Questions About Salvation

Humanity Part II: Introduction to the Study of Salvation (week 2)

Last week we went over the “Roman’s Road to Salvation”: Rom. 3:23, Rom. 6:23, Rom. 5:8, Rom. 10:9-10, Rom. 10:13. I believe this to be a decent summary of St. Paul’s faith concerning the restoration of people’s relationships with God.

In light of these scriptures and others, there are five major questions that have historically caused division among Christians.

1. Are human beings, unaided by any special act of God, truly capable of choosing to express the faith written of in Rom. 10:9-10?
Consider: Eph. 2:1, Jer. 13:23, Jn. 3:16, Rom. 10:13 (Can you think of others? What are the consequences of your answer?)

2. When God, in eternity past, elected certain people to be saved, did He do so based on any condition found in those people?
Consider: Rom. 8:29-30, Rom. 9, Eph. 1:11, Eph. 2:8 (Can you think of others? What are the consequences of your answer?)

3. Did Jesus only bear the sins of the elect when He died on the cross?
Consider: Mk. 14:24, Jn 10:11, Acts 20:28, Eph. 5:25, 1 Tim. 2:5-6, 1 Jn. 2:2 (Can you think of others? What are the consequences of your answer?)

4. Do individuals only express the faith written of in Rom. 10:9-10 when they are irresistibly brought to do so by a special act of God Himself?
Consider: Jn. 6:35-40, Eph. 2:5, Prov. 1:22, Matt. 23:37, 2 Pete. 3:9, Jn. 12:32, 1 Tim. 2:3 (Can you think of others? What are the consequences of your answer?)

5. Is it possible for someone who has truly expressed the faith written of in Rom. 10:9-10 to die having lost that faith and its accompanying salvation?
Consider: Jn. 6:40, Jn. 10:28, Heb. 6:4-6, Col. 1:21-23, Jn. 15:6, 1 Jn. 2:3-4, 2 Cor. 13:5 (Can you think of others? What are the consequences of your answer?)

After all is said and done, it is important to believe:
• God is all powerful (can do anything logically possible)
• God is morally perfect (maximally loving)
• Humans are responsible for their sin (not God)
• Salvation is accomplished by God’s grace alone (not by anything man is or does)
• Salvation comes by a person’s faith alone (not by works)

After all is said and done, it is important to be:
• Humble, interested in learning about God and His work, & loving of God and others
• United relationally
• United in our faith on all the basic matters
• Willing to peaceably and kindly disagree on other matters
• Willing to divide only over the most important matters of faith
• WIlling to change our minds if we encounter new information or new perspectives

Update

Hi Everyone,

My computer is in the shop, so I am updating you by way of my wife Lindsey's computer while at Java. I heard that the night of communal worship through song and prayer last Wednesday while I was gone went very well. I was very pleased to hear about it from Chris and Zach. I am still working on getting the last few weeks worth of lesson notes edited, annotated, and uploaded here for you.

This Wednesday we will be starting a section on how to read the Bible. We will be talking about major scholarly methods for reading and interpreting the Bible, and then we will be talking about simple, practical methods that you can practice on your own.

It's gonna be hot.

I look forward to seeing you Wednesday night.

Comment If You Are Reading This

Please comment on this post if you are reading it. I want to get an idea for who has been checking the blog, if anybody.

I had a good time hanging out with you guys last night, talking about the landscape of Textual Criticism and the spectrum of translation philosophies. I'm sorry I'm so behind in terms of posting lesson notes and special links on the blog - I now have three big posts I owe you.

I can't be there next week, and I forgot to talk to you about this last night. Do we want to meet anyway and either 1. hang out or 2. hear from someone else, OR do we want to take a week off?

Introduction Notes

Hi guys, thanks so much for coming out to the Introduction of The FAITH Project. We didn't get the video working, but you can get the notes here.

Download Notes on Thryve's 5 Core Values
• Cover
1. Mission
2. Love
3. Community
4. Creativity
5. Evolution
* What Thryve Believes

Notes on the Purpose of The FAITH Project
The purpose of The FAITH Project is to focus for a time on learning to live by faith. Jesus said that “if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you” (Matt. 17:20b). The reason that a small amount of faith can accomplish big things is because the content of our faith is immeasurably more important than the caliber of our faith. So The FAITH Project will largely focus on the details of the content of the Christian faith.

Many recoil at the idea of learning about the details of the Christian faith, but think about the nature of such an attitude! Imagine if I were to sit across from my wife while on a date and recoil at her when she began to talk about herself! I might say “Lindsey, I love you, but I just want to be married to you. I don’t want to be bothered with all of these details!”.

Seeking a better understanding of the details of God’s character and purpose are vital to our ability to love Him and the humans He made in His image.

At Thryve, we often talk about how important it is to live and share the gospel with those who are not followers of Christ. How important is it then, to be well acquainted with this “gospel”!

Such is the purpose of The FAITH Project: to pursue a sophisticated and detailed understanding of the Christian faith, to learn about the details of God and His world, and to become well acquainted with the content of the gospel.

Notes on How to View The FAITH Project
The process of getting information from the Bible involves several steps. One way of describing these steps is like this:

1. We have to figure out what the text of the Bible is.

This is called “Texual Criticism”, and it involves painstaking scientific analyses of the fragments of parchment we dig up in the dirt. We have to try and figure out how old a fragment is, where it came from, who wrote it, etc.

I found what looks like a very respectable blog on Evangelical Textual Criticism, if you want to check out some of the conversations that are going on in this realm of scholarship. The site also has a selective index of New Testament manuscripts.

2. We have to figure out what individual passages in the Bible say.

This involves processes like “Exegesis” (drawing the meaning out of the text) and “Hermeneutics” (interpreting the text).

3. We have to figure out what the major components of the Bible mean.

This is called “Biblical Theology”. It involves the study of historical sections of the Bible at a time and aims to understand each author’s intent within its historical context.

To see an example of a Biblical Theology, check out this Biblical Theology of Corporate Prayer online.

4. We have to figure out what the Bible as a whole teaches.

This is called “Systematic Theology”, and it involves organizing the meanings of the Bible into categories so that we can learn all about Angels, or all about Jesus, or all about Church, etc.

Christians scholars around the world and throughout history have been engaging in these and other disciplines in an ongoing effort to pursue a better understanding of God’s word. The FAITH Project can most closely be compared to the discipline of Systematic Theology, because we are going to explore the fundamentals of the Christian faith by category. However, we'll be introducing you to many of these other concepts as our course unfolds.

Other categories of Christian scholarship include "Homiletics" (the preaching of the teachings of the Bible), "Philosophical Theology" (the disciplined employment of philosophical methods in developing or analyzing theological concepts), and many more.

I found an example online of a pretty comprehensive educational program that spans most major categories of Christian scholarship. You can take a look at the prospectus of this Reformed Baptist School of Theology here.

The page includes a little framework similar to the one I drew on the whiteboard, organizing the various disciplines in relationship to each other:


Group Information
ESV Bible References
All Bible references, unless specified otherwise, are from the English Standard Version.

No Homework
I don’t want you to ever develop any negative feelings toward theology. And while I believe that rigorous effort should be made by every believer to pursue a more sophisticated understanding of God, His Word, His world, and what He wants us to do, I don’t want an introductory group like this to overburden you or scare you away. I want you to be able to just show up and enjoy yourselves. So there aren’t going to be any requirements or homework assignments or anything like that. Just show up and relax and listen.

Attendance
I do ask however, that you try your best to commit to a showing up for a whole module at a time. There are ten modules total, and tonight’s introduction counts as a whole one on its own. Each module lasts about a month. They are made to be self-contained, but each one builds on the previous. So you will get the most of this group if you can come every week until the end of June!

But if you skip a module, or if you don’t come to any until months down the line, its ok. You will still benefit from joining us just for our module on the Holy Spirit, or on Mission, etc. The idea is to get as many people into this program as possible, and to keep whoever is in it for as long as possible. But like I said, don’t stop coming just because you miss out on a module, and even if you skip a week here and there.

We are going to have a lengthy Christmas break and one for Easter too, and any other days when it looks like most of us won’t be able to make it. Maybe we will just have hang out time during those weeks or something.

This whole thing is a learning process for us too, so be patient and offer your help whenever you can!

New Launch Date: September 10th

We changed the launch date to September 10th, so that The FAITH Project will start the same week as Thryve Coeur d'Alene's LIFEgroups.

Wed., Sept. 10th @ 6:15pm: The FAITH Project

Welcome!

Hello! Welcome to The FAITH Project blog. We hope to be able to post an audio recording of the lesson, as well as its notes and references, each week. This is also a place for you to post your thoughts and questions. The FAITH Project is scheduled to launch on September 3rd.