What Must Be Believed To Be Saved?

[willowtree]

Hi Singalphile,

Thank you for your explanation. Truly one of the important elements of being saved is that we recognize the seriousness of our unsaved spiritual condition.

In listening to evangelists on the radio, I frequently shudder at how easy they make it sound for a person to be saved. We do not help the Christian faith by calling people to an easy 'believe-ism'.

Graeme

[Homer]

Singalphile wrote:

Certainly, a person must believe in (or "put his faith in" or "entrust himself to") and subject himself to the Lord and not practice sin and walk in the light (and all the other good things that you've all said related to faith and obedience) in order to be counted as a Christian (i.e., welcomed into any Christian group as a functioning part of the body of Christ), but does that mean that such a person must also necessarily affirm a certain list of facts? If so, which facts?

And this is what I was getting at in the beginning of this thread. We have had a very long discussion regarding the Trinity, and I consider myself in that camp. But there are a great many Christians, I am sure, who do not understand it very well and can not explain it. They love the Lord and mean well, and try to be obedient. So are they lost, even while saying they are Trinitarian, although they do not understand it? And what of those who have looked deeply into the matter and honestly have an opinion other than the Trinitarian formula in a creed? Even though they believe Jesus is the Messiah, God's actual and only Son who God raised from the dead, are they lost? I certainly will not say they are.

We have thousands of denominations with differing beliefs. Some differences are great and some amount to no more than splitting hairs. Of all these denominations, is there only one, of whom the members are the only actual Christians? Some of them believe this. And the only difference between them may be unrelated to how they personally live.

It seems to me belief in certain facts is necessary to be saved. Living a life pleasing to God in our moral and ethical behavior is certainly important, but there are people of non-Christian religions, or no religion at all, who live a good, kind, and moral life. But we are not Unitarians who believe in multiple paths to God, and one of the things that makes Christians set apart is the belief that certain facts are true. What I was looking for is a scriptural list of those facts, not what might be wonderful to be believed and understand, but what must be believed.

[Paidion]

In listening to evangelists on the radio, I frequently shudder at how easy they make it sound for a person to be saved. We do not help the Christian faith by calling people to an easy 'believe-ism'.

Well-said, Graeme! Jesus' call was not to believe-ism of any kind, but to discipleship.

If anyone comes to me and does not hate [love less] his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:26 ESV)

Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:27 ESV)

So therefore, any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. (Luke 14:33 ESV)

[jriccitelli]

The question was not how do you avoid easy believe-ism (?), nor was it what does it mean to be a disciple, the question was 'What must you do to be saved?'

'But what does it say? "THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, IN YOUR MOUTH AND IN YOUR HEART "-- that is, the word of faith which we are preaching, 9 that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 10 for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation...' (Romans 10)
"Sirs, what must I do to be saved?" 31 They said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household." 32And they spoke the word of the Lord to him together with all who were in his house... (Acts 16:30)
so that at the name of Jesus EVERY KNEE WILL BOW, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father' (Phil. 2:11)

"You call me 'Teacher' and 'Lord,' and rightly so, for that is what I am" (Who's disciple are you, might be a good question, John 13:13)

If Adam had believed God and obeyed His Word, Adam would not have sinned.

There is a long list of things we need to believe, they begin in Genesis chapter One: In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth... it is not understanding how Jesus could be God, but how could He not be? Not understanding or being able to explain the incarnation is completely different than denying , or saying Jesus cannot be God. I often hear Christians unable to explain it, but rarely do I hear them deny Jesus could be God. What do you say to a Hindu or a New Ager who believes Jesus is one of many gods, or one who says God is one of many gods? I am not saying they aren't saved, I said we need to 'grow and continue' in our knowledge and relationship of God or we may have the wrong god. I don't believe it is a list, or doctrine, as much as it is a 'will to believe' what we already know about God, but if we want a list, we can start with The Commandments, that is where Jesus started when He was asked.

[TheEditor]

As far as the Trinity goes; I will turn that back to the other thread, but add here that it is not being able to explain ..... but it is the Command to believe God and not to have other Gods (And the command to worship only God and have no other Gods before Him). .....Not believing God puts us in danger, that’s how we got in this mess.

It is dangerous to believe the bible is just too hard to understand, or we cannot perceive enough of it to come to conclusions about anything, there are some things it lays out well enough. I believe that some people just do not want to believe (everything in Gods Word). Many will fall away, they believed parts of it, and they liked the parts about the god they choose, but ultimately reject the parts they don’t like about God. God overlooks our misunderstandings, and God knows we are incapable of seeing the big picture and the true evil that lies behind deception, but not believing still does not change what and who God is. And when we meet God and when God is revealed, we will either love the True God, or love the lie. If we really do not want the God that we will meet someday, then we really need to consider it, now.

I know this sounds like I am purposefully trying to make a case for the Deity of Christ, or making a case for reading and believing the bible, but no, this is just how the scriptures reason this together. If Gods Word is ‘not’ God, then His Word is not eternal, then His Word is not Holy, and then Gods word is not like God at all. If we believe He is God, then we believe His Word. His Word is Lord.

Hi JR,

Here is the problem I see with your line of reasoning. The assumption is that we take one absolute idea or concept (fill in whatever blank you want) and then sacrifice all reason to it. You as much as admitted it has nothing to do with wrapping our minds around a particular concept; just accept the concept, warts and all. That may speak to a person's integrity of obedience, but it falls short of being a whole person and using the capacities God has lovingly given us to try and know Him.

For example, a vegan may find himself marooned on a desert island with his family. All that is there for food is either wild boar or fish. The only vegetation on the island is not suitable for human consumption, only for the consumption of the swine. So, the father says, "Well, I have to stick with my principles" and they slowly starve to death. Idiotic? Perhaps. But he stuck to his principles. We can easily see how such behavior is wrong-headed. But to my point of view, your reasoning is similar. You say "Believe God". That's fine. But what if the way you are believing God is not true? Or, what if there's more than one way to skin a cat? Or, just maybe, God is not as interested in our mental apprehensions of Him as we seem to be.

There are plenty of examples of people in the Bible that acted against what was thought to be the way to do/believe things, and they were not censured. For one, consider David eating the showbread. Would he and his men have died if they didn't eat it? Was it a matter of life and death? But he ate it. Was he disobedient? Would Israelite JR have been there mumbling under his breath about the behavior of the would-be usurper of King Saul? "Guy doesn't know how to believe God."

You seem to be taking a one-dimensional view of God's requirements in that you keep hammering on this one notion regarding "one God" and so doggedly holding to that statement that no other possibility seems open to you. That's fine, as far as it goes. But it doesn't make it true.

You also keep talking about having "the wrong God". So, it appears that you in fact do place a premium on understanding this doctrine. As I was making my mental exodus from the JW Organization, I used to quip that I thought they should expand the definition of "apostate" to include not only those JWs that didn't believe what the WT taught, but also those that didn't know what they taught, as well as those that did know but couldn't explain it. Of course, I was being facetious, but at the same time it's hard to see what the difference is. After all, which is worse, to understand something and not believe it, or to not understand something and believe it? And I'm not talking about something like believing computers work without knowing how they do; that's a pointless argument. I'm talking about saying that some article of faith is so critical that one has to believe it, even though there may be legitimate reasons for holding it in abeyance.

Myself, I think that doctrines about God's personality, how He is--as opposed to what He is--are far more important.

Regards, Brenden.

[Singalphile]

It seems to me belief in certain facts is necessary to be saved. Living a life pleasing to God in our moral and ethical behavior is certainly important, but there are people of non-Christian religions, or no religion at all, who live a good, kind, and moral life. ... and one of the things that makes Christians set apart is the belief that certain facts are true. What I was looking for is a scriptural list of those facts, not what might be wonderful to be believed and understand, but what must be believed.

Exactly! Such an important judgment should not be vague and arbitrary. So what does the Bible explicitly say that a person must affirm in order to be welcomed as a serving Christian among any Christian church?

Again: Hebrews 11:6, 1 John 2:22, 1 John 4:15, John 20:31, 1 John 4:2-3, Romans 10:9, 1 Cor 15:17-20, 1 John 1:8, ...?

There are surely more (that are not just more repeats), and what about the OT?

There is a long list of things we need to believe, they begin in Genesis chapter One: In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth...

It's hard to imagine that any Christian would disagree with Gen 1:1, but I wouldn't include it because 1) the verse itself doesn't say that a person must believe it, and 2) the plain affirmation of God's existence (as required in Heb 11:6) covers that ground, I think, and 3) it's possible that a Christian - who affirms all the statements in the verses listed above - has never even heard of Genesis.

I don't believe it is a list, or doctrine, as much as it is a 'will to believe' what we already know about God ...

It's not really possible for me to identify and measure someone's "will to believe". Lots of people might be willing to believe what you or I believe if they were told, but we can't really call those unidentifiable people Christians.

but if we want a list, we can start with The Commandments, that is where Jesus started when He was asked.

I do want a list, and I think it's doable with a bit of time. I know that it's not so simple, and it can be difficult. A person's behavior and "heart" are real ways to assess a person's status as a Christian or non-Christian, but obedience is not primarily a matter of affirming some facts, as I see it.

[dizerner]

But if one has never heard of the Son, or has never had an opportunity to hear the unvarnished Good News, will the wrath still remain on him? If people who saw the winsome Son of God, and were moved enough by him to say "Hosannah" one day and yet "Crucify him" the next; if these received Jesus mercy ("Forgive them Father for they know not what they do") then who am I to say toward whom God will or will not show mercy?

The Editor, do you consider Scripture to be a guide to the inspired truth, or as just a good book containing some truth? I ask because, how one argues must be fundamentally affected by that consideration. If we get a verse that says "will not see life" but then say, God must not mean that because it's too severe, what have we just done? Do we submit to the Scripture or rewrite it the way we want it to be? I think when Christ said "Father forgive them," he meant for his own crucifixion, since they did not realize his divinity, not for all their sins in their whole life. To exercise a saving faith, we need to know why Christ was hanging there, and trust him to bridge the gap. That saving faith is exactly what Scripture says "all thieves and robbers" are after. To take away our "door" of salvation and instead lead us away from a "narrow" path where "few" are saved into "broader" pastures and more "doors," but at the cost of that one true door. We have got to do something to acknowledge Christ's role, even if it is as simple as the thief next to him. What did he do differently than the other thief? He expressed an active trusting reliance in Christ to do for him what he knew he could not do for himself. This is for me a fundamental expression of faith in grace, and the heart of salvation. To say that this saving faith is unnecessary, is in a very real way, to deny that method of salvation for oneself, because you are declaring it unnecessary, and thus not truly putting faith in it. Now we believe that just as that spear pierced Christ's side, a very real spiritual life flows out from his heart to all who would actively put faith in it, and we pass from death to life. But let us pray "that our God will count us worthy of our calling" and not have it said, "thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself."

[jriccitelli]

Well said Diz. We have to believe ‘something’ to be saved. There is a deceptive position that says we don’t need to believe anything in particular. There are also those who say we have to believe this, and we have to believe that, we have to do this, and we shouldn’t do that. But my point is that we should believe 'whatever' it is that we know and read in Gods Word. We must believe Gods word.

Although these are my two favorite subjects (salvation and the Trinity), and I am very dogmatic of my own theories, I am also on a campaign to get people to agree to disagree and stop dividing over non-essentials and grey areas (in church and bible study groups). We should not be guided by the letter of the Law (or restricted to the Law); we should be guided by the Spirit of the Word (or the Holy Spirit). But for a believer, we also should recognize the two will not contradict each other. So, in teaching and evangelism I realize each person is different, and what might be an issue with one person is not the same for another. On paper I am more willing to be dogmatic, but in discussion we should be willing to overlook such inconsistencies in other people.

Singalphile mentioned a list, while at the same time mentions ‘obedience is not primarily a matter of affirming some facts’. I have made a number of lists myself, some I might actually be able to find, but I figured someone else would post the list for me, and they have. There is enough in the Bible to affirm, and plenty enough essentials to compile, but whatever you pick, believe it.

It takes awhile to correlate everything we know from scripture into one comprehensive complete understanding of everything, but I believe we have to start ‘somewhere’. I truly believe many people in the west come to Christ first, and then try to read God back into their concept of Jesus. Or end up taking God out of the background altogether (particularly the God of scripture). Such is the case when it comes to the doctrine of God and our salvation.

I think some may have misunderstood my post above, I was sure that I implied somewhere that ‘IF’ you want to actually have a list, you COULD start in Genesis one. My point was that we must BELIEVE God, and precisely: Believe His Word. No matter what verse or passage you read, the main point is that we believe it. If it is second Kings or second John, the thing we don’t want to do is ‘not’ believe. So if you ‘really’ want a ‘list’ then begin in Genesis chapter One: In the beginning God created the Heavens and the earth... (Me, above). And by saying this I was not talking about ‘how’ God created, but WHO created the heavens and earth. I believe scripture teaches two primary things: 1. WHO God is, and 2. Who we are (God is The Creator, and we are not). And just the same: What God is, and what we are (i.e. God is Holy, and we are not).

I don’t expect someone has to know Jesus and God are the same, right off the bat, I didn’t either. But 'eventually' I expect you have to consider who He is, and was, and will be. Not to mention the eventual reminder to have: No other God before Him, and the command to not follow other gods, and that God alone is LORD.

I don’t expect someone to have everything figured out when they become a believer, just that they continue to believe what they continue to learn.

[TheEditor]

Hi Dizerner,

Good questions and points. I'll take them one by one.

I think when Christ said "Father forgive them," he meant for his own crucifixion, since they did not realize his divinity, not for all their sins in their whole life.

Yes, I believe Jesus was asking for their forgiveness on this act alone. But I don't know how that affects anything? Killing the Son of God would have been a doozy of a sin it's true, but if forgiving them for that one act doesn't affect their ultimate salvation one whit, why ask for it? It would be like beating someone to death, but then having mercy on them and not continuing to beat them after they are long dead. My point is that forgiveness must accomplish something for the forgiven. To me it appears as though there is some sort of "cosmic reckoning" for lack of a better term. For instance, Stephen, as he was losing his life said:

“Lord, do not charge this sin against them.” And after saying this he fell asleep in death. (Acts 7:60)

Some translation render it as more of an "accounting" and many commentators feel this is the sense of it. The expression 'to one's account' is referenced many places in Scripture. The overall impression I walk away with is that that this "cosmic reckoning" I referenced earlier is the final judgment and that it takes into consideration more than a mere profession of faith.

If we get a verse that says "will not see life" but then say, God must not mean that because it's too severe, what have we just done? Do we submit to the Scripture or rewrite it the way we want it to be?

I think we do need to use reason when we are looking at any one particular verse or group of verses in trying to understand just what they mean. I could say, for instance, absolutely under no circumstances should thus and so be done, and yet allow for circumstances to dictate I violate my absolute statement. Jesus said:

“I was not sent forth to any but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (Matthew 15:24)

And yet we know that Jesus healed Samaritans, a Canaanite woman, gentiles and the like. Circumstances dictated that Jesus not be unyielding to his commission. Largely, I think we will admit that we (I know I do) read the Scriptures and see things as we believe conform to our own sense fairness. If one is a bean-counter; likes to have all his ducks in a row, etc. then saying "It says this" becomes the default way of looking at things.

But I try to consider the fact that since exactly what God was going to accomplish was largely missed by the Jews, and in fact, barring divine revelation, they could never have doped out what God's intentions were toward the Gentiles, perhaps we may be missing something as well. And, didn't they have Scriptural reasons to justify their Judaeo-centric ideology? Was not the past once the present? If so, then do we perhaps have some "centricism" of our own to contend with? Is it possible that we are missing something, and that Christianity blesses believers, in the same way the Jews had an advantage (Romans 3:1-2), and installs them in a privileged position, but that all is not lost for those who, for whatever reason, do not avail themselves of an opportunity now?

I don't have the answers. I just like to entertain the questions and possibilities.

To say that this saving faith is unnecessary, is in a very real way, to deny that method of salvation for oneself, because you are declaring it unnecessary, and thus not truly putting faith in it.

I agree. But the question is not as simple as that. If it were, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. The underlying character of God's fairness and justice and mercy is at the heart of all of this. And it is not something that only we moderns have considered. For instance, recall Abraham's words to God when he was told that Sodom and Gomorrah were to be destroyed:

Then Abraham approached and began to say: “Will you really sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there are fifty righteous men in the midst of the city. Will you, then, sweep them away and not pardon the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are inside it? It is unthinkable of you that you are acting in this manner to put to death the righteous man with the wicked one so that it has to occur with the righteous man as it does with the wicked! It is unthinkable of you. Is the Judge of all the earth not going to do what is right? (Genesis 18:23-25)

We all know the interchange, how God would not destroy the cities if even 10 were found there to be righteous. In fact, he made special arrangements to save the one righteous man who was there (Lot) as well as acquiesced to Lot's not wanting to go to the mountains for safety:

"But I—I am not able to escape to the mountainous region for fear calamity may keep close to me and I certainly die. Please, now, this city is nearby to flee there and it is a small thing. May I, please, escape there—is it not a small thing?—and my soul will live on.” So he said to him: “Here I do show you consideration to this extent also, by my not overthrowing the city of which you have spoken. Hurry! Escape there, because I am not able to do a thing until your arriving there!” That is why he called the name of the city Zo′ar." (Genesis 19:19-22)

In this case, God even spared a city so that Lot would be safer, or more comfortable.

So the fundamental question for me is, Is God's mercy going to be less now after Jesus has, as you put it, "bridged that gap" then it was previously?

The Editor, do you consider Scripture to be a guide to the inspired truth, or as just a good book containing some truth?

I believe that Scriptures to be inspired. That being said, I believe in rigorous textual criticism. I also have my questions on certain books; why they are there. Are we understanding them correctly (for example, is the Book of Job an Epic Poem, or a nuts and bolts historical document?) I also believe that there is some editorializing that took place by the quill of the writer. I guess my view would be somewhat similar to the "dynamic inspiration" model.

Regards, Brenden.

[Homer]

Regarding Jesus' request that God forgive those who were crucifying Him I have long believed what Jesus intended was that God would bring them to repentance so they could be forgiven. Note what Peter preached at Pentecost:

Acts 2:23 (NASB)

23. this Man, delivered over by the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God, you nailed to a cross by the hands of godless men and put Him to death.

So Peter charged them with responsibility for Jesus' crucifixion, although carried out by the Romans.

Acts 2:36-38 (NASB)

36. Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified.” 37. Now when they heard this, they were pierced to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “brethren, what shall we do?” 38. Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Again Peter lays the guilt on his hearers and, when asked how they might get of their predicament he demands their repentance and baptism in order to obtain forgiveness.

Another thought - perhaps Jesus was asking God to forgive the Roman executioners who could have been considered ignorant where the Jews were without excuse.