Why should Catholics Abhore OSAS?

[thessalonian]

linus:

You take Scripture way out of context. In Romans 1 & 2 Paul is building his argument for justification by faith, which he presents in chapter three just after he writes in 3:10 (exposing the depraved condition of all mankind apart from Christ) “There is none righteous, not even one.”

In 3:19 he shows that through the example of the Law of Moses the world is accountable to God, but in verse 21 he states that "APART from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, even the righteousness of God THROUGH FAITH IN JESUS CHRIST for all those who BELIEVE, for ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God , BEING JUSTIFIED AS A GIFT BY HIS GRACE (that’s sovereign grace)* through the REDEMPTION WHICH IS IN CHRIST JESUS…"* In other words, there are no works involved in God declaring a man righteous (i.e., justified) through faith in Christ Jesus alone.

In 3:26 he goes on to say that God is just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Faith excludes any boasting based on personal works, the glory goes to Christ alone because of His sacrificial work on the cross on our behalf (verse 27).

In verse 30 Paul states that God justifies the circumcised (Jews) BY FAITH and the uncircumcised (Gentiles) THROUGH FAITH.

When you read Paul in context your gospel of works cannot be found in the book of Romans.Matt. 25 is in the context of Christ’s 2nd Advent when he sits on the Davidic throne and judges the Gentile nations at the beginning of His Messianic Kingdom rule on earth. There is no general resurrection at this time. You fail to understand the context and misapply it.

Paul does stress works for the saved believer in Ephesians. But it is all in the context of being saved not BY good works but FOR good works (see. Eph. 2:8-10).

In the 1 Cor. 15:1-2 passage Paul refers to the gospel he preached to them by which they were "saved," but qualifies it by saying, “unless you believed in vain.” That is, not a true faith. In 2 Cor. 13:5 he tell them to “test yourselves to see if you are in the faith,” if Jesus Christ truly is in them…unless indeed they fail the test. In other words, you can decieve yourself. There are many false brethren who have a false faith.

The Hebrew passages are warnings about Jews who have never fully believed in Christ alone but desire to go back to the Law of Moses and the sacrificial system to be justified. You fail to understand their context and misapply them.

Again, to “fall from grace” is to abandon Paul’s gospel of grace and adopt a works gospel.

You can prove anything when you take Scripture out of context. But the Scriptures are clear: salvation BY GRACE THROUGH FAITH alone. Yes, faith alone. James in chapter two is describing a false faith. A kind of faith that cannot save, based on a false gospel. Just as Paul says to the Corinthians, *“unless you fail the test.” *

Why would one bother to respond to something like this is what I am asking myself?:banghead:

Sorry, my kid puked on another one of my kids in the middle of the night so I’m not my charitable old self. Perhaps tommorrow I will give it the old college try.

Blessings though

 

[Matt16_18]

ceasar:

… we can also go to another passage in the bible that explains about the man that was having an explicit sinful sexual relationship and paul ordered that that man be turned over for the destruction of the flesh so that his soul might be saved…but later recanted that statement.

What do you mean when you say that Paul “recanted that statement”? Paul allowed the man guilty of serious sexual sin back into the community after the obstinate sinner finally repented and gave up his sexual sin. Apparently, being turned over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh made the sinner wise up.

i believe you can lose your salvation…and i’m a non-denominational protestant…but its not as easy as most people think it is…

How difficult is it to commit adultery?

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker

I am still trying to figure out what you really believe. I am having a difficult time doing that because you keep flip-flopping and you evade giving answers to direct questions.

First you say that Adam committed the original sin because God secretly willed Adam to be disobedient. Then you say that Adam chose to be disobedient.

First you say that no man has free will, then you say that Christians can choose to commit sin.

It would help in this discussion if you would pick a position and then be consistent!

Do you believe that Christians can choose to be disobedient to God?

Do you believe that God is the cause of all evil?

 

[sonseeker]

MATT 16_18

You say:
Matt 16_:

First you say that no man has free will, then you say that Christians can choose to commit sin. Do you believe that Christians can choose to be disobedient to God?

Yes. You are inconsistent in your hearing. I have answered yes in each instance, be it “Adam” as the subject, or now “a Christian.”

You are blustery and bellicose, but you are not stupid. What is the problem? How many more times will you ask me the same question? It is obvious that you want to go somewhere with this. Why not just ask me what you want to ask, and quit beating around the bush?

In post #60 you said:
Matt 16_18:

Evil is not something created.

…evil can have no existence in and of itself.Make up your mind. You are contradicting yourself. Teach me, where did evil come from? Self-cause?

So far, you have only offered an overly-simplistic explanation:
Matt 16_18:

Evil is always the result of angels or men being disobedient to God by their abuse of the good that God has created.

You seem to think that you know a great deal about evil and have all the answers. You say it “wasn’t created,” “can have no existence in and of itself,” and that it “is always the result of…” disobedience.

So then, disobedience created evil? Can disobedience create itself?

You say: “…Evil…is the abuse of good…” I have heard a slight variation of that argument before. “Evil is the absence of good.” I tell you, evil is neither the “abuse of good,” nor is it the “absence of good.” Evil is “something.” It is a positive, not a negative. Read the scripture, particularly look again at Paul’s discussion of the two natures in Romans 7.
Matt 16_18:

By an act of God’s sovereign will, God has decreed that angels and men are to possess free will, and their free will makes angels and men agents of free cause. God allows angels and men to exercise their free will by choosing to be disobedient to himI ask you again: is this will that men now possess, the same as Adam possessed before he fell? (BTW, contrary to your assertion that we have a “human nature,” and not a “sin nature,” it is Adam’s nature, after the fall that we inherit. Human nature is by biblical definition a “sinful nature.”)

Also, you say:
Matt 16_18:

If sin is the will of God, then God is not good.

Don’t be silly; God can decree sin and still be good.

These are more of your statements:
Matt 16_18:

But you are saying that Adam was incapable of being disobedient to God’s perfect will,

which means that it was also God’s perfect will for Adam to commit the sin of disobedience!

You said that it is impossible for Adam to do anything other than God’s perfect will. Therefore, if Adam was disobedient to God, then it was God’s perfect will for Adam to be disobedient.

…Adam was only following God’s perfect will in being disobedient to God?Why do you put words in my mouth? This is, by your own admission, Catholic theology (see your quote directly beneath this). I said that God has a decretive will, and that His decretive will is absolutely fixed. My theology is consistent. It only becomes inconsistent, when you put words in my mouth, and attempt to mix it with your theology. You need to stop doing that; if you stop, you will see the consistency of my answers, and my theology.

You said in an earlier post that you weren’t interested in winning an argument with me, but clearly you are; I don’t have a problem with that, but please, be consistent in both your hearing, and your speaking.

(continued below)

 

[sonseeker]

(continued from post #124)
Matt 16_18:

That is correct, and that is why Catholics speak of God’s perfect will, and God’s permissive will.

---

God’s perfect will for Adam was for Adam to be obedient.
God’s permissive will was to allow Adam to [be]…obedient or disobedient.Your theology is fatally flawed. In your theology God has a perfect will. You say that His perfect will was for Adam to be obedient, but Adam was not; therefore, God’s perfect will was thwarted. If His will can be thwarted, then He cannot be Sovereign God, as you have claimed that He is. Do you agree?

If God’s perfect will was to be permissive toward Adam, and allow Adam to be “either obedient or disobedient,” then the whole of God’s creation and the end goal of His plan was contingent upon Adam’s choice. What your theology says is that God didn’t know what would happen, and so He sat nervously with crossed-fingers, hoping that Adam would make the right choice, the choice that God desired, but was not certain he would make.

Under your theology, the only way God could have known what Adam would choose, was to take the Arminian definition of “foreknowledge,” i.e., He looked, and learned by empirical observation, what Adam would do, and then He fashioned His plan around Adam’s decision. A god of contingency, is not the God revealed within the pages of scripture. Further, the Arminan definition of foreknowledge is not the Biblical definition of foreknowledge. Additionally, learning by observation shows that God is mutable, which He is not; immutability is one of His attributes. Do you agree?

Yours is Strange Doctrine Indeed!

Bill

 

[linus]

thessalonian:

Why would one bother to respond to something like this is what I am asking myself?:banghead:

You don’t have to respond, but you can take some time and think about what I wrote. Even check out the Biblical context.

Sorry, my kid puked on another one of my kids in the middle of the night so I’m not my charitable old self. Perhaps tommorrow I will give it the old college try.

“College try” for what? To convince me that I can lose my salvation? That I can fall in and out of “grace?” That I can be regenerated, born-again one day and lost and dead in trespasses and sins the next? That “eternal life” does not actually mean eternal but only until the next unconfessed “mortal” sin? I’d rather you actually respond to what I wrote, as I responded to what you wrote.

Blessings to you too.

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker:

How many more times will you ask me the same question? It is obvious that you want to go somewhere with this. Why not just ask me what you want to ask, and quit beating around the bush?

Why don’t you just answer my question? Do you believe that as a Christian you can choose to be disobedient to God? If you believe that you can make that choice, then you believe that you have free will. If you do not believe that you have the freedom to choose disobedience to God, then you either believe that as a Christian that you are incapable of committing sin, or you believe that as a Christian that God forces you to commit sin.

You say: “…Evil…is the abuse of good…” I have heard a slight variation of that argument before. “Evil is the absence of good.”

If you have heard this before, then you should know then that I am saying nothing new or original. I suggest that you pick up a copy of C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity and read the chapter titled “The Invasion”. That should clear up what I believe. Here is an example of what Lewis says about evil: “Goodness is, so to speak, itself: badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good before it can be good. … evil is a parasite, not an original thing. The powers which enable evil to carry on are given it by goodness.

I ask you again: is this will that men now possess, the same as Adam possessed before he fell?

To answer your question, one must first ask you to clarify if you are speaking about men who are Christians living in a state of grace, or sinners that are not dwelling in a state of grace.

Christians are freed from the bondage to sin by Christ’s redemptive death on the cross. The Christian that is in a state of grace has the same freedom from the bondage to sin as Adam possessed before the fall. After Adam sinned, he became bound in the slavery of sin. Before a man becomes a Christian, he is also in bondage to sin.

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker:

In your theology God has a perfect will.

Yes, God has a perfect will, because God is perfect. How can a perfect God have an imperfect will?

You say that His perfect will was for Adam to be obedient, but Adam was not; therefore, God’s perfect will was thwarted. If His will can be thwarted, then He cannot be Sovereign God, as you have claimed that He is. Do you agree?

No, I do not agree. A father is the head of his house. If a child is disobedient to his father, the father is still the head of the house.

If I am disobedient to God, God is still the sovereign ruler over all creation. My unrepentant disobedience simply puts me in the position of being a rebel deserving just punishment – a punishment I will surely see if I do not repent and ask God for forgiveness.

If God’s perfect will was to be permissive toward Adam, and allow Adam to be “either obedient or disobedient,” then the whole of God’s creation and the end goal of His plan was contingent upon Adam’s choice.

I never said God’s perfect will was to be persmissive to Adam, as if God is some sort of enabler. I said that Catholics distinguish between God’s perfect will, and God’s permissive will. God’s perfect will was for Adam to be obedient, just as a loving father desires that his children be obedient. A loving father allows his children to make their own decisions in life, but a loving father also warns his children that disobedience will bring consequences.

God allowed Adam to exercise his free will, and in doing that, God tested the faith of Adam. God was upfront with Adam that if he was disobedient, that he would suffer death.

God established a covenant with Adam, and he laid before him either blessing or curse, life or death. If Adam was obedient to the covenant, he would have life, if he was disobedient, he would have the curse of death.

Blessing or curse, that is the same promise of the New Covenant. The Christian that chooses obedience receives eternal life, the Christian that chooses unrepentant disobedience receives the curse of eternal death.

God’s plan was always for the Adam and his progeny to become partakers of the divine nature. Adam’s sin did NOT change God’s perfect plan. Adam’s sin brought about the just penalty for that sin – his sin brought death into the world, and his sin sold himself and all his progeny into the slavery of sin. God the Son paid the price to free us from Adam’s sin by suffering death on the cross. Catholics believe that Adam’s sin did not thwart God’s plan for men to become partakers in the divine nature.

What your theology says is that God didn’t know what would happen, and so He sat nervously with crossed-fingers, hoping that Adam would make the right choice, the choice that God desired, but was not certain he would make.

Nonsense. I have never said that God is not omniscient. Obviously God knew what the consequences of Adam’s sin would be before Adam ever committed the sin of disobedience. God told Adam that he would suffer death if he was disobedient, and death was something Adam had never seen.

I said that God has a decretive will, and that His decretive will is absolutely fixed.

If I understand you, you saying that God decreed that Adam would be disobedient, since disobedience is what Adam manifested. How, then can you say that Adam chose to commit sin?

 

[Matt16_18]

linus

Do you believe that a Christian is capable of committing sin?

 

[sonseeker]

MATT 16_18

I begin my final post on this subject with a favorite quotation from the Letter To the Hebrews:

Hebrews 11:6 (NASB95)
6 *And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. *

Finally, sir, by the very pride which I have accused you of possessing, and which you have denied possessing, you have inflicted upon yourself the Coup de Grace.

Your sails are luffing; you have chopped off your own head; you have, like King Saul before you, thrust yourself upon your own sword, while separated from the sweet mercy of God’s salvation.

I will show you how in a moment, but first, out of courtesy for your valiant, though failed, effort, I will one more time answer your questions.

You ask:
Matt 16_18:

Why don’t you just answer my question? Do you believe that as a Christian you can choose

to be disobedient to God? If you believe that you can make that choice, then you believe that you have free will.

And

To answer your question, one must first ask you to clarify if you are speaking about men who are Christians living in a state of grace, or sinners that are not dwelling in a state of grace.To quote President Reagan, “There you go again!”

As to your first question: Yes

As to your second question: I have told you, “all men live in a state of grace…the fact that they are breathing proves that.”

As you shall see, by reading on, the other questions you have posed are now irrelevant.

To Wit:

You say:
Matt 16_18:

If you have heard this before, then you should know then that I am saying nothing new or original. I suggest that you pick up a copy of C. S. Lewis’ Mere Christianity

and read the chapter titled “The Invasion”. That should clear up what I believe. Here is an example of what Lewis says about evil:

“Goodness is, so to speak, itself; badness is only spoiled goodness. And there must be something good before it can be good. … evil is a parasite, not an original thing. The powers which enable evil to carry on are given it by goodness.Thank you, sir; you have, yourself, provided overwhelming proof and support for my argument.

Let me explain: Lewis says, “Goodness is, so to speak, itself; badness is only spoiled goodness…evil is a parasite, not an original thing.” Notice what Lewis says about badness; it is, “only spoiled goodness,” to which I say, Amen!

However, Lewis continues: “evil is a parasite, not an original thing.” Lewis says that “evil is…not an original thing,” nevertheless, Lewis agrees with me, that evil is, as I have asserted, some”thing.” Notice also, sir, that Lewis asserts what I have been asserting all along, ie., the powers which enable evil to carry on are given it by goodness.

Lewis’ support is the second to the last “nail in the coffin” of your “free will.”

(continued below)

 

[sonseeker]

(continued from post #130)

Matt 16_18

You continue:

After

Adam sinned, he became bound in the slavery of sin. Before a man becomes a Christian, he is also in bondage to sin.Again, I say, Amen!

If memory serves me, it was Augustine who referred to our will as a huge “beast,” with a bit in his mouth, and reins on his back. He said that, your will goes wherever the one who holds the reins directs it to go. There are only two who can hold the reins: The King of Kings, or the Prince of this world.

At this point, I ask that you carefully read Rom 6:12-18 paying close attention to vv 17, 18; this will help in your understanding of my next statements.

Your will is not free. In the unregenerate state, it can only sin; it hates God; Once regenerated, it can once again chose “to not sin,” though it will not always do so, as it stills dwells within sinful flesh; that is the point of Rom 7:14-25; That is also the point Paul is making in Rom 6:17, 18, ie., stop presenting the reins to Satan; continually present the reins to Christ. Whether or not a will is a slave of Satan, or a slave of Christ, it is, nonetheless, a slave. I am sure that you will agree that a will that is a “slave,” is not a will that is “free.” Do you agree?

Of course, we will not always do as Paul instructs, but, God does not take away from His adopted children, the grace of salvation by which He has graced them. That sir, is another of the points of Arminianism, ie., You can lose your salvation, thus, Arminians abhor OSAS, the true title of this thread.

Again, sir, I have consistently stated, and Paul and Augustine agree with me, that God’s free will sets the boundaries of your limited will; and as Paul and Augustine also agree, His free will controls your limited will.

That, sir, is the final “nail in the coffin” of your “free will.” Perhaps you will reconsider my abbreviated exegesis of the Parable of the Prodigal.

Sir, in my post immediately preceding this post, I successfully dismantled your theology; as you did not refute it in your response, I conclude that you have nothing more of any value to offer in its defense.

You deny that you are Arminian, and you say that you are Catholic; well sir, I have proven that your theology, whatever you call it, “Collapses in on itself.”

To God Be the Glory,
Bill

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker:

As to your first question: Yes

You say that you believe that a Christian can choose to be disobedient to God. If that is true, then you believe the Christian has the freedom of will to make a real choice against God’s will for him to be obedient. Why is this so difficult for you to accept?

We either have the freedom to choose to reject the grace of God, or we are nothing but meat robots that must live whatever life a capricious God has decreed. If men are nothing more than animals without free will, then God is a font of evil. If a man predestined for damnation rapes a woman because God has decreed that the rape should occur, then God is the one responsible for the rape, not the rapist, since the rapist was predestined by God to commit the rape. This OSAS-Calvinist conception of God is nothing but unadulterated blasphemy.

However, Lewis continues: “evil is a parasite, not an original thing.” Lewis says that “evil is…not an original thing,” nevertheless, Lewis agrees with me, that evil is, as I have asserted, some”thing.”

You need to actually read Lewis’ Mere Christianity. He certainly would not agree with you that evil is a “thing”.

Your will is not free. In the unregenerate state, it can only sin; it hates God; Once regenerated, it can once again chose “to not sin,” though it will not always do so, as it stills dwells within sinful flesh; that is the point of Rom 7:14-25; That is also the point Paul is making in Rom 6:17, 18, ie., stop presenting the reins to Satan; continually present the reins to Christ. Whether or not a will is a slave of Satan, or a slave of Christ, it is, nonetheless, a slave. I am sure that you will agree that a will that is a “slave,” is not a will that is “free.” Do you agree?

If you do not believe that Christians have been freed from the bondage to sin, then you do not understand what Paul is talking about, nor do you understand what it means to be Christian.

You are arguing that “unregenerate” men are meat puppets controlled by Satan, and Christians are meat puppets controlled by God. But this is a ridiculous argument, because unless Satan has free will, then Satan is also only doing what God has decreed. Ultimately, God is still the master puppeteer that causes men to sin, because Satan is also nothing but a puppet that God controls. This conception of God is blasphemous filth.

Of course, we will not always do as Paul instructs, but, God does not take away from His adopted children, the grace of salvation by which He has graced them.

If the Christian commits mortal sin and does not repent, he will be damned. There will not be any unrepentant rapists, murderers or apostates in Heaven.

 

[sonseeker]

Matt 16_18

You are going down for the third time! Give it up!

I have been looking at other of your posts, and find you to be a blustery, and bellicose, and bellowing, and bleating, and blathering, and bafflegabbing bully, who tries to scream those who disagree with him into submission while obfuscating and evading the real issues. You are doing that again. But it does not work on me!

And so sir, to those adjectives listed above, I now add, that you are also a
**SORE LOSER! **

You subscribe to strange and unbiblical doctrine! Again, facts that you ignore!

And again I state, that sinful and wicked men are loathe to extend to God the Sovereignty that He claims over His creation.

You believe that God made this creation for YOU! He did not, and He has the right to dispose of it and its creatures in any way He chooses; and even though it is distasteful to you, I trust in my God that He has a morally sufficient reason to purpose all of those things that make you uneasy! You should feel uneasy; that is God’s living and powerful word (Heb 4:12) convicting your sinful heart that your theology “Collapses in on itself.”

Repent! Stop believing in yourself, and start believing in Jesus Christ!

This discussion is over! You have nothing of value to say anymore!

To God Be the Glory
Bill

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker

I have been anything but obfuscating. I have been trying to show you why your OSAS-Calvinism doctrines necessarily means that God is a font of evil, and that this is a blasphemous thing to teach.

Your salvation is anything but secure if you persist in your blasphemy.

 

[sonseeker]

sonseeker

I have been anything but obfuscating. I have been trying to show you why your OSAS-Calvinism doctrines necessarily means that God is a font of evil, and that this is a blasphemous thing to teach.

Your salvation is anything but secure if you persist in your blasphemy.

Sir, Paul, C.S. Lewis, Augustine, and myself have shown you that my doctrine does not make God a font of evil!

You are full of SOUR GRAPES!

Good night, and,
To God Be the Glory
Bill

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker

You haven’t proven anything. You need to cool down a bit before you blow a head gasket.

Sheesh!

 

[sonseeker]

…or we are nothing but meat robots that must live whatever life a capricious God has decreed

. If men are nothing more than animals without free will, then God is a font of evil. If a man predestined for damnation rapes a woman because God has decreed that the rape should occur, then God is the one responsible for the rape, not the rapist, since the rapist was predestined by God to commit the rape. This OSAS-Calvinist conception of God is nothing but unadulterated blasphemy.God is not capricious; you are struggling with great and hard truths, but the facts and truths of scripture must be heeded.

Matt, obviously you trying to protect God’s honor, but He does not need your protection. I cannot resolve all of the paradox that is found within the pages of scripture for you, but it is clearly there. God is simply incomprehensible to us, and without His revelation, we would never know Him; we must with Paul exclaim: “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!” (Rom 11:33 NASB95)

I have provided only some of the vast amount of scriptural proof that refutes what you state in your quote above. Though God predetermines, and man carries out, scripture is absolutely clear that it is the creature that is responsible for the carrying out of what God has predetermined. I can tell you from years of study, that you will never resolve that paradox; but your inability to resolve it does not lessen its truth. Please read each of the verses below, and compare them with your statements above.

Luke 22:22 (NASB95)
22 “For indeed, the Son of Man is going as it has been determined; but woe to that man by whom He is betrayed**!” **

Acts 2:23 (NASB95)
23 *this Man, **delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you *nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.

Acts 4:28 (NASB95)
27 “For truly in this city there were gathered together against Your holy servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, along with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel,
28 to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose predestined to occur*. *

This is only of many dealing with predestination to salvation:

Acts 13:48 (NASB95)
48 *When the Gentiles heard this, they began rejoicing and glorifying the word of the Lord; **and as many as had been appointed to eternal life believed. ***

In your system with its practices founded on historical developement, and not scriptural revelation, I fear for your eternity, and the eternity of your fellows. God, through His revealed scripture, trumps all human invention and tradition.

God BlessYou,
Bill

 

[Matt16_18]

sonseeker:

God is not capricious; you are struggling with great and hard truths, but the facts and truths of scripture must be heeded.

You are right God is not capricious. But the god of OSAS–Calvinism is capricious – he is a monster that creates some men solely for the purpose of sending them into eternal torment in the fires of hell, while other men he creates to be eternally free from damnation. Neither the damned nor the saved can do anything about their fate. The god of OSAS Calvinism is the source and cause of all evil that is in his creation – rape, murder, incest, torture – all decreed by God. None of this blasphemy against God are “great and hard truths” that I must struggle to accept, what you are saying is nothing but rank heresy that must be rejected as a poisonous corruption of the truth.

Matt, obviously you trying to protect God’s honor, but He does not need your protection.

Yes, I am defending God against your blasphemous belief that he is the source and cause of all evil in the world. I am glad that you at least understand that.

I cannot resolve all of the paradox that is found within the pages of scripture for you, but it is clearly there.

You don’t understand scripture, and that is why you see if full of “paradox”. You are correct, you will never be able to resolve these false paradoxes for me!

God is simply incomprehensible to us, and without His revelation, we would never know Him …

God is not so beyond my comprehension that I am incapable of knowing that what you are saying is blasphemy. God indeed has revealed himself to men, and because of that revelation, I know that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. I know that God is love, and that God desires all men to come to repentance. I know that God sent his only begotten Son into the world so that I can be freed from the bondage to sin. I KNOW that God is holy, and that he is NOT the source and cause of the evil of abortion, rape, incest, murder, death camps …

I have provided only some of the vast amount of scriptural proof that refutes what you state in your quote above.

You have thrown up a lot of words, but you haven’t provided a coherent proof that refutes my statement at all. All you have done is tap dance around the defects of your theology without ever addressing the issues that I have raised. And now you are trying to obfuscate the issue by claiming that God is incomprehensible!

The only thing that is incomprehensible is your contradictory theology! Christians have no free will, but they can choose to be disobedient to God because God had decreed that Christians must be disobedient even when God commands obedience. The disobedience to God that Christians manifest can never be a cause for their damnation, but the disobedience that the damned manifest will bring glory to God, because God will manifest his glorious justice by punishing the damned for their disobedience - a disobedience that God caused!

Sheesh! How can any sane person actually believe this is what scriptures teach?

 

[thessalonian]

linus:

You don’t have to respond, but you can take some time and think about what I wrote. Even check out the Biblical context.“College try” for what? To convince me that I can lose my salvation? That I can fall in and out of “grace?” That I can be regenerated, born-again one day and lost and dead in trespasses and sins the next? That “eternal life” does not actually mean eternal but only until the next unconfessed “mortal” sin? I’d rather you actually respond to what I wrote, as I responded to what you wrote.

Blessings to you too.

I’ve gone round and round with your type making every kind of excuse for what the Bible teaches. Ignoring or discrediting the hard verses and finding some “context” which fits your thinking. The context is the superimposed doctine of Once Saved, Always Saved. A doctrine which requires 100% infallible scripture interprutatoin in order for you to be 100% sure you are going to persevere unto eternal life. If you are among those who will enter the heavenly glory you cannot lose your salvatoin so I do not like that term. Yet the only way you can know you are one of the elect is to persevere in good works and strive for righteousness, growing in holiness. He said “you shall know them by their fruits”. But you can fall from grace. If you fell from grace and are not restored you “were never really one of us”.

Peter is an excellent example. He had to have fallen from grace. Jesus says “if you deny me before men I will deny you before my father in heaven”. Now we know from MAtt 16 that Peter had faith, given to him from God the Father that Christ was the Messaih. Yet he denied Christ. How many times can you get away with denying Christ. Was he bluffing. I’ve heard all the arguements to this one. None of them come close to making sense.

Sorry for my snappy tone yesterday.

Blessings

 

[sonseeker]

Matt 16_18

Clearly you are like Paul Newman’s character in “Cool Hand Luke,” who after he has been severely beaten, believes that he won.

I have dismantled your idea on human free will, destroyed your thelogy relating to God’s Sovereignty and will. Even after I have beaten you and left you sobbing in the dust, you continue to claim victory.

You have shown yourself to be nothing but a buffoon who is full of hot air and invective.

You have one argument, and one argument only. You are a clanging bell, a screeching trumpet, a broken record. When you encounter someone who is your superior in intellect, your argument, and you fall apart.

How anyone who has been so severely beaten, and chastised as I have beaten and chastised you, can continue to claim that I have proven nothing, is beyond me. I have said from the beginning that are someone who has never met a fact he couldn’t ignore. Again, you prove me right. Hencforth, you shall become the brunt of my jokes before men, for your foolish and ungodly behavior.

The problem with your theology, and your religion is that it prohibits people from being saved. It tells them the wrong way, and like sheep, they follow.

We are sinners to the core, without the ability to move toward God, in fact, we hate Him, until He performs a marvelous work in our hearts and reveals the truth of our sinfulness and His glory to us. We then come to know that we are saved by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. Any addition to that, i.e., the eucharist, penance, baptism, confirmation, meritorious works, trust in Mary, is the different Gospel spoken of by Paul in Galations. You must repent of your sins, put aside your idols, and put your faith and trust in Christ, and Him alone, or you are not saved.

You have heard the Gospel. If you reject it, and continue in your ways, I tell you with certainty, that you are doomed.

I have discharged my duty, and I am not guilty of your blood, as I have preached the whole counsel of God to you during these posts.