Then a problem arises and the person falls away. They become unsanctified and unjustified; are put back into the kingdom of darkness; their heart of stone is put back; they lose their spiritual eyes and ears and go back to being dead in sin.

Are some so desperate to cling to their free-will theology that they would even contemplate such heresy as this? Brethren, are we saved or do we save ourselves? I believe we have lost sight of what we have been saved from, how we were saved and He who is the Saviour.

He has procured our salvation for us. To even ask if once saved is always saved is to denegrate the Name of our Dear Saviour.

He is not gentle Jesus meek and mild as the hymn would have it. He is the Creator, the Eternal Son of the Living God, and the Judge of the living and the dead.

Begin with God - and lay down His attributes and characteristics as an unmoveable foundation for everything else. If one of your theological viewpoints sheds doubt on any of those foundational truths, then it must be wrong.

God reveals Himself as He is; Holy, Omnipotent, Immutable. Therefore if there is a text which says that God changed His mind, we must understand it in the correct light of His immutablility.

If there is a text which seems to indicate that God wanted something (ie, the salvation of all men), but was unable to achieve His goal, then that text must be understood in light of the truth of His Ominpotence.

Just as in studying other sciences where basic principles have to be laid down as foundational laws, so it must be in theology.

The problem with today's methods of Biblical interpretation is that it begins with man; with man's needs, man's problems and what God has done for man.

But the Bible begins with God. It is all about God. And when you study theology systematically, your basic foundational laws and principles must be the study of God, His nature, His attributes, His character etc.

Then when in later study you come across a problem and you check your foundational laws and facts. God is immutable, He is Omnipresent, He is Omnipotent etc. So don't ask is once saved always saved, or is there a covenant of grace etc. If you know the God of the Bible as He has revealed Himself, you will already know the answer. He has one eternal plan, encompassing the end from the beginning. He has foreordained all things, even the free choices of men. That is the God of the Bible. Anything less than that, anything that detracts from that, portrays a different God.

In Ephesians 2 he goes to great lengths to demonstrate that Christ has made from the two, that is, Jew and Gentile, one man, uniting them into one body unto God.

In Romans and Galatians Paul laboriously shows how New Testament Christians are partakers of the promises made to Abraham and are the true seed of Abraham. Anyone who is in Christ is an heir according to the promise. In Galatians Paul explains it all again very carefully.

When Peter said to the converts at Pentecost, all of the Jews, that the promise was to them and to their children, he did not have to explain to them what promise he was referring to because they knew from their Old Testament Scripture.

It is a sad and destructive habit of the Dispensationalists to dismantle the Scriptures and to seperate that which God has united.

Secondly, this has nothing to do with Calvin, or Augustine, or anyone. Calvin would be horrified to know that after his death his name would be used like this and his prevaling legacy, despite his life's work, is this continuing argument.

This debate began with a published prayer of Augustine; "Lord command what thou wilt and enable us to obey." A man called Pelagius took offence at the second part of that prayer, insisting that God would not command what man could not perform.

Now I am sure that you would not agree with Pelagius. God commands you to repent. He commands you to be holy. He commands you to obey His law to the letter.

People try to get around that by saying we no longer need to keep the law. But that is a whole other argument. They say that God will settle for the best we can do. That our attempts at obedience and holiness are acceptable to Him despite our imperfections.

But our very best, the utmost ultimate best, that we can muster is as offensive to God as a used menstrual pad is to you if it were offered to you.

The true Calvinist is a true evangelist. And I believe that only the true Calvinist has a thorough understanding of the doctrines of Grace. But if they are confined merely to academic debates then we have missed the mark completely.

I have known many who swore till they were blue in the face that the KJ was the only truly inspired English translation. But their Bible spent 90% or more of its time on the shelf gathering dust.

If you leave your Bible on the shelf it doesn't matter what translation it is. It is just a book, made of paper and ink, and is no more the Word of God than the dictionary sitting next to it.

But when you open it, it is then that it becomes the Living Word of the Living God. And only then if the Holy Spirit takes that Word and applies it to your understanding, your heart and your life.

You are becoming rabid over English translations. You forget, like most English speaking people, that there are thousands of other translations out there in the languages of all the world.

If we believe that the Word of God is supernaturally produced, can we not believe that it is supernaturally preserved in all languages for all times?

If I did that, I would question God's imputation of Adam's sin onto the whole human race. I would question the justice in someone else paying my price. I would question God's righteousness when children are abducted, raped and murdered and planes piloted into buildings.

We can only reason from the Scriptures. We can only base our understanding of God, ourselves and the world around us on the Scriptures. Just because there are things that are beyond our human understanding, does not give us the right to sort it out with human reason and logic.

Deuteronomy 29 vs 29 tells us that there are some things God has been pleased to reveal to us, and some things He has been pleased to keep from us. It will always be so because we will never fathom God, who He is or what He does.

As soon as you apply your logic, you destroy faith. God has promised us time and time again He has all things under control and there is nothing which happens which is outside His will. If we do not have that comfort, how can we be assured of God's other promises?

Casob wrote:
Let me say it again. There is not a passage in Scripture that says anyone is chosen to be saved before the foundation of the world.

Be careful to make blanket statements, especially in light of the fact that there are many texts which support unconditional election.

This is not about man, it is about God. We must be careful how we represent God in our theological deliberations. Remember, Job's friends were not far wrong in their arguments, but they were wrong. And because of that they were not even allowed to pray for themselves. If you portray God as anything other than He has revealed Himself, then you may find yourself in the same position as Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar. But Job is not here to pray for you now.

The list goes on endlessly. These great men of God, past and present, are not just amazing theologians; they are wonderful pastors, Biblically committed preachers and tireless evangelists.

Francis Nigel Lee has been described in print as "Triumphalistically" Reformed and Conservative. This man, who has 12 earned doctorates, went home to South Africa because his father had been murdered in a home invasion. He visited his father's killer and preached Christ to him. Not only was the killer converted, so were several prison guards who could not but overhear the gospel preached.

This man is now in his 70's, yet works tirelessly throughout the world to preach the doctrines of grace. Many of his sermons are on this website if any of you are interested.

I wholeheartedly agree. There are always differences of opinion and interpretation and therefore of methodologies.

Some, said Paul, preach Christ from a purely wrong motive. But he praises God that Christ is being preached.

Mr Casob seems to be unashamedly Arminian. But he also seems to be unashamedly evangelistic. I have known many Calvinists who had a knowledge of the Scriptures that was enviable, but had no manifested desire to evangelise. They could argue the great doctrines of grace and impress many with their sholarship and learning. They could deride people like Mr Casob for what they thought was poor theology. But while they were arguing and discussing and parading their learning before others, people like Mr Casob were talking about Jesus Christ and salvation through Him alone to strangers on the street.

I am proud of my Reformed heritage. But I am deeply ashamed that many of us have worried more about our theology than about the Great Command in Matthew 28.

Is that not the bottom line brethren? What is Theology about, if not about God; who He is, what He does, how He does it etc. It is not about man and what he does or does not have to boast about. It is about God and His work of grace accomplished through the death of His Son.

If you set your theology on this foundation, on God's attributes of Sovereignty, Omniscience, Omnipresence etc; on His nature as Love, Wrath, Mercy, Justice etc; but above all else, on His Holiness everything else falls into line.

Our different approaches to these things stem from our different concepts of what salvation really is and what is it we are saved from.

The Arminian has a persuasive approach. He appeals to reason in order to facilitate a decision. Yet I have heard Arminians fervently pray to God for the salvation of others, asking the Lord to change their hearts, convert their souls and lead them to Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. Their prayers are no different than those of the Calvinist.

But when describing the conversion of someone else they suggest that the more corrupt a person's life was before their conversion, the more marvellous their salvation was.

People loved to watch him perform. Much the same way as many loved to watch Jesus perform.

One day Blondin asked them if they believed he could walk across, pushing a wheelbarrow, with someone sitting inside it.

Everyone believed he could do it. If you were to ask them, "Do you have faith that Blondin could do that?" they would have answered, "Of course!"

But when he asked if anyone was willing to get into the wheelbarrow, he got no takers. You see, they had faith, but they didn't have faith.

Many believed in Jesus. In John 8 Jesus spoke to Jews who believed in Him. They had faith in Him. But they did not want to be united with Him, to be committed to Him, to have their whole life totally in His hands.

To those Jews Jesus said these words;
"Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do."

Casob wrote:
What I have taught is Jesus Christ's shed blood satisfied God, who as the judge of all the earth, condemned all men because of their sin and sentenced them to death. His sacrifice "put away" sin and an eternal pardon can be received of every man who hears of it. Go tell them!

Casob is correct! Whoever hears and believes receives an eternal pardon.

My question is who hears?

Moses told Israel in Deuteronomy 29 vs 4 "Yet the Lord has not given you a heart to perceive and eyes to see and ears to hear, to this very day."

Doesn't it seem that they saw and heard amazing things, but it did not convert them because God did not give them the spiritual faculties they needed to truly understand and be converted?

Again in Isaiah 6 the prophet is told to preach the truth, but that the people would not be able to see or hear or understand because God would refuse to enable them to do so. Isn't it frightening to read that the reason why He did that is because He did not want them to turn to Him and be healed?