Cheryl Schatz

Continuing on…
Mark, you said:

Unless we accept that every single piece of our salvation is from God, it will always be works based.

Look Mark, every piece of our salvation is from God. But regarding our faith, we are required to believe God. When God speaks and I believe God, how can I be considered to be working for my salvation? Scripture doesn’t say that faith is a gift of God to unbelievers. If so, please show me where it says this.

Rather, the faith that is a gift is always given by the Holy Spirit to believers.

I do pray that God will reveal that to you, in the same way he did to me a few years ago. It totally changed my understanding of the grace of God. He is so merciful.

I did an interesting study concerning Calvinism and I asked Calvinists how they got the “truth” of Calvinism and I was told in each case that it came from studying the works of Calvinists/Reformers. They didn’t just “get it” from reading the Word of God. Apparently some think that men’s books are necessary for God’s revelation because God’s Word isn’t plain enough without addition “helps”.

What I have seen from reading these books is a God who has mercy on so few yet the Scriptures tell me that God is rich in mercy.

Psalm 103:8 (NASB)
8 The LORD is compassionate and gracious,
Slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness.

And another thing I notice about the Scriptures is that God freely gives His lovingkindness toward those who fear Him.

Psalm 103:11 (NASB)
11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
So great is His lovingkindness toward those who fear Him.

I have not seen anyplace that says that God gives the “gift” of fear to some men. Rather, people respond to the revelation of God with godly fear and God responds with His awesome lovingkindness.

Should we say that those who “fear God” are doing a works based salvation? Should we say that God gives the “gift” of fear to some? No. Fearing God is faith in God and it is our response, not a gift reserved for an elite few.