I've recently joined a new group blog, the purpose of which is to consider various arguments for different views of church authority.  More specifically, my coauthors and I will be looking closely at Orthodox (and Catholic) arguments against Sola Scriptura.  Obviously attempts will be made at refuting these arguments, but the primary goal of this blog is to foster communication between Protestant and Orthodox Christians, and to work towards an increasingly charitable and transparent dialog between the two.  This blog is called "By Whose Authority?" and it can be found here. 

Guess who said this, and you could win the satisfaction of knowing you were right...

"I was able to open my mind about the absolute indescribable hugeness of that which we call "God." I took God out of the box because I grew up in the Baptist church and there were, you know, rules and, you know, belief systems and doctrine..."

"...I am a Christian who believes that there are certainly many more paths to God other than Christianity."

No cheating ;)

Saint Augustine is well known for (primarily) three things:  His intimate Confessions, his majestic City Of God, and his heated debate with Pelagius.  It is in this debate that Augustine's positions on Predestination and Perseverence of the Saints (eternal security) finds its final and strongest articulation (1000 years before Calvin!).

Pelagius, thanks largely to the tireless efforts of Augustine, was universally recognized as a heretic.  There were some at this time, however, who disagreed with both Pelagius and Augustine, and sought more of a middle road.  These people came to be called "semi-Pelagian" and eventually "Arminian" (after the position's strongest and most infamous Protestant proponent, Jakob Arminius). 

Today there are no confessing Pelagians (although many evangelical Christians today have Pelagian tendencies they are largely unaware of).  Thus the debate that goes on today within evangelicalism is between Calvinists and Arminians.  Since I am a Calvinist, I obviously have plenty of concerns and disagreements with Arminian theology.  However, I have noticed a strong tendency in many Calvinists today to simply think of their semi-Pelagian opponents as full Pelagians.  Or, if they acknowledge the difference, they still tend to treat semi-Pelagianism as if it represents no improvement on Pelagianism at all.   The implication of this sort of thinking is clear: Pelagianism is a universally recognized heresy, liable to lead its adherents straight to damnation.  If semi-Pelagianism is no different...

But Calvinists today would do well to remember that Saint Augustine himself faced semi-Pelagian critics in his own day, and he always treated them as erring brothers, not heretics.  The Augustine-Pelagius debate may have meant eternal life or death, but the Augustine-semi-Pelagian debate was an intramural one. 

It is possible to hold the truths of Scripture in the highest regard without sacrificing charity.  Indeed, it is possible to fight hard for those truths without sacrificing the Apostle's command, "love one another." 

From John Newton's An Authentic Narrative:

How many such casual events may we remark in the history of Joseph, which had each a necessary influence in his ensuing promotion!  If he had not dreamed, or if he had not told his dream; if the Midianites had passed by a day sooner or a day later; if they had sold him to any person but Potiphar; if his mistress had been a better woman; if Pharaoh's officers had not displeased their lord; or if any, or all these things had fallen out in any other manner or time than they did, all that followed [would have] been prevented:  the promises and purposes of God concerning Israel, their bondage, deliverances, polity, and settlement, must have failed; and, as all these things tended to, and centred in Christ, the promised Saviour, the desire of all nations would not have appeared; mankind had been still in their sins, without hope, and the counsels of God's eternal love in favour of sinners defeated.  Thus we may see a connection between Joseph's first dream and the death of our Lord Christ, with all its glorious consequences.  So strong, though secret, is the concatenation between the greatest and the smallest events.  What a comfortable thought is this to a believer to know, that amidst all the various interfering designs of men, the Lord has one constant design which he cannot, will not miss, namely, his own glory in the complete salvation of his people; and that he is wise, and strong, and faithful, to make even those things, which seem contrary to this design, subservient to promote it.

I can only respond with the words of Romans 11:33 and Psalm 139:6:  Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  It is too wonderful for me; it is too high, I cannot attain to it.