(01-09-2024, 08:12 AM)Ali Imran Wrote: You are critical of our effort to please (or satisfy as you put it) our Lord yet you're quoting a verse exhorting pleasing God.
Anyhow, let me ask you a question. Does being obedient to God's commands please God? If you stop eating pork because you come to believe God forbids pork, would that please God?
We just keep going around in circles on this faith vs works sticking point, and you're rehashing the same argument over and over again despite our repeated explanations that we cannot earn our way to Heaven by being obedient to God and doing good works, the way all other religions, incl yours, are practicing.
And mind you, I've never preached that we mustn't act on our faith by doing good deeds. In point of fact, I'm all for "being doers of the Word (obey the message), and not merely listeners to it” (James 1:22). In verse 23-25, James goes on to say if we only listen to the Word but don't obey it, it's like looking at our reflection in a mirror then going away and forgetting what we saw. But a doer of the Word, he says, is like one "who looks carefully into the faultless law, and is faithful to it and perseveres in looking into it... he shall be blessed in his doing."
God commands us to take action by being a doer of His Word, and when we're obedient, He promises we will be blessed. To put it in a nutshell, faith is inseparably tied to works. Remember we preached salvation by faith, by continual faith and continual works of faith.
The trouble is that we face the problem of immunity to holiness by virtue of our camaraderie with sin. We're fallen and we don't have the "moral ability" to be perfect and to obey God. But we have a safety valve. Only by grace can we be restored and redeemed by trusting in Christ personally.
Without that grace, efforts of moral perfection are doomed to failure. This applies to the great religious leaders of yore like Cornelius, a pious gentile who practiced Judaism and Nicodemus, a leader of God's chosen nation. Their sincere faith in the one true God and their righteous actions were not enough to secure their eternal salvation. Jesus told Nicodemus in no uncertain terms, "You must be born again."
When it comes to the central issue of salvation, we must allow our beliefs to be shaped by what Jesus Christ, the founder of our faith, actually said. Works of the flesh or works of the law are enemies of the gospel and detract from the grace that alone can save us. So far so good. All orthodox Christians would find common agreement with all this. Disagreement arises, however, when pious Muslims like yourself and "faithful remnants" of the works of the law strike a discordant note, saying their obedience to God's commands through religious rituals such as circumcision or through the offering of animal sacrifices is the way to salvation. Lest you come up with another trite argument, do reconsider what James says. Read post 315.
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Now he can have 4 wives! Because of Sharia law, he can married young girls who have started to menstruate
