DO YOU NEED TO BELIEVE IN THE TRINITY IN ORDER TO BE SAVED?

Question:
A Mormon asked me this question a number of years ago, and through the years here at church, I’ve asked a number of people this question, and I wanted to get your opinion. Can you become a Christian if you deny the Trinity?

Answer:

I would answer, "No." If you don’t believe in the Trinity, then you don’t understand who God is. You may say the word “God” but you don’t understand His nature. Second, you couldn’t possibly understand who Christ is--that He is God in human flesh. The Incarnation of Christis an essential component of the biblical gospel, as John 1:1-14 and many other biblical passages make clear. To deny the Trinity is to deny the Incarnation. And to deny the Incarnation is to wrongly understand the truegospel.

In saying that, I realize that such an answer is going to not only impact people that you may have witnessed to (like Mormons), but it also applies tosome in the broader Pentecostal movement, called United Pentecostals or "Jesus-Only" Pentecostals. Such individuals hold to a kind of modalism, where God is sometimes in the mode of the Father orthe mode of the Son or the mode of the Spirit, but He’s never all three at the same time. That too is a deficient and heretical view of the Trinity. It denies the distinct Personhood of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

The same question sometimes arises about the Virgin Birth. I think it is possible for a personto become a Christian before learning about the details of theVirgin Birth, thoughthat personwould certainly assume that Jesus Christ must have had a unique birthsince He is both God and man. But, if someone knows about the Virgin Birth and says, “I deny the Virgin Birth,” then he is simultaneously denying the deity of Christ, and also the Trinity. Such a person betrays the fact that they do not understand the gospel, and therefore cannot have truly been saved.  (John MacArthur)

Doctrine Matters

"For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctifed," Hebrews 9:14

"Therefore being justifed by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ," Romans 5:1.



The Reformed Faith and Confession: Introduction

The Reformed faith is rooted in the Reformation of the church which began with Martin Luther's nailing of the ninety five theses on the door of Wittenburg church in October 31 1517. The seminal doctrine of the reformation for Luther, Zwingli, Calvin and the other reformers was justification by faith alone. This is the truth that we are righteous before God in Christ who is our righteousness. That righteousness is imputed to us by or through faith, which is the instrument of God's grace to justify the sinner in his conscience before God.

That we are righteous before God by faith, means also that salvation is solely of the Lord. It is a free gift, and not of works. It is grounded in the truth of sovereign grace, for faith is not a new work on the basis of which man is righteous, but a work of grace in man, by which God imparts the blessings of salvation. The expression "by faith," or "through faith" refers to the instrument of grace. It does not mean as this truth is corrupted today "because of faith." To teach that man is righteous because of believing, is the heresy of salvation by works repackaged. Faith is a blessing of salvation, bought in the cross, and applied by the Spirit
Rome taught and continues to teach the error of salvation because of faith and the works of faith. It is Rome that teaches the cross is only a provision, a treasury of merits, upon which men by their faith and works draw and which is made available by a repeated sacrifice in the mass. It is to these errors that the reformers responded.

It is this same error of salvation by works, a conditional or provisional salvation offered to man and depending on the will, decision, act or works of the sinner in some form for its reception which pervades so-called evangelicalism. Such doctrine is not protestant. It is not evangelical. And it is not reformed. It stands at odds with the truth of Christ's perfect and finished atonement and of justification by faith in him. "For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified," Hebrews 9:14. Those sanctified by Christ's atoning death are God's elect, whom God effectually regenerates and calls unto faith and righteousness by faith in Christ.

It is exactly this truth of salvation by grace alone, which the genuine reformational doctrine of justification by faith represents. It is the gospel. Against it stands the doctrine of salvation by the works of man and his righteousness, which is the false doctrine of the Pharisees of Jesus' day. Jesus himself warns us against it, when he says, "beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees," and has in view their doctrine, Matthew 16:6, 11, 12. It is this corrupting leaven which repeatedly seeks to corrupt the life of the Christian church.
The truths of justification by faith and of sovereign grace are inseparable. They stand at the heart of every reformed confessional standard, both the Reformed continental standards: the Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession of Faith, and Canons of Dordt and the Presbyterian standards the Westminster Confession and Larger and Shorter Catechisms. The purpose of the Reformed confessional standards is to maintain that truth as the personal confession of believers and the corporate confession of the churches over against the false leaven of salvation by works

One of the Scariest Moments in the Bible

Walking in the Spirit

The only consistent way to overcome the sinful desires of our human nature (the flesh) is to live step-by-step in the power of the Holy Spirit as He works through our spirit.

Galatians 5:19-26

The works of the flesh are these:  Adultry, fornication, uncleaness, lewsness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkeness, reveleries.  Those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

The fruit of the Spirit are these:  Love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.

Those who are in christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.  If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.  Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.