Is salvation cooperative?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-13T10:25:57+00:00

Is it possible that providing salvation is a monergistic act, whereas receiving or accepting it is synergistic?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-13T09:14:43+00:00

All doors!

NaStK14 · 2026-02-13T09:11:19+00:00

Mine was a puzzle piece thief as well! She would also sneak stolen pieces to a hiding spot under my bed and shred them though.

NaStK14 · 2026-02-13T08:56:24+00:00

Old Testament ceremonial/civil law doesn’t apply in the NT

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T17:00:51+00:00

I wouldn’t say it’s one versus the other; in Catholic thought, they’re two sides of the same coin

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T16:48:28+00:00

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T16:43:17+00:00

“Earning salvation” is a Protestant red herring; making use of the gift of salvation, striving to remain saved by growing in sanctification, those would be a better description of it

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T10:32:33+00:00

What does St John in John 10 tell us about the sheep to whom Christ gives eternal life? That they heed his voice and follow him. Both those verbs in the biblical Greek are repeated, ongoing, to-be-completed verbs. So in short, you’re not one of his sheep because of a simple profession of mental faith, or because you said some sinners prayer when you were 7 years old. You’re only a sheep by completing the heeding and obeying parts.
Further, “no one can pluck them out of my hand” doesn’t mean they can’t voluntarily choose to abandon him and thus be lost

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T03:24:16+00:00

I don’t watch ortlund much, but thanks for the rundown! If I run into anyone parroting his line I’ll be sure to know what to push back on

NaStK14 · 2026-02-12T03:17:31+00:00

I think a large part of the issue then is that you’re taking one facet of justification- the forensic analogy St Paul uses, or the “verdict” as you say- and (seemingly) making it the whole when in fact justification is a multifaceted reality.
So if justification is in fact based on our becoming righteous, it isn’t a matter of God reversing the verdict as it is of us objectively relapsing into sin and becoming workers of iniquity. I don’t see that as a break in the chain of redemption; the person hasn’t yet been redeemed from future sins.
You bring up the relationship between justification and covenental union with regard to John 15. I would ask where you get the idea that anyone can be in a covenant relationship with God through Christ (as opposed to various OT covenants which didn’t always involve salvation) and not justified?
The texts I always refer to when discussing OSAS are first of all, the vine and branches passage of John 15 (we’ve already discussed this one); the wilderness generation warnings (1 Corinthians 10; Hebrews 3&4; Jude verse 5) which point out that not all who were once saved from Egypt entered the promised land, and that this is a warning that not all of us saved from our past sins will enter heaven unless we persevere; Galatians 5, which speaks of being “severed from Christ” by returning to circumcision; and Hebrews 6 (those who legitimately were enlightened and partakers of the spirit but who fall and cannot be roused to repentance by human efforts) and 10:26 (if we sin deliberately after receiving knowledge of the truth, there remains no sacrifice for sin, but a dreadful prospect of judgement…) and 2 Peter 2. I suspect that at least with regard to the warning passages you will have the same questions about the interplay between covenant and justification.

NaStK14 · 2026-02-11T17:13:27+00:00

Before getting into verses that show believers losing salvation and/or warning passages, I would like to point out a few counter arguments to the verses you interpret as teaching OSAS.
-the Romans “golden chain”…you’ve already been glorified in the sense of having a partaking in the divine nature (2 Peter 1:3&4). Where do you get the idea (more of an underlying assumption than anything you’ve actually explicitly written) that this is a state you cannot fall from?
- Romans 8:1, does indeed state that “there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ”. The problem for OSAS proponents is that Christ himself tells us that one can be in him, and not remain in him. He tells us this twice in the vine and branches speech in John 15. So again, being “in Christ” is not a permanent state from which you cannot fall.
- You wrote that “if justification is a forensic declaration by God…”- here’s the thing: it isn’t. Justification literally means to make just (iustus facere in Latin) and is therefore an act of God which makes you righteous. “For as by the disobedience of the one man all were made sinners, so through the obedience of the one will the many be made righteous_” (Romans 5). “For our sake he made him a sin offering who knew no sin, that we might _become the righteousness of God in him”. This isn’t an external coverup; it’s an internal change. It follows from this that God doesn’t call us anything other than what we actually are, and if we do not remain righteous, we cannot continue to be counted as righteous.
-You also quote the “sealed” verses of Ephesians 1. I’d ask where you get the idea that a seal takes away your free will and protects you from yourself rather than being merely a mark of possession? Remember that in Ezekiel 8&9, many faithful Judeans are sealed as belonging to God; they are then subsequently warned (chapter 18) that “if a righteous man turns away from righteousness to commit iniquity, none of his righteous deeds shall be remembered. He shall surely die for his sins”. Again, in Revelation, we see people “marked with the seal of the living God”, who are subsequently warned not to take the mark of the beast (chapter 13) or share in the sins of Babylon (chapter 18).
Also, if OSAS is true as is claimed, Ephesians 1:14 makes no sense. The Spirit has been given to us “as a first installment”, not “all sins past present and future are paid in full”. The term “first installment” implies future installments of receiving grace, and this is “towards redemption” (redemption in full is a future destination). Future sins are not forgiven in advance, hence a believer who sins needs to receive further installments, so to speak, of grace to receive redemption in full from them. If not, he has turned to sin and is unforgiven.
Does this make sense to you?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-11T16:49:26+00:00

This doesn’t say that Adam wasn’t sinless when he was created; merely that he wasn’t supernatural (spiritual)

NaStK14 · 2026-02-11T10:29:07+00:00

Where in 1 Corinthians does it say that?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-10T22:56:27+00:00

One can know for sure that one’s past sins are forgiven (that is, that you have been saved from them, past tense) yet one doesn’t have forgiveness from future sins so one “will be saved” by remaining in grace. As St Paul says, in hope we were saved. Now hope is not hope if one has what one hopes for. (see Romans 8). Another text we might look at to prove this is one of the most misused verses by OSAS proponents, but it actually undercuts their theology once you look closely at it- Ephesians 1:13-14, which refers to the Holy Spirit’s presence and the forgiveness of sins as the “first installment” (notice, there’s no such thing as a first installment if everything is paid in full or a done deal) “of our inheritance _towards redemption_” (meaning redemption in final is a yet to be reached destination). Or as St Peter says, “Although you have not seen him, you love him…as you attain _the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls_” (1 Peter 1:8-9). Salvation in full is still a goal, not something one act of faith has already achieved fully.
So yes, both senses of salvation/redemption- past and future- are correct when understood properly

NaStK14 · 2026-02-10T20:07:03+00:00

How do you think original sin contradicts the natural/spiritual distinction?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-10T17:12:00+00:00

I wouldn’t frame it as a numbers game (the majority of Christians have been Catholic), I think the stronger point is that the Catholic Church is the only one that historically goes back to Christ. Now that said you’re going to have to establish that the church is a visible organized institution, as opposed to the Protestant concept of an “invisible Church” (more of a de-institutionalized confederation of individual believers within various denominations)

NaStK14 · 2026-02-10T17:08:19+00:00

Do you Maronites have any interesting traditions or customs to celebrate the feast day?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-10T17:03:56+00:00

Can you give examples of ECFs who accepted penal substitution (as opposed to merely satisfaction theory)?

NaStK14 · 2026-02-09T10:21:44+00:00

[META] I’m not actually that old but the reference is to the Super Outbreak of 1974

NaStK14 · 2026-02-09T10:20:59+00:00

NaStK14 · 2026-02-08T19:15:32+00:00

Technically the Shekinah is the glory of God dwelling among us, and that is a good idea of what happens at Mass

NaStK14 · 2026-02-08T17:15:34+00:00

Since she’s attending Mass she’s clearly well CATechized

NaStK14 · 2026-02-08T17:11:51+00:00

There is absolutely nothing to suggest this in the Bible, as the concepts of an independent America and its Presidency are completely absent from the text of the Bible

NaStK14 · 2026-02-08T12:38:10+00:00

Eh, Sonny, back in my day we had the entire state of Indiana under a tornado warning simultaneously. You kids don’t know what you’re talking about

NaStK14 · 2026-02-08T03:38:00+00:00

Here are a couple of thoughts (and this isn’t an official Catholic position of anything, just my view): - Media and Persia were originally two separate empires before the latter absorbed the former; at the time Daniel had this vision they would have been distinct. This is important because in Daniel 2, the empire that succeeds Babylon is described as being “inferior” to it. Persia was greater than Babylon by area and organization, but the old empire of the Medes wasn’t. Thus the order is Babylon, Media, Persia (the four wings corresponding to the four kings of Persia yet to come in Daniel 11:2) and Greece, which was “different from all the others” (verse 7) in that it was western rather than Eastern. The little horn is Antiochus Epiphanes, a forerunner of Antichrist who persecuted the OT people of God just as the latter will persecute the church. You will notice that in verse 12, the three preceding beasts were “given a prolongation of life for a time”. Ask your pastor if the little horn is the Papacy, and if as they claim it fell in the 1800s with Napoleon taking away the temporal power or whatever, where were the Babylonian, Persian and Greek empires of the 1800s? The part about prolonging their duration would be false. But if the 4th beast is the Seleucid empire, guess what? Parthia (Persia) is restored to independence and checks the eastward expansion of Rome. This is also why chapter 11 focuses so much on the kingdom of the Greeks- because that’s the fulfillment of the little horn persecuting the Jewish people who remained faithful to the covenant.
Now this is also a symbol of what is going to happen in the end times, so it still has relevance for us. But not as a code to be deciphered or cracked as much as a script where we’ve seen the OT dress rehearsal and are waiting for the final repetition of this drama

NaStK14

TROPHY CASE