hi
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 26, 2008, 02:12:36 PM
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And all tho i think you are right in some
respects on the other hand there is some things to think about. Unless
we see that diversity in the main things is not a good thing in the
bible even tho there is diversity in culture, race or gender. Cause you
cant make an argument to me with such strong convictions and me being
able to disagree with you if we can accept different truths as being
both rite. Its like describing Christ to someone and then telling them
that the description means nothing, or getting along is more
important than the truth, which is another conviction about what you
believe is the truth in arguing against the opposition. I agree
that the local Church with all of its forms cannot do one thing to make a
person in union with Christ. If the visible church is equal with the
the universal church then there must be a determinate cause of being
saved in one, the visible and not being saved in the other. But
salvation is not found in baptism, in the preached word, in the
fellowship of the saints. Salvation is only caused by a decree of God
from all eternity. Because the moment i make man the instrument of
saving grace is the moment i become my own authority and speak for God.
Jesus Christ is the only high priest of the church. And He is much
bigger than the four walls. We share in His life by a spiritual
connection of being in Him by that truth or that divine saving knowledge
with every believe in every denomination, even those who find
themselves in a church that is unorthodox. Although being a
Christian or becoming a Christian outside the church is not the normal
means of coming to Christ yet who is going to say that he is a Christian
and he is not. Who is the judge of who is a Christian? Can we say
absolutely that this person is not a Christian if he holds to the
fundamental truths but he is not present in a local body? Please, who
will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? Plagenism<Liberalism<Semi Plagenism<Arminism< Calvinism These
different historical definitions of these theological groups are in a
community of Gods workings since what God does in bringing man in that
perfect order of His created design , so that God alone is praised since
He alone works good in the ends for which He is working. If God is
selfish , that is not depending on any other cause outside Himself for
His own happiness, then what is in man is a partial and misguided view
of self. And Gods understanding of Himself is absolutely complete so
that all other men would be a horrible reflection of God in how men view
themselves. So that these different definitions of belief are
definitions that are realities of faith as to its causes, workings, and
ends. The working power is understanding who God is by how one visits
these different defined views in one day. And just as Gods unity in the
Trinity is evidenced by His working in the community of men, so in man
there is a struggle by these different groups of inner workings to rise
to an understanding of who God is and who we are by that. But there
is a difference between understanding the causes and means and ends by
the proper working of a sovereign God , and loving lesser descriptions
of these workings. So that although there is a struggle in each one of
us to come to that understanding in our casting down idols, yet in
coming before a soveiegn God we are coming in the reality of who He is
by how He has defined in His word, these inward realities. So that there
is a sense in which we are reminded to be longing by the knowledge we
have of all of the cause and means and ends in our understanding of our
deep longing.
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6180
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 22, 2008, 10:45:51 AM
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Christ is not only an advocate in His
substitutionary role, but also in being One who speaks on our behalf on a
daily basis. This is where we fail to make the proper link to the ends
for which He has accomplished this great work of redemption. Since He
has gain the rite to rule over all things by His becoming man and dieing
, being raised again, and now is seated at the rite hand of God, then
that end will be accomplished by our being in union with Him. And even
tho we have a futuristic view of His advocacy, that is we wait for our
adoption as Sons in that final conquering of sin and death, yet we are
now experiencing that renewal effect in this life. For our hope is not
just a future reality, but it is that being connected to Him we are
conquering.
Our problem in all of this is we have our own desires
that are not always what He desires. And this advocacy paradigm is
having our desires renewed to be what He desires. But in a sense , since
we are in Christ our desires have been made complete , since we believe
that grace precedes all actions in the soul of a man. So we look to the
relationship we have in Christ as being the only real advocacy that we
have in this world. Since our view of the future is very narrow, yet we
look through our union with Him as working all things for the good of
those who love Him. This is our only object of renewal.
This is
why we believe that there is nothing that we can do to cause this
process to make better results in our lives. Even tho we have the
ability to increase our faith by the use of the means, yet the present
advocacy the He has ordered was planned from eternity. Even our
redemption from sin in His passive decrees. Here we see the thin line of
being made able by Him and having an inflated view of our own
righteousness. So now, we enter into the indicative mindset of
understanding the proper use of the means of grace. Our tendency is to
think of these means as more than they are, and yet the proper use of
them is having a renewed understanding of our position in being
corrupted. We are not only made righteous by a foreign righteousness but
our ongoing trust is only as strong as we have the proper longings in
lite of this work on our hearts. Since what we desire is caused by
grace, then our spiritual longings tho corrupted are made as the
essential means in the process of being renewed to be fully effective
through the redemption of that corrupted part. This is how we learn of
His ongoing present advocacy.
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6182
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 19, 2008, 09:53:45 AM
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Yes, and then if we have a change of will, its
from a cause that is not in a relational sense in the will of man. Paul
says i judge no man according to the flesh. Cause as the Lord has
declared that He knows the thoughts of man, that they are futile. That's
why Paul did not trust in any of his good works or his willing to do
good. Because the corruption of our thinking was the cause of our wrong
view of ourselves in how we treat one another. Love is unfeigned. Love
does not determine to do good based upon the object, but love comes as a
result of Gods work on our behalf, in spite of our worthiness of
receiving punishment. Since we visit the same sins on a daily basis or
we fall back into those sins we condemn others about. This is why it is
so important to see that Christ acts as an advocate as a universal
obligation in His house for all chiefs of sinners. And Christ shepherds
are the source of His unfeigned love.
Christ is personally
involved in all of those whom He has decided to pour out His love upon.
It is by the Holy Spirit that is the witness, who communicates that love
to us. We are love even when we are sinners, not as a result of
judgement but only receiving good in our weakness, and grace and
strength in our failure. If we think that we are able to will in order
to be loved, then we are going to be reduced to walking in the flesh and
being under the yoke of men. The will alone is the rule by which we run
from Gods goodness. Since we fail to see that there is no strength in
our own horses. If we think of why a horse is not acceptable to Gods
working, we would consider that it is what gets us from one place to
another in order to do anything, in order to fight the battles , it is
the means by which we are enabled to win the battle. A horse provides
the means for us to be stronger than our opponent. We put our confidence
in these means , in order to be a wise soldier. But God says its not
in the means. The power and energy is from His very will. Its not in our
will, but its in our desires given to us by grace. We have no authority
to judge men in the flesh since every man has a divided allegiance to
the means as being more than it is. God requires us to see one another
as objects of His love, and to only do good, not because of any thing we
trust in order for us to be good, but because we are loved by Christ
and we are all shielded by Christ, being made able at the same starting
point as the next Christ follower. At the point of relationships we
start from grace. So that we will not stand as the accuser of the
brethren.
The reason that i am so focused on this particular
identification is because our society has fallen from grace into
Plagenism. Its no different than the dark ages. This is a most under
confident church as if our sins speak against us toward one another.
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6183
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 19, 2008, 12:05:15 AM
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The word of God will never return to Him void.
Just because a teaching is not orthodox does not mean that the Spirit
cannot take the things of the scripture and use them to effect the
salvation or transformation. But at the same time, a lack of
understanding has consequences when we face trials , or riches , or
death. This is why Paul exhorted the elders at the church of Ephesus to
teach the whole counsel. Because sound historical teaching produces an
ability to be able to face these different circumstances when the evil
day comes. So a person can have a certain amount of truth that allows
them to live with a certain kind of control in certain situations, but
without healthy teaching there are circumstances that can overcome that
same person. Satan does not create false from the truth, but He takes
the truth and twist it. So that it is a lack of understanding or a
shadow in the understanding that Satan effects. But what He means for
evil God turns if for good. All the scripture is for our use so that we
can face these different circumstances and have confidence that by our
understanding of these doctrines that we will be able to understand
enough about God, having a spiritual sense to be able to overcome the
world and flesh and devil, in the day of evil, for the purpose of not
being controlled by the circumstances of this life. Unless we have a
healthy all around orthodox understanding of the whole counsel, then
there is going to be a way for Satans arrows to get through.
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6185
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Lukewarm = Not Saved ? (Lengthy)
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on: July 16, 2008, 08:51:54 PM
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I have not read the book, so am not qualified to comment.
Correct.
And my comment was directed at just those 18 quotes. I often wonder how
those who expect great rewards at the judgement seat of Christ believe
they are going to get there. To be a disciple means to embark on a life
of discipline. To embark on a life of discipline means that you have
fully come to the end of your own resources and dependency on self. To
reach this state means that you've had to experience quite a good deal
of despair and futility in "trying to be good." Whenever I "fell in
love" with something in this world, be it a woman, or a drug, or
whatever, It did not happen by way of me looking at a neutral object
and then deciding (for no good reason) that I was just "going to love
it." The inspiration for the feelings and the passion for the object
came from the object itself. So it is in our walk with Christ. We do
not, after we are saved, just decide that we are going "love Christ
more." He is the one who intiated that passion in us in the first place
and He is the one who completes it in us. The kind of life this author
is describing in just those 18 quotes is guaranteed to bring a person to
the brink of despair - not to a deeper relationship with Christ.
Great , Can i start quoting you? Man, this is hot to go. Keep writing TB. Write as much as you can.
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6186
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Lukewarm = Not Saved ? (Lengthy)
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on: July 16, 2008, 02:20:06 PM
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Theres no support for making this kind of
judgment. We believe that since believers have trouble in this world,
not only with having great trials, but sometimes being caught in some
very big sins according to the world. God uses a persons temptations to
humble them, so that they struggle long and hard by giving into them.
Repentance springs from the love of God in grace, and in no way is
connected to the law.
There are two kinds of striving that are
done by the Spirit of God. One of the strivings is a legal paradigm. The
Holy Spirit convicts an unbeliever of his sin, by making that person
crumble under the weight of his sins by applying the law as a school
master. This is to show the person that there is no hope in them coming
to Christ by the law.
The other striving is in a believer, and
it is through grace. The believer is convicted by the law, but never
comes to God by the law. So that the Holy Spirit brings a believer to
Christ by grace, and then the person is brought to Christ alone as his
only hope in this life.
The difference by experience in these
two paradigms is that he unbeliever will harden his heart and fall into a
deeper sinning by this legal way. He has no where else to turn for
relief except in himself. So that this process is extremely devastating.
His conscience cries out against him, the law is a witness to his
conscience and he is going through extreme pain. When the law and the
conscience get together there is nothing but the experience of
condemnation.
The other way of striving is in a believer. There
is this time of trial , where we begin to lose heart. It may be by some
sin, or it may be the opposition of the world flesh and devil. Now this
is very sensitive to make a comparison to an unbeliever since a person
who looks like an unbeliever may also suffer the judgment of other men
and his own self inflicted guilt. And since Christ has done all of the
work ,and declared that our striving like an unbeliever is promised not
to be in us, then we are sometimes not aware of His power to work out
salvation by this application in our hearts. So we are like to be
retreating , as if we were quieted, not able to speak . This is what
happens when we experience the gracious hand of the Father, who not only
wants us to fall back on Him, or to live in Him so that we might be
protected from all of the accusations of the world and the enemies of
God, but that we will learn that Christ is our only hope and we can rest
from our own striving. This is our striving in leaning on Him. The Holy
Spirit is made to give us assurance of His forgiveness, and our Father
is holding us up by His eternal love.
And yet we have sorrow upon
sorrow, but He will not break us. Since He has promised by Christ to
bring us to strength in His own time, then we are made to go to Him in
prayer and seek His grace. There is no amount of seeking that will
offend Him or make Him less to us. But we have all of His promises at
our call and He wants us to tell Him to do as He promised. Because He
has determined to make us like His Son in being our advocate and
speaking on our behalf. So that we are made to know that there is only
one thing we desire on this earth. Our souls find rest in God alone. For
He alone is the only one who can remedy this lifes turmoil. All others
desire would desire to assault us and bring us down. But God alone is
our rest from these outward attacks and the inward attacks. So that He
will give us a new song. So there are times when we are being under the
burdens of these different kinds of trials but even tho we have no
feelings or our feelings are very faint, yet falling back on Him we
shall look again to being revived.
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6187
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 16, 2008, 09:38:37 AM
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But then, there are some things to understand
about Gods love. Its what we know to be true and that advocacy that we
experience as a result of His ongoing care for us. So that Gods love is
without boundaries. I mean , if we want something and we are not
experiencing that salvation paradigm by that lack, then Gods love has no
requirement in meeting us at the point of our experience. Cause when we
bring nothing to Him except our sin, then our ability to meet Him by
our willing is not required for His acceptance. Rather, our intentions
are cause by Him, since our resistance to the negative circumstances ,
ie the evil and the devil, are not enough to be praiseworthy. It is
there fore impossible for us to have a requirement of His love, for us
to reach up to that level of willing or resistance in order to
experience His love by that. So that when we know God to be loving we
know that there is no situation in which we are able to do one good
thing until we offer Him nothing. And then we see how much He loves us
by giving it to Him.
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 15, 2008, 09:06:58 AM
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Faith is a gift , by grace. The whole
salvation chain described in the scripture from the gospel call to our
being glorified is by grace alone through faith alone. When we are born
again , we were called from eternity, and our salvation was obtained at
the cross, so that the transaction in time was an appointment by God and
had nothing to do with His response to us. It was in spite of our being
dead in sins and trespasses and our retreating from reality. He came
and called us with an irresistible grace. Because it is impossible for a
dead man to come alive on his own power. So that being the prodigal we
are always being called back to Him, and we are always enjoying Him
clothing us with new robes of grace. There is no christian that enjoys
having that kind of dwelling in His house apart from always being in the
paradigm of being brought back by Him. There are only those who think
they are in the house, who think that they got there by their own wills
and righteous power. Our Father is always good cause His grace is always
constant. If your His child, then He is going to discipline those He
loves , and if there is no discipline there is no relationship. So
we fight to overcome sin by the power of God through grace in the Holy
Spirit and the word. But we rest in His rescuing us as the only hope of
us being given that power to persevere. So that we are always seeing Him
as the only hope we have in this life to enjoy Him forever. There is no
good thing apart from Him. With Him we have a hope that is
secure. Because what we desire to know about Him, is what He teaches us
by our desires that He gave us when we were regenerated. So we desire to
be secure in Him, then He leads us to the rock that is higher than we
are, or the rock that stretches over our enemies. So that we are made to
have a vision of His being faithful in all of our circumstances since
we are led to be in the position of being able to see all of the traps
and the schemes of our enemies. So that our security is by Him teaching
us that He is faithful by Him giving us an understanding of His
faithfulness in each circumstance of our lives by giving us that vision.
This desire is fulfilled because we are in Christ. When we learn to
trust Him, we learn to lean on Him by having a focus on these desires
that are in us so that we can be assured that He will be praise on the
day that He delivers us from our trial and He speaks salvation on that
rock. We are made to have these test in order that we may know in Him
speak that salvation , that we are loved and that it was His
faithfulness in giving us a vision that we were enabled to persevere
through that test. This is having a desire , to enjoy Him by His
speaking that peace and salvation, above our ability to persevere. As we
grow in this desire, we will follow it to Him alone. He will begin to
strengthen us in faith, that vision of Him always deliveri
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 14, 2008, 04:50:28 AM
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Well in the scripture the heart is the seat of
the mind will and emotions or desires. You ve got to believe in certain
truths about Christ in order to have saving faith . If one says that he
believes in Christ , then the next questions is who is Christ. And then
when that person begins to define who Christ is, that is His
confession. In this way faith is not just a leap in the dark.
Since
we cannot on our own put our trust in Christ, since we do not have the
knowledge or ability to reason that Christ is God. Then we must be born
again. But the new birth is not from our ability to will to accept.
Because our minds are darkened by sin and the curse of sin. So we cannot
possibly believe in Christ since we do not have the rite knowledge to
understand who He is. When we are born again or regenerated , we are
completely passive. If we could act on the word alone as it is preached
to us or we are witnessed to, then our willing to believe would come
from our ability or our self will. But the bible says that our will is
corrupted so that in order for us to believe we need a new will. The
bible says that we must be given a divine knowledge that is like a light
of saving knowledge. The light of Jesus Christ has shine into our
hearts as the glory of God. Not the actual glory of God , but the light
of the glory of God. This is being born again. At the same time we are
made new, by receiving a new will so that we can choose spiritually
good. This is done by having a new mind or a mind that has new desires.
These are compared to new spiritual senses. The mind is not just a part
of the soul that collects facts , but the mind is made alive. So that we
are made to understand by having a desire to choose His good over our
desires to choose our own good. This is what the new will is. So when
the bible talks about the heart, its talking about this immediate act
by which we are saved and made able to understand spiritual things.
There
is a cause for all of our good spiritual choices. That is the desire.
The desire is from the mind choosing. The view of a believer is
spiritually made alive to the objects of our affections. Our view of
these spiritual objects are from an understanding as we are given these
new spiritual senses. So that we can actually look on Christ by having a
spiritual affection for Him. Our faith is believing that Christ is who
He said He was, and seeing Him as the object of our faith. We have all
of the spiritual understanding we can possibly handle, by going to His
word, and seeing Him by understanding His word, in the spiritual
affection for Him in that understanding. This is the new nature as the
cause of our desires, as the cause of our choices and as the cause of
our actions. Every good thing is what is of that nature, or that object
or affection is the worth of itself. So that the good is the nature of
the choice and the nature of the action. This is what it means by the
heart.
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6198
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Could Jesus have sinned?
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on: July 12, 2008, 01:27:22 PM
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Jesus was fully able to resist every impulse
to lust, greed, hatred, and malice. He never entertained a thought of
this sort, but was the very opposite, He was always filled with the
Spirit. And on occasions He was given a greater portion of confidence by
the Father in order to have the power to accomplish the work that He
had to do.
But we must see that there is a difference between
being lazy and being tired or weakened in the flesh. Because this is not
sin, but Jesus experienced all of these human paradigms. He had his own
personality, being closer to some disciples than others, was hungry,
tired, sorrowful, angry, compassionate, having deep feelings of sorrow
over Jerusalem. So that we are not doing anyone justice by making Jesus
less than human. Because we have a tendency to judge our own states of
grief with a standard that Jesus didnt even attain.
Here we have
this terrible problem with sin and a pride in which we are quick to
judge and slow to understand. It is very true that some people have a
stronger constitution than others. And some people struggle in different
areas with weakness than others weaknesses. So that is why we are
always to be dwelling on the faithfulness of God. If Jesus needed rest,
and a time to be refreshed how much more do we who are sinners? So that
out of Gods unfailing love He has remedied our sins in Christ, so that
we could be loved as human with all of our frailties. And this is the
emanation of the divine disposition. If Christ suffered alone on the
road to the cross, then we who suffer as a result of the pain of
rejection, or the pain of loneliness, or the weakness of our frame, then
God is not going to demand more than we can give. Since He is a God who
loves us to strengthen us , and not to judge us to destroy us.
If
we are not acquainted with our Fathers long suffering disposition, then
we are not going to understand ourselves with that wisdom of having Him
deal with us as an individual. All of our struggles are from the
tendency in us to have an uncaring disposition of how we think of
ourselves with our natural struggle with the flesh. If we are not
acquainted with these areas where we have a tendency to be weakened by,
then we will confuse ourselves in condemning ourselves where we have not
sinned, and we will be always in despair. It is so terribly important
that we know His grace as that which defines His searching us, since we
have all of the help we need in looking to Him. If we are weakened by
some sin then He will be there to strengthen us by His grace. Our
relationship with Him is not out of the flesh achieving some grand
design by obedience to the commands. We want to obey but we are always
straying. Here is where we have a tendency to think that He has
distanced Himself from us. Our trust is that we have the power to recoil
and get better. But God is more interested in determining to
communicate His love and faithfulness to strengthen us so that we are
made able. If God described every work on our hearts that He was in the
process of doing, then we would be crushed by His love. Thats how we are
to seek Him. Total acceptance as very weak vessels.
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6199
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Could Jesus have sinned?
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on: July 12, 2008, 09:57:42 AM
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Jesus was tempted in all points as we are
because He was human. He had human desires for food, and for these other
things of the world. But we also have these desires. Cause we are
physical beings. So that our physical impulses are also part of our
worship. But if these impulses were the cause of our sin, then the
nature of our choices would not be from the condition of our souls under
Adam. We were imputed with sin from birth because of the fall in the
garden. Man died because of sin. So that man knew good and evil,
choosing evil. There is nothing wrong with knowing evil, as long as we
do not give into doing evil. Prior to man falling to the test he had no
knowledge of evil. It was a very short time between the condition of the
test that was given to man, and the appearance of the serpent. If Adam
would have chosen to not eat of the tree of good and evil then all of
his prosperity would have been given eternal life. The knowledge of evil
along with the state of the bondage of the will, made mans self
reflection with an evil self obsession. Now there was guilt because of
the tension of wanting to do those things that do not please God, and
having a wrong view of the threats that go along with the bondage into
being self absorbed. Thats why they covered their bodies. There was a
new tension called sin that forced them to want to do these things they
had no experiential knowledge of prior to the fall. The woman was afraid
of the man, and the man want to control the woman. Their focus went
from the glory of God , to the self protection of being in bondage by
having a sin nature.
So we sin because it is natural for us to
sin by having a corrupted body and soul. We are born into this world
being in bondage to sin. But Gods grace keeps us from being the worse
that we could possibly be. Because the Spirits work on the unbeliever is
to convict that person and show them that there is no hope of
fulfilling the law. So the cycle of guilt and shame is what they are
familiar with in their relationship to God. It is impossible for man to
please God because it is impossible for man to choose good by Gods
standard. This does not take away the human liberty to choose. But man
chooses for himself according to what he enjoys the most. Man chooses
according to his nature. But , i dont believe that this is the same
thing as democratic kind of thinking. I dont believe that this is like
the liberty that Adam enjoyed. There is a cycle of being in bondage to
the law that accompanies this kind of liberty of choice. So that we as
believers look at this and conclude that the reality is that mans will
is in bondage. Ok, i will draw my conclusion.
So knowing this we
see that man cannot resist the temptations. Since every generation has
only grown worse by this choosing, and every institution of christian
education and church have declined into unbelief. There is a general
declension in the whole problem with sin. This earth is fading away, man
is declining physically and death is awaiting every one. But our
spirits are being renewed day by day. The whole creation grown inwardly
awaiting for that day when all of these other realities will be put in
order. When Christ will finally renew everything.
Christ earned
that rite by His complete obedience to the positive as well as the
negative commands. His resistance to temptation was evident in that He
did not practice on the level that man practiced. He did not think like
we think in sin. And He loved God with all of His heart.
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6200
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Could Jesus have sinned?
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on: July 11, 2008, 08:14:57 PM
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And we know that Christ was God so there was no way that His will was mutable.
In Luke 22:41-42, Jesus prays in Gethsemane: And
He withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and He knelt down and
began to pray, saying, "Father, if You are willing, remove this cup from
Me; yet not My will, but Yours be done." That would imply
that the Son has a will independent of the Father that had to be brought
into perfect submission to the will of the Father.
I
dont think it was a struggle in Him as much as a request, since He was
human, then there was two times that He prayed this but a little
different wording the second time. So the first request was answered by
the Father by sending the angel to answer Him and to strengthen Him.
Then the next statement about the cup was a submission to the Fathers
will . So that the Father was strengthening Him to go on by answering
the first request of the cup. He was made to face the suffering at that
second point with the amount of strength given to Him by the Father in
sending the angel.
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6202
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Ananias, Sapphira and Grace
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on: July 11, 2008, 01:25:59 PM
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Thanks
to those of you who responded helpfully. If we understand the grace
that God has given us through Christ, the payment for all our sin, then
God can never be angry with us or love us less (or more) because when
the Father sees us he sees the Son.
I understand there are
natural "consequences" to sin, like destroying your marriage when you
commit adultery, but this incident seems to say that Ananias and
Sapphira where punished in a way that showed God's displeasure with
them. God is no longer displeased with the Christian, because how
could he be displeased with His Son?
I also wonder if perhaps the
phrase "Satan has so filled your heart" is a clue to their being
unregenerate? Can Satan fill the heart of an unbeliever?
Ananias and Sapphira just had a bad day. LOL Because you had a bad day
You're taking one down
You sing a sad song just to turn it around
You say you don't know
You tell me don't lie
You work at a smile and you go for a ride
You had a bad day
The camera don't lie
You're coming back down and you really don't mind
You had a bad day
You had a bad day
Are
you saying that they were not believers? I mean, how mean is it for God
to bring them into something far better than we could imagine. Into a
state of glory. So that for a believer there is never a bad day, only as
it relates to determinism of the no cause paradigm. All of Gods
dealings with His children are only bad as to our views but they are
always a thousand times better in His purposes being fulfilled. We look
at our sin and our problems a frown of purposing in the end to have a
smile by Him. Its all of grace, people
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6203
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 11, 2008, 01:15:14 PM
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I am compelled to find that nugget of
divine knowledge so that my will is put under submission by His love. So
these things are not very simple. There is a sense in which truth is
never stagnant of under our present thinking ability by the our own
power as a source. Because His truth is new every morning. And even tho
these truths have a fashion and an end in working in us toward the goal
of becoming more like Him, yet we are ever growing into knowing Him
better as that purpose of these truths renew our new spiritual vision of
Him. So i can sense that we are involved in a struggle over these
things pertaining to who is able to do these things. I mean all the
truth we have about Him only starts by Him and leads to Him. So that the
confusion lies in our wanting out by our willing to have it our own
way. And since faith is believing by grace , then our wanting to believe
is of no consequence to the end of glorifying Him. Because He is the
beginning and end of all of our identity since we do not have a life of
our own, for "to me to live is Christ and to die is gain." I am what i
am by the grace of God. So it is my new identity in my way of thinking
to think of myself as not having the power to exercise my only life by
any accomplishment of my willing, but i look only at His grace as my
understanding my new identity.
We are required to wrestle with
our old way of thinking by sin so that we are hearing His voice as the
only voice of reason. I am only wrestling with you as it pertains to my
own voice in this and in prayer , then i hear these kinds of reasoning's
all the time. So your writing is my personal wrestling with the way of
thinking that is always has a design to gaining a heart of self
confidence. I spend more time in reminding myself that it is not of me
not of me, but to Your name be the glory ,because He is the only one who
exercises unfailing love. So that if there is ever a time in which i
feel responsible in being experientially unconnected to Him, then there
is a reason to always be renewing my mind unto a new vision of His power
through me. All of the lack in our strength is due to not having in an
experiential way, a fresh understanding of His strength by that
wrestling. So we in a sense having a new will must preach to ourselves
that we have that available first salvation paradigm always present as
to its immenate transparent translation from the state of our being our
own god, and His saving power to deliver us from that way of thinking.
We are only as mature as we are able to revisit this first love
paradigm. And as we see that He is all in all, then we will have a fresh
vision of Him over our thinking by our growing that we have some how
brought something to the table by our willing. Here is what power we are
faced with in our own pride as a real destructive determination that we
make that divides our loving Him as that end.
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6204
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Ananias, Sapphira and Grace
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on: July 11, 2008, 09:58:50 AM
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The Holy Spirit was showing that God takes
these gifts of the church very seriously. Even before this incident as
the account of the Holy Spirits work in the believers of the church, you
see this behavior all the way back to the day of Pentecost. Barnabas
was lauded for his selling his piece of property and giving it to the
church. But this was not really the churches money, it was the Holy
Spirits , since Christ is the head of the church. And it was first and
foremost to be used to take care of the poor as we see the apostles last
plea to the church in the letter to the Ephesian elders. Since God sees
the needs of the poor and is most concerned for them in the church.
Gods will in the community of believers is always reversed from how man
conducts his affairs in this world. Its not even that the Holy Spirit
was showing some kind of special lesson on holiness as if He were doing
harm to these two. But it is that God is concerned for all the members
of the body, especially those who are of the lowest. And this is an
added hope that this would bring about the unity of the body by the
communion in love. It was redemptive in nature.
So that their sin,
was against the very thing that God required for the church as the
hallmark of bringing unity and security. The church was in danger of
becoming just like the world. Thats what James says just after he says
that faith without works is dead. This is very important to God. He says
that if the poor are not receiving the proper care then they will call
out to me and i will bring discipline. This is what the Holy Spirit was
concerned about here.
But if you see the reaction to these
deaths, then you will see that all men are guilty of this before a holy
God. There was not one who look and said, they deserve that . No but
there was a holy reverence for God since they all deserved the same
thing. That is the proper reaction of the Holy Spirits work in the
church and in the world. Because when we exalt man, then we are going to
measure man by man. And there is room for us to become proud of our
giving. But all of these givers to the church did not react like that.
No just like the disciples with judas, they were in wonder that it was
just Ananias and Sephira. Cause at least these people gave something.
Maybe there were other people who were withholding their gifts as in the
normal society of the church. So that we are encouraged to know that
when we are buffeted in this world, and we are cast down not knowing
which way to go, by this we know that we are being protected as the poor
by God. We are the ones who see ourselves as bringing nothing to God so
that we have very little to give. Gods ways are not our ways.
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6205
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Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.
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on: July 11, 2008, 05:44:09 AM
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But here is where i think in my understanding
of our differences as to how these spiritual things bring about their
proper working in our hearts. Since we still have a problem with sin,
and we are always being buffeted on every side because of sin, then we
are fighting these enemies within and without. But our struggle is not
against these physical forces in the universe. Because even if we were
to become a monk and withdraw from the world into a monastery we still
would be as much or even more of a struggle with ourselves and our own
sin and temptation than i we were faced with having to deal with all of
the worlds possessions at our disposal. Our problem starts in our minds
view of things by wanting to make the thought of a thing more than it
was made to be to us by Him. We are little god makers. The sin is not
originated with the possessions but from the heart.
So that we
must struggle with our own hearts in order to know Him better. We are
always led astray by our thinking. That's why i do not write until i
have had a fresh awareness of the Spirits work that is transformed to me
through my thoughts and into my heart by His word searching my heart to
divide the thoughts of my heart so that i can discern what is not of
Him. I do believe that the word of God is the means by which we have Him
as a person and not as a way to do a work better or a way to overcome a
certain pattern of evil. If we have Him then all of these other evil
paradigms are put under our feet.
Here is what happens as we
are learning to listen to Him through His word. We learn that the focus
of knowing anything of value is when He has led us to the Father and we
are receiving an assurance of our Fathers eternal love. We ascend in our
prayers to look at Him so that we will know who we are in that
illumination. So that these things about us are very important.
I
understand that giving Him all of our lives is the essence of trust.
But in a sense, the focus on us is from the view of enjoying Him
forever. We know that He is concerned about our needs and that He has
promised to take care of these things . But we also know that we are
made to have fellowship with the Father, since He desires to have
control of us by His Spirit. The Spirit lust for control. So that our
desires are from a source that is not natural to us in this world. Our
desires were given to us from our new birth so that we would spend our
days longing for Him more than we have a tendency to long for the things
of this world. This is a battle.
Faith has its strength in the
object and not in the vessel. Our view of Christ is the means by which
we have a new ability to be like Him. This is only accomplished as the
word of God is engrafted into our minds view of Him. Since our thoughts
are not just an intelligence, but a strong longing knowledge of Him,
then our time on this earth is spent in longing into power, so that we
will know that we are being strengthened by His love for us, and not by
any other cause of subsisting in Him. When we have met the Father, we
have strong desires of love that are spiritual affections. This is the
primary focus of how we are to deal with ourselves in light of our
struggle with sin and satan.
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ng us by this
deepen understanding. |
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