Faith. If you have been around Christians much you hear them talking about it. We talk about being saved by faith which is not technically correct. We are saved by grace because of our faith.
(Eph 2:8 KJV) For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:We talk about living and walking by faith.
(2Co 5:7 KJV) (For we walk by faith, not by sight:)Faith becomes a mysterious thing of great power.
From whence does this faith come and what is it? Is faith something we do or something we are given that does through us? Is it some thing we possess or does it posses us. As believers are we not possessed by demons, but possessed by faith?
If you look at the Ephesians verse you notice the word “gift”. This is one of the places where Christian theology has split into two main paths. One branch of the Christian church says that the gift is grace. Through it God bestows his salvation. It is up to you to believe by free choice. The gift is available. The other branch says that the gift is faith. In order to be saved you are first chosen, or elect, and then given the faith which saves you. To me it seems to be a done deal.
I am in the first group. I have a hard time believing that God decided arbitrarily at the beginning of creation whom was to be saved and whom was condemned. I don’t understand how God can know the future and we can have free will and I will continue to struggle with it but I don’t expect to get the answer in this life.
But then there is eternity to work it out but, first I want to find out why Charley had to die early and how the three persons of the trinity can be one.
homo unius libri
I've probably said here before, by the time we can get the answers, we may not care anymore.
ReplyDeleteI hope it is because we are so excited about all the new questions that it will bring up.
DeleteGrace and peace