To say we can fall away is to say that we are more powerful than Christ. That we have the ability to keep Him from finishing the good work He began in us and that He is not able to keep us from stumbling and present us blameless before the presence of glory with great joy.
In order for the work to be completed, we must walk in His way. Else our names will be blotted out of His book. And didn’t Jesus say He lost Judas?
No, it’s not. Falling away is not power, it’s a lack of power. That’s like saying Satan falling from grace makes him more powerful than God, or when Adam and Eve fell they were more powerful than God. Falling away is not something, it’s a lack of something; i.e. it is a loss of faith.
It’s possible to have true faith at first and lose it the next moment.AugustTherese:
Because true faith is a life altering faith
True faith is a trusting faith
True faith is a persevering faith
True faith causes us to war with the flesh
True faith changes what is important to us
True faith endures
True faith seeks after God and His righteousness
True faith has roots so that it endures troubles and persecutions.
True faith takes our eyes off the things of the world and puts our eyes on Christ.
If that is the case then we are finishing the work and not Christ. It would say “You have will finish the Good work Christ started in you” instead of “He will finish the good work…”
God isn’t going to save us if we don’t will it, as Augustine said.Agathon:
If that is the case then we are finishing the work and not Christ. It would say “You have will finish the Good work Christ started in you” instead of “He will finish the good work…”
We allow Christ to complete the work He began in us. Christ does not coerce or force His work down our throats. He gives us the choice of either allowing Him to work in us, or rejecting Him to work in us.
If you lose it then it wasn’t true faith.
According to you.Agathon:
If you lose it then it wasn’t true faith.
So we have the ability to tell Christ what to do?
That’s like saying if you lose it, you didn’t have anything to lose. That’s illogical and a non-sequitur.
Nope. We have free will.AugustTherese:
So we have the ability to tell Christ what to do?
No, we have the free will to allow Him to complete what was begun in us.
Correct. For those who claim to have faith then stop “following Christ” they aren’t really losing their faith. They are losing their desire to be religious that stems from whatever reason. It could be social, relational, or whatever, but for whatever reason they aren’t losing their faith, they are losing their man made effort at “being a Christian”.
How can you lose something you didn’t have?
So we are the ones in charge. The creator of the universe bows to our will.
A claim of having faith and actually having faith are two different things.
God gave us free will, and there is nothing you can do about it. Being given the ability by God to say yes or no does not put us ‘in charge’ in the context you are alluding to. Again, God does not force His will down our throats! He asks us to be One with Him, He does not coerce us!
Agreed! But the Bible is not talking about a ‘claim of having faith’ being lost, that would be redundant! Why would Our Lord warn us of falling away from mere claims?! “Careful, those who claim they have faith will fall away”? Fall away from what, a claim? That doesn’t make sense. No, Our Lord is warning those who do have faith, that unless they persevere and allow Christ to remain in them, they will lose that faith and fall away.
Does He change our will? Does He change the desires of hearts and our desire to be faithful or do we choose to change the desires of our hearts and be faithful?
You are setting up a dichotomy of an either/or situation; like it’s either God doing all the work, or it’s us doing all the work. God sanctifies us if we allow Him. God wants to make you a saint right now, but He is not going to force it down your throat as He ties you up in bondage; that’s not love, that’s coercion. We allow God to change our hearts and our desires. Is it really that hard to imagine God giving us the choice of accepting or rejecting his grace?
No, he doesn’t force it down our throats. Instead He changes our hearts to where we gladly accept the things of God. Our choices are motivated by God instead of the Flesh. We were dead in our trespasses and sin and He makes us alive in Christ. We choose Him because He first chose us. And we abide in Him because He abides in us. Grace is not effectual because God forces himself on us. It is effectual because when we truly see the majesty and splendor and love of Christ we can’t help but reach out for it. This effectual grace is what brings to us Christ and what keeps us from falling. So he does change our will, not from coercion but from love and beauty. And all this Grace is a free gift that He gives to us without any merit of our own.