Another way this question can be asked is: Can one sin one's way out of grace? In the Circumcision evangel, the answer is "yes." But in Paul's gospel of the transcendent grace of God, the answer is clearly "no." Never is it more important, then, to recognize the differences between the Israel gospel and the
gospel to the nations, than here
.
But even when considering the Israel gospel, Christianity insists that the penalty for going afoul of the law is eternal damnation. What? No. One simply exempts oneself from the thousand-year kingdom. For all of our Lord's threats while on earth, the penalties thereof pertained to the Millennium only. Never is one's eternal
loss at stake, as there is no such thing, in Scripture, as eternal loss. Of course, only a knowledge of the proper translation of the Greek adjective "aionion" will inform one of this. An ignorance of said adjective is the foundation for nearly every doctrine of demons.
Presently, I am being accused by a member of a Baptist church that I am making light
of sin. Why? Because I believe, via Romans 5:20, that grace is more powerful than sin. Where one begins one's salvation in Paul's gospel via the spirit of God overwhelming the sin (Exhibit A: the apostle Paul), how is it that sin could then derail that salvation? For isn't the salvation predicated upon missing the mark?
This argument is put to the test
in the Galatian ecclesia, when our apostle discovers that members of the Circumcision have been spying out the freedom of the Galatians and insisting that, while their salvation may have begun in spirit, it must be completed in flesh. Hm. Let's see what Paul has to say about that.
