as usual, you are doubling down on your argument and refusing to allow those of us who disagree with you to do so in peace,
@C.W. Pettit
I not only gave you a few of the verses for why I believe as I believe, I also gave you a list of resources and told you that I have studied this issue in depth and have come to the side of once saved always saved.
I do not try to convince you to change your mind; I only offered up the counter viewpoint as this is far from being as settled as you insist that it is.
Frankly, I take much comfort in knowing that just as my salvation is secure in Christ from the beginning, so it will be in the end. As I could do nothing to save myself and with my sin nature still present until death or glorification at the return of Christ, I cannot abstain one hour, let alone the rest of my life from sinning. It is a very comforting, joyous hope and thought to know that my sin does not endanger me from separation from my Heavenly Father.
After all, you have said you are a father - would you cast your daughter out when she sins? Even if she gets to her teenage years and rebels against you and all you raised her to be, will you say you have no daughter and throw her out of your life? If you, as a sinful human being, says no, you love your daughter and no matter what she does, she will be your daughter, how much more will our perfect and righteous Heavenly Father do the same for the children He has adopted into His household? Because we are no more servants, we are children and have the right to call Him Abba, Father.
But as I stated before: you have your conviction, I have mine. I do not question your salvation; I only disagree with you on doctrinal points. I do not try to convince you or argue with you that you are wrong; I post what I do because I am secure in my understanding of this issue, I stand firmly on once saved always saved, and I wisheto present the counter defense to your arguments to widen the understanding of all who read this and perhaps spark a deeper study of the Word in them for their Spiritual benefit.
I would count it courteous, then, if you would abstain from continuing to argue with me and tell me I am wrong in my views and accept that there are those who disagree with your viewpoint. IT is one thing to state your views for why you believe what you believe; you cross a line, however, when you begin to attack others who disagree, especially on an issue that is not nearly as clear cut as you wish to believe it be.
Finally, in reference to Hebrews 10:26, even if that IS saying we could lose our salvation (which is not so clear as you want it to be as the whole thing is states as an IF statement, not a FACT statement), that verse would also say that this means that if you lose your salvation, you will never regain it - so mess up just one time and you are out the door forever. Yet many that I know who do believe one can lose their salvation also hold to the belief that they can repent and regain it, be re-baptized and brought back into fellowship.
Matthew 7:
9 Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? 10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?
Romans 7:14-25 is very much my comfort in this matter, as it ends with this:
21 I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. 22 For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: 23 But I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. 24 O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? 25 I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin.
Romans 8
15 The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship.[
f] And by him we cry,
“Abba,[
g] Father.” 16 The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. 17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
Galatians 4
Now I say, as long as the heir is a [
a]child, he does not differ at all from a slave although he is [
b]owner of everything, 2 but he is under guardians and [
c]managers until the date set by the father. 3 So also we, while we were children, were held in bondage under the [
d]elemental things of the world. 4 But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under [
e]the Law, 5 so that He might redeem those who were under [
f]the Law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. 6 Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” 7 Therefore you are no longer a slave, but a son; and if a son, then an heir [
g]through God.
