I know the truth, because He told me the truth.
Terry,
I wish the above solved the problem, Terry. But it does not. God has spoken to me just as definitely and in as great a detail as He has you. My view of justification is the biblical view. I have as much scripture as you do and a more consistent rationale. Mine is truly the story of "good news" to others.
You disagree? Of course, proving that "He told me so" has nothing to do with solving the problem at hand.
I don't know if anyone has noticed but I have left off the sarcasm for a while. I use it when others dive into the gutter of expressed judgmentalism and slander. For the time being -- it seems that we all have grown just a bit.
At any rate, this particular discussion -- and we are a discussion group -- is obviously a most important matter.
I am going to assume a thing or two in the words you wrote in the above and the immediate past. You see God as not having secured my salvation apart from my response. Which is the same as saying "God has not secured my personal and individual salvation." He has only provided for the possibility of my salvation. The rest is up to me. Some on your side of the fence even believe that I have to stop sinning in order to effect my salvation !!
You describe a covenant relationship in the above thinking, when in fact, you have described a contract. When God made covenant with Abraham, to establish a nation in his seed, to make that people as numerous as the stars in the sky (something He did not do in a literal sense, by the way -- a difference between millions of people and billions of stars), He made a covenant that only He could fulfill. And right here, in this illustration, we have the crux of the problem, the disagreement, do we not? If I were you, I would argue that although Abraham could not accomplish the fulfillment of the covenant, a nation of God's people or a Seed that would redeem (depending on which NT text you approach). he had to have that first son. And if his wife was barren and he was over the hill in regard to sexual activity, still, the sexual act HAD to occur. Abraham had to do something.
I think that both sides of this issue get bogged down right here. Activity on our part IS A NECESSARY ACTION. The right and left actually do agree with this. If you followed Bill Taylor or Lance Muir or Jonathan Hughes around, you would find no less a life of righteousness, peace and joy than exists in your own life. No one on the left (on this forum) lives a life of sinful self indulgence -- but your side often insists that what the left believes will lead to that conclusion. It does not. Karl Barth (the very manifestation of the raving liberal who believes in nothing except the value of his own thinking) died a righteous man -- certainly as righteous you or any in your camp. He spent his entire adult life reconciling his beliefs to the "B I B L E." Why is that? Did he just luck out -- living that lifestyle by accident? Our lives --------- yours and mine, yours and Barth's, yours and Deegan's, yours and Lance Muir's -------- are remarkably the same AND FOR THE SAME REASON if we can state that reason in terms of pleasing God because of the Spiritual Force that is within each of us. It is a shame that this sameness has no value to you in terms of defining the boundaries of the family of God. If we were placed under the same rule of Satan as Barth and Bonhoeffer, two who did not agree on what must be done about the Ass called Hitler, judgmentalism would fall away. We would share in the same fear of the enemy, the same persecution, the same work of extinction. We would be brothers. I would be hiding your loved ones and you would be saving mine. THAT is what would happen. It almost makes me cry.
Abraham and his effort? God wants us involved. His effort was necessary if the seed was to come from his lineage. God has included us in partnership with Him. But that does not change the fact that the covenant is from God to us, period. Abraham began working to fulfill the covenant ALREADY MADE TO HIM. God's promises are God's realities. To argue that Christ was not going to happen in the flesh apart from Abraham's cooperation is not a biblical view, IMO. Christ's activity was determined before the foundations of the world, of course. Abraham is included in the covenant relationship but is not the weak link in the chain we call "the redemption of man." Think about what you are saying. God's plan depended upon the cooperation of a particular man and the continuing effect of salvation in my life is dependent upon ME, praise the Lord (?)
We have God at the top of the cliff throwing a rope to one trapped on a ledge below. The rescue is effective because the cliff hanger reaches up and grabs the rope. When pulled to the top, all will say that God At The Top did the saving. No one will argue that the man on the edge saved himself. And so God throws the rope and all we do is grab it and hang on for dear life. Pretty close? So ............ what if we are driven to the bottom of the cliff by a consuming fire. Hell is licking at our heels. And God is in Heaven -- miles and miles above. He throws the rope and we grab it ....................... and hang onto it for a salvation that is miles and miles and miles above us. Got strength? But I must call it a morning. Beans.
To be continued with a thorough discussion of Col 1:17 -23. Understand that I am only sharing my faith -- I do not mean to be "talking down." But this is a discussion group. I only wish it was a fellowship of the saints -- but "discussion group" is good.
Jd
