The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Eternal Justification

This close to what, Bill? . . . a nervous breakdown? <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/giggle.gif" alt="" />

I'd be privileged to pray for you even though you didn't specify in what regard. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

In His Grace,

Joe k,

Please learn to spell "not" !! "nto" is driving me crazy!

<img src="/forum/images/graemlins/bash.gif" alt="" />

Thanks!

Ruth

Dave I mean they way jeff and Joe put a piece of paper in the post. or an undelined name of a person. hats what i am trying to do

JoeK read this and use the Graemlins >>> or to purchase additional smilies go here. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/compute.gif" alt="" />

Spellll Checkkkk is freeeee here. <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/3stooges.gif" alt="" />

it is NTO...... That was for Ruthy.

Not <------------= (notice the spelling?) only do you have an issue with orders, you also seem to have an aversion to listening to directions, taking advice, and even accepting the answers given to your very own questions. You want to know how to do these things? I've already told you in another reply to a similar question concerning making "clickable links". But I'll repeat it one more time:

Click here: FAQ

Or, you can simply use the items found in the "Font Style" dropdown menu in the "Advanced UBBT Code" box, which is found just below the blank space (aka: textbox) where you type in your message.

Or, you can ask these type questions in the [b][color:blue]HELP Forum[/color][/b]

HAHAHAHAHA Jeff. I can be very grating and frustrating. Everything you said would be confirmed by my blessed wife!!!!!!!!! I need to be more diligent. Perhaps I can find one to do it for me, then I would be satisfied...


Grace and Peace

Joe

Thanks

Joey k!!!!



Ruth

Ruthy:

It must be the New Yawka in me to add a y at the end of everyones name!!!!!!!!!! <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/BigThumbUp.gif" alt="" />

Pilgrim

Years ago when I was wrestling through this and other issues related to it, I felt like I was going to have a nervous breakdown. The only support group I had at the time, was forums such as this.
I have a feeling that my experience was/is not unusual.

Tom

Hello all:

I am in the process to reveal my conclusion on when an elect person is justified. When I have more time I will elaborate. I have looked at the strengths ond weaknesses of eternal justification and the traditional justified by faith positions and find they both are wanting from the correct scriptural support. Also I may be concluding that there is no warrant for a 3 fold process of justification. One conclusion I have reached is our faith does not cause justification, nor is it the condition of our justification. I will attempt to clearly show that our faith is a fruit of His elect being justified at the cross.


Grace and Peace

Joe

Joe k,

Before you reveal your conclusions, please reread the entire thread, with an open mind. No one has said that faith causes justification! The Word says that we must believe to be justified,

John 6:29 "Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent."


Romans 4:3-6 "For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works,".

Nor has anyone said that faith is a "condition" of justification, it is element that the Lord has proscribed with which we are to apprehend the justification that He is imputing to us. For if we are justified in eternity, why would we need to repent? Why are we called "children of wrath"?

Mark 1:15 "And saying, The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent ye, and believe the gospel."

John 1:12 "But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:"


Again, please do more study of the Word before you come to any "conclusion". <img src="/forum/images/graemlins/bingo.gif" alt="" />

In His Hands,

Ruth

Ruth an issue of such importance as justification needs to be addressed carefully and prayerfully. I will show you what i am speaking of when I have more time. Again, I stand corrected and will say that I am not at all comfortable about eternal justification as I once was. Nor am I comfortable with the traditional understanding of justifed by faith as prescribed by many.

I agree and have reread the thread. What continues to bother me is saying it is not caused or conditioned by faith, but God waits for our exercising of faith then justifies us. I sincerely believe that we are justified prior to faith or repentance. And I believe a correct interpretation of scripture will show this.


And Ruth, Do not forget verse 13 in John 1. This preceedes verse 12.

Joe

JUSTIFIED BY FAITH


“Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law”. Romans 3:28



The Reformers made the expression ‘justified by faith’ the ground and pillar of their doctrine. Much of mainstream Protestantism has therefore adopted this terminology into their confessions of faith. The problem is in how most interpret this biblical phrase. There are three particular interpretations propagated, two of which are false.



1. The Reformed doctrine teaches that Christ secured the justification of the elect in His death at the cross, but that His righteousness is not actually imputed until those elect are brought to faith in Christ. Therefore they teach ‘justification upon the act of faith.’ Although they do not make faith the cause of justification, they make it the instrument for justification. This is the view of most ‘Calvinists.'



2. The Free-will Arminian doctrine teaches that Christ died to make salvation possible to all, and that those are justified who ‘make Jesus the Lord and Master of their lives and give Him first place in their lives. Then He is able to give them His righteousness, which makes them justified before the Father.’ This view teaches ‘justification because of faith.’



3. The Biblical doctrine teaches that when Christ died, God the Father then and there justified the elect once for all. He did not merely secure their justification. Justified by faith then means ‘justification REVEALED by faith,’ Romans 1:17. Faith is not the instrument of justification. It is the result.



Faith however must be understood in one of two ways, depending on the context. Sometimes it is used as a synonym of the Gospel itself, i.e. ‘the faith which was once delivered unto the saints,’ Jude 3. That is not speaking of faith as a result of the Spirit’s regenerating work, but faith whose object is Christ, and whose substance declares His blood and righteousness as the only ground of justification before God. In other words, the justification of sinners is revealed by faith (the Gospel of God’s Son). That is certainly the sense of Romans 3:28 where faith is used in opposition to the ‘law of works.’



Faith may also be used in the subjective sense, i.e. the work of grace in the heart, as in Romans 5:1. However, even there, faith is not the instrument or cause of our justification, but the fruit of it. The instrument of our justification is always the righteousness of Christ, once for all established by Christ, accepted, approved and imputed to the account of all the elect of all time there and then, Hebrews 10:10. Therefore being justified, it is by faith (the gift of faith to believe) that redeemed and justified sinners come to learn of their redemption, justification, and forgiveness of sins and enter into the peace with God in their spirits, souls, and consciences. However, it is not then that God imputes the righteousness of Christ. That was already done on their behalf at the cross! 2 Corinthians 5:21


More to follow.


Joe

Hmmmmm, I have to object strongly to this notion of yours on exegetical grounds. Can you please EXEGETE this text and show that it warrants your new-found view?

Romans 5:1 "Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ;"

Again, I must reject your conclusion based on sound exegesis of this text. Please EXEGETE this passage and thus warrant your view, and especially that it is even speaking of "justification".

Hebrews 10:10 "By which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all."

What you are have said here is very much like that asserted by neo-Orthodoxy's adherents, e.g., Karl Barth. He held that there is a group called the "elect-elect" who differ from the "elect-reject" in that the come to know, experience, realize that they are elect when they believe. In other words, faith is simply the apprehension of what has already occurred and doesn't actually effect the person's standing before God. What I could easily conclude is that there is no real need of the elect to believe since they are already justified; their judicial punishment has been assumed by Christ and His righteousness imputed to them. The only benefit of one's believing is subjective; e.g., an appeased conscience.

but there is simply an overwhelming amount of passages which perspicuously state that one is justified, i.e., made right, declared righteous, by (through) the means of faith and not before.

Philip Eveson's incontrovertible exposé on justification is something you really should read. Click here: The Great Exchange.

Justification: "If the purity of this doctrine is in any degree impaired the Church has received a deadly wound and brought to the very brink of destruction. Whenever the knowledge of it is taken away, the glory of Christ is extinguished, religion abolished, the Church destroyed and the hope of salvation utterly overthrown. - John Calvin "The Necessity of Reforming the Church" p. 42

In His Grace,