Competing in the Games

[Episkopos]

ok well imo lets not forget that it is the perceived losers, the poor in spirit, etc who get the gold ok.

Agreed. The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the strong. It is by trusting and waiting on the Lord.

 

[Waiting on him]

So it's a generational race. Pitting one generation against the other...and all this to please God or be pleasing to Him. We are competing for favour from the Lord.

See this is where we always part ways you run for self.

 

[Episkopos]

See this is where we always part ways you run for self.

I run for God. To please Him. Who are you living to please? Do you think Jesus came to earth to please you...so you would accept Him? Is this not the American middle class Jesus appealing to rich Westerners...and that kind of self-serving gospel?

So you are seeing this backwards.

 

[Waiting on him]

I run for God. To please Him. Who are you living to please? Do you think Jesus came to earth to please you...so you would accept Him? Is this not the American middle class Jesus appealing to rich Westerners...and that kind of self-serving gospel?

So you are seeing this backwards.

Not what I’m seeing at all.

 

[marks]

We are competing for favour from the Lord.

You have a very small God.

 

[Waiting on him]

Acts 20:29 KJV
[29] For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock.


Tecarta Bible

 

[Episkopos]

Acts 20:29 KJV
[29] For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock.


Tecarta Bible

That's for sure! Wolves in sheep's clothing...denying Christ and taking souls away from the race.

 

[Waiting on him]

That's for sure! Wolves in sheep's clothing...denying Christ and taking souls away from the race.

Now that wasn’t very nice. What I’m saying is the spirit of Antichrist is all around us, scripture affirms this.

 

[Episkopos]

Now that wasn’t very nice. What I’m saying is the spirit of Antichrist is all around us, scripture affirms this.

But can you discern it? And what wasn't very nice...that I didn't take your accusation personally?

Who are you really?

 

[Waiting on him]

But can you discern it? And what wasn't very nice...that I didn't take your accusation personally?

Who are you really?

Nobody.

 

[Episkopos]

Nobody.

But you could be somebody...get in the race and get God's attention!

 

[amadeus]

Here is another excellent exhortation at the end of 2 Clement...(Ch. 20)

2 let us have faith, brothers and sisters! We are competing in the contest of a living God, and are being trained by the present life in order that we may be crowned in the life to come. 3 None of the righteous ever received his reward quickly, but waits for it. 4. For if God paid the wages of the righteous immediately, we would soon be engaged in business, not godliness....

very telling thoughts indeed ...How did Clement know that God's ways would be one day be exchanged for man's by turning godliness into a business ruled by Mammon?

The essence of the man of flesh has never changed. It would seem to me that when Clement encountered God, God revealed things to him as He did to those He inspired to write scriptures. God certainly has never changed, but while the man of flesh may choose to continue in his own ways as apparently most have done from day one, God has provided a way to escape for the hungry heart. Man can changed or be changed. How is it that a heart becomes hungry for God?

 

[VictoryinJesus]

 

[VictoryinJesus]

Competing in the Games: 1 Corinthians 9:24-25 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. [25] And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.

Philippians 3:14-16 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. [15] Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. [16] Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing.

...the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. ...an incorruptible.
Matthew 5:44-48 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; [45] That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. [46] For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? [47] And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others ? do not even the publicans so? [48] Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.


Doubtfully the highest calling of God in Christ Jesus for that which is incorruptible is ...I will run you down or plow you over if you get in my way. but instead: John 6:51 ...the bread I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
and John 10:17-18 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. [18] No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

 

[bbyrd009]

See this is where we always part ways you run for self.

word

Nobody.

yikes gotta put you back on follow i guess lol

 

[bbyrd009]

The essence of the man of flesh has never changed. It would seem to me that when Clement encountered God, God revealed things to him as He did to those He inspired to write scriptures. God certainly has never changed, but while the man of flesh may choose to continue in his own ways as apparently most have done from day one, God has provided a way to escape for the hungry heart. Man can changed or be changed. How is it that a heart becomes hungry for God?

ol Clement lost me @ "the life to come," i'm pretty sure he didnt mean "after baptism" lol
actually he lost me at "competing" tbh

 

[Episkopos]

The essence of the man of flesh has never changed. It would seem to me that when Clement encountered God, God revealed things to him as He did to those He inspired to write scriptures. God certainly has never changed, but while the man of flesh may choose to continue in his own ways as apparently most have done from day one, God has provided a way to escape for the hungry heart. Man can changed or be changed. How is it that a heart becomes hungry for God?

If we could know that... It is a mystery. A hungry soul. Lord fill us with yourself!

 

[bbyrd009]

Doubtfully the highest calling of God in Christ Jesus for that which is incorruptible is ...I will run you down or plow you over if you get in my way.

i know a "but instead" follows, but this reads funny imo

 

[Episkopos]

Competing in the Games: 1 Corinthians 9:24-25 Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain. [25] And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown; but we an incorruptible.

Philippians 3:14-16 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. [15] Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you. [16] Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing.

...the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. ...an incorruptible.
Matthew 5:44-48 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; [45] That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust. [46] For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? [47] And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others ? do not even the publicans so? [48] Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.


Doubtfully the highest calling of God in Christ Jesus for that which is incorruptible is ...I will run you down or plow you over if you get in my way. but instead: John 6:51 ...the bread I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
and John 10:17-18 Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again. [18] No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received of my Father.

That's why I see this as a generational race. We are to strive together as a body...in every generation.

 

[Waiting on him]

word

yikes gotta put you back on follow i guess lol

It’s funny bird, if you asked my grandchildren they would probably tell you I’m someone special, but they’re too little to know that its God both wills and performs in me his good pleasure. They just assume I’m somebody, because He houses feeds and clothes them.