How does God lead?

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Dave L

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I think many imagine God talking to them in their own voice and words. And then acting on it find themselves fraught with questions when imaginations never play out as expected.

In Acts prophets warned of famine and persecution, and believers took action. But most of the prophecies today prove false. It is because God now frames our thoughts and actions through scripture, not available to the New Covenant church until written, collected, copied and circulated in the late apostolic era.

So how do we know what to do according to scripture, when we come to a fork in the road? From scripture we know love always chooses the right course. So when love motivates our choices, we can rest assured it was the right choice.

Scripture also warns us to avoid certain traps. And with further understanding, we grow keen to the witness of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. We find peace moving in certain directions, and alarm or heaviness moving in other directions.

Faith, when understood as being a fruit of the Holy Spirit also directs our path. If we have faith when we pray, we know the answer is on the way and we move in ways that expect its fulfillment. When faith is not present in certain matters, we know not to look any further in that direction.

Peter said scripture gives us a more sure word of prophecy than God directly speaking to us (2 Peter 1:17–21). In that scripture is not of private interpretation, where vocal proclamations were.
 

Episkopos

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I think many imagine God talking to them in their own voice and words. And then acting on it find themselves fraught with questions when imaginations never play out as expected.

In Acts prophets warned of famine and persecution, and believers took action. But most of the prophecies today prove false. It is because God now frames our thoughts and actions through scripture, not available to the New Covenant church until written, collected, copied and circulated in the late apostolic era.

So how do we know what to do according to scripture, when we come to a fork in the road? From scripture we know love always chooses the right course. So when love motivates our choices, we can rest assured it was the right choice.

Your premise here is flawed. In the bible, the Holy Spirit speaks to people outwardly as well as inwardly.

He still does that.

what people lack today is spiritual experience, spiritual understanding and spiritual life. The bible testifies to these...not replaces them. So then it behooves those who want to follow after Christ that they should seek the deeper things of God and to actually KNOW Him and not just about Him.

This idea of love, in our own understanding of this, knowing the way is ok for natural things. But not for eternal things whereby one acts by the righteousness of God.

Was it love to kill Ananias and Sapphira? Who is going to discern what love is in the eternal sense by human understanding?
Faith, when understood as being a fruit of the Holy Spirit also directs our path. If we have faith when we pray, we know the answer is on the way and we move in ways that expect its fulfillment. When faith is not present in certain matters, we know not to look any further in that direction.

Peter said scripture gives us a more sure word of prophecy than God directly speaking to us (2 Peter 1:17–21). In that scripture is not of private interpretation, where vocal proclamations were.

Again, flawed reasoning. Peter is not saying what you think He is. The problem is when we ONLY have the bible...without the words from God. THEN it is ONLY by private interpretation.

So then your reasoning is exactly backwards.

There is a famine in the land today...of hearing from God directly...not of bibles and human interpretations.

Your post is a prime example of this famine.

The NT is a series of testimonies of God's DIRECT interventions in this world. We should be seeking for more of the same in our time.
 
D

Dave L

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Your premise here is flawed. In the bible, the Holy Spirit speaks to people outwardly as well as inwardly.

He still does that.

what people lack today is spiritual experience, spiritual understanding and spiritual life. The bible testifies to these...not replaces them. So then it behooves those who want to follow after Christ that they should seek the deeper things of God and to actually KNOW Him and not just about Him.

This idea of love, in our own understanding of this, knowing the way is ok for natural things. But not for eternal things whereby one acts by the righteousness of God.

Was it love to kill Ananias and Sapphira? Who is going to discern what love is in the eternal sense by human understanding?


Again, flawed reasoning. Peter is not saying what you think He is. The problem is when we ONLY have the bible...without the words from God. THEN it is ONLY by private interpretation.

So then your reasoning is exactly backwards.

There is a famine in the land today...of hearing from God directly...not of bibles and human interpretations.

Your post is a prime example of this famine.

The NT is a series of testimonies of God's DIRECT interventions in this world. We should be seeking for more of the same in our time.
Scripture doesn't support your claims. Tongues, Prophecy, and Word of Knowledge all expired with the Apostles who administered these gifts. God moves us inwardly by love and the witness of the Spirit. Also through the presence or absence of faith. But never apart from scripture since the close of the apostolic age.
 

Episkopos

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Scripture doesn't support your claims. Tongues, Prophecy, and Word of Knowledge all expired with the Apostles who administered these gifts. God moves us inwardly by love and the witness of the Spirit. Also through the presence or absence of faith. But never apart from scripture since the close of the apostolic age.


So then in your view all spiritual powers and experiences are evil since the bible was published?
 
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Dave L

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So then in your view all spiritual powers and experiences are evil since the bible was published?
No, just the signs and wonders that confirmed the Apostles' authority expired with them. Along with the charismatic gifts that came only through their hands after the two outpourings. Scripture replaced tongues, prophecy and word of knowledge. God still heals through the prayer of faith and we still have ministry gifts.
 

Episkopos

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No, just the signs and wonders that confirmed the Apostles' authority expired with them. Along with the charismatic gifts that came only through their hands after the two outpourings. Scripture replaced tongues, prophecy and word of knowledge. God still heals through the prayer of faith and we still have ministry gifts.


Again humility would say...I have not yet experienced these things for myself yet...

A lack of spiritual experience is a sign of the times. This doesn't mean that intimacy with God is no longer possible.
 
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Dave L

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Again humility would say...I have not yet experienced these things for myself yet...

A lack of spiritual experience is a sign of the times. This doesn't mean that intimacy with God is no longer possible.
If scripture does not confirm your experience, it is bogus.
 
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Dave L

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But you just said that scriptures negated spiritual experience. Will you say what you mean? Are all spiritual connections today evil?
Jesus said his words are Spirit and they are life. And faith comes by hearing the Word. Vibes will not cut it.
 

Episkopos

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Jesus said his words are Spirit and they are life. And faith comes by hearing the Word. Vibes will not cut it.


But you are missing a whole dimension of understanding here. The word of God is meant to convey us into a spiritual realm so as to walk in the same power Jesus did.

Paul says...that I might KNOW the power of His resurrection...and not...that I might read the bible that has no power in it.
 
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Dave L

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But you are missing a whole dimension of understanding here. The word of God is meant to convey us into a spiritual realm so as to walk in the same power Jesus did.

Paul says...that I might KNOW the power of His resurrection...and not...that I might read the bible that has no power in it.
No scripture = no faith = theory only.
 
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Dave L

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Do you always need chapter and verse?

Philippians 3:10 I want to know Christ-yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,

Is this for now...or only after death?

Are you the final arbiter of the things of God?
How does this prove special vibes and voices?
 

Episkopos

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How does this prove special vibes and voices?


I can find any person walking by on the street and he or she will be as you are according to the apprehension of the reality of the biblical account. You are espousing unbelief in the power of God. That's all you are doing. We are to turn away from those who appear to speak of godly things but deny the power of it.
 
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Dave L

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I can find any person walking by on the street and he or she will be as you are according to the apprehension of the reality of the biblical account. You are espousing unbelief in the power of God. That's all you are doing. We are to turn away from those who appear to speak of godly things but deny the power of it.
But, scripture is the source of faith, and you float vibes and "voices" in place of it. Who's denying the power here?
 

Episkopos

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But, scripture is the source of faith, and you float vibes and "voices" in place of it. Who's denying the power here?


The bible doesn't have power. God does. Your religious inclinations are taking you from a living encounter with God. Read what is happening in the bible. THAT is the normal walk of a Christian. Obeying God's instructions...and having miracles follow.

Paul testifies to the Holy Spirit speaking to him personally and also in the gathering together.

That is in the bible...what the bible testifies of...and what we are to experience for ourselves...by faith.
 
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ScottA

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I think many imagine God talking to them in their own voice and words. And then acting on it find themselves fraught with questions when imaginations never play out as expected.

In Acts prophets warned of famine and persecution, and believers took action. But most of the prophecies today prove false. It is because God now frames our thoughts and actions through scripture, not available to the New Covenant church until written, collected, copied and circulated in the late apostolic era.

So how do we know what to do according to scripture, when we come to a fork in the road? From scripture we know love always chooses the right course. So when love motivates our choices, we can rest assured it was the right choice.

Scripture also warns us to avoid certain traps. And with further understanding, we grow keen to the witness of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. We find peace moving in certain directions, and alarm or heaviness moving in other directions.

Faith, when understood as being a fruit of the Holy Spirit also directs our path. If we have faith when we pray, we know the answer is on the way and we move in ways that expect its fulfillment. When faith is not present in certain matters, we know not to look any further in that direction.

Peter said scripture gives us a more sure word of prophecy than God directly speaking to us (2 Peter 1:17–21). In that scripture is not of private interpretation, where vocal proclamations were.
It is clear you have the wrong idea about the scriptures.

Yes, Peter gave credit to God for the voice of Christ the Word. But Jesus, though He referred to the scriptures many times, made clarification that His "words are spirit"...which many now and as it was then, will not hear, referring back to the scriptures, rather than to the very voice of Him who inspired their writing.

Which is greater?

But whether by the scriptures or by discernment of the spirit of God, either way, what is written was not to be the end of the matter. The end of the matter is written also, and so there should be no room for debate: In the end what was once written by the scribes on parchment is made complete by God Himself writing them on our hearts, not with ink, but with His own hand...which is spirit.

So, we have heard and read it from the prophets, from the mouth of Christ, and also from the apostle Paul, the apostle for these times of the gentiles wherein God has promised to pour out His spirit upon all flesh.

The question that all should be asking, is: Who are these who refuse to go along with the great plan of God to finish in the spirit, what He has begun in the flesh, just as it is written? And who are these who hear their voices, instead of His?

This too is written.
 
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ScottA

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Tongues, Prophecy, and Word of Knowledge all expired with the Apostles who administered these gifts. God moves us inwardly by love and the witness of the Spirit. Also through the presence or absence of faith. But never apart from scripture since the close of the apostolic age.
No.

Now you have spoke against the scriptures yourself, which say, "But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all: for to one is given the same Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another discerning of spirits, to another different kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. But one and the same Spirit works all these things, as He wills."
 

amadeus

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No, the scripture is not the source of faith.

"Which is greater the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift?"
Indeed… "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." Rom 10:17

The "hearing" is that of the spiritual ears a person has when he has the Holy Spirit within. Then by that "Hearing" when he reads or hears the scriptures read, the Holy Spirit is able to bring those words to Life so that then they are the Word of God.
 
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