy to talk to him some more. He agreed, and I was gone for just a minute (I can’t tie my tie without a mirror…lol). When I got back, the whole tone of his conversation changed.

Q: Catholics don’t worship Jesus do they?
A: More than you know. The Mass is all about worshipping Jesus.

Q: But you don’t read the Bible do you?
A: More than you know. I explained the basic order of the Mass.

The whole conversation turned into a chance to evangelize. Although, it wasn’t the type of evangelization he was thinking of when he knocked on the door.

I told him that if he wanted, he was more than welcome to come check out the church with me, look around, and if he liked, he could stay for the Vigil Mass. You could have knocked me over with a feather, when he said “sure”.

Long story short, he sat in the front pew with me, and some members of the team, we helped him through the missalette, etc.

After the Vigil was over (2hrs. 38 min), he told me how glad he was he accepted the invitiation, how moved he was at ALL of the liturgy, and how obvious it was that everyone there loved our Risen Lord.

I am not sure, but I am thinking we may have our first candidate for the next RCIA session!!

 

[T_More]

I can’t help it, but I have to relay this story.

I am the Lay Director of RCIA for our parish, and was getting ready to head to church for the Easter Vigil on Saturday.

I had to get there extra early, to check on some last minute details, changes, instructions, all that sort of thing. We had 21 people coming into the church that night, so you can only imagine some of the confusion that could have happened.

So, here I am, fresh out of the shower, getting my suit ready, etc. etc., and here is a persistant knock at the door. I go to the door, and here is a gentleman from one of the local Baptist churches, Bible, and tracts in hand.

I take a deep breath, and pray “Jesus, is this really necessary right now?”. Well, the gentleman asked me:

Q: Do you know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior,

A: I just kind of chuckle and said “Yep, sure do. Probably more than you know.”

Q: Do you have a church home?

A: Yep, sure do.

Q: Do they have Easter services?

A: Yes, 3 on Sunday, and I am getting ready for our Easter Vigil services right now.

Q: What Church?

A. St. Joseph’s Catholic Church.

Insert long pause here…lol

I asked him to give me a minute to tie my tie, and get my jacket, and I would be more than happy to talk to him some more. He agreed, and I was gone for just a minute (I can’t tie my tie without a mirror…lol). When I got back, the whole tone of his conversation changed.

Q: Catholics don’t worship Jesus do they?
A: More than you know. The Mass is all about worshipping Jesus.

Q: But you don’t read the Bible do you?
A: More than you know. I explained the basic order of the Mass.

The whole conversation turned into a chance to evangelize. Although, it wasn’t the type of evangelization he was thinking of when he knocked on the door.

I told him that if he wanted, he was more than welcome to come check out the church with me, look around, and if he liked, he could stay for the Vigil Mass. You could have knocked me over with a feather, when he said “sure”.

Long story short, he sat in the front pew with me, and some members of the team, we helped him through the missalette, etc.

After the Vigil was over (2hrs. 38 min), he told me how glad he was he accepted the invitiation, how moved he was at ALL of the liturgy, and how obvious it was that everyone there loved our Risen Lord.

I am not sure, but I am thinking we may have our first candidate for the next RCIA session!!

Absolutely fantastic! Thank you for sharing, reading this was truly inspiring.

 

[FromTheAshes777]

I can’t help it, but I have to relay this story.

I am the Lay Director of RCIA for our parish, and was getting ready to head to church for the Easter Vigil on Saturday.

I had to get there extra early, to check on some last minute details, changes, instructions, all that sort of thing. We had 21 people coming into the church that night, so you can only imagine some of the confusion that could have happened.

So, here I am, fresh out of the shower, getting my suit ready, etc. etc., and here is a persistant knock at the door. I go to the door, and here is a gentleman from one of the local Baptist churches, Bible, and tracts in hand.

I take a deep breath, and pray “Jesus, is this really necessary right now?”. Well, the gentleman asked me:

Q: Do you know Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior,

A: I just kind of chuckle and said “Yep, sure do. Probably more than you know.”

Q: Do you have a church home?

A: Yep, sure do.

Q: Do they have Easter services?

A: Yes, 3 on Sunday, and I am getting ready for our Easter Vigil services right now.

Q: What Church?

A. St. Joseph’s Catholic Church.

Insert long pause here…lol

I asked him to give me a minute to tie my tie, and get my jacket, and I would be more than happy to talk to him some more. He agreed, and I was gone for just a minute (I can’t tie my tie without a mirror…lol). When I got back, the whole tone of his conversation changed.

Q: Catholics don’t worship Jesus do they?
A: More than you know. The Mass is all about worshipping Jesus.

Q: But you don’t read the Bible do you?
A: More than you know. I explained the basic order of the Mass.

The whole conversation turned into a chance to evangelize. Although, it wasn’t the type of evangelization he was thinking of when he knocked on the door.

I told him that if he wanted, he was more than welcome to come check out the church with me, look around, and if he liked, he could stay for the Vigil Mass. You could have knocked me over with a feather, when he said “sure”.

Long story short, he sat in the front pew with me, and some members of the team, we helped him through the missalette, etc.

After the Vigil was over (2hrs. 38 min), he told me how glad he was he accepted the invitiation, how moved he was at ALL of the liturgy, and how obvious it was that everyone there loved our Risen Lord.

I am not sure, but I am thinking we may have our first candidate for the next RCIA session!!

Wow! that is really awesome! this deserves its own thread I think in the Evangelization forum. I would like to hear updates if you hear from this gentlemen again, and I’m sure many others would like to hear the story on its own thread as well.

really good stuff.
God bless!

 

[brkn1]

You need to re-think your position ! God calls all sinners … re-read John 3:16 — where St. John makes this abundantly clear.

You suggest above that we come to God as ROBOTS … and thereafter, gain our freedom & FREE WILL. Please reconsider you understanding on Salvation.

Salvation is personal, because it is FREELY available to all who DETERMNE to trust and be healed by Christ. Your position makes it very IMPERSONAL, robotic, predetermined, etc.

In (John 3:16), Jesus says “that whosoever believeth in Him (Christ) should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
In both (John 6:44) and (John 6:65), Jesus says that “no man CAN come” to Jesus except that the Father draws or gives the necessary saving faith in Jesus to actually come.
I see no contradiction here. We have the requirement of Who we must believe in to be saved along with the requirement of God’s gift of also being drawn by God to that saving faith in Jesus.
I can not see how you can explain away the “no man CAN” part of (John 6:44, and 65). You simply can’t, if you insist on our “free will” being a determining factor in our salvation.
Please explain away “no man CAN” in those verses using your “free-will” determination. The standard “It’s a mystery.” answer won’t cut it in my understanding.

 

[elvisman]

Since you ask…

The word Saviour appears several times in the Bible describing Jesus Christ. 2 Timothy 1:10, 1 Timothy 4:10 are examples.

The word “accept” as far as I know is not used in the Bible in relationship to Jesus Christ. The word “receive” is (John 1:12). I have heard both “receive” and “accept” in this phrase. I personally consider the word “receive” to be preferable, but in my opinion this is in the category of “straining at gnats and swallowing camels”.

The word “personal” as far as I know is not used in connection with the words Savior or receive. However, if you read the book of Acts, when the apostles preached to the multitudes, they demanded a personal response to the message preached. For example Peter in Acts 2;38 uses the phrase “let each of you”.

Let he who does not use a phrase that is not explicitly found in the Bible cast the first stone here.

(like I said this phrase can become Christianese…but that can happen to any phrase).

Like, Purgatory, for example . . . **

 

[elvisman]

Our free will has no part in our being saved.
Jesus said, “…, that no man can come unto Me, except it were given unto him of my Father.” (John 6:65) This verse proves that even the desire to come to true faith in Jesus is a gift and not something our free will can produce.

An earlier verse has Jesus saying, “No man can come to Me, except the Father which hath sent Me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:44) Again, I only see God’s will involved here.

A preacher might use the invitation method as part of his program and the Holy Spirit might choose to go along and bring that person to a saving faith, but neither the preacher nor the sinner has any “free-will” say in whether that sinner will eventually be saved by the preaching, invitation, or personal request to be saved etc.
Salvation is God’s work.
Free will comes into play after a believer is saved as he later serves God. A believer has to answer for that stewardship, but that stewardship can never be what saves him or salvation could not correctly be called a gift.

Actually - this is a pretty twisted way of understanding God’s love.**

He decides who will be "saved" and who he will toss into hell at his pleasure?
He forces us to love him and then he gives us free will so that we can continue to let him force his love upon us?
This is a perversion of the Gospel message.

**Gos doesn’t drag ANY of us kicking and screaming into heaven against our will nor does he send us kicking and screaming into hell against our will. **

John 6:65 “For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by my Father.”**
This verse proves that God must reveal the truth to us and that we cannot find it on our own. He gives us the free will - from the beginning - to accept or rejct this free gift of grace. It is not a gift unless it can be freely accepted or rejected.

God is not a spiritual rapist who forces his love on us, nor is he a monster who would create someone simply to toss them into the eternal agony of hell.