God Doesn't List All The Conditions Of Salvation In One Verse
Recently I had a Calvinist (we'll call him "Mike") present to me John 6:40 as a passage that proves we don't have to be baptized to be saved. His argument is that the verse says a person has to believe to be saved, and it doesn't mention baptism, therefore baptism must not be necessary.My quick reply to this was that the verse doesn't mention repentance either, and therefore according to Mike's reasoning, we don't have to repent to be saved either.Mike's reply that "true repentance will follow faith" only gets Mike into more trouble, because in making such a point he was admitting two things:- salvation is not by faith alone because repentance is necessary also- salvation is not at the point of faith, because repentance is necessary and it follows faithMost importantly Mike was giving up his original argument. Remember his original argument was that baptism must not be necessary to salvation because baptism is not mentioned in John 6:40. But that argument would rule out repentance, since repentance is not in the verse either.Isn't it strange that denominational people will use an argument that rules out repentance as being necessary to salvation, when they believe repentance is necessary? They are so prejudiced against a simple truth of God's word that they will make an argument they really don't even believe in order to try to get around that plain Bible truth.Continuing our thought, if John 6:40 proves that belief is the only thing necessary to salvation since belief is the only thing mentioned, then …John 5:25 and Isaiah 55:3 would prove all you have to do is hear (since they only mention hear), which would rule out believe and repentI John 2:10 proves all you have to do is love your brother (since love is the only thing mentioned) , which would rule out belief and repentMatthew 6:14 would prove all you have to do is forgive others (since forgive is the only thing mentioned) , which would rule out belief and repentActs 11:18 would prove you don't have to believe (since repentance is the only thing mentioned) , which would rule out beliefI Peter 3:21 would prove all you have to do is be baptized (since baptism is the only thing mentioned) , which would rule out belief and repentance