Dear Joe,<br><br>Revelation 22:19 very clearly proves that a person who is one of the elect can have their part taken from the holy city, and hence the book of life. I have read responses to my statement about this verse, but none of them were valid.<br>As I indicated before, not only the tree of life, but the holy city is mentioned as being taken away here.<br><br>Your statement about Lucifer was interesting, but simply conjecture. It could also be that God foresaw Lucifer's rebellion and predestined Christ to die because of that. My whole point in asking that was to respond to your unfounded accusation that "God was only God sometimes" according to what I believe. Because He is sovereign, God retains the right to not use His power as well.<br><br>You wrote:<br>"For that matter, why don't all Christians abstain from fornication?----could it be because ahhhhhh, because they are sinners or maybe not Christians at all? But, He still reveals His sovereignty in chastising those whom He loves--not the others...."<br><br>I am talking about real Christians. I don't think that you could effectively argue the case that no believer has ever committed fornication. Yet the scripture says it is God's will that we abstain from it, not be chastised for it; though He will do that if we go against His will. But the mere fact that some Christians have fornicated before is manifest evidence that God sometimes does not exercise direct control over all of His creation, and that some have defied His will (to their peril I might add). Where is it written that God has to exercise full control at all times?<br><br>That was an interesting article, but it provided no real evidence that being born again happens before being saved. The closest he came was quoting John 3:5, "Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (the implication being one had to be born again before he was saved). Matthew 5:20 makes it clear that we must be righteous to enter the kingdom of God. As is clearly spelled out in scripture, righteousness is by faith upon all who believe in Jesus Christ (Romans 3:22). So comparing these two, I really can't say that I see a difference between being saved and being born again. I'll leave it at that.<br><br><br>In Christ,<br>Josh