Salvation

Salvation by Faith without Works Is Only for the Church Age

Doctrine, Salvation / /

The Pauline Epistles have established that God provides the gift of salvation by grace through faith apart from works in this present dispensation, the Church Age. And that salvation allows and encourages the saved person to do good works. Although God provides salvation through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ to all men from Adam on, all Scripture, including the Pauline Epistles, indicate that only in this Church Age has salvation been given through faith without works.

Yet it is commonly, almost universally argued, by those who claim to derive their doctrine of salvation from the Bible, that all salvation from Adam and into the future must have been and must be by faith without works as in this Church Age. We might overlook this error because it seems to emphasize the true nature of salvation in this Church Age. But actually it undermines true doctrine, even the doctrine of salvation.

Such doctrine denies that Scripture is profitable for doctrine by promoting false doctrine over what Scripture says. Such doctrine biases interpretation and translation of Scripture by those who claim to believe Scripture. By forcing the faith plus works passages in the Bible to agree with works after salvation passages, theologians blur the line between salvation and works. By arguing that works prove salvation, they effectively make works necessary for salvation to promote a gospel that is no longer faith apart from works even in this Church Age.

The key to understanding salvation from the penalty of sin is that God will give eternal life and the gift of righteousness to those who show continued interest in righteousness. It is doubtful that anyone before the first advent believed the coming Messiah would die for their sins and be raised from the dead. And even if it can be shown there was someone who did, that would not indicate that God gave salvation by faith without works at that time. Scriptures clearly declare how God has provided salvation in the various dispensations.

God cannot build correct doctrine on a foundation of incorrect doctrine without first reproving that false doctrine correcting it. It is time to correct the false doctrine about salvation and go on to rich doctrines the Holy Spirit wants to teach us. See the slides on Dispensational Salvation for Scriptures that establish Biblical doctrines of salvation in the various dispensations.

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In Consideration of Thought-provoking Questions by Atheists

Christian Living, Doctrine, Salvation / /

I saw these 15 Thought-Provoking Questions Atheists Often Ask The Religious on the internet. They are indeed thought-provoking questions that everyone ought to be able to answer. In writing out answers for them in my slides Consideration of Questions Atheists Often Ask, I have been stuck by how simple and how profound was of the answer Jesus gave to the Samaritan woman who wanted to talk about correct worship of God. He stated in His answer, “God is a spirit and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

The words “in truth” set apart true worship from all false worship and false ideas about God. God allows the devil to propagate lies for those who prefer lies to the truth.  Jesus said of the devil that “he abode not in the truth; because there is no truth in him…he is a liar and the father of it.” And of Himself Jesus said, “And if I say the truth, why do you not believe me? He that is of God heareth God’s words.”

The truth is in God’s words. A person needs God’s words to know about God and true (and false) worship. So, I will attempt to answer these questions from the truth, that is from the Bible. I accept the King James Authorized Version to be God’s words. I give my reasons in the slides Identifying the Words of God. Consider my Biblical arguments there, but do not take my word for it. Ask God to show you what to believe. He is most interested that every person know the truth and believe it.

Some will surely ask, What about those who do not have a Bible? I would say to get one and read it. To those who have no access to a Bible, ask God for it. Concerning those who are too unknowing to even ask, God confronts every person with some measure of truth. To each person who accepts that truth, God gives more. My answers to these thought-provoking questions expand upon these things.

Jesus said there are many that are on the broad way that leads to destruction; and few are on the narrow way to life. Since many on the broad way think they are on the way to life, everyone should consider carefully what way they are following. Consideration of these questions will surely be useful for that. I trust my discussion of these questions in the slides Consideration of Questions Atheists Often Ask will be beneficial for everyone’s consideration.

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Body, Soul and Spirit of Man in Church Age Salvation

Doctrine, Salvation / /

Man made in the image of a triune God has three parts. As God is made up of three persons with different ministries, so man’s three parts– body, soul and spirit—have different functions within a man. Interestingly, each part can have a separate life and death. These slides, Body, Soul and Spirit, investigate the changes in each part of man that occurred as a result of Adam’s Fall and the changes that come as a result of Church Age Salvation.

Doctrine should agree with Scripture.

The Pauline Epistles have considerable information about this, but that information is not as systematic as we might hope. To put the information together in a systematic way, we must study diligently, believe God’s words, and trust Him to give us insights. For example, to exchange “sinful nature” for Paul’s use of the word “flesh” is not believing God’s words. But such is done by many commentators to produce support what they call “orthodox theology”. These slides discuss the differences between that commonly believed theology and Biblical doctrine in a section that is easily skipped over.

Some years ago a fellow asked me if I believed the Bible. When I said I did, he asked me about Ephesians 2:6, namely how we were raised up to sit in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. I was proud that I could give an answer—a standard answer that I had learned from Bible commentators. He just looked at me with a look that said, “And you think you believe the Bible.” As I thought about it, I realized the standard explanation was designed to explain away what we do not see a way to believe. In fact, much of our Bible “education” teaches us how to explain away Scripture we do not understand. God gives understanding for us to believe what the Bible says.

Implications for Christian Living

The Pauline Epistles have a considerable amount to say about Christian living after salvation. But Paul always establishes doctrinal truth before going on to say how the believer is to live in light of that truth. It is vital that we understand how salvation changes a man internally before we understand how to live practically. A common teaching that the Christian must strive to control and eliminate a sin nature from body, soul, and spirit provides a wrong basis for living righteously. Such a wrong basis makes Scripture quite confusing and makes righteous living more difficult than it need be. These slides Body, Soul, and Spirit will establish what happens inside a person when he experiences salvation. They will explain how the believer is in Christ and Christ in him; and they will also clarify what is the new man and the old man in a believer.

Later slides Living by Grace Not Law deal in more detail how to live after salvation in consideration of these truths.

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Why does God multiply sorrow in childbirth?

Doctrine, Salvation / /

Sorrow in Childbirth is often counted as a punishment for Adam’s wife for disobeying the commandment not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. But the punishment was death. That was promised ahead of time and fully came upon the woman, Adam and all his descendants.

Was it a curse like God put on the serpent and on the earth? God did not call it a curse, apparently because it was not a curse. Surely God had a good reason for this. I had thought for some time that other things might have made more sense—like maybe making the woman allergic to that specific fruit or something like that.

I looked everywhere I could think of to find the reason God to assigned sorrow in childbirth. I looked in commentaries in libraries and bookstores. I looked in religious encyclopedias. This was long before there was internet. But there were Bibles with explanatory notes, so I looked through every one of those I could find. I saw no satisfactory answer until one morning God showed me the answer in my Bible reading. And God’s answer, which I have written in the theology slides Sorrow in Childbirth, is far above anything I could have imagined.

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Baptism: an Overview

Doctrine, Salvation / /

Years ago when I had learned that baptism by immersion symbolizes the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, I tried to understand why baptism is in water. Scripture and common sense both clearly indicate that a simple immersion in water does not cleanse externally or internally. It cannot even be symbolic of cleansing.  Cleansing from sin is by the blood of Jesus Christ, and that is surely not applied while one is in the grave. When I saw a clear argument from Scripture concerning the meaning of the water just last summer, I decided to document it in a set of PowerPoint slides.

While I was well into that, I saw an internet blog speculating on where the water baptism used by John the Baptist came from. I thought surely the Scripture would give some clarification on that. And it surely does. So I added more slides about that.

My pastor then suggested I add in some slides about transliteration of the Greek words for baptize and baptism. Then if I would also talk about “saved by water”, I could teach an adult Sunday School class about baptism. By the time I had added discussions about John the Baptist, about Jesus’ baptism, about Holy Ghost baptism and baptism by fire, there was material for several lessons. And even as I was trying to organize all that material into a single set of slides for this website, I was presented with arguments for trine and face-forward immersions. To organize my thoughts about that I wrote more slides. And since they contributed to my understanding about baptism, I decided to add them as well.

So these Baptism slides are extensive. I would not have expected that there would be so much to say, when I started. And there is surely more that could be said. In fact, even as you consider this discussion, you may wonder why I did not comment on other things that may come to mind. My philosophy here has been not to examine the many false doctrines about baptism (except where doing so is clarifying), but to systematically establish Scriptural doctrine.

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Salvation is different in different dispensations

1 Comment / Salvation / /

That salvation is different in different dispensations is a challenging topic. It stirs up considerable controversy. I have heard fundamental Baptist pastors declare that whoever says anyone ever got saved in any other way than by grace through faith apart from works is a heretic. They have learned to twist any Scripture to agree with that. Once a seminary dean told me that he did not need Scripture to support this view, because it would impugn the very character of God to suggest He would save different people in different ways.

I have placed extensive Scriptural evidence for God’s different methods of salvation in different dispensations in the PowerPoint slides Dispensational Salvation, so I will not attempt to place those arguments here. But within the first few chapters of God’s words to us, it is evident that Adam and Eve had unique choices to make concerning right and wrong. Likewise, no other person on earth has had the promises and opportunities that God offered to Abraham and his descendants. God most certainly does deal with different people in different ways.

Accept God’s Justice

In every case where God has dealt with man there are inevitable similarities. God in every situation has the same character and attributes. Man in every case has human nature. But within those parameters, humans can be marvelously different from each other, live under vastly different conditions and face staggeringly different situations. God deals with each person individually. And he deals with people in ways we may not count as fair. For when we question His fairness, He asks, “O man, who art thou that repliest against God?”

God has, indeed, placed within us a sense of what is just and what is not. But we attempt to apply that sense of justice with limited information and limited understanding. In Scripture God has also given us details of His interactions with various people in various circumstances. It is these details that help us to understand God in His dealings with men.  It is entirely inappropriate for us to undermine what God has written with our own limited sense of justice.

Understand Dispensations

Our limited sense of justice probably sustains our strongest resistance to accepting that God has dealt with mankind differently through different dispensations. But one will have very limited understanding of the Bible without recognizing such dispensations. But even dispensationalists have resisted the truth that God’s method and nature of salvation is different in different dispensations. This resistance to truth greatly confuses our understanding of Scripture even when we accept that there have been dispensations.

To assign God’s present method of salvation to all dispensations, does not directly hinder evangelism in this Church Age. But it does greatly hinder our understanding of the Bible in other dispensations. To fully understand Scripture we must accept that God has said what He meant to say; and that He means what He said. The slides Dispensational Salvation present a full step in that direction.

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Salvation in the Church Age

Salvation / /

Salvation is a highly important doctrine. According to God’s words, each person will go on to the next life to one of two places: to heaven with God or to the lake of fire and brimstone with the devil and his angels. By one man, Adam, sin came into the world and death passed upon all men. So every man has sin as defined by God. A man with any amount of sin will not get into heaven with God. God cleanses a person from sin only through Jesus Christ in His death on the cross whereby Jesus accepted the judgment of God against sin for all men.  Through His resurrection Jesus Christ provides life free from sin for any person.

Thus apart from Jesus Christ there is no salvation. Since there are a multitude of people on this planet who are not trusting Jesus Christ for salvation, there are a multitude of people who need salvation. Furthermore, God’s word declares that most people who think they have salvation in Jesus Christ are not saved. God Himself, in the words He has written to us, is the only one to trust about how to be saved. The Theology Slides, Salvation in the Church Age, carefully explore the what God says about salvation and how every person in this age can get the life God intended for them.

Because God wants each person to know how they stand with Him, He deals with each person individually concerning how sincere they are about seeking truth about Him. Depending upon that sincerity, God will show anyone and everyone the truth. Ultimately knowledge of that truth is only to be found in God’s words to us. Salvation can only come through believing those words — words quoted in these slides.

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