Mormon apologists present an interesting response to Ephesians 2:8-9. They appeal to Romans 8:24-5: "For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for?" This passage is taken as offering a linguistic parallel to Ephesians 2:8-9, and it is argued that "(t)aking Paul's words at face value, and in isolation from everything else he taught, one could make the case that hope is all a person needs to be saved."

However, the argument is grammatically flawed: Romans 8:24 is a dative of reference, not a dative of means, so that it is best understood as saying that "we were saved, with hope as the ever present companion of this salvation," not that it is the way in which we are saved.