Many in the church assume that grace precedes faith seeing as faith, like grace, is a gift from God thus they argue that faith is a gift of grace. While that might be true on God's side of things seeing as He's the giver of all good gifts, mankind - being the recipient of those good things - must first become aware that such gifts are indeed available to us thus faith (believing) precedes grace (God's unmerited favor) on man's side of the equation.
In other words, your work may deposit your paycheck directly into your account on a regular basis however, you can't access that money until you know for certain that the transaction is cleared. Grace works similarly. Through the finished work of the cross, Jesus Christ made God's unmerited favor toward mankind 200o years ago. However, until a person both understands what Christ did and how he can partake of such grace, he is unable to access it. That is why faith precedes grace from man's perspective.
With that being said, conntrary to what many in the church believe today, there is no such thing as Unconditional Eternal Security. If a believer is saved by grace THROUGH FAITH with faith being the only condition for salvation as scripture testifies in Ephesians 2, then doesn't it make sense that our salvation is also secure by grace THROUGH FAITH?
Besides, if you attempt to remove faith as the prerequisite for grace then you are entering into the heretical realm of Universal Salvation for all mankind.
In other words, your work may deposit your paycheck directly into your account on a regular basis however, you can't access that money until you know for certain that the transaction is cleared. Grace works similarly. Through the finished work of the cross, Jesus Christ made God's unmerited favor toward mankind 200o years ago. However, until a person both understands what Christ did and how he can partake of such grace, he is unable to access it. That is why faith precedes grace from man's perspective.
With that being said, conntrary to what many in the church believe today, there is no such thing as Unconditional Eternal Security. If a believer is saved by grace THROUGH FAITH with faith being the only condition for salvation as scripture testifies in Ephesians 2, then doesn't it make sense that our salvation is also secure by grace THROUGH FAITH?
Besides, if you attempt to remove faith as the prerequisite for grace then you are entering into the heretical realm of Universal Salvation for all mankind.