Re: YOU MUST BE BORN-AGAIN To Enter Into Heaven

Rainy, thanks for your post. I think that the way that you and most other Christians think, equating belief in Christ to salvation and rebirth, is partially correct and partially incorrect. If we really want to explore it even further, the scriptures say that we are either saved or not from the foundation of the world. When we believe in Christ, that is a confirmation that we indeed are one of his fold. But it is not until we are born of the Spirit that we are sealed as His. Being born of the Spirit is not something that we can do, it is a gift given by Christ.

I think that if we just read the words on the page, either one of our interpretations could be correct, but I know in my heart that the way the majority of Christians read these scriptures is incorrect. Of course when we are forming a definition of being saved, we want that definition to include ourselves. How do you convince someone that has it in their mind that they are saved, that maybe Christ has not completed their salvation but they are still only in the process? I am not saying you specifically, Rainy, or anyone else. My aim is not to convince anyone they are not saved, but to discuss what salvation really is. And that truth can only be understood when your heart is opened by the Lord.

I would be happy to hear more of your thoughts on the subject. Yes, it is a very long post, I really got going there, lol. This is a topic that is very close to my heart, and I think something all Christians need to ponder, more than any other topic. I don't claim to have proved anything with the scriptures that I quoted. But when I read those scriptures, they speak to my heart telling me that although it is only by faith in Christ that a man can be born again, and the two absolutely to go hand in hand. Faith in Christ and being born again are in fact two separate and distinct things. It is when we have faith in Christ that Christ begins to work in our lives to our salvation. And just as we can say that even at the foundation of the world we were saved by grace in Christ, we can also say that once we believe in Christ we are chosen by Him for salvation, it does not mean that His work in us to salvation is done immediately at the moment we believe (although it certainly COULD happen this way).