There is a logical fall out from this
thinking. I mean if i was dogmatic on a certian issue were it was not
widely accepted and i am talking about indifferent things here then that
thinking could drive that atmosphere into a legalistic spirit. If we
study reformed theology there are alot of differences in these areas in
different camps. The probem is when we become over exclusive sorta like
Psalms only, re baptism for everyone unless comming from the same
sect.etc. To exclude people is a form of control, and it leads to a
yoke. We need to step back when we are tempted to exclude others from
our set of beliefs of indeferent things. It is a spirit of legalism. If
i took that teaching of baptism from Acts were they number the church
after baptising them and i used all the text in acts in which baptism is
mentioned to push that idea then i would need to have an order in each
text like they were baptised and then they could join the church. I do
not see that. I think that it is the same thing with the text on the
general love of God and the particular love of God. There are
distinctions that we need to draw based apoun the whole counsel and not
just the Acts account. I think that is the spirit of inclusion, and
liberty in finding that balance. Then i have a question as to
wether Owen and Edwards could have worshipped together in the same
congregation. I would not think that these men would exclude one another
based on these issues. I think the ultimate problem with yoking
is that you make the world you live in very small. You seperate so far
from the society you live in by exclusion which is a spirit of legalism
so that your always explaining why its ok to be this
exclusive[/COLOR].[/SIZE]
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Forums / Main Forum / Alien Baptism?
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on: April 07, 2006, 11:36:56 AM
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There is a logical fall out from this
thinking. I mean if i was dogmatic on a certian issue were it was not
widely accepted and i am talking about indifferent things here then that
thinking could drive that atmosphere into a legalistic spirit. If we
study reformed theology there are alot of differences in these areas in
different camps. The probem is when we become over exclusive sorta like
Psalms only, re baptism for everyone unless comming from the same
sect.etc. To exclude people is a form of control, and it leads to a
yoke. We need to step back when we are tempted to exclude others from
our set of beliefs of indeferent things. It is a spirit of legalism. If
i took that teaching of baptism from Acts were they number the church
after baptising them and i used all the text in acts in which baptism is
mentioned to push that idea then i would need to have an order in each
text like they were baptised and then they could join the church. I do
not see that. I think that it is the same thing with the text on the
general love of God and the particular love of God. There are
distinctions that we need to draw based apoun the whole counsel and not
just the Acts account. I think that is the spirit of inclusion, and
liberty in finding that balance. Then i have a question as to
wether Owen and Edwards could have worshipped together in the same
congregation. I would not think that these men would exclude one another
based on these issues. I think the ultimate problem with yoking
is that you make the world you live in very small. You seperate so far
from the society you live in by exclusion which is a spirit of legalism
so that your always explaining why its ok to be this
exclusive[/COLOR].[/SIZE]
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Forums / Theology Forum / Examining Dispensationalism
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on: April 06, 2006, 04:30:19 AM
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While
convalescing from injuries received when his horse threw him, Darby was
convinced of the authority of Scripture and the importance of prophetic
teachings. He was especially impressed by the thirty-second chapter of
Isaiah, which he referred to as describing \"a state of things in no way
established as yet.\"
In spite of his belief in the authority
of the Scriptures, Darby retained some of his old Anglican beliefs. For
example, Neatby says of him (ibid., p. 63): \"...Darby alone among the
earlier Brethren remained a pedobaptist.\"
Darby wrote into the
doctrinal platform of the Brethren one innovation which still marks the
dispensational school today. We refer to his disregard of and actual
contempt for history. In his book, Prophecy and the Church, p. 26, Allis
quotes Darby as having said:
I do not want history to tell me
Nineveh or Babylon is ruined or Jerusalem in the hands of the Gentiles. I
do not admit history to be, in any sense, necessary to the
understanding of prophecy.
The Plymouth Brethren, when first
organized, had two main distinctives: (1) theirs was an ecumenical
movement, and (2) they sought to do away with an ordained clergy and
anything which even resembled organization within the local church. They
were opposed to music or any type of ritual in the church service.
Darby's watchword, according to his biographers, was \"the union of the
children of God.\" The Brethren frowned on ordination as constituting a
man-made ministry, and the very word \"Brethren\" was an attempt to get
away from denominationalism.
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9246
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Forums / Theology Forum / Is Theology Your God?
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on: April 05, 2006, 03:04:02 PM
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I
was paraphrasing Psalm 111. cc, just go and contemplate on that
psalm. We are in a low point in church history, there is not much
Spiritual activity in alot of churches because this psalm is not
understood. Yet if we understand this psalm and we pray then those who
are in authority will be open to discipline because God always listens
to the needy if you know what i mean. It may be that He will discipline
in this low point through those who cry out to Him in lack. That is also
a possibliity of the way to look at it being set in decrees.
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Forums / Theology Forum / Is Theology Your God?
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on: April 05, 2006, 02:12:37 PM
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Just
as God reveals Himself through His revelation, He also teaches so that
anyone who claims they have not enough to understand, or enough to get
through this life have not to blame God. To claim this is to say that
the teacher does not have enough knowlege. Really the Lord knows the
thoughts of man and He knows that they are futile. Man left to himself
is just blind through and through. We can trust the teacher.
Now
this way of teaching comes to us through the counsel and the assembly.
That is those who share in the covenant of redemption and then we
assemble to share in these great and glorious truths in His word. Yet in
trying to understand His word we left to ourselves would only have a
carnal knowlege without the Spirit and then without the pleasure of
understanding that He causes.
He has spoken in His word and He
causes us to understand and to get a taste of Christ in that
contemplation in the church. And in contemplating those truths we see
His hand in our lives. We are all under the great counselor who is
imparting wisdom and knowlege because He is showing us that even tho we
work, yet that work is filthy rags unless He works in us because He
alone deserves eternal praise.
Yes, He is working through us and
we are working, and so we offer Him all the praise for that work. He
provides for us, he has given us all the ability to be counselors and we
are all working in unison to effect that redemption in all of us for
His praise. He shows us the power of his decrees, that is all of those
things that transpire in our lives , the good and the bad, by giving us
gifts that other unsaved men in the world have by giving them to us.
When we see this power we are convinced that it is by His grace alone
through His eternal decrees. This is the process of understanding the
fear of the Lord.
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Forums / Theology Forum / Is Theology Your God?
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on: April 05, 2006, 06:36:00 AM
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\"We are all one; why divide about these things? We must all come and
stand together as Christians, and then we shall have power M L Jones.\"
So
MBG do you think thats what its about \"having power\"? I Don\'t. That
is just more self serving and the using of god for self. Most of what I
see in life is nothing more then worshiping an idea and at the same time
selling to those who are willing to serve self that you are worshiping
truth. I wonder what God really thinks about this creation.
Gods
idea of Himself is the reality of who He is -always. What ever idea God
has, becomes reality. God has reveal the ideas in His revelation. He
has given us a lively sense of that idea of who He is. We worship a God
who reveals Himself through His ideas. No one has ever seen God. Yet we
can know God through His revelation. Once He reveals Himself to us we
have enough idea of who He is to know Him.
God
seeking himself in the creation of the world in the manner which has
been supposed, is so far from; being inconsistent with the good of its
creatures, that it is a kind of regard to himself that inclines him to
seek the good of his creature. It is a regard to himself that disposes
him to diffuse and communicate himself. It is such a delight in his own
internal fullness and glory, that disposes him to an abundant effusion
and emanation of that glory. The same disposition, that inclines him to
delight in his glory, causes him to delight in the exhibitions,
expressions, and communications of it. If there were any person of such a
taste and disposition of mind, that the brightness and light of the sun
seemed unlovely to him, he would be willing that the sun’s brightness
and light should be retained within itself. But they that delight in
it, to whom it appears lovely and glorious, will esteem it an amiable
and glorious thing to have it diffused and communicated through the
world.Edwards
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9252
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Forums / Theology Forum / Is Theology Your God?
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on: April 05, 2006, 06:29:50 AM
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\"We are all one; why divide about these things? We must all come and
stand together as Christians, and then we shall have power M L Jones.\"
So
MBG do you think thats what its about \"having power\"? I Don\'t. That
is just more self serving and the using of god for self. Most of what I
see in life is nothing more then worshiping an idea and at the same time
selling to those who are willing to serve self that you are worshiping
truth. I wonder what God really thinks about this creation.
Gods
idea of Himself is the reality of who He is -always. What ever idea God
has, becomes reality. God has reveal the ideas in His revelation. He
has given us a lively sense of that idea of who He is. We worship a God
who reveals Himself through His ideas. No one has ever seen God. Yet we
can know God through His revelation. Once He reveals Himself to us we
have enough idea of who He is to know Him.
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Forums / Main Forum / Is Accountability Good
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on: April 02, 2006, 05:20:50 PM
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In the area of the soul and desire and the Holy Spirit and control.
The
soul (us )after the fall in a conscious level entered into an
adversarial state. Pryer to the fall there was perfect unity at the
conscious level of life. By adversarial i mean in a relational way. The
very nature of the origin of this adversarial state is control.
As
believers we have given control over to Christ. Yet the will being new
is still corrupted. And the will of God and our will are not seperated
in our acting. Our will is not sin in itself, nor is it the Spirits will
apart from our will in the act. Granted that our side of the will is
corrupted and the Christ side so to speak is the only spiritual good.
Yet when we act it is us acting.
We are still in an adversarial
state as believers in this world. We still will for control in the germ
of our acting. Look in gen. where sin desires to control us but we must
control it. So desiring control is not wrong. Nor is it wrong to
exercise control over others.
The nature of our initial desire
is for control. As a believer our wills are new and so what we will is
what is Gods will, yet it is corrupted coming from us. The whole human
struggle starts in this germ of control. We are in a moment by moment
struggle for control. That is not necessarily wrong.
In fact much of our spiritual growing is rooted in the gaining of control at the very heart of the will. got to rite later.
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Forums / Main Forum / Is Accountability Good
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on: April 02, 2006, 02:47:48 PM
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Most humans, that would include Christians, have blind spots. They
can't see or accept their own errors or faults that others see so well.
Being accountable to someone else can help us deal with personal issues
that we have placed on the back burner of our conscienceness.
It
all about human interaction and fellowship...helping each other as we
go down the road. It takes just as much faith to interact to our fellow
man as it does with God. We have to believe that it is good to trust
other people who God has seen fit to sprinkle so many upon the earth.
Thor
Ive
thought about this issue alot and meditated on some of these things you
are talking about. First there is a view that control issues that come
from these character flaws, that are produced in us by sin, are issues
that when identified can be overcome in us and that being through
accountability partners. Granted there are blindspots in all of us and
this does tend to translate into anti social- behaviour which is just
areas of control problems.
But i have never seen a person
balanced so well that these areas of control do not pop up often. And in
fact these areas where these problems exist in all of us are areas that
demand more than just identifying them and being controled by someone
else to over come them. There is not one leader in the history of the
church that i have read that does not exibit strengths and weaknesses in
their writings and in the bios i have read. It is impossible to get rid
of the chaff.
Control is not just dealt with in the realization
that God is soveriegn and has everthing in control so we do not need to
be obsessed with these areas of control. To reason that realizing that
we are not in control by thinking that God is in control will only make
us followers, and having no expectations for change.
We have the
word and the Spirit, then we have other people, yet if anyone who is
married will see that control issues are never over come. They are
managed. The truth is that as we grow in Christ by these means the
control we have will be overcome by the supernatural control in the
sense that we are in control of our will but the desires will more an
more be eternal.
The control of the Holy Spirit in this growth
sense will give way from our control to a reality of experiencing His
control over a long period of time. That is what overcomes these blind
spots. Its supernaturalism to the core!
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Forums / Main Forum / Is Accountability Good
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on: April 02, 2006, 09:31:43 AM
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Accountability
can be good and bad. Think of this, if we are made clean salvation, and
we are given all that we need for life and godliness in a personal way
then really the focus of our christian life is not what others can
inforce apoun us but what kind of submission that we have to Christ in
the inward experience.
If Christ is our high preist, our
mediator, then what can replace Him as a relationship that can compete
with our love for Him and our trust in Him.
If we are in a
relationship of grace in Christ, that is being given grace pryer to all
acts of obedience, and giving grace to prevent us from straying, in a
supernatural way, then that carrot should keep us dependent on Him in
prayer and meditation and that same grace to prevent us from sinning
should also prevent us from idols, that is placing people in a position
of authority that only Christ should have.
If there are
relationships that have accountabilty then we need to see the positive
aspects and the negative aspects in a descerning way because
concentration of behavioral change on the outside as an overall focus,
will be a deception for us as to the work of the Spirit, that is, His
acting by the word in a continuios, all seeing comunication in the
sanctifying action on our souls. And in that fellowship the focus is to
overcome sin.
If we just confess sin to people, then we will not
experience all the peace and joy of forgiveness of truely repenting to
God alone, and we will not understand what trust in the work of Christ
is on our behalf, so that we will have a divided love in our hearts.
In
a sence real accountability partners are facilitators. They can offer
advice, or can act as an inbetween in a dispute between peoples by
opening up lines of communication. But as to keeping someone from
sinning, that process is brought about by faith alone, through Christ
alone, by grace alone.
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Forums / Theology Forum / Is Theology Your God?
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on: April 01, 2006, 06:23:54 AM
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How
can you know God unless you understand who He is by His word, and how
can you understand His word unless you understand the propostional truth
in His word. The problem here is not the Theology, but the people who
miss use the theology. To ask the question Can theology be a God is to
ask can God be God?
The process of systematic thinking is not
idolic in itself. It is in the nature of this thinking process that is
antithetical to the nature of the thinking process of man in his fallen
state. This process is informing on the thoughts of man and is a
reversal of the fallen process of thinking in man whos well spring of
truth comes from self- knowlege.
There should be an all out
determination to consume as much Theology as often as possible for a
better transformation of the mind. The problem comes when we mis apply
the nature of who God is as to who we are. Here is where we read things
into theology,rather than be informed by theology so that it becomes the
definition of who we are which will determine what we do.
As
well as consuming theology we need to practice the art of meditation on
the word. There is a duel action in informing who we are in a mystical
sense also. If i say that all christian experience ultimately starts
from the inside and works it way to the outside then not being able to
observe the inside of me by observation, not having the capability, then
these inner workings in which scripture centers on must be understood
by this two pronged transformation of the mind.
If i just focus
on meditation, then i will be scued in the process of informing. If i
just focus on theology then it will ultimely be a focus on the outward
and will just degenerate into moralism.
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Forums / Theology Forum / The Bible Driven Church
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on: March 30, 2006, 03:48:42 PM
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Were
did we get the idea that prayer is a temporary solution. Were did we
get the idea that prayer was only good if it was part of a solution?
Where did we get the idea that prayer was the means to change our
circumstances. That view has to much fleshly purposing in it. Prayer is
the natural outcry of a believer. The desire to Pray is from the Holy
Spirit who infuses us with the presence of the divine consciousness an
actual fellowhip with the Father, an enlightened disposition in the
midst of the mondain and painful reality of life.
The troubles
from within and without that consume us are co existent with our new
life in Christ. We are divided in the sense that what we are in
ourselves is terribly horrific , and what we posses in grace is
extremely supernatural. We live knowing that at any time we could
stumble into sin, and fall very hard. There is a war going on inside of
us that even tho most of the time is unspoken in the everyday culture of
the church nevertheless is common in all christian dispositions.
Just
because the battle is not explained, described, forced into everyday
communication yet the psalmist describes a groaning that is life long
and is not easily acknowleged by the best of us. Here in this battle on
the inside is where we misapply applications of behavioural therapy in
modern human behavioural systems of anthropology. The great delima comes
when theology and anthropology are taken out of the context of biblical
realm of truth in every day communication.
We all share
physicosis, troubled relationships, loneliness, rejection, and even
those who once loved us as becoming our accusers. These realities are
sprung in the heart, the exist in all areas of our souls. These areas
are so common in us that there is not a day where we do not experience
all of these troubles in one degree or another. Just think about the
corruption of the mind, that is a propensity to think about
relationships in a way that is slanted to our own benifit, or with some
slight intention that is more an imaginated person, whoever we co exist
with in our world.
We are so susceptable to creating characters
of our imagination that we sometimes do not understand who we are in
light of our relationships. So we depend on the percieved truth of our
peers not realizing that their minds are corrupted also and slanted
toward hiding what is corrupted in their minds so they can look like
they are wise enough. And yet the bible depicts us all as terribly
mistaken in what we think and so dependent on supernatural light of the
word that any system that introduces thought patterns that do not expose
these inward corruptions in their root is just a spewing of one mans
imagination.
And yet we all share in emotional desperation that
is a dispostion of unrest, anxiety, depravity. In this area we are the
most corrupted. We run the gamit of emotions every day. Our thoughts are
corrupted and our emotions are corrupted, and this is common to all of
us. We try to hide how we feel so that we can create an illusion that we
in control of ourselves even tho we are either, delusional, numb, full
of hate, anxious to the point of bleeding and yet what is going on
inside of us is common to every one around us to one extent or another.
The
truth is we live as corrupted people in a realm that is eternal. We
live in the presence of a loving Father who understands all the motives,
all the idols, all the peer imaginations, He knows all of the problems,
the fortresses we build up to protect our independence from feeling His
presence inside of us. He knows that there was a terrible reality that
enter our consciousness when sin entered. He must become so real to us
that our present consciousness of independence will be so obnoxious to
us that no system of man could compare to His revelations of love in us
by His word.
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