If we are to be equally yoked, how do we know the person we want to be with is truly born again. Can we really know?
How can we know
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They will have fruit and you need to pray about it before hand, if you listen to God beyond your own feelings you will know.
When understanding where someone else is at, I always try and work from this passage:
Matthew 7:13-16 HCSB
Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it. Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravaging wolves. You'll recognize them by their fruit. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes or figs from thistles?
As v13-14 let us in on, it's difficult. This means that just as God gave us grace, we are to give grace to others. It's too easy to let one mistake write someone off. If the Bible says that the way is difficult, the way is difficult. That means both for us and for them. There will be stumbles and bad days.
The second part of that is that you'll know a person by their fruit - what they produce. A lot of people like to focus in on Matthew 7:18 which says a good tree cannot produce bad fruit. Unfortunately, I think overemphasizing that verse and de-emphasizing Matthew 7:13-14 will result in skewed understanding. Yes, a good tree will not produce consistently bad fruit. However, we produce fruit because of Christ, and in general even a Christian who screws up still has other evidence of God being at work in his or her life.
This passage is primarily directed at false apostles, but nonetheless applies to any relationship in Christ.
Matthew 7:13-16 HCSB
Enter through the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the road is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who go through it. How narrow is the gate and difficult the road that leads to life, and few find it. Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravaging wolves. You'll recognize them by their fruit. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes or figs from thistles?
As v13-14 let us in on, it's difficult. This means that just as God gave us grace, we are to give grace to others. It's too easy to let one mistake write someone off. If the Bible says that the way is difficult, the way is difficult. That means both for us and for them. There will be stumbles and bad days.
The second part of that is that you'll know a person by their fruit - what they produce. A lot of people like to focus in on Matthew 7:18 which says a good tree cannot produce bad fruit. Unfortunately, I think overemphasizing that verse and de-emphasizing Matthew 7:13-14 will result in skewed understanding. Yes, a good tree will not produce consistently bad fruit. However, we produce fruit because of Christ, and in general even a Christian who screws up still has other evidence of God being at work in his or her life.
This passage is primarily directed at false apostles, but nonetheless applies to any relationship in Christ.
- Dec 31, 2010
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God tested Abraham (w/ Isaac) and he succeededATP said:
God tested David (w/ Bathsheba) and he failed
God puts tests in peoples way to test their character.
Well, if they love Jesus are they from the devil? Love Jesus = follow Matt 16:24 = Christianity 101 = laying our lives down for God's will and others = how do they speak of obeying God's commandments (any healthy fear and trembling?) and how do they treat all beneath them? Do they do anything along the lines of James 1:27? Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.ATP said:
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