How many ways are there we can be saved?

So...once baptized allways saved???

I don't see a conflict between my expressed theories and these scriptures.  If the law was a "tutor" then it was established to show us, or teach us how we should be--yet were / are not--therefore, the need for Jesus.  But the question is why were we not able to look like what the law said we should.  The answer IMO is sin of course, but sin within our nature deep down beyond the behavior level, at the motive level, where it should have been recognized that the promise of a coming savior was needed just as much as the realization nowdays that he did come.  The promise then was that He would come and cover all sin, and the promise now is that His comeing did cover all sin.

The law wasn't adequate because it addressed our behavior, not our core, but by revealing that our behavior was not what it should look like, it was addressing our core (state of being)--that it was not what it should be.  That, I think is why the law could never impart righteusness.  Not only could it never be perfectly obeyed, but even if it was--by humans--it would still be behavior that was righteuss, and not our state of being, wich only Jesus could address.

The covenant Jesus established resolves the problem of our state of being.  It is the eternal covenant that existed in the OT too.

IMO...

The Acts 22 reference should be read as, "...wash your sins away calling on His name".  The prepositional phrase "by calling on His name" modifies the action "wash".  Being baptized is a seperate thought and action, prompted by the faith allready present, wich compells the believer from inside to obey.  It is not our behavior of obediance that demonstrates faith, but the compelling force within that does.  Since we are no longer under law, we are not bound to obey, but as believers we are compelled to.  Same behavior, different reasons for it.

All right, everyone I wanted opinions from are here...well almost everyone, but I suspect 2nd Timothy will be along shortly, and a few others   , so lets get a couple things straight.

I was raised christian, memorizing scripture, and am fairly familiar with it.  I remember more scripture than I can find when I want it.  Because of that though, I recognized something about myself, I don't allways come up with the questions I need to think through, because most of the Bible I learned before the "thinking gear" kicked in, and since it was a part of my thought process allready, once I could think things through, I didn't realize I needed to.

My best learning is done in argument form, therefore I tend to serch out those who disagree with me, and can defend their opinion well, to bounce my own opinion off of, to test it.  I am looking for dialogue with you guys to do just that.

I do not disagree with anything posted here so far, except Toms  comment on the "praying for Paul thingy"  I only included that because it is the logical conclusion of my premis about time.  I recognize it is meaningless, and useless for any kind of doctrinal foundation.  It's purely my own speculation, unsupported by scripture.

I did not intend to suggest that we are still under law, it was man that made it a condition of salvation, not the wrighters of the OT, and I am prepared to defend that statement.  My proposition is that we are under Grace, just as the OT believers were, even though they may not have  realized  that.  The only difference between the Old Covenant, and the New Covenant is: the OC was conditional on man maintaining God as their God, the NC is conditional on God, an absolute,  but the rest of the respective covenants are the same.  The two were even established the same way.  In Ex 24:8, Moses "instituted" the Covenant of the Law with blood, in Matt. 26:28 Jesus did.  Under both covenants, the object was not behavior modification, but a relationship with Jesus / God.  One described what it looked like, and the other illustrated it, but both were designed to reveal our need for Jesus, that we could not 'look like' what he required, and that we needed Him to work in us the state of being that produced the results that satisfied the condition of being righteuss.  It was that 'state of being' in both covenants that was the objective.  IMO

It is not a quarrel I am after, but an argument that I can test my own opinion against, and examine opposing arguments---and after all, this forum is called "debate".   

Hey Brothers and sisters in Christ,

I thought I would throw out some of my thoughts so you all can tell me how off the wall I am (with scriptural support please) or help me think them through better.

One of the things that kinda bugs me, is when well meaning Christians display an understanding of scripture as something like, " that was OT theology, but we are under NT grace."  I think we get confused by the labels--OT & NT--but they are not scripture, just labels describing a part of the Bible.

The more I read the Bible, the more I agree with the old saying, "the OT is the NT concealed, and the NT is the OT revealed."  They are saying the same thing.  The scriptures Paul argued from, proving to the Jews that Jesus was the Messiah were the OT.  The scriptures appealed to by the Bereans in Acts 17:11 to see if what Paul ( a NT christian) said was true, were the OT.  The things Jesus said in His ministry on earth were almost all direct Quotes from the OT.  He even said that He only repeats what the Father told Him to say.  From the cross,Jesus quoted Ps 22:1, I think, to bring to mind the descriptive prophesy about the messiah, the observers were seeing right in front of them.  When Jesus said, "hear oh Israel, the Lord is one...love the Lord your God with all thine heart..." He was quoting Deut. 6:4...and on and on. Hebrews 4:2,6 says the OT Jews heard the same Ghospel as we did,  Zeph. 1:7 talks about a sacrafice that was allready prepared, and Heb. 13:20 says that sacrafice was Jesus--the Eternal covenant.

As I read it, the covenant given in Gen. 17:7,8 was an eternal covenant, the same covenant we are under in the NT---if God is our God we will inherit the promised land forever.  In Gal 3:17, Paul says the OT covenant made in Gen 17 was not nullified by the law given to Moses.


Another point is that time is only relative to us, not God.  To claim that "Jesus hadn't died yet" is really irrelevent I think in the light of the eternal covenant.  (Now this is where I get a little goofy)  I take it one step further in my understanding.  I define 'time' as that 'thing' that seperates events.  If God is outside of time, then to God, everything is 'now' and there is no such thing as 'then'.  My dead Grandparents, Moses, and I will all approach the Throne at the same instant, immediately following each of our respective deaths.  This elliminates the conceptual need for a 'holding tank' for those who die before the end of 'time'.  It also renders 'salvation by faith' in the OT a non issue in my own ability to understand it.  One more step I take on this thought ( although I haven't really figgured out why yet  , is that it is legitimate for me to pray now for the apostle Pauls welfare.  Kind of rediculus, 'cause I know how the story turns out, but I don't know the emotional battles he faced, and I can support him with prayer just as I can support my wife as she visits her mom in the hospital,  Because God is outside the realm of 'time'.


OK, theres a couple of my thoughts---fire away   

Matthew 10:37
37 “Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me;


What I believe that passage is saying, is that if someone chooses to be loyal to the opinion of a person, church, denomination...ect. instead of to Him...

Why do you believe what you believe?  Is it because that is what Jesus revealed to you in His written word, or because someone told you that is what it says?  If you choose to believe what someone said the Bible says, then you're placeing your trust in the person who told you what the Bible said, and not in Jesus, aren't you?

Once upon a time, I believed what someone said was in the Bible, and would have stood shoulder to shoulder with you SatisfiedMind, arguing the same position...untill I read it myself.

It is very important to understand that the “baptism of the Holy Spirit,” as that phenomenon was initiated both in Acts 2 and 10, was not a condition for anyone’s personal salvation. It was a miraculous authentication of divinely orchestrated events – unique to those occasions. It is thus not being implemented today as a means to any person’s conversion.

"It is very important to understand that"...that statement is false.  The baptism of the Holy Ghost is most certainly a condition of salvation...at least Jesus said it was, so I gotta float my boat with Him.

Jn 3:3 In reply Jesus declared, “I tell you the truth, no one can see the kingdom of God unless he is born again.”

1 Peter 1:23
23 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.

Excellent posts PR & DW 

OOps, that was only one cent, here's the other one 

......................Acts 22:16 says ,"Get up, be baptized..."  thats two things to do, ..."and wash your sins away"  Something you do does not wash your sins away, so this passage is not saying that washing sins away is a result of being baptized.  It is assuming the understanding that before a person submits to the outward sign of water baptism, the faith that prompts obediance to the command is allready in place.  Sins are washed away because we believe the Word, and the act of baptism as they did it, by submersion, is the illustration of what takes place spiritually upon believing the Word and the resulting spiritual baptism of the receiving of the Holy Ghost,  which John the Baptist said Jesus does.  Romans 6:3-4 illustrates the picture.  Paul uses the picture of full immersion in water as the burial, and the comeing out of the water is the illustration of the ressurection with Jesus to a knew life.  Here again it is not the result of what we do, but the picture of what allready happened the moment we believed and were born again.  Romans 3:27 does not say we clothed ourselves (or were clothed) as a result of being baptized.  Paul merely points out by useing an outward expression of faith that we are clothed in righteusness.  There again, it assumes the understanding that the reason for the act, was faith allready present.  If the act of being baptized was not a responce of faith, it is reduced to a ritual by which something can be gained.  God responds to the condition of our heart towards Him, not to the position of our bodies-that would be more like occult theology than the Bible.  1 Peter 3:21,  "and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ".  What water is it that symbolizes baptism?  The water of the flood that originated in two places.  It rained down from the heavens, and broke forth from the earth.  When a person is baptized with the Holy Ghost, He is rained down from Heaven, and wells up within, floating the Christian above the grasp of the world, drownding the world and those who choose to stay in it, cleansing us from it. Peter defines the act of baptizm here, as the plege of a good concience before God. Not an outword result, but an inward one.  It's a plege, an outward statement of the condition, and commitment,  of our heart towards God, made possible only by the last scentance of that vs., by the ressurecction of Jesus.  1Cor 6:11   And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.   The vs. says that the 'acts'...washed...sanctified...justified were done, in the name of  Jesus, by the Holy Spirit.  It has nothing to do with water baptism.  Titus 3:5-7 has nothing to do with baptism by water.  It is talking about baptism by the Holy Ghost.  Nowhere in the context of the passage is Paul even referencing water baptism.  The passage even says, "...washing of rebirth...BY the Holy Spirit.  In Eph 2:8-9 Paul said that we are saved by grace, through faith...without works.  The result of faith, is salvation.  Faith itself is the result of believing the word of God.  How then can Paul turn right arround and say that we are saved by baptism with water, only 3 chapters later in the same letter?  The only answer is; he isn't.  Paul is saying we are saved by  faith, and it is professed by obediance to the command to be baptized, faith that came to us through believing the Word.    In Eph. 5:26, there are two prepositional phrases; 'by the washing of water', and 'with the word'.  Both modify the verb, 'cleansed' .  The passage says the church was cleansed--with the word, and, by the washing with water.  1 Peter 3:21 qualifies how we are cleansed ' by the washing with water'; as the plege of a clear concience toward God, again, calling up the picture of dying to the world and being resurrected again in Christ--the way Paul was trying to illustrate how men are to live with their wives--as dead to self, but alive toward her.

Peter recognized in Acts 10 & 11 that Cornelius, and his household were baptized with the Holy Ghost before they were baptized with water.  What did jesus say to the thief on the cross?  He said, "Today you will be with Me in paradise.  The thief was not baptized.  Water baptism is not nessesary to be saved, but faith is.

Forgive me if this seems a little disjointed...it is.  I just cut and pasted this from an argument I wrote to my uncle, who is a Lutheran pastor, and holds the exact view expressed in the last few posts.

OK, here's my two cents   

The understanding of Acts 2:38 seems to be a hinging point here.  The question is this: is forgiveness of sin, and the gift of the Holy Ghost given to us because we believed, or because we were obidient to the command to be baptized?  If it is because we were baptized, then we are  not born again, and therefore saved, by faith alone.  He holds out on us untill we do something.  If it is the result of faith, because we believed, then being born again has nothing to do with water baptizm.  The Bible says we are saved through faith alone, " For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. (that means apart from obeying a command ) Rom 3:28.  Mt 3:11, Mk 1:8, Lk 3:16, Jn 1:25,26, and 33 state the difference between Johns baptism with water, which we are also commanded to observe, and Jesus' baptism with the Holy Ghost.  "If baptism is something man does, then that would mean man grants the one being baptized the Holy Ghost",-- if the Holy Ghost comes to man in the waters of baptism, . That is why that is not the way it happens.  We are born again through the Spirit when we believe, through faith. Romans 10 :13-17 13 for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
14 How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?  15 And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!”
16 But not all the Israelites accepted the good news. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed our message?”  17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ."
 Here Paul sets up his argument, concluding with vs. 17 that faith comes from hearing the word of God, he does not say from water baptism. In fact, his rhetorical question in vs. 14, "...and how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?" reveals his point, that there is only one way: to believe the Word. Galatians 3:2 I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard?  Here Paul points out the Holy Ghost is recieved when we believe, not by doing a command. We are told to be baptized.  That is a command, but not so we recieve the Holy Gost.  If it were, then what Paul insinuates in Gal 3:2 is false. There are two different baptisms referred to in these passages, and they reveal that being baptized with water is in fact an act we do.  We are told to do it.  The concept that God sets up a prescribed behavior pattern (baptism) that we can do, and God responds to that act, is occultic in nature.  The occult is all about what we can do to get god (or the gods) to do what we want them to do, and that is exactly why Jesus set up a plan where no man is ever looked to, and exactly why works done by man will never result in Gods favor, only faith in His promise is rewarded.

If in Acts 2:38 Luke was trying to say that forgiveness came through water baptizm, then why, in Acts 10:43 does he only say it comes through believing. The 10:43 passage is clear, and should be used to clarify the muddied 2:38 passage, not the other way arround.  In Acts 2:38-39 the phrase, "...and you will recieve the Holy Ghost" reveals the result of repentance, not of being baptized with water.  The Holy Ghost is recieved as a result of believing, as Paul points out.  Repentance is the responce of believing, and being baptized with water is the outward expression of that faith.  Just one chapter later, in Acts 3:19,20, the theological position held in Acts 2:38 is repeated by the same person, and recorded by the same author : Acts 3:19,20" Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord, 20 and that he may send the Christ, who has been appointed for you—even Jesus. "  We must understand Acts 2:38, in the light of the more clearly expressed Acts 3:19,20, otherwise, we end up with a contradiction in scripture. 

Teaching, and makeing Disciples are about the same thing, and don't change the meaning at all.  Both include the idea of a continuing process, transferring knowlege and understanding.  You can't teach, or make disciples in a one time event, and thats why you can't make a disciple by baptizing them--a one time event.  It is not the case that "teaching observance" and "baptizing" are tools to make disciples with, because it is not us that brings people to faith, it is God.  We only carry the message.  This concept you promote here is not pointing to Jesus' act on the cross, but our own act in bringing people to faith, therefore it is not from the Holy Spirit, since He only points to Jesus.  A better understanding of what the passage says is: "Go, make disciples...teach them by example to obey...and also baptize.  Baptizing, and teaching, are verbs, they describe an action we are told  to do.  The baptizm of the Holy Ghost is not something we do, but water baptism is.   Since baptizing is something we do, and Jesus told us to do it, and to be baptized ourselves, then obeying, and becomeing baptized is obediance to the command.  We can not be saved by obediance to a command..........................

[All]

How would you communicate to a man born blind, what ' sight ' is?  How would you communicate what ' love '  is, without describing the actions it prompts us to do?

In Deut. 6:4, God prefaces His law with the words Jesus echoed in Mark 12:29, as the greatest commandment. In the parallel passage in Matt. 22:36-40 Jesus said,  "...All the law and the prophets hang on these". 

In the OT, God described the behavior we were to have, that was a behavior prompted by love.  It wasn't obedience (behavior modification) God wanted, it was the state of being that prompts those actions in us that He was shooting for, and revealing that we don't have...

Psalm 51:15-17
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it;
you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings.
17 The sacrifices of God are a
broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart,
O God, you will not despise. 

Jesus also revealed to us the state of being we are expected to have, but not by describing it, but by illustrating it for us, and demonstrating what it looks like.

Paul is trying to relay to us that that state of being, though it is required by God that we have it, is not achieved by obedience, but by receiving a gift Jesus won for us, and offers freely to us.

Once Jesus resides in us, the state of being requirement is fulfilled, and the behavior falls in line with it.  Put another way, receiving Jesus comes first, then Jesus causes us to be right with God, and the natural consequence is our behavior follows.

Back in the saddle again    .  A little spiritual warfare going on here.  The dog ate my phone cord that I was useing to strech from the computer to the phone jack.  Finally got a new one run.   



Thanks Kelly,
You need to follow the course of your ministry the way the Lord lay's it out for you, so I respect that you don't want to address it as the questions I ask would lead it.   I however tend to attack the JW's at their doctrinal root, from the argument that only one truth exists--either their version, or the Bible--but they cannot both be true.  That is why I use their bible, (NWT) and frequently, the one from their own hand, and their doctrines, to reveal the fallacy of their belief system.  When they walk away from my door, there are a few issues in their own mind now that wern't there before that they must deal with.  So I'm allways keeping an eye out for more information to reveal to them in the way they would understand best, that their belief system needs to be re-examined.  Like a fishermans tackle box--each lure for a specific result in a certain situation--all of them designed to catch

There is no such thing as ' evil '.


In my trade, I deal with vaccumes.  Not vaccume cleaners, but pressures below atmospheric pressure.  There is no such thing as a negative pressure, only a positive pressure less than atmospheric pressure (14.7 psi @ sea level)  All we can do is remove that 14.7 psi from a space. you can't remove more than that.

If you walk into a dark room, it is said to be dark, but that means the absence of light.  You can't have a measure of darkness, only a declining amount of light, untill there is no light left.  You can't have less than ' no light' and increase darkness beyond that point of ' no light '.

When you read a thermometer, you read the amount of heat present. as heat declines, the temperature goes down, but you can't remove any heat beyond the point where there is no heat.  You can't add cold to a space with absolutely no heat in it.

God exists.  He defines Himself as good, absolute good.  Evil, is the absence of God.  So wherever God is not, is evil.

God created evil, in a similar manner that I ' create ' a shadow on a sunny day.  The absence of light, relative to my surroundings, is my shadow.  The absence of good, relative to God, is evil.

We must have a bunch of preachers here...all these long winded posts 

Ain't it great!