A plague on all their houses.
Fitting together the facts of scripture concerning grace, faith, and works is definitely one people struggle with.
It caused Martin Luther to name the epistle of James âthe epistle of straw.â Which means failing to fit all the pieces of the puzzle together, he simply wanted to throw one of the pieces away.
It caused Calvin throw away nearly half the Bible which very clearly speaks of our role in making a choice and having faith.
Matthew 19:25 When the disciples heard this they were greatly astonished, saying, âWho then can be saved?â 26 But Jesus looked at them and said to them, âWith men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.â This is the foundation of the gospel of salvation by the grace of God â something which only God can do and we cannot. But nowhere in this passage does it say that it doesnât matter what we do. On the contrary, when the man asked what he must do to be saved (Matthew 19:16), Jesus begins by asking what he has done. He keeps asking until the man gives up, showing there is no end to what we need to do. That salvation is a 100% a work of God doesnât mean we donât need to do anything. The work of salvation by God is a work in us, changing and transforming us. It requires faith because we have to be open to that change. The point of Matthew 19:16-26 is that looking for what is enough to be saved is the wrong attitude. There is no enough. Our salvation is not and never can be something which we have accomplished. This is why Jesus doesnât answer the man by saying he should have faith, because the manâs attitude was contrary to faith itself. Faith can never be the answer to the question of what is enough. This agrees completely with Romans 10 which says that faith doesnât ask the question of who is saved and who is damned. This also agrees with James 2:26 that faith without works is dead. Faith simply does what is right for its own sake without looking for payback. Salvation is not something we accomplish by doing the right things and that includes believing the right things. So when Jesus says âYour faith has saved you,â He is not talking about a way in which people have accomplished their own salvation. It is about pointing to people who had the right attitude of faith of not trying to claim a reward to which they are entitled.
Ephesians 2:8-9 âby grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.â
All the pieces fit together. We do what God asks, âcease to do evil, learn to do good, seek justice, correct oppression,â and help those in need (Isaiah 1:17), because of a faith in goodness which is the very opposite of entitlement. We have to stop looking for payback, counting brownie points, and asking what is enough. That will get us nowhere for it puts up a barrier against the change which God is seeking to bring about in our heart. Having the law of God written on our hearts is the very meaning of salvation itself. It is not about getting a pass to heavenly rewards, it is about becoming a heavenly person.
You are correct in saying He brought love. Love does not allow an unrepentant, wicked person into His Kingdom. Only the children born again by faith, trust in Him will be a part of His family. All others will be thrown into the Lake of Fire. That is what a loving and holy wrathful Lamb of God will do. Thus saith the Lord.
That was loving. 
Which C19th English Lord? When?
Like Jesusâ hard sayings, the love comes first.
Tell that to the first born of the Egyptians in Exodus.
No the real God. God as He is. Not the one of Jewish myth.
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It is apparent you donât have confidence in Godâs words through the prophets or the words of Jesus or the Spirit through the apostles. Therefore we have no foundation for a profitable conversation.
I have no confidence in your mish mash of dated, selective, limited English interpretation of ancient Greek texts of Aramaic native speakers with Hebrew minds.
No.
My friend, hello again.
Forgive me if I am ignorant about your take on this, I havenât read everything youâve written.
What will happen to those who are wicked and unrepentant? Iâm not talking about tribals who have never heard the Gospel or even those who intellectually cannot accept Jesus for one reason or another. Letâs just put those aside for a moment.
Truly abominable people, wicked people, the worst of the worst. Suppose that God does not punish them. What would you say happens with them?
Thanks, friend. 
Homo homini lupus est for sure. Such will be fixed. Thatâs what transcendence is for. For broken creatures. To be fixed. Theyâve all been saved after all, thanks to the faithfulness of Christ.
I only play with a full deck.
My dear Joshua. We are in the same gutter, looking up at the stars. Equals. And I must look up to you. Which you make easy. What happens to Sodom and Gomorrah? Or arenât they bad enough?
It occurred to me that I should look into how Calvin dealt with the parts of the Bible about faith so I googled the topic âJohn Calvin on faith.â Apparently he defines âfaithâ very narrowly as âthe firm and certain knowledge of God in Christâ (Wikipedia). This not only sounds like a Gnostic gospel of salvation by special knowledge, but salvation by self-brainwashing. This is because I consider certainty to be nothing but pure delusion â i.e. the only certainty comes from simply not allowing yourself to question something. Of course he sees faith as something given by God in order to remove the contradiction with salvation by grace. This is very much in the category of faith being some power to save yourself whether it is given by God or not. I can see how this works for Calvin to reconcile grace and faith, but I certainly do not agree with any of this.
The closest knowledge to certainty which I believe in is simply the choice to live your life that way. I do not call that certainty but faith. So I obviously define faith differently. Faith is a choice to accept something as true. This is a very wide definition of the word âfaith,â with application to all of knowledge and reasoning, for every argument of logic must begin by choosing to accept the premises which your argument draws its conclusions from. To say that we are saved by faith simply means we choose to accept the gift, and thus this is equivalent to salvation by the grace of God. No I do not accept the repudiation of faith, choice, and gift by saying that God gives our faith, makes our choice, and forces this gift as an assault upon us. But I will acknowledge that because sin destroys free will, it is likely that God has to liberate our free will to some extent before we can even make such a choice â so it is not as if we can even do this much without Godâs intervention.
In Nordic countries, separation from the catholic church was made by the decision of the king. Parishes of the catholic church became lutheran parishes by the decree of the king. Some catholics did not accept this and moved away but many priests and bishops continued their work. They had been nominated by the bishops of the catholic church and they continued to nominate new bishops and priests in their lutheran parishes. So, there was a continuous line of nominations by bishops through generations.
Lutheran churches do not usually lift up the concept of apostolic succession in everyday discussions. It is not considered as important matter as in the catholic church.
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Itâs a simple question that Protestants sometimes hate: Does the Church teach apostolic succession through the life and teachings of Christ: Yes or No?
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I donât understand what you mean by this question. I understand the concept âapostolic successionâ and the words âthe life and teachings of Christâ. But I donât understand what you mean by the word âthroughâ. Could you clarify?
What contradiction?
Thatâs what Luther is saying and it is completely wrong and absurdly complex; nothing simple about it.
Again, the complexity of this is a Gordian knot that Christâs faithfulness slices through. Faith is the gift of God in the faithfulness of His son by whom, in whom all are graciously saved: Pistis Christou. There is no expiry date on the gift.
The âapostolic successionâ is a total fabrication of the RC church and the LDS church, and I give it no credence whatsoever in either case. Like I said above, I adhere to sola scripture according to which the Bible is the only authority for the Christian religion. I find the idea that God would put any authority in the hands of sinful human beings to be both ludicrous and offensive â an invention of those seeking to use religion as a tool of power. God does not need sinful human beings to speak for Him. It is only sinful human beings who lust for the power in the idea of speaking for God.
Whatâs that got to do with Pistis Christou?
Thanks for the info. My context is a country where the two main churches have been the lutheran (formerly catholic) church and the eastern orthodox church. Other denominations have been very small, including the Roman-catholic church.
I was raised within the lutheran church. When I became a believer, I started to study what the Bible and the earliest church were teaching about baptism. This changed my understanding about baptism and the church and I had to leave the lutheran church.
Nowadays I belong to a local congregation (part of the Evangelical free church of Finland; www.svk.fi) that has the reputation of being very cooperative towards the other churches - we are just a tiny part of the global church and respect the believers in the other churches. We have active cooperation with other churches, including the local lutheran church.
As you can guess from my background, I know a bit about the eastern orthodox church. I can easily understand why Orthodox Christians are not very interested about forums where mainly non-Orthodox Christians discuss about the interpretation of the Bible.
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