The California Collection/TheCaliforniaCollection.cdr/his079/assuranc.lzh/ASSURANC.TXT

Text File | 1991-06-29 | 6KB | 126 lines

CEC:Answers by Bill Jackson, to NO "ASSURANCE OF SALVATION" by Karl Keating

CATHOLIC ANSWERS, Box 17181, San Diego, CA 92117.

   Mr. Keating totally misunderstands the biblical basis for salvation.
He says,

   "They conclude that heaven is theirs in exchange for a remarkably
simple act. Christ has unlocked the gates of Heaven. He did his part
and now we have to cooperate by doing ours."

   "The Bible teaches that God does give Heaven as a free gift (Rom
6:23), but that salvation was not procured by a remarkably simple
act. That salvation was purchased by the shedding of the life blood of
our Saviour upon the cross."

   If it is true that Christ merely unlocked the gates of Heaven, it
would be necessary for us to do our part to get through those open
gates. However, the Bible clearly teaches us that "For Christ also hath
once suffered for sins that he might bring us to God." Jesus did unlock
the gate of Heaven, but then He came back to where I was as a poor lost
sinner and brought me through that open gate.

   If our co-operation is necessary, then our work must be added to
Christ's work. If His work was infinite, we cannot add to it. If it was
finite, then any number of finite values added together can never equal
infinity.

   We have to be spiritually alive at the moment of bodily death. True,
but the life God gives us is eternal life, a life that lasts forever.
If it is eternal, it will last to the moment of our bodily death.

   "You can be Mother Teresa, yet you will go to hell if you do not
accept Christ in the fundamentalists' sense"

   It is true that you can appear to be the greatest saint alive,
whether Catholic, Protestant or Hindu, and yet if you have not trusted
Christ in the Bible sense you are doomed for eternity. That is simply
because Jesus Himself said, "I am the way, the truth and the life; no
man cometh to the Father but by me." (John 14:6)

   The reason is that "accepting Jesus" has nothing to do with turning
a spiritually dead soul into a soul alive with sanctifying grace.

   I John 5:12, "He that hath the Son hath life: and he that hath not
the Son of God hath not life."

   Karl begins one of his paragraphs with the bold heading, You Can't
Lose Heaven

   "The basis upon which that is true is that you did nothing to merit
Heaven, therefore your entrance into Heaven is based upon a different
foundation than your goodness. Since you didn't do anything to gain it,
you cannot do anything to lose it."

   "How can any fundamentalist know his salvation experience was real? I
John 5:11, "And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal
life, and this life is in his Son."

   "Besides, there are verses that call the whole notion of assurance of
salvation into question. "I buffet my body or I, who have preached to
others, may myself be rejected as worthless"(I Cor 9:27). This follows
the well-known verses that speak of running a race, and the race, of
course, is the race of life, the finish line being entrance into heaven."

   "(A fundamentalist author) says that Paul "did not want to lose the
reward for service through failing to satisfy his Lord; he was not
afraid of losing his salvation." While that interpretation seems to
strain the passage a bit (read the whole of chapter 9 yourself), it
is not entirely unreasonable."

   We challenge Karl to see what the Bible really says, and to look
honestly at the context and other passages where Paul mentions the
race. I Cor 9:27 says, "lest I myself should be a castaway". Then just
using I Cor 9 it is very reasonable that the Christian is correct, and
when we compare this with Paul's other writings, we see their
conclusion is inescapable.

   Note Rom 9:16, So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him
that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

   If the finish line is Heaven, then the Holy Spirit would have
contradicted Himself in Romans 9 and I Cor 9. We know that in other
places He has written of the necessity of wise Christian living in
order to be God's best. Another passage that clearly shows this not to
be gaining salvation is I Cor 3:15 where, after talking about the loss
that may be suffered by unwise Christian living, even if a man's work
is burned up, "he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire."

   Karl would not have been a normal R.C. aplologist if he had not
misquoted Php 2:12, "work for your own salvation." But Karl does admit
other translations say "work out" but concludes that "fear and
trembling" is not the language of self-confident assurance.

   The worst part of this exegesis is to assume that a Christian ought
to desire "self-confident assurance." If my assurance of salvation were
determined by my achieving I would have none. The fact that I must
stand before my blessed Saviour one day and give an account of how I
have lived my life for Him makes me realize that the Christian life is
serious indeed. We are not participating in a three-legged race at a
Sunday school picnic. We are living a real life with a real foe, and we
should seriously consider the faithfulness of our walk with Him.

   Karl also misquoted John 3:5. He said it says, that a man must be
reborn by water and the Holy Spirit.

   Notice what the Bible says. Verse 3: Except a man be born again;
verse 5: except a man be born (not re-born) of water and the Holy
Spirit; verse 7: ye must be born again. No where is water said to be
necessary in the new birth.

   "Are you saved? asks the fundamentalist. "I am redeemed" answers the
Catholic, "and like the Apostle Paul I am working out my salvation in
fear and trembling, with hopeful confidence - but not with a false
assurance - and I do all this as the Church has taught, unchanged, from
the time time of Christ."

   The Christian answers with assurance, "Jesus loves me; this I know;
for the Bible tells me so" and he is perfectly willing to entrust his
future with the One Who loved him enough to suffer on Calvary that man
might be redeemed.

   The Church might have arguments, but we say, "I need no other
argument; I need no other plea; it is enough that Jesus died, and that
He died for me."