Is Salvation by faith alone?

[Compassionist]

Is Salvation by faith alone? http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contr ... alone.html I find Christianity to be very confusing. Could a Christian please clarify how Salvation works given all the contradicting verses about it in the Bible? Thank you ever so much.

[PinSeeker]

It does not say in the rules: "Debates about 'first you must prove the Bible is true' is not allowed here."

I humbly suggest you look at Post #1 in the pinned post, "Purpose of this subforum." viewtopic.php?p=59490#p59490

If that is not convenient enough for you...

• "The purpose of this subforum is to have a place to freely engage in debates on Christian theology with the basic assumption that the Bible can be used as a primary reference without the need to defend its authority. Responses to topics with 'but first you have to prove that the Bible is true' is not allowed here."

Happy reading, and grace and peace to you.

[2timothy316]

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It does not say in the rules: "Debates about 'first you must prove the Bible is true' is not allowed here."

Those are the rules on how to treat others. This forum has special rules.

viewtopic.php?f=38&t=3168
"The purpose of this subforum is to have a place to freely engage in debates on Christian theology with the basic assumption that the Bible can be used as a primary reference without the need to defend its authority. Responses to topics with "but first you have to prove that the Bible is true" is not allowed here."

If you want opinions and not a Biblical answer then I personally have nothing for you. I debate in this forum 90% of the time because I don't have to spend time defending the Bible.

[2timothy316]

My points:

1. The Bible is false and unethical. Please see: https://www.evilbible.com and http://skepticsannotatedbible.com

2. The Biblical God is evil (imaginary or real).

The problem is that both of your points are produced by fallacious reasoning, for they simply beg the question. According to Christian theology, God defines both truth (John 17:17, "your word is truth") and ethical conduct (Mark 10:18, "No one is good except God alone"). These points of yours are question-begging because they simply assert the contrary—and faulty reasoning is not compelling. A rational person must do more than merely assert the contrary.

You are most welcome to prove me wrong by proving the Bible to be true and ethical and by proving the Biblical God to be real and good. So far, you have not done so.

There is no need for me (or anyone else) to prove them wrong. These are your claims (see Post # 4); the burden is yours to prove them right. Perhaps you suppose they are right until proven wrong, but that would just be more fallacious reasoning—argumentum ad ignorantiam, the fallacy of asserting that "a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false," as Wikipedia explains.

Just because the Bible claims to be true, it does not make it so. It makes many claims about reality without proving them. Quoting from the Bible is no better than quoting from all the other religious books. As far as religious books go, the Bible is much worse than many other religious books of many other religions.

Well, then you might be looking in the wrong forum for answers. In this forum the Bible has the final say and is considered the highest authority. There are many forums that will give you all sorts of opinions yet most post here for a debate or discussion with the Bible being the touchstone as to what is true concerning doctrine and dogma. One's opinion or feelings is not the highest authority here. Debates about 'first you must prove the Bible is true' is not allowed here. In short, if you don't think the Bible holds the correct answer to the question, "Is Salvation by faith alone?" then perhaps you'd like to find a forum that uses a reference that you do trust to have the correct answer. Even if you think that you are that correct reference, there are others that you can discuss all of this with, without a Bible.

So my question to you is, when you said, "Could a Christian please clarify how Salvation works given all the contradicting verses about it in the Bible." Do you want a Christian to explain without a Bible or would you like someone to explain salvation using these scriptures you're calling contradictory?

I want to understand Christians and I want to understand Christianity. That is why I posted my original post. I am an agnostic pacifist vegan egalitarian compassionist. My goal is to save and improve all lives. I don't hold any source to be correct until the source has proven himself/herself/itself to be correct through incontrovertible evidence.

If you want to understand true Christianity it will have to come from a source that is not a personal opinion. That means using an objective source. That source should be the Bible seeing how it is said to be the source of Christian doctrine and dogma. So what scriptures are you saying are contradictory?

[theophile]

If I embrace that thinking then the ultimate conclusion and inspiration that I see Paul declaring in Romans 8 in particular is more to my point, and pertains to all us "mere men." i.e.: Those of us who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God and as such are heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ. (Verses 14, 17)

I'm not trying to "one-up" you or anything like that, but my point is Biblically correct. See above. The whole outcome of Romans 8 is inevitable from the first sentence (verse), that "(t)here is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." And this is despite the "faults" that are still in mere men, those who have repented -- and are continually repenting -- of their sin and believe in Christ. These are the ones who are in Christ, and that there is no condemnation (under God's Law) of anymore. So yes, we are adopted by God, even in the same place as Christ, as a result of what God Himself has done, both in choosing us (the Father's purpose of election) and the Son's work and accomplishment of our redemption on the cross, and the Holy Spirit's effectual calling and conversion of our hearts at our appointed times. As J.I. Packer so eloquently put it:
.

God - the Triune Jehovah, Father, Son and Spirit; three Persons working together in sovereign wisdom, power and love to achieve the salvation of a chosen people, the Father electing, the Son fulfilling the Father's will by redeeming, the Spirit executing the purpose of Father and Son by renewing.

Saves - does everything, first to last, that is involved in bringing man from death in sin to life in glory: plans, achieves and communicates redemption, calls and keeps, justifies, sanctifies, glorifies.

Sinners - men as God finds them, guilty, vile, helpless, powerless, unable to lift a finger to do God's will or better their spiritual lot.

God saves sinners -- and the force of this confession may not be weakened by disrupting the unity of the work of the Trinity, or by dividing the achievement of salvation between God and man and making the decisive part man's own, or by soft-pedalling the sinner's inability so as to allow him to share the praise of his salvation with his Saviour... (S)inners do not save themselves in any sense at all, but that salvation, first and last, whole and entire, past, present and future, is of the Lord, to Whom be glory for ever.

.

What this tells me is that we are no different from Jesus, and the only thing setting him apart from us is that he was the first to realize this human potential. That is, he was the first human being who lived according to the Spirit of God.

Well, what it should tell you is that God only regards us as no different than Jesus, whose righteousness has been imputed to us through no accomplishment of our own and despite our utter undeservedness, and that despite our human state and inability to reach this "status" in this life, we have been redeemed and that our destiny is to be glorified, not in this life but in the life to come, with Jesus, as we are co-heirs with Him. Jesus will always be our Lord and God, of course, but we will be, finally, glorified with Him. This is Romans 8, Ephesians 1 and 2, and Philippians 2... in a far-inferior-to-the-real-thing nutshell. As Paul says in Romans 8:28-30, "for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose... For those whom He foreknew... (foreloved, chose) ...He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, in order that He might be the firstborn among many brothers... And those whom He predestined He also called, and those whom He called He also justified, and those whom He justified He also glorified" (will glorify, for those who have not passed from this world yet).

More precisely in this chapter, I believe Paul is saying that Jesus is the one who has finally broken the yoke of the law and the oppressive legalism of the Jews by living according to the Spirit, and in doing so he "freed" us all to follow him. i.e., it is more about contrasting a life lived according to the law, which leads to death, and a life lived according to the Spirit, which leads to life.

Well, no, Jesus is the One who fulfilled the Law perfectly for us (because we can't) and died the death that we are deserving of, so that we could then be justified (and ultimately glorified). This is what it means to be led by the Spirit and no longer subjected to the Law -- freed from it -- to fulfill the law of Christ by walking by the Spirit and bearing the fruit of the Spirit as a result (again, Paul, in Galatians 5 and 6).

But again, I don't see a need for any special Godlike abilities or nature in Jesus that isn't equally available to us all in order for him to do this.

Jesus has to be God made man -- thank goodness He is -- in order to be, as Hebrews 4:15 says, "...tempted in every way we are and yet remain sinless," which He did, fulfilling, as I said, the Law perfectly on our behalf. This is what qualifies Him as mediator between man and the Father and therefore reconciles us to the Father. As Hebrews 9:15 says, "...He (Christ) is the mediator of a new covenant, so that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance, since a death has occurred that redeems them from the transgressions committed under the first covenant."

He was simply a revolutionary (like many other human beings), but one who was receptive to the Spirit sent by God and who lived by it.

The only two alternatives, really, are, a.) Jesus was a lunatic and wholly unworthy of any esteem whatsoever, or b.) He was/is who He said He was/is, God Himself. I choose the latter of the two.

Grace and peace to you.

The crux of the matter between us is how Jesus is different from any other human being. And by that, I mean different in nature. i.e., What special Godlike abilities does he have that we do not.

My argument is that he is the depiction of what human beings were always meant to be from the beginning (Genesis 1), and that there is nothing essentially different about him from the rest of us. What is different about him, as Paul says, is that he lived according to the Spirit. But this is not, and never was, a path denied or unavailable to the rest of us. That is, there is no additional Godlike nature in Jesus that enables him to do this versus us. Per Genesis 1, we were all created in the image of God, and have the same potential for Godlikeness. (Otherwise, where is Jesus in Genesis 1 according to your Triune theology if not the fulfillment of humankind?...)

In all of the above, your main point to the contrary that I see is the highlighted portion, and that, if I follow you correctly, Jesus has some additional Godlikeness about him that allows him to remain sinless. In other words, human beings cannot help but sin when faced with various temptations. Jesus' additional Godlikeness allows him to do so even when he takes on a human form. And this "God taking on human form," and remaining sinless through temptation is a necessary action / event to reconcile and reconnect the rest of us sinful humanity with God.

If that's a reasonable account of what you're saying, don't get me wrong, I understand what you're getting at. I just think it adds unnecessary complication to the redemption arc in the bible and flies in the face of fundamental biblical texts like Genesis 1. Not to mention, per an earlier point I made, characters like Job, who was a blameless human being that talked directly to God (i.e., was a mediator on his own behalf.) Or Moses. Who may not have been blameless, but again, mediated on behalf of and led the chosen people through direct converse with God.

In other words, there is a better (because simpler and more cohesive) reading that treats Jesus as a human being, no different from you or I, who lived according to the Spirit (just as all of us can and were called to do from the beginning). This approach (my approach) treats him as the ultimate human being in a long line of human beings going back to Genesis 1 who fulfill, or partially fulfill, our calling to rule over creation, and achieve the tremendous power (over death even) that can come through that.

There is no need in any of this that I can see for a theology of "God taking on human form", which, frankly, smacks more of mythology. Nor of complicated redemption logics that undermine our human potential and fundamental texts in the bible that declare it (i.e., Genesis 1). All it requires is a Spirit from God (the ruach Elohim), that any and all of us can live by. A Word that we can all equally hear and receive (from the beginning) and allow to permeate what we say and do throughout our lives.

What would be helpful, to understand why I am wrong and should accept the additional complications you are suggesting as necessary, would be an argument as to why human beings cannot help but sin. Or why human beings, without the additional Godlikeness that Jesus has, cannot live according to the Spirit and be the very mediators / reconcilers / redeemers that you say only Jesus can fulfill. I have not seen a clear case for that in anything that you have said, and have pointed out biblical examples to the contrary.

[PinSeeker]

The crux of the matter between us is how Jesus is different from any other human being. And by that, I mean different in nature. i.e., What special Godlike abilities does he have that we do not.

Sure. And why it is necessary to understand that He is. Although I don't like your use of "Godlike abilities..." ... but understand what you are saying by it. Read on:

My argument is that he is the depiction of what human beings were always meant to be from the beginning (Genesis 1)...

No, actually that was the pre-fall (up to Genesis 3:6) Adam. Jesus was/is our Savior, Who, through His work of redemption on the cross, reconciles us to the Father, as first prophesied in Genesis 3:15 immediately after the Fall.

...and that there is nothing essentially different about him from the rest of us.

In His humanity, yes. He was born of a woman, tempted in every way that we are (as Hebrews 4:15 says, as I said before). I surely don't mean to insinuate that you're "not thinking," but about Hebrews 4:15... think about it:

• "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin."

The implicit statement in that very verse is that in and with and of Him, there is most certainly something essentially different than what is in and with and of the rest of us. And then consider 1 John 3:2, that "when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is." Again, none of us are really like Him yet. If we are really in Christ, we are being made like Him -- and so we can live as if we are now... because it is a certainty that someday (when Christ returns) we will be -- but are not really like Him yet. He is the One through Whom all things were made (John 1:3). Who of us can claim anything even remotely similar? Well, no one, of course.

There are two takeaways relevant to our conversation here in that verse, the first being that we are not now exactly like Him or even close, really (which entails being without sin but also loving God and others -- in that order -- perfectly, among other things), and the second being that He will still be our Savior, Lord, and God and as such far above us and worthy of our worship and adoration. As Isaiah says:

• "the government shall be upon His shoulder, and His name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore." (Isaiah 9:6-7)

What is different about him, as Paul says, is that he lived according to the Spirit.

I agree, but not, I think, in the way that you mean that. Jesus was just as much one with the Holy Spirit as with the Father... the Son and the Holy Spirit both proceed from the Father. What statement or statements of Paul would you point to as proof of what you say here? Careful...

But this is not, and never was, a path denied or unavailable to the rest of us.

Sure, but it is not attainable in and of ourselves -- which gets back to your statement immediately above and -- no offense intended -- it's inherent short-sightedness.

That is, there is no additional Godlike nature in Jesus that enables him to do this versus us.

Very strongly disagree, for the reasons outlined here in this post to this point and many more. As Jesus Himself says, "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30) and "I am in the Father and the Father is in Me" (John 14:11. Paul knew this very well, and even stated it with absolute clarity in Philippians 2:

• "...Christ Jesus, Who, though He was in the form (Greek 'morphe,' meaning of the same essence/nature) of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, by taking the form (again, Greek morphe', meaning of the same essence/nature) of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross." (Philippians 2:5-8)

Per Genesis 1, we were all created in the image of God, and have the same potential for Godlikeness.

Well, I would say that, per Genesis 1, man was most certainly created in the image of God, and was actually already in possession of Godlikeness -- Adam and Eve were created that way. However, subsequently, as we see in Genesis 2:7, after having created them this way, God warned Adam and Eve that if they partook of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, they would assuredly -- in that very day -- die. And die they did when they partook of the fruit of that tree, as we then see in Genesis 3, and bequeathed that state to all of us. Therefore, this image of God in them -- and all of us, in turn -- became "fallen," or corrupted, and therefore the need for all of us to be redeemed by a Savior and this image eventually restored in us to what it was meant to be. And the promise of Genesis 3:15 is that it will most certainly happen.

...where is Jesus in Genesis 1 according to your Triune theology if not the fulfillment of humankind?

He is present in Genesis 1, along with the Holy Spirit. We see in Genesis 1:2 the Holy Spirit "hovering above the waters." So we know -- or should -- that God is at least a duality from the very beginning. And then as you know -- or should -- God says, on the sixth day, "Let us make man in our image..." So, we couple Genesis 1 with John 1, and specifically verses 1 through three -- which no one should have any problem doing -- which say:

• "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made."

God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit were all present at creation.

In all of the above, your main point to the contrary that I see is the highlighted portion, and that, if I follow you correctly, Jesus has some additional Godlikeness about him that allows him to remain sinless. In other words, human beings cannot help but sin when faced with various temptations. Jesus' additional Godlikeness allows him to do so even when he takes on a human form. And this "God taking on human form," and remaining sinless through temptation is a necessary action / event to reconcile and reconnect the rest of us sinful humanity with God.

Well, you follow correctly somewhat, I guess, or you are not completely grasping what I'm saying (what the Bible says). I would correct a few things here, namely that Jesus is God the Son and thus in possession of not just a mere "Godlikeness" but rather the same nature, even the same essence, as God the Father. It's very important to understand what is meant by the word "form" as you're using it here; we see it in Philippians 2 when Paul talks about Christ being both in the form of God and, in His life on earth, in the form of man. It means that He possesses from all eternity to all eternity the same nature and essence as God and at His birth took on the same nature and essence of man. As I have said, this is what qualifies Him as Mediator between the two; He identifies intensely with both. So, in answer to your statement here, like the Father, Christ is incapable of sin... not merely that He "can't do something," but that it is not in His nature as God the Son to do so, and even absolutely against His nature to do so. This is not true for any of us, and therefore why we cannot help but sin, and therefore why we need a Savior to redeem us to the Father. And of course the nature of God is more... "powerful," shall we say... than the nature of man, and though in possession of both natures, this is why Christ was able to resist all sin and remain without sin. The nature of a person drives his actions. One surely can suppress this nature he or she has voluntarily from time to time -- i.e., resist temptation -- or even quite a lot, but sooner or later, the nature always wins. And because Jesus is God in the form of man, He was able to perfectly resist all sin -- and did, of course, thereby accomplishing redemption and making it possible for any man (or woman, of course).

I just think it adds unnecessary complication to the redemption arc in the bible and flies in the face of fundamental biblical texts like Genesis 1.

Yeah, okay. Disagree. Not complicated.

Not to mention, per an earlier point I made, characters like Job, who was a blameless human being that talked directly to God (i.e., was a mediator on his own behalf.) Or Moses. Who may not have been blameless, but again, mediated on behalf of and led the chosen people through direct converse with God.

Theophile, 'blameless' should not be understood as synonymous with sinless. In response to what you said, I said that the fact that Job was blameless does not convey sinlessness. The fuller context in Job 1:1 is, “This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil.” So, the description of Job being “blameless and upright” is linked to the fear of God and the avoidance of evil. In short, Job was “blameless and upright” in that he was a man of integrity who trusted in God as his redeemer (see Job 19:25), sincerely worshiped the Lord, loved his family, and was consistent in his walk with God. Job was surely not any kind of mediator. God did speak to him, and Job questioned God. But read chapters 38 through 41. Here's how it starts:

• "Then the LORD answered Job out of the whirlwind and said: “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements -- surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy? Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb, when I made clouds its garment and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed limits for it and set bars and doors, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed’? Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, that it might take hold of the skirts of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? It is changed like clay under the seal, and its features stand out like a garment. From the wicked their light is withheld, and their uplifted arm is broken. Have you entered into the springs of the sea, or walked in the recesses of the deep? Have the gates of death been revealed to you, or have you seen the gates of deep darkness? Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare, if you know all this."

(Job 38:1-18)

Seventy unanswerable questions God asks Job in His righteous anger. So what is Job's response?

• "Then Job answered the LORD and said: “I know that you can do all things, and that no purpose of yours can be thwarted. ‘Who is this that hides counsel without knowledge?’ Therefore I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know. ‘Hear, and I will speak; I will question you, and you make it known to me.’ I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you; therefore I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes." (Job 42:1-6)

Job, theophile, was no mediator by any stretch of the imagination.

Now Moses... Okay I'm going to make this short. Moses was a type, a shadow, of Christ Jesus, the true Deliverer to come. There are many of these types and shadows of Christ throughout the Old Testament. Sometimes it is a person, like Joseph, or Moses, or David, and sometimes it is an inanimate object, like Noah's Ark or the manna with which God fed His people in the desert. As for Moses, God used him to deliver the Israelites from the house of slavery in Egypt and bring them to the Promised Land, and He spoke to His people Israel through him (Moses). So in a sense, yes, Moses was a mediator of sorts, but only a shadow of the true Mediator to come.

In other words, there is a better (because simpler and more cohesive) reading that treats Jesus as a human being, no different from you or I, who lived according to the Spirit (just as all of us can and were called to do from the beginning). This approach (my approach) treats him as the ultimate human being in a long line of human beings going back to Genesis 1 who fulfill, or partially fulfill, our calling to rule over creation, and achieve the tremendous power (over death even) that can come through that.

In a sense, again, I agree with you about Jesus being no different than you or I. But this is only half (if that) of the total picture, as I have said. If Jesus is just a human being, "ultimate" or otherwise, and not God the Son, then He falls far short of the glory of God just as we all do (Romans 6:23) and thus cannot be our mediator and thus redeem us to the Father in any shape, form, or fashion. Thanks be to God that this is not the case. What you're doing -- without meaning to, presumably -- is making God out to be in man's image. So your premise is backwards, and the resulting conclusions are backwards, also. Again, no offense intended, of course, but that's the pretty much the problem.

There is no need in any of this that I can see for a theology of "God taking on human form", which, frankly, smacks more of mythology. Nor of complicated redemption logics that undermine our human potential...

Yes, sadly, you are not alone in thinking that.

...and fundamental texts in the bible that declare it (i.e., Genesis 1).

<chuckles> See above.

All it requires is a Spirit from God (the ruach Elohim), that any and all of us can live by.

Ah, yes, "a Spirit..." I agree, actually, but not in the way you apparently mean that, I think... It does require the quickening work of the Holy Spirit, the third distinct Person of the Trinity, in our hearts, Who is the One Who removes our hearts from stone and replaces them with hearts of flesh, the result of which is that God puts His Holy Spirit within us and causes us to walk in His statutes and to be careful to obey His rules (Ezekiel 36). In this life, we don't do that perfectly, of course, because we are still sinners, as Jesus and all the Biblical writers make very clear. But still, at that point, we are counted among His people and He is our God. Jesus Himself is very clear that the Holy Spirit is this third Person, especially in John 14, where He says the following:

• "These things I have spoken to you while I am still with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, Whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you."

A Word that we can all equally hear and receive (from the beginning) and allow to permeate what we say and do throughout our lives.

Unfortunately, universalism is very much antithetical to God's Word, specifically His sovereignty, His justice, and His purpose of election. In answer to what you're saying here, as Jesus said in slightly different ways as we see in Matthew 19:26, Mark 10:27, and Luke 18:27, "with man this is impossible, but with God, all things are possible."

What would be helpful, to understand why I am wrong and should accept the additional complications you are suggesting as necessary, would be an argument as to why human beings cannot help but sin.

See above. There really are no "complications"... it's pretty simple, really. It would be a mistake to see wordiness as evidence of complication.

Or why human beings, without the additional Godlikeness that Jesus has, cannot live according to the Spirit and be the very mediators / reconcilers / redeemers that you say only Jesus can fulfill.

See above.

I have not seen a clear case for that in anything that you have said, and have pointed out biblical examples to the contrary.

See above. In answer to this statement, though, when presented with such, I always hear those "prophets" Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel singing, "Still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest..."

Grace and peace to you.

[Compassionist]

My points:

1. The Bible is false and unethical. Please see: https://www.evilbible.com and http://skepticsannotatedbible.com

2. The Biblical God is evil (imaginary or real).

The problem is that both of your points are produced by fallacious reasoning, for they simply beg the question. According to Christian theology, God defines both truth (John 17:17, "your word is truth") and ethical conduct (Mark 10:18, "No one is good except God alone"). These points of yours are question-begging because they simply assert the contrary—and faulty reasoning is not compelling. A rational person must do more than merely assert the contrary.

You are most welcome to prove me wrong by proving the Bible to be true and ethical and by proving the Biblical God to be real and good. So far, you have not done so.

There is no need for me (or anyone else) to prove them wrong. These are your claims (see Post # 4); the burden is yours to prove them right. Perhaps you suppose they are right until proven wrong, but that would just be more fallacious reasoning—argumentum ad ignorantiam, the fallacy of asserting that "a proposition is true because it has not yet been proven false," as Wikipedia explains.

Just because the Bible claims to be true, it does not make it so. It makes many claims about reality without proving them. Quoting from the Bible is no better than quoting from all the other religious books. As far as religious books go, the Bible is much worse than many other religious books of many other religions.

Well, then you might be looking in the wrong forum for answers. In this forum the Bible has the final say and is considered the highest authority. There are many forums that will give you all sorts of opinions yet most post here for a debate or discussion with the Bible being the touchstone as to what is true concerning doctrine and dogma. One's opinion or feelings is not the highest authority here. Debates about 'first you must prove the Bible is true' is not allowed here. In short, if you don't think the Bible holds the correct answer to the question, "Is Salvation by faith alone?" then perhaps you'd like to find a forum that uses a reference that you do trust to have the correct answer. Even if you think that you are that correct reference, there are others that you can discuss all of this with, without a Bible.

So my question to you is, when you said, "Could a Christian please clarify how Salvation works given all the contradicting verses about it in the Bible." Do you want a Christian to explain without a Bible or would you like someone to explain salvation using these scriptures you're calling contradictory?

I want to understand Christians and I want to understand Christianity. That is why I posted my original post. I am an agnostic pacifist vegan egalitarian compassionist. My goal is to save and improve all lives. I don't hold any source to be correct until the source has proven himself/herself/itself to be correct through incontrovertible evidence.

If you want to understand true Christianity it will have to come from a source that is not a personal opinion. That means using an objective source. That source should be the Bible seeing how it is said to be the source of Christian doctrine and dogma. So what scriptures are you saying are contradictory?

Here is a list of some of the contradictions in the Bible http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/number.html

[Compassionist]

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It does not say in the rules: "Debates about 'first you must prove the Bible is true' is not allowed here."

Those are the rules on how to treat others. This forum has special rules.

viewtopic.php?f=38&t=3168
"The purpose of this subforum is to have a place to freely engage in debates on Christian theology with the basic assumption that the Bible can be used as a primary reference without the need to defend its authority. Responses to topics with "but first you have to prove that the Bible is true" is not allowed here."

If you want opinions and not a Biblical answer then I personally have nothing for you. I debate in this forum 90% of the time because I don't have to spend time defending the Bible.

I have asked the moderators to move this thread to another section of the forum where the Bible is not assumed to be truthful and ethical. "On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel:

“Sun, stand still over Gibeon,
and you, moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.”
So the sun stood still,
and the moon stopped,
till the nation avenged itself on[a] its enemies,

as it is written in the Book of Jashar.

The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day." - Joshua 10:12-13, The Bible (New International Version). If this event truly happened, why is there no evidence for it? Why aren't there any historical records of the Sun standing still and the Moon standing still outside the Bible? This is how our Sun and our planet and the other planets move through the space: If the Sun and the Moon stood still, how did that impact on the Earth and the other planets and moons, etc.? God is claimed to be love by the Bible. "And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them." - 1 John 4:16, The Bible (New International Version). How is it loving of God to allow a group of people to kill another group of people? The Godly people should be the most loving people but they clearly are not loving.

[2timothy316]

[Replying to Compassionist in post #58]

If you don't want to see the Bible as a historical record then so be it. Yet the being that made the universe and all of its physics can make them do whatever he wants without harming anything. It might amaze us but to Him it was child's play.

[Compassionist]

[Replying to Compassionist in post #58]

If you don't want to see the Bible as a historical record then so be it. Yet the being that made the universe and all of its physics can make them do whatever he wants without harming anything. It might amaze us but to Him it was child's play.

There are many reasons I don't see the Bible as truthful historical record e.g. http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/science/long.html and http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/number.html You are most welcome to prove that God is real and good and the Bible is true and ethical. It is my studied conclusion that the Bible is false and unethical and the Biblical God is evil (imaginary or real).

[2timothy316]

[Replying to Compassionist in post #58]

If you don't want to see the Bible as a historical record then so be it. Yet the being that made the universe and all of its physics can make them do whatever he wants without harming anything. It might amaze us but to Him it was child's play.

There are many reasons I don't see the Bible as truthful historical record e.g. http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/science/long.html and http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/number.html You are most welcome to prove that God is real and good and the Bible is true and ethical. It is my studied conclusion that the Bible is false and unethical and the Biblical God is evil (imaginary or real).

I'm good. I have already debated that topic to death. I do not waste my time on it anymore.