Apostolic Ministers with Guts to Preach 1-Steppers

[Jito463]

Originally Posted by Jason B

Granted, I affirm all those scriptures as legitimate, inspired, and authoritative. But here's issue, not only are Mark 16:16, Acts 22:16, and 1 Peter 3:21 inspired and authoritative, but so are also John 1:12, John 3:16-18, John 6:40, Acts 10:43, Acts 16:31, Romans 3:21-5:2, Galatians 2:16, Ephesians 1:13, Ephesians 2:8-9 also as inspired, and so the point is not who can proof text a few verses, but ratherhow do these verses compliment each other and present a unified message.

And therefore I see my position as true to the entire testimony of scripture. I do not have to redefine what it means to be saved by grace through faith without works, nor dance around the teaching of justification by faith, so plainly explained by Paul in Romans and Galatians.

Those verses do not preclude baptism being essential to salvation. Care to explain how that proves your point? I'm not seeing it.

Originally Posted by Jason B

See note above, let me add this. If your position says "you can't be saved unless you are baptized", then your position equates the application of the blood of Christ at baptism. It also equates justification at baptism. But there are two major problems with this position
1)Cornielius' house received the Spirit BEFORE baptism. That alone destroys any argument that salvation, forgiveness of sin, or application of the blood is made AT baptism.

No, it doesn't. There is nothing in my argument that says baptism must come before the infilling of the Holy Ghost. Also, the argument can be (and has been) made, that God needed to fill them with His Spirit, in order to convince Peter and the other Jews that they were indeed part of the new birth experience, and were equally accepted by God.

Originally Posted by Jason B

2)Paul goes to great lengths in Romans 4 to teach on justification by faith, and especially in Romans 4:10 emphasizes Abraham was justified BEFORE circumcision. That same argument applies to justitification before baptism.

You fail to take into account that the book of Romans (and every book after Acts, in fact) was written to those already saved. They didn't need to go back and build up the basics of water baptism again, every one of them had already been baptized.

Originally Posted by Jason B

I totally understand where you are coming from, but I simply don't think your position is completely consisitent with ALL of scripture.

But you haven't proved it.

Originally Posted by Jason B

I know thats what they say, but its a matter of semantics. They also say, when you buy a pair of shoes you don't buy the tongues, but you get the tongues, so it is with the Holy Ghost. No one who believes that will affirm that people can be saved without speaking in tongues, thus the logical conclusion is anyone who hasn't spoken in tonuges is not and cannot be saved. This is untenable because not only does it lack Biblical proof, but also it doesn't hold up historically.

I'll come back to this at the end.

Originally Posted by Jason B

Oneness people who affirm this, NEVER want to deal with the logical conclusion (except Steve Epley). The logical conclusion is essentially every Christian for 2000 years was a false convert who will burn in hell for eternity, having neither been baptized in Jesus name nor spoken in tongues, and certainly not both. Thus essentially everyone who has advanced the Gospel message and the cause of Christ through the history of the church was lost-Wycliffe, John Huss, Luther, Melanchton, William Tyndale, John Knox, Charles Spurgeon, Jonathan Edwards, John & Charles Wesley, Savanarola, John Bunyan, etc to the recent times, David Wilkerson, Leonard Ravenhill, Hudson Taylor, and many men now living, who have never spoken in tongues, even some who desire to (see John Piper), all lost. *BUT* while condemning all them to hell, Charles Parham and all those who follow him are seen as true Christian (well except the fact many of them were trinitarians and came down against the "new issue" in the early 1900s and died outside the oneness movement. Thus what OPs are left with as the truly saved are the Urshans, GT Haywood, Howard Goss, Frank Bartleman, and a handful or organizational heros, while condemning the rest of Christianity to hell fire. YET where are the great oneness contriubtions to the church-where is the oneness blood spilt for Bible translations, hymns, commentaries, etc? Oneness is built on the backs of trinitarians who didn't speak in tongues, while condemning the same. That position is untenable. Do you sing Amazing Grace? The old rugged cross? Rock of Ages? Crown Him with many crowns? Why? Why use songs written about God and his salvation by people who didn't know God, nor his salvation? It's untenable, and inconsistent.

You assume several things.

1) You assume there were none who spoke in tongues during the time between the rise of Catholicism and Azusa Street.
2) You assume that just because someone did something for the kingdom of God, that they should be saved. Remember, Jesus said that the day will come when many will hear, 'depart from me, ye workers of iniquity, I never knew you'. That wasn't directed at the lost, that was directed at those who claimed to be part of the body of Christ, but never actually were.
3) You assume that one must be saved to be used of God. God used a donkey to talk to Balaam, does that mean the donkey was saved?

Originally Posted by Jason B

Several times its not recorded. In fact only in a few cases is it. 24 of 27 NT books never mention tongues. Acts has 21 converstion accounts/reports, only 3 mention tongues. One can assume they always spoke in tongues, but its simply not in the text.

Again, lack of reporting doesn't mean it didn't happen. Now, if you could find a verse that proves someone received the Holy Ghost and did NOT speak in tongues, I would pay you $1,000. Heck, let's make it $1,000,000.

Originally Posted by Jason B

I believe that a repentant sinner is justified by faith as an instantaneous act of God, and baptism is subsequent.

Remember when I said I'd address your point below? This is it. Using your own argument that you made against us, the logical conclusion of your argument here is that you cannot be saved without baptism.

We say when one receives the Holy Ghost, they will speak in tongues. You say, the logical conclusion is that tongues saves.

Here, you say that when one is saved, they will be baptized. The logical conclusion then, is that baptism saves you.