OSAS vs. Confession

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Mateo el Feo' date='May 26 2005, 10:24 AM'] Our Lord repeatedly warns the disciples that individuals who think they "know" that they are saved will be lost in eternity. [/quote]
Let me edit this sentence so it makes sense!

Our Lord repeatedly warns the disciples that [u]some [/u]individuals who think they "know" that they are saved will be lost in eternity.

[Briguy]

OK, so the answer to my argument is that it is an isolated, misinterpreted scripture???

If that is the best answer I will accept that.

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='Briguy' date='May 27 2005, 08:53 AM']OK, so the answer to my argument is that it is an isolated, misinterpreted scripture???

If that is the best answer I will accept that.[/quote]
The only other alternative is that the Holy Scriptures are self-contradicting. Is that your position?

[Briguy]

Actually, I believe that the scriptures as a whole say just what the verse says. I see no contradiction what-so-ever. I think, for the Christian the bible teaches eternal security plainly. "He who has ears, let him hear" (not a direct quote - just me speaking) Since this scripture and argument seem clear, even to you perhaps its what you think other parts of scripture are saying that is wrong here. Could be a good time to take a deeper look at some passages you have thought meant you could not be sure or that you can lose your salvation. Just a thought anyway

In Christ,
Brian

[Mateo el Feo]

Catholic teaching on this subject [url="http://www.catholic.com/library/Assurance_of_Salvation.asp"](nicely layed out in this link)[/url] permeates through the entire New Testament. Further, the interpretations contrary to Catholic teaching (e.g. OSAS, eternal security) must necessarily ignore Our Lords words in the Gospels, because so many of His statements and parables are directed toward those who are deceiving themselves and have a "luke warm" faith (Rev. 3:15,16).

In fact, even if we ignore that Our Lord's words do not support the theory of eternal security/OSAS, we could isolate the discussion to Saint Paul's writings and still easily disprove eternal security/OSAS.

Finally, the Catholic.com website quotes a protestant source ("Can Anyone Really Know for Sure?") that admits to this possibility of self-deception. Mulls (not yet a Catholic ) also admitted that others can deceive themselves, though he hasn't "seen the log in his own eye" on this particular issue.

I would enjoy discussing this further with you (digging deeper into the issues), if you would like. I'm just an amateur next to so many here, but I learn more when I see everyone else's contributions to topics like this.

[Brother Adam]

Okay...just some ramblings.

I hate to leave this topic by having just run in circles until they drop. Really, I think we run into brick walls because Brian and Mulls whole entire worldview on salvation is dramatically non-covenantal whereas the Catholic worldview is. We are taking off from two different spots and it is to understand why Brian would come to a different conclusion than we would. It took me a long time of hard study to figure it out when Catholics kept telling me that I just wasn't getting the Catholic understanding of soteriology to finally get it all to click, and then I had to be completely intellectually open to at least fully understanding what Catholics believed.

While Brian is free to correct me, if our understandings are the same as when I was a Baptist, he also believes in the Trinity and that Jesus came to pay the full penalty for sin and suffered, died, resurrected, and ascended into heaven. The Apostles then, left with the full deposit, began to teach the message of Christ and writing it down for it to be transmitted from generation to generation by way of Scripture Alone. For a baptist understanding of salvation we look primarily to the Pauline epistles, especially how Paul lays out sin and salvation in Romans. Any passages that speak of a salvation by faith and belief take prominance and then we get an understanding of Faith Alone. All other passages such as Mt 7:21, John 3:5, and 1 Peter 3:21, cannot in any way contradict what he have first understood from the popular salvation passages (Romans 3,6,8; Ephesians 2:8-9 for instance).

Because of our understanding of salvation within the context of the New Covenant we don't find verses such as "You may know you have eternal life" to be problematic because we look at them from the view of "Yeah, we know if we die right now that we will be in heaven with God". Where as Brian looks at it as "If you trusted in Christ as your personal Lord and Savior you are living eternal life right now and know with assurance no matter what you will go to heaven when you die." Brian would say that this doesn't trump the need for Christians to bear good fruits, but if the person genuinely became a Christian there will be good fruits, out of necessity to his understanding of salvation a genuinely saved Christian will not commit a sin such as apostasy, though there may be times of sin and doubt.

Our Catholic view of salvation sees it as our liberation from evil and filial love of the Father bringing us into a family relationship with Him and all other Christians. We directly connect salvation to santifying grace and adopted sonship and eternal life as a result of our final salvation when we die a physical death and begin our life with God in heaven. In essance we really see a whole 'salvation history' that began with Adam and Eve, to Abraham, to the Jewish people, and extends to us as Christians today. We see the coming of Christ as not obliterating the old covenants, but as fulfilling them and so we still see our salvation within the context of a covenant. We then see the Church as our family and the sacraments as means of actual grace which are instituted by Christ. They are outward signs of an inward change.

I think it can often confuse Protestants when they ask "Are you saved?" and "Do you accept Jesus as the only way to the Father" and "Do you have a personal relationship with Him" and we respond with a resounding "Yes!" It is confusing because what they see in our faith [b]seems[/b] to contradict those Pauline passages of "confessing with your lips" and "not by works". To an outsider looking in, it sure looks an awful lot like we are trying to strictly merit our salvation by all we do. It doesn't make sense when we say it is necessary to always be at mass on Sunday if we reject "a works salvation". I think we need to help our brothers in the faith in our ecumenical dialogue understand properly our work in the liturgy of giving glory and honor to God, and the work of God in the liturgy in the sacraments. We see our salvation so permeated in the liturgy and in the scriptures that it is apart of everythign we do, whereas our non-Catholic friends see salvation in a completely focused view having to do with altar calls and sinners prayers. We need to find a way to effectively sort these many differences out so we can get to the root of the theology and see how in many ways we are dramatically similiar. Now yeah, I was able to do this, but look at my bookshelves. We need to find a way to do this that is shorter and simple to understand and effects a dramatic change and conversion in the hearts of our seperated brethren.