You ignore any Scripture that contradicts your idiotic theology. Therefore it's a waste of time trying to reason with you. Your theology is dishonest and vacuous.
The myth of grace-only & easy-believism shattered forever
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marksman
My eldest granddaughter showing the result of her
Who knows and who cares. I only focus on what he implies and that can be quite spiteful and sarcastic.
Be honest. He said we All sin, so your accusation is based on prejudice, not fact.
CharismaticLady
Well-Known Member
For me in my marriage to an abusive man, and I saw a kind man loving his wife, God taught me to shake my head real fast back and forth, rattling my brains, and not look back. The image was gone. When I did what He said, I never had to dwell on it. Temptations come our way, but it is the dwelling on it that leads to sin.
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CharismaticLady
Well-Known Member
Ever since Adam sinned, every person born thereafter was born with a carnal nature bent toward sin and selfishness. That is all that is meant by all sin and fall short of the glory of God. It is a teaching between how we were under to law of Moses in the Old Covenant, and the freedom from sin through being born again of the Spirit in the New Covenant. Only through Jesus did He take mankind from sinner to child of God. We are not both.
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CharismaticLady
Well-Known Member
No apostle taught that Children of God "all sin." "Jesus was manifest to take away our sin, and in Him is no sin."
Don't forget the parable of the wheat and tares. Jesus said to let them grow together lest you pull out the wheat with the tares. So when Paul admonishes a congregation he is talking to the tares among them, not to the wheat.
marksman
My eldest granddaughter showing the result of her
I have to say a simple thing, which actually sits at the heart of God and His law, love.
Love is something we hide and protect in our hearts, it is most dear to us, and makes us both vulnerable and beautiful.
To defend this as babies and children we learn to hide the love, to protect ourselves, to defend what we really care about. So love is just an emotion that passes, a distraction to meeting our needs, over romantic sentiments, facts and truth matter more.
So in a bible study I am with good believing people and their response is "no love is not the most important thing." And then one looks at the cross, at the cost of pain, hurt, lashing out, defending our property, our family, our cares against the world who are those horrendously evil people over there who deserve to die, if only we could get our hands on them, and then we would be safe.
Letting go of the defences, laying it all down, because Jesus loves us. God the Lord of all loves us. There is no winning we need to do, we have won. There is no defence that is needed, rip all we are apart, He loves us. This place, this ultimate founding reality makes everything else slot into place.
Now imagine I am in this place. And another brother in the Lord wants to get me to admit my sin, my hypocrisy, my denying my failures and repent and admit it is all Jesus and not me. This is gibberish, a bound, defeated sinner desperately trying to justify their defence against the Holy Spirit and ultimate reality in Jesus. And when our defences are down, everything else is a service, a giving, a reflection of what Jesus has done in us and love, His love, His reality reaching out to others.
And what will I get? Nice words, but where did you get this from. I do not buy it. You are a legalist deceiver lying and trying to doom me to working to earn my salvation. But that is Jesus, open, loving, giving, not judging, taking people as they are and letting them know they can be true to their cleansed, purified and healed selves, and find life in Him. God bless you
"those who claim they are not under law"
A common theme people use is the one above. I am not under law. Emotionally what they mean is when they read scripture and they feel convicted of sin, it is satan convicting them and not God, so they do not need to repent or resolve the issues. How dare scripture and the Holy Spirit convict them of sin, when God has forgiven them already of the continual sin they are committing.
Now anyone who is caught in this cycle needs to face up to reality. Just repent, set your heart on God, love, and His ways, and your burden will disappear. All the self condemnation over speed limits, over being rude, of others being upset, of not being acceptable to yourself, your family, your work etc. does not matter, Jesus loves you, and lays a simple path before you. Get real, and learn His ways, and listen to Him.
I care zero about what other people think, I care 100% what God thinks. I desire that I can bless and encourage others in love and truth, to find the healer of healers, the King of Kings, the lover of our souls. It is this hierarchy that matters. Gods laws and boundaries are to stop us harming ourselves and others, for our benefit, not His. It is not a burden, it is for us, and for our eternal future, because that is how things are, fixed, unmovable yet with infinite variation and ability to express. But to begin to see this, you have to meditate on His word, on His laws, on what in us matters and how we work. The superficial emotionally self justifying sinners will always grasp at what is easy and calms the tumult within, without working it through. But Jesus declares we have to die and be reborn, new creations, rebuilt on Him and His ways, and then we will see.
I say these words now, as an old man, a life time to begin to understand the wisdom of God, because until it becomes true in ones heart it sounds just like theory. Emotional foundations, faithfulness, truth found in who we are in Jesus, immovable in His love. Amen
mailmandan
Well-Known Member
Do you believe that we are worthy "in of ourselves" to receive salvation? Do you also believe that we are righteous "in of ourselves?" In Luke 20:35, we read - but those who are considered/counted/accounted worthy to attain to that age and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage. Just as in Romans 4:5-6, we read that faith is counted/accounted for/credited as righteousness and God imputes/credits/reckons righteousness "apart from works" so we are not righteous "in of ourselves." Does Romans 3:10-12, 23 spell worthy and righteous "in of ourselves" to you? Take away the blood of Christ/death, burial and resurrection of Christ and then name one person who is worthy "in of themselves" to receive salvation apart from Christ.
BreadOfLife
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BreadOfLife
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WRONG.
JESUS taught it, James taught it, Paul taught it and John taught it.
Matt. 6:12
"and forgive us our trespasses, as we have forgive those who sin trespass against us."
This is a DAILY form of prayer that Jesus taught to His followers.
James 5:16
Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
James is writing to born-again believers here.
Rom. 7:21-25
So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.
Paul is lamenting the fact that although He is a follower of Christ - He STILL struggles with sin in his life.
This is not some "past" event - but an ONGOING struggle.
1 John 1:8
"If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is NOT in us."
John includes HIMSELF here as he uses the term "US" instead of "YOU". This is written to born-again believers.
As Christians, we STILL struggle with sin because of our fallen nature.
HOWEVER, we have a way OUT through Christ.
YOU and ALL of the others here who claim that they are no longer capable of sinning are trapped in your own hypocrisy . . ,
Eternally Grateful
Well-Known Member
why does an athlete strive to be in shape. why does an Olympian runner strive all year to run the race
To earn the reward
Salvation is not a reward. it is a gift. So I do not stive to save myself
But I do as paul said Continue to strive to run the race.. to "work out" the salvation that God has given me
I re-iterate I do not think you understand what bearing fruit is. so it is easy to see why you do not understand
Eternally Grateful
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"If we claim to be without sin" is an interesting phrase.
If we say Jesus has forgiven us of our sins, cleansed and purified us, as a new creation, are we to say we are still in sin, ie the cleansing has not worked? If I hold Jesus to His word, that I am clean, completely and literally, then I could say at that point I am without sin.
So how then could I resolve the point John is making. If I claim I have no sin from birth in my life, or without the potential for sin, ie sinless perfectionism, I am perfect and can never sin for the rest of my life. Now this summarises the problem with summaried statements. Those who believe will be saved. "Believe" is a generic term, equally "saved" is a generic term which in the context of christian faith actually has some very specific definitions, but some will take the words as meaning a totally open ended approach, belief at any point in ones life, that Jesus is God and took our sins upon the cross forgiving us and making us righteous in his righteousness. This idea is actually quite complex and has many stages, which complicates the term belief, because belief could miss a few out, and invalidate the belief promise.
On the other hand if belief means full immersion into Jesus at every level possible, with our whole hearts, it is actually quite descriptive, that this kind of belief means we are saved. At full immersion into Jesus where is the argument of failure or a bad walk or a failed understanding.
This for instance is Peters argument of being assured ones calling is true, but putting on brotherly love etc.
The flip side of the argument in being Holy, which is our calling. We are called to be Holy in all we do, literally. If we were still contaminated and defiled by sin, how would this be possible. So no matter how unlikely it feels, God regards us as Holy. And it is this mystery we need to explore, for God speaks the truth.
I am interested in three concepts - free gift, reward, works.
God says those who believe will be saved. Paul says those who confess.
saved - his spirit saved on the day of the Lord (future), he himself will be saved (future), who are being saved (on going), For in this hope we were saved (past), you will be saved(future), you have been saved (past), you will be saved(future)
Salvation is a past, present and future reality.
who has saved us and called us to a holy life
2 Tim 1:9
Our salvation is conditional on a holy life. So our being saved from death is real, but can stop if we do not live the holy life, and can equally be stopped if we are not saved from the second death.
Now this seems to create a problem for those who have a one off event, and that this is all concrete and certain.
Our works do not earn this salvation, but our faith is counted as earning it, except our faith is a gift from God.
So where are we, except accepting the gift of faith, which leads to salvation, which leads to the holy walk which leads to no second death.
Language of works, reward, gift only summarise some of the realities, which possibly is our problem, we cannot describe this fully, rather we can just take the next step in front of us.
Our understanding is always limited, but letting His word abide in us, makes it clearer to us as we walk on, Amen.
BreadOfLife
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Eternally Grateful
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BreadOfLife
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When we come to Christ and are Baptized - our sin is washed away (Acts 2:38). This is NOT a guarantee that you will never sin again - NOT does it forgive all of your FUTURE sins. We STILL need to repent and ask for forgiveness when we stumble.
Matt. 6:12, James 5:16, Rom. 7:21-25, and 1 John 1:8 ALL point to the fact that we will continue to struggle with sin. The entire message of the Gospel is that, as followers of Christ - we now have a way OUT because of what He did on Calvary.
The idea that Christians cannot sin is an arrogant position that has NO place in Scripture or in the teachings of the historic Christian faith.
We are in constant need of God's grace and mercy until the day we die.
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