There you are. I forgot what thread you were on.Still coming back?
Let's do this one chunk at a time, to see if we can move forward with any agreement.
But also, let's establish a base line: Do you believe if any man is sinning with the devil, that he is also a born son of God and saved by grace?
I say no: no one while fornicating will awake in the presence of the Lord, if they die bodily while fornicating.
We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with the Lord.
The most simply stated, we neither caused ourselves to be born of our natural parents, nor did we cause ourselves to be born from God. And in that same way, just as we cannot cause ourselves to be somehow "unborn" from our parents, neither can we cause ourselves to be "unborn" from God. We just aren't capable of such things. Having been born, we exist, that's that.
The problem here is comparing natural things to spiritual, so as to cause spiritual things to be conformed to the natural.
The parables only show a shadowy figure of the spiritual things of God, even as creation shows the handiwork of God, but they are not exact representations of the spiritual.
The natural parable of the sower of seed is imperfect pertaining to the spirit of man, because while natural ground has no will nor say about any seed planted, the spiritual soul of man does have something to say and do about it: whether to receive and obey it unto life, or to reject it unto death.
'Causing ourselves' is simply by our own will and power, which is not how we are born of God.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:
Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
However, that does not mean we have nothing to do with being born of God, and nothing to do to be born of God. When we hear His voice, we must be the ones to repent and open the door to receive Him. We open the door by obeying His voice knocking: we do so by repenting of lusting to sin and obey Him in a pure heart.
Until we are obeying Him, He cannot enter, because the door is still closed to Him by the hearer only: they believe He is knocking and He is God, but they are not obeying and doing His word, which begins within the heart first to purify and purge ourselves of all lust and unrighteous thoughts for sinning.
Purifying our heart for His name's sake, is opening our door to Him, That is our part that we have power to do with Him.
His part was His cross and resurrection; whereby He could knock on doors of hearts with power to save and purge clean.
Jesus calls this the first works of the believer that is justified by Him:
Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.
Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.
Natural man only sees obedient or sinful works with the body, but obedience or sinning against God begins within the soul and spirit of man, whether purifying our hearts in righteous obedience unto life, or lusting for sin and death to God.
What you say we are not able to do naturally, to be born or unborn of earthly mothers, is true, but is not true in the spiritual kingdom, where we choose to be born or unborn of God by obeying or sinning against Him, beginning within the heart and finishing it with the flesh.
But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
This is why we are being saved by faith, while being justified by works: the justification by Christ is the finishing work of faith in Jesus:
Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar? Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?
We believe it is He at the door, and open the door to receive Him by obeying His voice:
Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also.
By dead faith alone, people seek to open the door to Jesus, while also enjoying the pleasures of lusting and sinning, but their delusion is that He has entered by grace anyway.
Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
He did on His cross what we could not do, but now must we do what we can and must do only our own cross: crucify the old man of lust from our hearts.
Having no part in being born of God is for hearers only, not for doers of the word.
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