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61	Forums / Theology Forum / Re: God's Mind has been Reconciled	on: May 26, 2013, 04:28:58 PM
God is the light of the world who lights up the whole universe. He is said to dwell in unapproachable light. From the view of standing and looking at the throne all things focus on Him and the whole history of the world with the creatures glorifies Him and praises Him. That view is our gazing in face to face worship. We are looking at the object that swallows up all things. When we look at God on His throne we see and experience , power, wealth, wisdom and strength , honor, glory and praise. We are looking at pure holiness. When we experience all of these attributes as one we are worshiping God as His emanations flow one way through all things through all eternity. This is why He is compared to the sun rising. First because all creatures and created things are a display of these attributes. The whole creation was ordered from the counsel of God in eternity past. They are worked out by His laws, statutes, decrees and promises. Everything thing in the universe has its symmetry from the mind of God who not only creates things anew but reorders all things. This includes all families, governments and the establishment of cultures.  When the scripture makes reference to the light it is with this teaching in focus. The sun rises from the beginning of time. So as to show that Gods view as the light is set apart from man and the earth. God looks upon the earth not with a passive sight. He sees things as ordaining whatsoever comes to pass. By ordaining them we mean there is nothing that exist outside of Gods word. When we see the sun rising it is a view that is above us. This means that God exist outside of time as opposed to us who are subject to time. It also speaks of Gods knowledge. God who has no parts but explains Himself to us as having human parts. God knows beyond our humanness in acquaintance with all things but lowers Himself to meet our humanness to answer every need that we have. This is seen in the marriage covenant.  Man was given the gift of subduing the earth. God gifted men with an intellect like no other part of His creation. This intelligence of man is given so that the divine order might be seen in Gods kingdom. As man thinks after God he has the special gift of creating what God has decreed in working out all of time. God cannot fail in working out His purpose through man. Man is the king of his own sphere. There is no power that can overcome Gods righteous generation. In the end all of Gods children will overcome all opposition. We will judge angels and men. God has brought men to a face to face relationship with Himself.  He has done this through His work alone. Through the work on the cross God has provided all that man needs. God has gone out before man and done the work to establish the foundation of the family, society, governments, and meeting all the needs of man. These are all gifts that God has given man to order the events of the earth. Although these things place man in an authoritative position they are not fundamentally a part of mans identity. In the end we must conclude that we do not deserve what God has done on our behalf.
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662  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 26, 2013, 02:00:03 PM  Cont. Since I established how there is since the beginning of time a society that has been spiraling down through a learned way of man  becoming more successful in redefining the peace that God has established by offering a peace that is almost godly. The highest form of treachery is flattery. So on a personal level peace is very hard to define since it must be uncovered like having a well that provides water that has been covered by dirt. Its not easy to understand the natural order of peaceful dwelling. Love as it is defined is not necessarily love. Hate about something is not necessarily directed correctly. This is why the bible describes mans heart as a deep well. There is a way that seems rite .. always. In Gods absolute view there are always before Him two kinds of men. The righteous and the wicked. But we cannot read the hearts of men in our view. Yet there is no time in Gods view that He sees in a pragmatic way. So that if He is absolute about His judgments at all time through all history then He speaks absolutely in His judgement about every thing at all times in light of His purpose. God does not reduce something to refine His original purpose. And this is not just a private secluded understanding in God but He communicates His design in our language. This means that there is a view that God has that is revealed about His final declaration that our survival is depended upon. God says things that seem to be beyond our ability to reason. Gods rejection is more dreadful than we could imagine. Gods anger is more hot than we could understand. Given the full effects we would not want Him to speak to us. This is our gift in our being accepted. We speak Gods words that are beyond our sense of justice. We feel and experience things about God that go beyond our earthly relationships. When we speak as God sees it is so absolute and sure that we experience something that goes farther down than we could ever go and goes higher than we could ever acheive. Gods voice is creative. It brings into existence something from nothing. The way that He communicates is so true that it makes our explaining what He says as false. But this is our gift. Its our ability to go beyond past and present and future to say things that we do not understand but brings us into a mysterious acceptance. The acceptance is something that is created in us in time. We say things in prayer and proclaim things that are to wonderful to understand as a way to silence this earth in being transformed through real mystery. Reply Quote Notify

663  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 26, 2013, 01:21:01 PM Ive been reading some of the prior post. One of the ideas that came up was this need for approval. I do not think we can divorce ourselves from our desire to survive from receiving approval in some form in all these different societies that we are involved in in this life. In the most fundamental sense we feel acceptance on the basis of our experience of approval.Our healthy image is tied to our sense of accomplishment and it is how we are approved as to the weight that bears upon our understanding of self appreciation we experience. God created the earth as good which is that He approved of the work in a reciprocal way. The natural law of the universe is to think, speak and act in Gods order according to Gods standard and order of value. But when sin entered then death reigns. This original way of experiencing the goodness of God working out through all of His creation in perfect approval as He created the simplislist things to work for the good would experience the pleasure of approval through both the idea of Gods approval and the perfect communication of approval as the second hand moves on a clock. When sin entered then man began to redefine the world in using approval to create his own rule. How does man accomplish this? By seeking to overturn Gods safe standards. Gods way of order is through the peaceful dwelling of a righteous generation. But through deception and scheming man introduces war and destruction into Gods created order. Man turns what is good and rite into death and destruction. So we must understand that the bible speaks of lawlessness as treachery. When ever the bible talks about lying, deception, it is connected to the idea that distinguishes men from being good by an act of treason against the kingdom that God has established and not necessarily one law violated. We see that the kingdom of God is represented by the original usage of words ordered in a way that puts everything in its natural order...the peaceful existence of Gods order. But when sin and death entered then man began to offer other ways and definitions that changed the purpose of how God created things to work in light of knowing the pleasure of approval in terms of communication between people and the enjoyment on a personal level in light of the social norms of enforcement of what is approved. As time goes on the extent of evil in terms of redefining Gods peaceful standard is magnified and practiced in a way that brings society in to utter confusion. What is good is called evil and vise versa. Not only is our healthy acceptance damaged but the whole existence of society is threatened as peace is replaced by threats, violence, and redefining the orignal purpose of how we are accepted in our experience of survival. We must begin in this matter of our own judgement in light of recieving those natural experiences that God has ordered for our living in peace to unravel the years of the ways that man has established his own world view that holds men under its power. We do this by word and Spirit. We attempt to be illuminated as God sees all things. We go outside of the box of the normal views of a single generation and we recieve divine wisdom from God who has existed through all generations. Reply Quote Notify

664  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Mental Illness or Demonic possession? on: May 25, 2013, 03:08:35 PM Quote from: Lone Arranger on March 21, 2013, 03:00:21 PM MBG, your experience (and I've heard others similar) would tend to put one off trying to draw closer to God.  I'm sure you feel it's worth it.  Can you explain why -- considering the blowback you get when you do?   LA... The focus of all of this struggle is kind of like trying to distinguish what is the most happy place in this world. We are who we think we are at all times. If we describe what is the deepest part of the earth it would be through our imagination. If we tried to describe Gods love which the scripture describes as going from one end of eternity to another it would be something that is too big for us to imagine. So when we think like this it is the gospel way. The gospel is not just a message of good news that we are saved and one day all of this sorrow and pain will be addressed. But its holding onto something that we can grasp now that gives us hope in something to great for us to imagine in the future. We hold onto these things by faith. These ideas of the gospel pass through our minds and kind of spread to our imagination. This is like something that comes to us and expands us in the inner man. So the way that God created the universe in terms of how we respond when we observe the physical beauty is how He works in us by His word to expand and deepen our desires. We can describe this as Gods governance over all things being worked out through His laws, decrees, statutes, and promises. All of these events that God creates are visual properties to be observed for the purpose of seeing beyond what we accomplish by our hand. So you could say that we are kind of locked up in a finite prison that never keeps us amazed enough to be challenged. Humanism is a ball and chain. And all of these vain philosophies are not as clear but they are there to keep us from thinking about things that go over into our imaginations.There are only two ways of thinking. One is mans way and the communication is to subvert, threaten and subdue true beauty and enjoyment of the soul. The other is revealed words. God wants us to think on things above because these heavenly things help resist the power and not just redefine the world view. In your light we see light. Or we experience a war like victory when we use Gods language to oppose Gods enemies. When we approach the enemy it is always in a resistant way. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. This means that our victory is a legal pronouncement as a king would rule in an absolute way. Our pronouncement is through Gods eyes. So since He works all things for our good our servant hood is our pronouncements of victory in the future and past as documents stored up in heaven. When we pray in this way its our history documented for us that gives us a greater position of authority in heaven. Its also an argument that its time for Him to respond now. We are servants over a kingdom that has been subdued by Christ. Our endurance is seeing the day of salvation as a word to us that becomes more clear as we gain victory in all of these  small battles. The vision is to experience the ultimate victory in revival. The Father looks on Christ and then He is pleased to revive us so that we call on Him. This experience is more and more clear to us like we are being changed from one glory to another. We are awaiting the day when we experience revival that is by site. But now we go from faith to faith. So the reason it is worth it is for reward and experiencing a greater revival. Reply Quote Notify

665  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: God's Attitude on: May 25, 2013, 12:51:33 PM I want to discuss this idea of being "cut off". I am gonna discuss this as it relates to grace and not get into the physical act itself. We need to see that God describes two kinds of being cut off. To be cut off is to experience some kind of sorrow in relationship to God. I do not think its the same as the curse. The curse is always destructive. Although the curse could be led along by events that a saint is caught up in. So the curse works to destroy the wicked ... a pronouncement of death upon those who oppose God and yet God always smiles on His sheep as working all things for their good. So the curse is powered in such a way that it works to reorder events in this world by directly effecting the lives of the wicked in a negative way and allowing righteousness to rule in the realm of grace. So cursing acts in an effect of renewing all things. God orders events in this world for His glory and out good. God deals with us a dust and not having strength to feel a sense of accomplishment in ourselves apart from Him. We are always dealing with the reality of Gods position of His presence in our lives. We do not want to look at this like a Greek philosopher. We do not separate powers in the supernatural realm or the meta physical realm. Our God is one and as we see Him as one then we will experience oneness. So whatever He does in relation to us is in the experience of feeling. God has one way of communicating and the art of bringing all things to bare in the total teaching of Gods unity is to describe our relationship to God in this completed revelation. Being cut off in the true sense is being alienated from God. Being cut off in the christian experience is to experience sorrow from God being distant. That is why the ot saint tore their clothes. Cutting was a sign of inward sorrow. That was the first response to the bad event. It was the representation of anger felt over the piercing of the sorrow. Tear the things of this world in order to survive on treating people as identifying yourself as a high priest. We learn to cheer our brothers on as we learn to cheer God on. THis could be responding negatively to the events in this world. So tearing is a rebel act toward the value of things in order to show the inward struggle. This is exactly what God does on a larger scale. He responds in judgement upon nations in order to identity with those who are being abused. God always responds to this world in light of His pure communication of His attributes in relationship to all men. Sometimes what seems to be His distancing is our advancement in a negative way in cheering Him on as the true idenfication of Him being a high priest in responding to the suffering of the poor and oppressed. God is not a form of democracy. He takes from one person and gives it to another. He orders things by His absolute law in response to man corrupting His law and using it to destroy other people. I will further explain this cutting off. Reply Quote Notify

666  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 25, 2013, 12:04:10 PM The language of God is a creative language. Its not just the words that we use to describe the true culture but its how we are related to God in complete dependence. This dependence is set apart and is described as having boundaries of grace that cannot be crossed. So we define going in the wise way as being under the reign of a new mind. Its not necessarily having a moral component that gives us an identity of being humble. But its being guided by a principle using supernatural means. Our view of being dependent is from a view of the object of our faith that we are drawn to in this refuge of absolute boundaries. I do not think we can completely reconcile our understanding of ourselves with this new ability to view Christ who connects with us in ways that cannot fail. Christ never destroys what He builds in us seeing that we are renewed day by day. We define christian humility as using words of scripture that give us our true identity. This complete dependence is in a relationship in which our survival depends upon someone else's success. We are reduced to holding onto grace in defining all of our confidence as our being safe in the name of the Lord. Our dependence is in the refuge language. We hold onto grace as we describe the boundaries of this dependence. The bible defines these boundaries as our having a new name in the family of God. This relationship is more than a correct definition of the terms of loyalty as the world describes healthy relationships. But it goes beyond one description of our identity and creates an identity in the only holistic way as we are confident in what Christ does in connecting with us. No one can be dependent upon Christ without seeing Him as our all in all. To define ourselves as lesser than we are in terms of our gifts or purpose is to bring Christ down. Humility is our vision of the majesty and glory of Christ with a heart that is enlarged to glorify and praise Him. Humility has in it a true boasting in Christ. Because the grace of humility is seen not just in an ongoing relationship to Christ but its reduced to depend upon His advancement toward us that we persevere in this life. Our believing is our surviving on His communicating all of the supernatural properties in what we see in this world and the unseen changes that we experience. We must declare that we cannot trust in man, princes, and the things of this world. Because we have a real vision of who we are defined by in Gods family in which we experience this holistic acceptance. Humility is our viewing Christ as lifted up so that we do not confuse the true value how we are represented. Reply Quote Notify

667  Forums / Break Room / Re: Christian faith - joy, suffering, and unanswered prayer on: May 24, 2013, 10:27:53 AM God gives us desires in the same way He created all things on this earth. Gods creative powers go beyond the physical universe. He created things that we cannot see. This is why the scripture presents the argument that God knows the numbers of our hairs. Its not necessarily a count of our hairs but its talking about those things that do not impact our lives through what we normally consider important. So the insignificant things in our eyes are upside down in Gods view. This is why the bible speaks of our lives like a reflection of light. Because we see that God creates an image in our minds as to what we see as truth. The bible talks about our understanding being enlightened. The comparison is as light shining into a dark place to expose the visual reality. So not only is the enlightened image of a thing likened to our full understanding but the view we have of that image is in the context of our having eyes that are not physical. This is what I think the Psalmist is talking about when he prays that God will shine the light into his face. That light reflects off the face as an understanding of the true image. And all of this reality is like waters flowing out of our inner being. We see the context of the light of Gods creative powers which is likened to the light of His glory, the true refection of the image of God in the face of Christ. This is our renewed desire that cannot be destroyed. This renewed desire  it the total of our muliti colored faith. This desire is likened to the word of salvation. It is given to us so that we might seek His face. Nothing in this world is accomplished unless it is first passed through our faculties in communication of words. The image of those words is compared to the brightness of the light. The more we understand the true nature of things the more we will reflect the image of Christ and the more His light will shine in our face. Our desire is Gods creative power to bring in the light of the glory of God to greater effects. Who we are in each moment as we are aware of the true reality of Gods creative sovereign power is our experience to a fuller effect. This reality is likened to rivers of water flowing out of us. Our desires become His desires. By faith we apprehend what has not come into time. Reply Quote Notify

668  Forums / Break Room / Re: Christian faith - joy, suffering, and unanswered prayer on: May 17, 2013, 10:19:42 PM If God decided to spend a day with us what would we say that we do not normally say in our prayers? Would God talk to us as men in our own language? If God knows what we are going through from before the foundation of the world would He be more acquainted with our  total view of our circumstances and how we experience them than we are?If He is that much more powerful than we are and that much more knowledgeable then why would He come to us on our level? Why not just have Him explain what the cause is and how it should be fixed instead of offering His ear and listening to what we have to say from our small view? Is it that He says to Himself... "I will listen to you because I know how stupid you are but i dont want you to be hurt thinking that I am so much more knowledgeable than you and i know it will hurt you because it will look like i am ignoring you." Or does He really come down to our level to respond to what we say to Him? Are we so important to God that He would focus on us as if what we felt about our experience was worth His time? After all we all know God has His agenda. He has His time table. Hes not gonna change. I mean He is merciful and kind but please He surely does not want to look as if He is being taken advantage of. Hes forgiving but Hes not gonna accept our sin without some kind of response! God listens to us but Hes God and He has His boundaries that cannot be crossed so His concern for us has its limits. But what happens if God is not like we think He is. What happens if God is there scratching His head thinking to Himself "Why do you not come to me more and ask Me for anything? Why dont you tell me what you are feeling and ask me to help you? Why dont you stay when we talk and tell me everything? Ive been here the whole time waiting to answer all your needs but you keep going away from Me  thinking im gonna do something to hurt you? Why do you think Im only nice sometimes?" Its easy for us to read a story and relate what happens to other people to what God is like.   Reply Quote Notify

669  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans Chap 7 on: May 12, 2013, 02:49:35 PM We dont want to just oppose the language but we want to silence it as a pronouncement of destruction. The Devil dosent come to just hold people captive but he comes to kill and destroy. I dont mean to say that we have certain catch phrases that keep us safe. But at the same time what power of sorrow, of fear, of anxiety that we experience is always in the form of communication.  The cultural level in a society is always in a language that is repeated as a fact. There is no language in scripture that is presented as neutral language. Its always in the context of opposition. These nt words come from a foundation of war. We describe the inward human battles like real battles that are fought in Israels history. The ideas being presented are like opposing soldiers in the heat of the battle. Evil and the human condition under Adam is the opposition using language to deceive and redefine the image of the saint. Jesus did not just come to the earth to die and establish the final justice. He wasnt just concerned about forgiving sin or healing every disease. He did not come to destroy every human being by holding every word of he law over their heads. He wasnt less that God at any time after He took on human flesh. But He was the king of the whole world and every thing that transpired in His earthly sojourn was held together by His word. This means that all of time and space was under His control by His word that was not directly in the account of the NT. From His view point then it wasnt just walking from one place to another with a view of just a man. He had to be in perfect union with our Father in this eternal communication of creation. He came to set the whole world in order by His pronouncements of blessing and cursing. He did not need destroy His opponents by a disease or mental illness. He simply pronounced judgement at the rite time through cursing those who opposed Him. Jesus was not just opposing evil.. He wanted to kill it in the use of His law.   Reply Quote Notify

670  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans Chap 7 on: May 12, 2013, 01:44:45 PM tb its really tough because there are a lot of circumstances that have past that cannot be reconciled. And most of these circumstances are beyond our control. Its hard for us to acknowledge that we do not have control over these things. The only hope we have is for God to redeem everything so that it is for our good. God buys back all of the messed up ways that we attempt to survive and uses it for His glory and for our good. At the same time God pre ordained whatsoever comes to pass. He does this so that the successful ways of this world might be confounded by the insignificant things. The times we experience success in this mysterious work in that we feel the good as He is working it out then we feel unified and loved. But when He works in a way that we must grow down we do not always respond in a way of understanding that He is God. The pain is that we feel as if God is distant and the circumstances seem to be very large and dangerous. This is where we try to be brave without being human. Ive experienced these things in growing down that are too strong for me. Religion can make people react in strange ways. The standard of growth patterns in a persons life are not the same in other peoples lives. And no one can look at another persons heart. So we all are subject to devouring one another because we do not consider that there are powers that are too strong and given the rite circumstances we all would be cowering in the corner. This is why it is very important for us to understand how to grow down. The gospel is a way of thinking in which the way we speak to others and to ourselves should silence the flesh. When i speak to myself i try to speak in way that i try to oppose the voices of the flesh. The flesh wars against the spirit and the spirit against he flesh. This war is communication. There is not battle that has ever been successful that happens by one person reading another persons mind. Every battle in this world is always done by communication. The war is described like someone being taken captive and silenced. We take captive every thought and make it obedient to Christ. The thoughts come out on our lips. What we say leads us in some kind of direction. The ways of the Spirit is to oppose every spiritual force that opposes God. We wrestle with spiritual forces in the heaven-lies. The Devil doesnt speak a strange language. He develops a language that is common to all men. He uses Gods words to hold people under His power. He lives in a world of creation that God rules every inch by the entire language of mankind.  He comes as a human being in the most eloquent language twisting that language. We oppose everything that exalts itself against the knowledge of God. The bible presents exact doctrine as the foundation that we use to apply Gods words to every situation. But we hear God speak application of that word to us when we ask Him for wisdom. This means that our senses are trained to hear that wisdom from God and from others. The gospel of grace is clear and precise. The more we understand the gospel and trust in it the more we will be able to protect our hearts and be able to know which way to go. Reply Quote Notify

671  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans Chap 7 on: May 11, 2013, 12:27:31 PM Its terribly important to understand that the presence of sin in a believer is not on the danger level of being equal with our renewed desire. Its like the old argument about how to discipline a child. We used to say that its wise to pick your fights. lol. So the apostle is explaining the relationship that sin has in very precise terms. I do not think the apostle is saying that his disassociation with sin is in the context of trying to avoid something that he is afraid of. But its acknowledging his inability in himself to overcome it. I love how things in scripture are described and we come out scratching our heads. Because we are always looking at these things from our natural fleshly mindset. But the bible is an account of teachings that are dumb ed down so that some of the effects of the teaching do not need to be passed through our wills. Because there is a sense of resignation in the apostle that he cannot avoid something that is in him. How can something good and pure be accomplished through acknowledging that we are unable to deal with something that is wrong and impure? Thats is the anti intuitive vehicle of grace that goes beyond our ability to be reduced to nothing. We are kind of like the guy who brings a sledge hammer to fix a cabinet full of crystal. When we get done the cabinet is fixed but the crystal is shattered and on the ground. There is a sense in which God saves us from being the bad guy. You know that its very strange to us to experience something that reduces us to something that we must follow into a circumstance that we do not naturally find if we use fleshly means. This is the power of Spirit and word. It takes us to a place that we could not envision that is beyond our ability to go there by ourselves. Do you experience freedom from seeing the apostle being reduced to acknowledging the power of sin and his lack of ability in himself to do one thing about it? There is a freedom from it that comes to us where we scratch our heads. Reply Quote Notify

672  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Mental Illness or Demonic possession? on: May 11, 2013, 11:52:52 AM The world is on a course. So the world is not necessarily physical. But its described in the minds of people like being brainwashed. This brainwashing is kind of like a birth defect. Because men are born in sin they are corrupted in a total way..both physical and spiritual. When God created the world in six days He declared that it was all good. There was no defect. But when Adam and Eve sinned they not only rebelled against Gods lawful authority in the way of thinking but they were cursed both body and spirit. They began to experience destruction. God created everything by His breath. Gods breathing life into all things was His one rule of order of eternal life. When man rebelled he brought death. So man became fugitive in Gods kingdom. Gods rule of order is His perfect word that is worked out over all things. Man now seeks to redefine Gods rule and overturn Gods kingdom. Man does this by describing a universe where he rules. Satan was the first to reorder and twist what God had said. He was cast out of heaven where he deceived man by twisting Gods words. When man fell everyone became a kind of clone to Satans world view. Man is born to declare his independence from God and to use his words to define how others should follow him. Satan is not omni present. No man can turn to God and claim that Satan made that man do the things he did. Gods order is to bring in life, justice, peace and glory in His kingdom but man spreads , lies, death, hate, war, and the worship of other gods. Mans heart is filled with hate that generates his desire to place himself and other things in place of God. There is no hope for man in himself to avoid the end of his desire to imprison as many people as he can, destroying as many lives as he can, presenting a world view of his ruling as a god as being a utopia and taking the wealth of the world all for himself. Man doesnt need to be controlled by Satan...he enjoys being his own god. In a sense we are caught in between the great battle of the universe between the forces of evil and God. Our distinct power is put in perspective as we see these different realms.   Reply Quote Notify

673  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: The Reality of God's Reconciliation on: May 11, 2013, 11:19:17 AM Reconciliation is our being delivered from a relationship of servitude to sin and being enemies of God to our being translated into Gods kingdom that Christ has purchased with His own blood. It was accomplished through Christ suffering and it is made real to us in the blood of the martyrs. The success of reconciliation with Christ is accomplished through the suffering of the saints as Christ suffered. But from our personal view our being made friends with God is the just consequence of our receiving a sure defense from all that Christ has accomplished that comes to us freely as the expression that we are reconciled. Reconciliation is God treating us in the present as if we had never sinned. This means that our peace that we experience ..the peace of Christ is successful because God acts in justice to defend it apart from our fallen- ness. It presupposes that there is opposition in all things ...opposing the direction that everything will be reconciled in Christ one day. Which is the just consequence of punishment that is foreseen in the active defense of Gods friends with the final declaration of victory in the last day. It is seen in Gods ongoing activity of reversing the effects of sin. Reply Quote Notify

674  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Ministers of Righteousness on: May 11, 2013, 10:52:36 AM If the matter of salvation has already been accomplished there is nothing standing in Gods way. Does this include our focusing on what we accomplish in life by our choosing? Why not just say that God alone saves us by His will alone? If God already has been successful in making us complete how can we be sure it is done if we are always saying that we must choose for it to be what it is? Its like saying probation is our being tested on the value of our choice but there is nothing standing in the way of what God has done for us. This is a contradiction. If the sin question has been taken care of by Christ in the past then it should not be dependent upon anything in us to be assured that it is true. If we respond in offering value in our ability then His forgiveness is dependent upon the value in us. But if there is nothing of value in us it is a true gift of forgiveness since the value is expressed in the gift as the assurance in us that it cannot fail. It cannot fail because there is nothing preventing it not even us personally. The bible says that we are to confess our sins and obtain forgiveness. But it also says that our confession does not measure up to receiving that forgiveness. This distinction is how we learn to be assured that it cannot fail because it must be reduced to Gods free grace in order for us to receive the successful message as God created us. So the confession that it is already accomplished is equal to the confession that there is nothing in us of value that deserves the work that Christ has done. We seek to silence that voice of destruction so that we might rest in Christ alone. Now we can display great confidence since we are not confused about the success that He works on our behalf. Its not in our horses, but its in His hand. His right hand and the light from His eyes. Which we confess " I believed therefore I said I am greatly afflicted and in my distress I said all men are liars." Which is saying I cant trust this side of heaven when I see through the eyes of faith the great gulf between what God says and what comes from the lips of men. This is our attitude before we call on the name of the Lord. Reply Quote Notify

675	Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster.	on: May 10, 2013, 05:43:59 PM
"The flesh works against the Spirit ..they are in conflict with one another so that you dont know whatever you want. But if you are led by the Spirit you are not under the law. " The principle is upside down from the working principle. In the use of the means what is the strongest opposition is the most successful endeavor. Usually when we are opposed in the application of word and Spirit it is the rite way to go. The only way I can describe this is that the proper use of the means of faith is an attempt to go outside the box from the normal procedures. When we are talking about the work of the Spirit it is the view that we are being renewed into something that we were not previously. But when we are dealing in the flesh it usually is focused on what we accomplished to move forward a little bit. So the application of deliverance is to try to not act before God. Its coming before God in our feelings, our problems, pains, and sorrows. The most opposition to this approach is the temptation to think it is insignificant. The opposition is "He trust in God let God deliver Him." Our attempt is to complain as we experience the sorrow. The more proficient as our passion grows in response to our present sorrows the more we grow to see with the eyes of faith. Burdens are the sorrows, pains that we experience. They could be emotional, physical or mental. These burdens are weights that hold us under the power of fear and an uncaring experience. We unburden the weight as an attempt to burn away the imperfections. We push the curse away. God has given us words that mean things and the expression of these words have a vehicle of many different personalities. When i say personality i mean a happy, sad, passive, pushy etc. God is always consistent with His expression and the words. But our words and the personality are corrupted. God speaks to us like He searches into the depths of the soul. Gods words and His spiritual emanations are always perfect. So God not only speaks to us with a still small voice but He moves in us with a personal touch. We see this as a reflection of our corrupted personality. God comes to us in a spirit which is our way of being spoken to in the personality of the wholeness that we are most burdened by.       676  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 10, 2013, 03:43:28 PM tb i understand depression. Ive dealt with some of it all my life. I havent been cured. But in my experience it is related to our predisposition of reacting to sorrow and bad events that come into our lives. But i really believe that the pain of illness is relieved by connecting. And there are different levels of connection. The circumstances of being able to find relief is in how healthy our near relationships ...ie family are. But if we do not have healthy family relationships then we desire to have another person have the role of a brother or father. But there is no relationship on this earth that can provide total healing. In my experience our relationship to life and the people we know in the present are changing. So our desire is they will change for the better because we depend upon people who are close to us. So there is a sense in which we develop a satisfaction with our present relationships in which our dependence is not healthy. But we still must pursue these close relationships because we need others to survive in this life. The best relationship is with those who know us the best. I dont necessarily mean in a religious sense. Because there is a kind of dna in relationships. The way of wisdom is to be able to understand the unity in our lives as people influence us for the good. As you have been saying above that you discern people the direction the other people in your life are going that you do not agree with. Which i presume that your not satisfied with the connection. I would pray that you get the connection with the people who believe like you do that will meet your needs. Most people ..like family ... avoid the differences in beliefs for the sake of unity. But in a church setting the people should be unified not only in the doctrine but in their view of applying it. The apostle says to follow him as he follows Christ. He not only desires that there would be unity in doctrine but that the people would feel like they fit in some where. Ive had different parts of my life where the relationships ive had seem to fit like a puzzle. But then something happens that we cant control and we feel disconnected. People come in and out of our lives. This is why I memorized the Psalms because they express the frustration of being lonely sometimes and feeling like a stranger. I dont like to feel unwanted or alone. I dont believe that having people around necessarily makes us feel connected. We can feel alone in a big crowd. But we want to know God as a person who can create a healthy success in our lives by knowing our weakness and knowing who we need to really connect and creating that in our future. Thats why we plead with God. God has His hand on the control button. The best thing we can do is to ask for wisdom and learn to pray in wisdom. And ask for other people who we respect as wise to pray for us. Reply Quote Notify 677  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Seed of woman versus son of man on: May 09, 2013, 10:05:46 AM Jesus had to be fully man in order to overcome death and destruction. Not only did Jesus as a man become a curse for us... ie He became sin for us... or came as close as He could to sin in order to identify with us... but He paid the ransom price as the one who purchased us from being slaves and punished for not confessing His allegiance to the god of this world. He was treated as a criminal of war so that we might have complete victory over the enemy who is the Devil. He obtained complete victory ...took the spoils of war which is His complete control over all things and led captivity captive to heaven. Christ purchased price of His blood will be avenged in the judgement. Gouda i may not understand what you are saying but this battle is not centered on mans ability or will to give up everything or obtaining an unfeigned love. But the gospel is centered on what God has accomplished in obtaining a complete salvation that is worked out for us in our being delivered from this present evil age. We can over simplify this matter of salvation to our being saved to make disciples. But its in our best interest to let the whole counsel of God speak about our great salvation. Our security of salvation is in our allowing all of the scripture to speak...not just what is described in the religious culture or in our efforts to create a balance. But we must overcome all opposition as a good soldier in this spiritual battle. So we are involved in describing this in a spiritual context..with spiritual beings...and matters of faith in which we believe things we do not see. Our salvation is kept in heaven for us as a present hope that we look forward to in a single vision. This description in some ways has been revealed to us. We are to search the scriptures and submit by faith to every word. Heaven is described as spiritual forces who battle against the forces of this world. Christ is the Savior not just to provide us with a peaceful life but He is presently coming on the red horse with a sword in His hand. There is a real fierce battle going on around us that we cannot see. The world problems are not really defined by what men describe. They are only real in the context of our vision of Heaven. We find the problems of this world put in the context of the motif of complete deliverance when we describe the atonement in terms of this battle. We are not deceived to think that there is an earthly solution to our seeing good reign in the future without this response of judgement from heaven that is pushing in upon us so that the vision interacts with the way we feel about our present experience and we see the salvation of God.. A total deliverance that we will experience in the future. The value of our present faith is dependent upon how real this spiritual vision is to us.   Reply Quote Notify 678  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 07, 2013, 05:08:49 PM 5 20 The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. God established the law in the creation ordinance. He created the universe through His spoken word. Not only did He create the earth and the heavens but through His statutes, decrees , laws and commands He established social order. Before the creation of the world God decided to display His power, wealth , wisdom and strength, honor glory and praise. Everything that exist in the physical and meta physical world is in this foundation that was established that under girds the earth, human governments, social order in our view of reality. This foundation is created according to Gods attributes. It is revealed in His word alone. God has a house. Its not just a local place of worship. It is a building in a meta physical way through the natural order of things and people that He establishes through a righteous generation. This includes the order of families which extends into the culture in light of the establishment of human governments. This divine mandate that establishes all societies is Gods display of all of these attributes that we have been discussing prior. The evidence of Gods attributes is the peaceful dwelling of a righteous generation. So the house that God builds is the success of sons and daughters that is promised by God that He would give gifts to establish this society as compared to the structure of this house. God not only gives the gifts of prosperity, safety and nurturing but He actually designs the success of society through displaying His attributes by doing the work in securing the foundation. This success is guaranteed through His covenant of redemption and is completely depended upon grace. This defines the success of His grace by not only upholding the structure of successful generations that provide the security of a culture but He displays His glory as the basis of our confidence that we cannot fail.  Reply Quote Notify 679  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Romans and the Flesh Monster. on: May 05, 2013, 11:15:01 PM Its a pleasure to see you responding again tb. Its been awhile. Im glad you brought this back to the front. I want to discuss more on this subject. There is so much we could write about our relationship to the flesh and how it enforces Gods grace in us. Thanks so much for your encouragement. Reply Quote Notify 680  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Have We Been Deceived? on: May 04, 2013, 05:42:09 PM Let me give you the other side of this. On the other hand our desires are not something that controls us. We control our desires. But our desires God created to be beyond what we could ever ask or think. This really is a realm in us that God acts according to His faithfulness, kindness, goodness, and love. Which is God ruling from the heavens in terms of His governance. Our identity is Gods language that describes high and low relationships on this earth. God has spoken the whole word. It includes His absolute order in every area of society. But because of evil there is a language of rebellion. The heart of an evil man is bent toward abandoning Gods order on this earth. Man schemes against Gods language. This is our most genuine inward war. These schemes are desires to eliminate God. Our desires as believers create Gods order in society. We have the mandate of a , prophet, priest and king. Even tho God has established order through different gifts to man , yet God will not share His glory with any man. So in a sense we are all equal before God in worth. Grace prevents us from distinguishing in powers of this earth. Grace only allows us to think of the gift and the giver. And the giver is not on this earth. lol So we are given desires that are bigger than our little circumstances. We belong to a long line of kings and kingdoms in the history of mankind. Our mission is to subdue the earth. It goes rite down to the basic war in desires between the righteous and the wicked. We want our desires met because Gods order in society is in our hearts. We each have to rule over the earth. We all individually must overcome all opposition in our desires. We are all gifted with the same purpose. No matter where we are we have a mandate over the whole earth. It starts with our desires working in a fashion of Gods righteous indignation. The defense of Gods purposes is extremely personal to us.  Reply Quote Notify 681  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Have We Been Deceived? on: May 04, 2013, 04:41:12 PM Quote from: Gouda on November 30, 2012, 11:43:13 PM Thor and MBG, those were some really interesting points. MBG, I may be fooling myself, but I don't think I long to control others. Actually, I get most upset with the people I see trying to control others, especially with Bible-beatdowns. I guess that could be said to be the same problem, though, but I think the consequences of me trying to tell people to back off the weak are less than the consequences of shaming and accusing people randomly. Again, maybe they're just the same mistake. I do not know why i did not respond to this Gouda... but control is an issue that is the strongest and deepest for us to give up in a rational way. I believe that the gospel teaches us to give up control so that we have our hearts always reacting to God in the praise of all things. The apostle says that he is not controlled by anything but that he saw all things as a gift from God. So there is a way to get to the point in our lives were we are not controlled by the psychological defects of this anxiety of reacting to things out of fear, sorrow, anxiety, and pain. The gospel is leading us from a very tight room where we feel locked up to a wide open field. God has given us a natural desire to be free. This is part of our desire to survive as long as we can. So our wanting to control our lives is not really a natural desire. In my opinion our wanting to control our own life is from thinking incorrectly and not really sinning because we know exactly the depth of its destruction. God is the only one who has His hand on the control button because He not only controls the renewal of all things but He keeps us from being utterly destroyed at the reality of sins effects. So we sin in a way in order to survive and God honors our weakness. This is like an art form. We all do things in relationships from our personal perspective of how to survive. We all resist each other in some ways in the direction we feel most comfortable with. We all go in directions that are not unified. God teaches us through this weakness that we are not in control. I think God honors our efforts even tho we experience this struggle of wills. God gives us desires so that we will enjoy His recreating us into Christ image. These desires are only dangerous when we begin to believe they are not gifted to us. Because control is our thinking that we obtained these desires through our goodness. So we react to these desires that are not fulfilled with some kind of human neurosis if we feel that we have earned them. God always shows us who He is and in seeing Him then we put these gifted desires in perspective. When we see God then we do not feel the human anxiety in frustration of our own anger. But we get a better understanding of our desires when we have a vision of Gods righteous anger. As I have said that the small room is what we are angry at but the large field is our vision of Gods bigger problems in righting the wrongs. So our learning transparency is arguing on the basis of His purposes for our fulfillment. Which is learning biblical boldness.  His gift to us of seeking the transparency of a gifted desire. I believe all neurosis is a form of self anger. Its being frustrated under the weight of feeling unworthy or neglected. In Gods withdrawal should be a further transparency of our desires but in thinking that God has rejected us we turn the anger upon ourselves.This is why we want to control. Reply Quote Notify 682  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: God's Attitude on: May 04, 2013, 01:34:42 PM Christ has given us the spiritual victory in the grace of the bread and wine. The physical elements are not magical but the experience of the physical taste that gives us the vision of all the powers of this earth coming together in Christ. In this Christ has conquered all of our enemies. Christ has ascended to Heaven as the Lamb upon His throne who is redeeming a people for Himself. The cup is our being in touch with our present battle and experiencing His judgement upon our foes. In grace we experience Christ suffering in the taste of these physical elements. Our physical desire and spiritual desire produce longings to overcome every adversity in this world. We as it were drink and eat pleasure in judgement. It is the highest form of understanding Gods righteous indignation. It is never in the physical elements. But this is not always the experience in this world. We go through being in a kind of exile. This exile is given to us because God in Christ came to the loss sheep of Israel. These sheep were scattered and exiled. Christ came to them outside of the false religious system. This is why that Shepherd that was promised in the OT came under the lowest experience. He came to unburden His church from the false teachers. He came in pure grace. He promised to save the most scattered sheep by taking that yoke off their shoulders. At the same time He pushed the curse away by cursing the leaders. He answered the longings and not the physical act itself. The sheep hear His voice. That voice that takes the cup in a worthy manner. The cup that that does not chain His word and promises to the lectern. Reply Quote Notify 683  Forums / Main Forum / Re: Sin, forgiveness and grace in parenting on: May 04, 2013, 01:08:29 PM Let me discuss this matter of the relationship between feelings and faith. Some people teach that feelings follow our consent to the truth. But we experience feelings as if they are disconnected to what we know intellectually. This is why we are different from God. God is very simple. What He says is accomplished. He gives us promises and the trouble and complications of the reality of the experience of His promises are always our problem. So God has ordered our salvation as He declares that it is in Him alone. The total experience is in God pursuing us. Salvation is compared to a mixed drink. It has all the ingredients of elegant taste and lasting satisfaction. It is experience by us as we drink the contents. Just as the wicked are said to be given a satisfying mixture of worldly pleasure and success in which they drink it down to its very dregs. It is pleasurable to them for a short time and instead of drinking blessing they actually are drinking judgement and destruction. As I have said that our experience is not only in knowing the clear division in this world but its cheering God on in His created reality. Gods salvation is always true. The total reality of it always comes to us in the experience of grace. His salvation cannot fail. We experience it in a confidence that we do not possess in ourselves. We want to know His power, love, understanding that is beyond our ability to live in. Salvation is like war. We have been given all of these spiritual weapons to use and the more we are season in the use of these things the more we will live before God in a transparent way and the more we will be in touch with our renewed feelings. Salvation is living on the high experiences and its ascending to the top as we go down into the valley. Our hate is a gift that in loss we always push the curse away because God grows stronger as we lose strength. God allows us through grief to feel pain to come to Him with anger so that He consumes it in us to create judgement so that He brings in the glorious future kingdom. God turns the bottom experiences in this world upside down. We fight as God consumes our hate. We have been saved to full acceptance in living before the Most High God. The highest authority of this earth is beyond our understanding of justice. It is where God makes all things good for us. We ascend in prayer to experience this goodness that is beyond our present circumstances. This is what the Psalmist describes as looking upon the glory of Christ , having that light shine in our face. This light always reflects the true image of ourselves. It is a supernatural transformation that produces a spiritual understanding in us in which we experience His power that comes up from the deep recesses of our souls. The soul is compared to deep waters. We do not understand this illuminated reality. This experience is like the word of Gods salvation , that message of trust ... that floods our soul. Its experiencing God speaking to our souls of all the effervescence of His goodness going one way. That goodness floods our souls and it gives us eyes to see beyond our troubles.This is what David describes as ascending to the hill to look down on this world. Reply Quote Notify 684  Forums / Main Forum / Re: Distracted By Words on: May 02, 2013, 10:51:35 AM mylife... There is great confusion in the distinction between an image of life as opposed to a mechanical process in how we determine the connection to original powers that we draw from in understanding ourselves. We can reorder our minds to draw from created powers that keep us focused on the proper intention of real pleasure. By intention i am talking about the fundamental trust we have in receiving pleasure. With all of this artificial scientific culture we experience a watered down effect in this divine created communication. All of this personal communication comes to us in the meta physical image of reality. So we are talking about a spiritual communication of opposing images in a direct way in this spiritual language. A simple example would be how we change our physical looks by reconstructive surgery. In receiving the pleasure through feeling older than we look we entertain images of being younger even tho fundamentally we are facing the prospect of having to deal with our process of growing physically weak which is the true meta physical condition in how we know ourselves in Gods purposes in us in this face to face relationship of our true condition. The true communication of persons in the changes we experience in life is how the trust of salvation is made real to us in God communicating to us in our present need. This divine communication comes in the small voice. It is experienced outside of this scientific culture. God does not need man to intervene in this world in our hearing His personal counsel. In order for us to understand how our fundamental needs are met through our souls being satisfied with Gods personal promises we must experience growing down to find Him at the bottom as the only voice of reason to meet our deep need. I do not mean that we are experiencing helplessness from being abandoned but we seek to kill the destruction that is opposing the clear communication of God in satisfying us through this personal language. We experience these temptations in this culture of powers that seem to be the answer but we learn through seeking His face how to remove every hindrance so that we hear Him speak clearly. Reply Quote Notify 685  Forums / Main Forum / Re: Sin, forgiveness and grace in parenting on: May 01, 2013, 08:25:02 PM Vilatalina... God gave us an ability to reorder our mind so that our inner peace could always protect us. God wants us to feel totally safe in our relationships so that anxiety, guilt, fear, and sorrow seem to be behind us. So here is what He did. He chose us before we experienced the catastrophes of our childhood. Because He went beyond our past experience then He decided to over turn our past experience by Him telling us how successful He was in having decided to have a relationship with us from eternity past. What this means is that His re creative abilities are more powerful than our memories. In other words we feel healing in the present by learning that God forgets all of our past sins in His word that speaks to us as a promise. This constant reminder... not only that God has told us but we are reminding God of His promise is the most personal cry to Him to remember us. When we tell God to remember us we are asking Him to help us experience His kindness, love, faithfulness, long suffering, and protection over the hurt that has damaged our souls and left scars. Jesus wants us to feel like He is present with us over our being left to ourselves to feel the pain of our past hurts. So He left us the Psalms because they are all the experiences that a person feels in the soul. In these Psalms He speaks to us as the shepherd of our souls. We experience Jesus as our Physician. Every time He tells us something in the Psalms about Himself ,He is trying to draw near to us. The way He approaches us is through His promises and His telling us to ask for whatever need He tells us that we have when we focus on His counsel. He teaches us self confidence by listening and responding to our passionate cries that He gave us in the Psalms. He acts upon us and in us in inconceivable ways so that we experience a change in our feelings even tho we may not understand it logically.  (Psalm 25) Reply Quote Notify 686  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Is belief a choice? on: May 01, 2013, 07:52:04 PM The gospel is offered as a universal call to believe. But it is not logical to say that we choose something we do not want or think it will benefit us in some way. In the same way it would be disingenuous for God to offer something too hard for any man to accomplish and claim that it is a free offer. So we must look at how God created us. He created us to choose a thing because we are pleased to choose it for ourselves. It is in our best interest to avoid side issues or powers that prevent us from genuinely enjoying the good things that God has given freely so that we in a sense climb a mountain of our own miss understanding ...almost like thinking that God gave us a catch 22 choice as if God could not be good enough to allow us to choose freely according to what we are pleased with. So this matter of understanding choice is very important .. so important it is really tided to the anxiety we feel in miss understanding Gods purpose in our enjoyments. We must apply the gospel mandates to ourselves in a spiritual way. The way of the gospel is precisely dissecting our desires of the flesh with our spiritual desires. These desires are both entirely personal to us. We are in a war of understanding ourselves by learning to enjoy God by our personal desires. Its not that we face a desire that is evil in the sense it does not bring us pleasure while our spiritual desire leads us to spiritual pleasure. Both desires are pleasurable to us. Its that one desire brings lasting pleasure and the other one is fleeting. Our spiritual desire leads us to the ultimate enjoyment of the highest experience of Gods, power , wealth , wisdom and strength, honor, glory and praise. Because we cant earn our spiritual desire. It is created in us according to Gods goodness, faithfulness, kindness, long-suffering and endurance. We cant feel that connection of worth that we accomplished gaining this treasured desire according to our own worth. Its increased value is like we are standing outside of ourselves... kind of like a more complex two dimensional reality..a gift with ongoing illumination that we can always enjoy in word and Spirit. Reply Quote Notify 687  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: God's Attitude on: April 28, 2013, 04:14:27 PM This is correct but sin has not been eradicated. If God looks at events in this world and responds in an angry way then i would suspect He would accept our human response. I would even go so far to say that a human story of redemption or defense of the poor and helpless is an evidence that God is still speaking in the seemingly small things. God is not just in the attitude of our being righteous. I guess in any story that is told by us, God would be the only one who really understood the necessary details and the ultimate reasons for that event. I would think that God who knows the hearts of people reordered the thoughts of the people in the story as He is the reality of all things that are understood. He controls the thoughts of the king as the waters flow down the stream. So God is the only one who can structure our lives to be holistic as he creates in us a new heart to understand ourselves in light of His purposes being worked out in all of the details. God treats us as dust or as weak and feeble sheep needing the most fundamental human ability to accomplish anything. He meets us in the most transparent place. As we learn how important our lives are then we are able to respond to Him according to our real need. The more God comes down in our skin the more all things from our view will be put in order and symmetry. God not only saves us to have an attitude of righteousness but He reorders our thoughts so that our souls are put in symmetry and we respond from being dulled in our anxious lust. God shows the greatest concern for our welfare as being responsible for the quality of our lives in order for us to feel safe in this world. God is not in the business of looking at our goodness but He goes farther and destroys the destruction in our lives. God actually loves us more than He describes love through the condescending law. Reply Quote Notify 688  Forums / Main Forum / Re: Hating your sin.. on: April 28, 2013, 02:46:55 PM We must fight to see all this powers on this earth as good and evil. Jesus said that His yoke was easy and burden was lite. This means that Gods view of things as black and white is our mysterious power over all other powers on this earth.  The apostle encourages us to sing Psalms. Because the Psalms are the spiritual advantage for us to be protected from thinking that we are able in ourselves to change things. They reduce reality to God allowing and we are able. The word is the only healthy application to life because it deals with life in a circumspect way. He says without me you can do nothing. So the healthy boundaries in our lives are created rather than performed. This is why there are only two powers that we face in this life. These powers are destruction or renewal. The destructive powers are Gods curses because of sin. God has no evil. He does not really destroy. God must punish evil. The only reason that God responds to sin the way He does is to reverse it. Sin is the destructive force of the curse. God does not need to add a positive destruction to sin. Man curses himself. If he goes his own way then he cannot avoid going in the way of destruction. This is why we shun destruction by cursing the curse. We create allowing by word and Spirit. Reply Quote Notify 689  Forums / Main Forum / Re: Hating your sin.. on: April 28, 2013, 02:24:09 PM God does not withhold forgiveness when we have a problem forgiving others. God initiates forgiveness through grace alone. We never are able to measure up to Gods standard of forgiveness in the first place. God grants us everything that pertains to godliness through His kindness to us according to His faithfulness to perform in us all that He ask us to do. But we are not burdened to approach Him on the basis of our obedience but we always come as we are trying to open up to Him in a more transparent way. Faith in its purist form is we have a need and He answers it. God wants us to always be in a frame of mind to seek His favor. Because He has provided the stability of the relationship in His promise to give us what we ask for. This is why He buttresses our strength with His reminder that He has removed our sins as far as the east is from the west. At the same time He signs His covenant to us in His blood which the value of that price is His protecting us according to His justice. This covenant of love is what He gives us in place of our tendency to have a long term memory of our sins that He has forgotten. So He shows us by describing His love as going out from the east and the west. That is... He loves us with an eternal love. All of Gods attributes are compared to us from our view of the lesser things in this world to the greater things. When we look up to the heavens it shows us the spacious freedom of the things of God that are not built into the system of checks and balances of this earth. God leads us to the open spaces so that we feel free not encumbered by the weight of this world. This vision is how we understand Gods free grace coming to us according to His love. When we get a vision of Gods free choice then we expand our awareness of His free forgiveness. This is looking on the glory of Christ. It is being lifted above ourselves. Or its described as being raised into the freedom of the open sky above the finite distance of this earth. On day we will actually enter into the third heaven in a physical way. Reply Quote Notify 690  Forums / Theology Forum / Re: Is belief a choice? on: April 25, 2013, 11:54:03 AM I agree 2 8 and 9 are referring back to the whole gift of salvation. We are always thinking that our belief secures our salvation. But our christian experience is looking back and examining this great gift that brings us into relationship to people and life that gives us a satisfaction of the resting in the greatness of God and not these things and the people we interact with. So we learn to lean on Christ for all of our needs and trust that He is working out our salvation for our good. This is why we have the end of our faith as Christ leads us along by His promises. So we are always encouraged to look beyond this world to hope in receiving our final grace in which there will be no more tears, sorrow and pain. We will be restored to the strength of our youth. The direction of suffering and pain that is the end of this world will be changed in an instant. So we go away to think and meditate upon the things of the next world. There is so much experience in His gifting us with the pleasures of being illuminated by His word that there is not enough time in this life to enjoy all of these times when we imagine what it will be like. Faith really is our living in the realities of another world through Christ illuminating us to go beyond our present experience.