If you're going to promote Calvinism here, then I'm going to refute it. Every time. This is a public forum, so if you can talk about this topic here, so can I.
No, because God is at work in us ~ because we have His Spirit leading us ~ we will work out our own salvation and can be confident in doing so.
You do not believe there is anything we need to work out ourselves as it relates to salvation. Why don't you just admit that? In your view it's God who does EVERYTHING in relation to salvation. Why do you try to hide that by acting as if we have any responsibility at all in the matter when you know you don't believe that?
The primary initiative is His, according to His will. If not for His gracious choice... and giving us new birth by His Spirit... we would have remained children of the devil and only desiring to do his will... slaves to unrighteousness.
This isn't taught anywhere in scripture. This is all just your own words.
But, having been chosen by God before the foundation of the world, and at the appointed time given new birth by God through the work of His Spirit, we are since then in Christ and thus His sons, desiring to do His will... slaves to righteousness.
If everything is up to God, as you believe, then why wouldn't He just make us slaves to righteousness from birth? What is the point of us supposedly being born totally depraved and slaves to sin if we are eventually going to be slaves to righteousness?
Yet again, "it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy" (Romans 9:16).
Why do you make doctrine out of that verse while ignoring Romans 11:30-32 which says that God wants to have mercy on all people? Man didn't decide that God should want to have mercy on all people. God decided that. Because God is love (1 John 4:8) and it would make no sense that He would only want to have mercy on some and not the rest.
Scripture teaches that Jesus died for the sins of the whole world (John 3:16, 1 John 2:1-2) and that God wants all people to repent (Ezekiel 33:11, 2 Peter 3:9, Acts 17:30-31) and to be saved (1 Timothy 2:3-6). Calvinism contradicts all of that.
Paul does not deny or shortchange man's free will or responsibility in any way ~ and so neither does any good Calvinist <smile>
LOL. I don't know who you think you're fooling with this. When it comes to salvation, Calvinism teaches that man has no responsibility, in and of himself. Can you not be honest enough to admit that?
~ but only says there that one's salvation does not depend on it. But yes, once that happens, we have great responsibility... to obey, trust, follow, serve, and of course love Him.
And what if we don't? Of course, in your doctrine that isn't possible for the elect because God makes it so that we "obey, trust, follow, serve, and of course love Him". So, in Calvinism it's God's responsibility to make sure we do what He wants us to do and we have no responsibility in and of ourselves relating to that at all.
And we do so freely (although not perfectly, of course), because we are in Christ, sons of God, slaves to righteousness. God created... re-created, actually... us for this purpose... we are called by God to do these things. And like everyone else, will be judged according to what we have done.
What does that mean to you exactly to be judged according to what we have done? Is that based on choices that we make in and of ourselves? Why else would we be judged if it's not based on that?
So, again, God began a good work in us and will bring it to completion at the day of Christ, and therefore we can work out our own salvation with fear and trembling ~ with solemn reverence for, confidence in, and in praise of God and His Spirit (and Jesus of course).
You believe that it is God who works out our salvation and we cannot have any part, in an of ourselves, to work out our own salvation. Why do you act as if you believe otherwise?
As you know, regarding how anyone can be saved, with man this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible... and as Paul goes on to say in Philippians 4:13... well, he says it of himself, but it is true for all of us who are in Christ, "(we) can do all things through Him Who strengthens (us)."
In closing, a rhetorical question: If the responsibility for one's salvation is divided between God and the one, then shouldn't one praise and worship in... some proportion... both God and himself/herself for his/her salvation? <smile>
No, not at all. Look at the following parable and assume, for the sake of argument (looking at things from my non-Calvinist perspective), that both the Pharisee and tax collector have free will in the sense that God leaves the choice up to them to decide whether or not to humble themselves and repent of their sins while trusting in Him for their salvation rather than themselves.
Luke 18:9 To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ 13 “But
the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ 14 “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
The Pharisee chose to exalt himself and believed that he would be justified before God by his own supposed righteousness. He thought he was better than other people like the tax collector while not understanding that he was a sinner like everyone else. The tax collector, meanwhile, chose to humble himself while acknowledging that he was a sinner and needed God's mercy.
In this scenario, do you think the tax collector would be praising and worshiping himself for being justified before God despite having just humbled himself and acknowledging that he is a sinner and is not worthy of praise and worship? Of course not. So, the idea that if salvation is partly the responsibility of man means that man would then have a reason to praise and worship himself is false. This parable proves that. We are not responsible for proving we are worthy to be saved, we are responsible to acknowledge that we are lost sinners who are not worthy and are in need of God's mercy.
It can, and it does. Because of God's work in our hearts, we respond positively ~ because of this new spirit we have... because we have the Holy Spirit. Once we are born again, we are being made more and more like Jesus.
But, it is not automatic that one who has been born again ends up being made more and more like Jesus. You think we have no choice in the matter despite Paul warning believers to not grieve the Holy Spirit and to not quench the Holy Spirit. If what you believed was true, it would not be possible for us to grieve and quench the Holy Spirit.
Pish. Again, If the responsibility for one's salvation is divided between God and the one, then shouldn't one praise and worship both God and himself/herself for his/her salvation? <smile>
Again, no. That is something you made up in your imagination. Scripture says we are saved by grace through faith and not by works of righteousness. You have decided that faith is a work of righteousness that, if it was something we do, then it would be cause for us to boast and praise and worship ourselves. But, faith and works are not the same. They are contrasted with each other in passages like Ephesians 2:8-10 and James 2.
Surely you see the absurdity in this question...
Yes, I do. It's absurd for you to assume that if we have responsibility in salvation that it means we would then be able to praise and worship ourselves for our own salvation. That shows a lack of understanding of what we are held responsible to do by God, which is exactly the opposite of praising and worshiping ourselves.
