Marvelloustime
Well-Known Member
How right brother is.
“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;”
2 Thessalonians 2:3 KJV
The eternal gospel (everlasting gospel)
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“Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition;”
2 Thessalonians 2:3 KJV
There are a LOT of questions to be asked.
One of them is whether or not "Lucifer" has place as a proper name. Personally I think the idea that "Lucifer" = Satan is tradition and not Scripture.
You ask, is Lucifer just a man? I ask, is "Lucifer" anyone at all? Satan, yes.
Isaiah 14:16 KJV
They that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider thee, saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble, that did shake kingdoms;
Is this verse true on it's face value, that those who see this one recognize him as a man?
Concerning Ezekiel 28, this is a very different sort of passage at least to me. There is some interesting grammar and types of statements absent from Isaiah 14.
Ezekiel prophesies to both prince, and the king of Tyre, interestingly. When he starts for the king, that's when it changes. In this passage, there is much personal identification that does not fit a man, while Isaiah 14 lacks those features also.
So these are some of the things I look at.
Much love!
I think it's a good discussion, I don't want to derail anything either. For me, all is answered in the finished work of Christ. Otherwise we're talking about the individual renewing of the mind, discipleship, which all believers receive from God regardless of the time they live in, how close it is to the end of the age.
We can do a new thread if you want to get more into this.
Much love!
Not according to my poor understanding of dispensationalism. A friend and brother in the Lord who was a seminary student at the time, and a huge fan of John MacArthur went to some effort to produce a study on the subject, but I dismissed it out of mind as it made no real sense to me. We see God's grace delivered through faith in His word from the fall of Adam and Eve straight through to His second coming and into the millennial kingdom.
I don't mean to trample on your understanding, but I was blessed to be saved in ignorance of denominational divisions, and I can't say that these divisions were ever righteous. Yet the Lord is not thwarted by our misunderstandings and error, but glorified by the fact that He saves us in spite of them. Isn't that wonderful?
God bless you brother. I just took a break from splitting wood, but I need to get more done so, via con dios amigo y Hasta la vista.
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No worries! "Dispensationalism", as a concept, has, I think, a lot of baggage being lugged around with it.
Nothing to do with denominations. Myself, I was saved through the teaching I'd received as a very young child, when later, as a young adult, I came to realize those things were true.
Dispensation comes from Paul's use of oikonomia, the "house law", which refers to the ways and means by which the household provides for the needs of it's members. Our word "economy" comes from this word.
If we think of the world as our household, and we the members, our most fundamental and profound need is to be revived in reconciliation to our Creator. Dispensation was chosen as a translation in the idea of "to dispense", it is a despensation, that is, the house law providing for the household.
It becomes it's own sort of doctrine in realizing that the reason Paul speaks of this dispensation is that there are variations in the ways and means by which God provides for our reconciliation and life with Him.
As you had said, and the same as in Romans 8, we don't hope for that which we see, or your words, we don't have faith in Him when we see Him, I think was how you put it. I completely agree with you here. The fact that Jesus is Personally in Jerusalem ruling mankind does change things. Before that time, we are told to trust Him, and, the just shall live by faith. Then, the command is to keep the commandments. Isaiah talks about the sinner will be the one to die young, only 100 years old!
Before Jesus came, God's way of giving grace and salvation to mankind was focused on Israel, being a covenant of commandments which if kept gave blessing, and if not, cursing. Other peoples, all we know, I think, is that God wasn't shy of communicating personally with other people, and interacting with them as groups, and faily openly.
In Christ the temporary reconciliation given by the animal sacrifice was replaced with the permanent reconciliation through Jesus' offering of His body to death. This is the change in the dispensation.
When we say, faith will be superceded by obedience when Jesus comes and rules, then this is the change in the dispensation, or, how God goes about providing for the needs of His people.
It's always wrapped around faith. Abraham is held as the example of faith, and the father of all we who believe. What did he believe? God came to him and told him he would have innumerable children, more so than the stars in the sky. Abraham believed God, and that believing, God saw that, and justified Abraham, that is, rendered him righteous. Abraham believed God, and God accounted it to him for righteousness. His faith was in God, that God's message to him was true, but that message was different than the message we receive from God today, to believe in Jesus, to receive Him. That He was The One sent to die for us, that in Him we have life.
Hopefully this gives a more clear idea of what I mean as I'm talking about dispensations.
Much love!
Thank you, a perfect passage that speaks to the purposes of such a study. It's unfortunate that some people are more afraid of being deceived and somehow loosing their salvation, than the blessing of growing in Christ. Many are even afraid of His return, which is really very sad when you think about it.
I don't really have a problem with anything that you're saying, I just dont like theological terms that are popularly used to label a brother or sister in the Lord, in order to justify ignoring what they have to say. I consider that willful sin and disobedience to God. I know a few people, at least a few, that will be grinding their teeth at that statement, but it's far easier to recognize sin in others than in one's self. I had a pastor at grace tabernacle that confided in me that he could see everyone's sin in that congregation, but couldn't say a word about it. I'm assuming that he meant hidden and unrecognized sin, not gross and obvious sin on display.
Amen sister! Something lacking too often around here!
The scripture tells us.
6 And I heard, as it were, the voice of a great multitude, as the sound of many waters and as the sound of mighty thunderings, saying, “Alleluia! For the Lord God Omnipotent reigns! 7 Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.” 8 And to her it was granted to be arrayed in fine linen, clean and bright, for the fine linen is the righteous acts of the saints. Revelation 19:6-8
I hope this helps, brother. Some Christian's use justification by faith as an excuse to stay in the pews and this thing we're doing here and now, just working out our understanding, is a pretty flimsy wedding gown.
Uh, that falling away started a long time ago. I was a child in the RCC from 1956 until I walked away from that church in 1969 at the age of 13 and shortly after my confirmation. I most definitely was not the only one as nearly half of the bible believing churches that I've worshipped with were former Catholics and that doesn't include people like my brothers who just walked away from Christianity and never looked back. Lots of congregational buildings have closed their doors forever for insufficient funding to keep them open, while false gospels have filled churches like Joel Osteen's and lined their pastors ' pockets with lots of hard cash. This sort of thing has happened before, but never to the extent that we see it now.
That's kind of how I feel about when someone dismisses what I see as very valid doctrine, "that's dispensationism!" as the label makes it wrong.
I like to stay with Biblical terminology as much as I can, holding to the original language meanings.
I've learned that there are so many variations to pretty much any doctrine, when someone names something, I know I need to explore a little to make sure I know what they mean.
Much love!
I appreciate your sentiment!
:)
We are to work out our salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God Who works in us both to will and do what pleases Him. I make no mistake that we are created to walk in good works, specific works which God ordains, not ourselves.
Just the same, in my Bible reading, I see that God had wed to Israel, then divorced her, and has promised to re-wed her. Jesus told Israel, you will not see Me again until you say, blessed is He Who comes in the Name of the LORD. When the time is right, when the bride has made herself ready, Jesus will come, and many will come from the east and west and north and south to the wedding feast of the Lamb, as God again marries Israel.
This in no wise diminishes us, as we are His body, flesh of His flesh, bone of His bone. But staying with what the Bible says, that's what I'm seeing it say.
Much love!
Clothed in Christ is hardly flimsy I think!
Just the same, we are justified by faith, being recreated to do good works, and there is no better life in the world than doing those works, the life God ordained that we would walk in.
Much love!
You're very wise my friend and I'm very pleased to call you brother. My friend Jerome liked the expression "My brother from another mother". That always worked for me.
I think that I see what you're saying, but does Christ have 2 brides? Or is the church and Israel one bride?
This source of prior arguments is part of what led to "replacement " theology and the doctrinal error concerning the "rapture". Its also part of what divides congregations of Christian Jews from Christian gentiles.
Rather than asking these sorts of questions, what are the Scriptures which inform these ideas, and what specifically do they say?
Much love!
When I say flimsy you might compare it to what James said about faith without works. Jesus told his disciples at that well in Samaria, that He had other food to eat, the works of God. That's solid food, the meat of the word, which we do by faith. I've heard "mother" Theresa put down because she was a devout Roman Catholic, and by her own admission was unsure about her doctrine. Yet, she was a godly woman who has a strong testimony of righteous works, even without any true understanding of the gospel. Weren't those works a more powerful testimony than most of us give lip service to?
Nothing comes to mind at the moment, but I'm sitting in my underwear, waiting to take a shower and make something to eat for dinner (I had a granola bar for lunch and I'm pretty large, 289 at my last check) , so maybe someone else has an answer. My alerts for the day are getting a bit long to follow ( the new ones are highlighted, but the highlighting disappears as soon as I respond to one and I keep rereading the same posts over and over again. That's part of the reason I started part 2 of this study as a continuation. Maybe I should switch to a computer instead of using a tablet. The errors it introduces with word fill, spell check, and pointos (like typos on a keyboard) are both frustrating and time consuming. Thanks though for the comment. This is also something very helpful to understand.
BTW, I'm trying to guide the study, not teach it. The best bible studies that I've been part of were guided, and contributions that help our understanding also bring us closer to like mindedness.
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That was my intent with the question.
I know a number of passages that speak to this, but rather than just list them, I thought I'd do that instead.
Much love!
Unsaved people can do very righteous seeming works, but that doesn't mean they are works of faith.
Mother Theresa, by her own admission, and rather late in life, expressed she didn't have any sort of real knowledge of or relationship to God. By her own testimony, she didn't know him.
Very sad!!
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