Oh Boy! Seeing So Much!

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stunnedbygrace

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Four ? What am i missing?
These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful. (Revelation 17:14)

Quick question, do we no longer get a link to scripture when we post verses?
Yes, it really does seem to fit…
called = filthy
faithful = righteous
chosen = holy

the fourth type of man/destiny of man of 22:11 is annihilated/ Euphrates dried up.

But, as I said, this would only work with both verses if the called/filthy/not dressed properly, go to outer darkness/prison for 1000 years - a purgatorial type place.

You might not see it. I can though.

Gods call - irrevocable, without change of mind…
 
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Lambano

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Well, what’s your definition of: holy,holy, holy?
Okay, that's a fair question. (And thank you for your allusion to that old hymn; that one has some special meaning to me, going back to when I was five years old...)

How do you read "holy nation" in the 1 Peter (which echoes Israel's call in Exodus 19:6) quote I gave? Or do a word search on "saints" (literally "holy ones") in the New Testament writings, and tell me what you see.

...
...
...

Okay, now that I've given you time to think about it, I'll tell you what I see. I see in these verses our being set aside for God's use whenever He wants to and for whatever purposes He has in mind. Those tasks may be as spectacular as miraculous healings, or as mundane as making sure the hungry and homeless get fed and sheltered. Yes, that overlaps with "righteousness"; the human holiness part comes in the awareness of allowing ourselves to be set aside and preparing ourselves to be used by God.

And that brings up our calling

15 but like the Holy One who called you, be holy yourselves also in all your behavior; 16 because it is written: “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” (1 Peter 1:15-16)

And that involves taking on God's separateness.

(Gosh, of all the mean and nasty things I've called men in six decade of life, I get called out for calling a faithful woman who HAS set her life aside (however imperfectly) for Christ's use a "saint".)
 
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Lambano

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Yes. In that particular place He does not say when. You have to believe what He says there and begin to hope for it and wait patiently.
Agreed. The promise is that when He appears, we WILL be like him. (That 1 John 3:2 passage again.) We at least have a promised delivery date.

If we hunger and thirst for personal righteousness now, in this life, yes, we should hope and wait, and ask and seek and knock, and PREPARE ourselves. (Next verse, 1 John 3:3) And of course, TRUST. No guarantees, no promises, but trust. But with God, all things are possible.

I think it takes more faith to trust when you don't have a promise of success.

13 All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having seen and welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. (Hebrews 11:13)
 
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Lambano

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Paul on numerous occasions addresses the faithful and the saints... See Ephesians 1:1
Nah.

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are at Ephesus and are faithful in Christ Jesus: (Ephesians 1:1)

"Faithful" is used in the adjective form. The referent has to be "the saints". If they were separate groups, the noun cognate and the article would have to be used. Similarly, "faithful brethren" in Colossians 1:2 does not have its own article, indicating it is the same group referred to as "saints".
 
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Episkopos

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Nah.

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are at Ephesus and are faithful in Christ Jesus: (Ephesians 1:1)

"Faithful" is used in the adjective form. The referent has to be "the saints". If they were separate groups, the noun cognate and the article would have to be used. Similarly, "faithful brethren" in Colossians 1:2 does not have its own article, indicating it is the same group referred to as "saints".
Actually, not so much. In between the words for THE (article) faithful and THE (article) saints is the conjunction "kai" which means "and". We are called to be saints...as in, the high calling. But we can be faithful in what God has given to us. Not only the saints are saved. These are ABUNDANTLY saved (1 Pet 1). Whereas the righteous are SCARCELY saved (1 Pet 4:18).

The destiny of the righteous and the saints is different. In the next age the righteous inhabit the nations and the saints rule over them from the New Jerusalem. New Testament holiness is built on Old Testament righteousness. Notice the Bible has two parts....just like there are two tablets of commandments.

Do you see the difference between the Bride of Christ and the guests who are called to the feast (who are both bad and good)?

So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together all as many as they found, both bad and good: and the wedding was furnished with guests.” Matt. 22:10
 

David H.

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Holiness is absolute purity and perfection and pertains to God.
But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor.
Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work. (2 Timothy 2:20-21, NKJV)
Nah.

1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are at Ephesus and are faithful in Christ Jesus: (Ephesians 1:1)

"Faithful" is used in the adjective form. The referent has to be "the saints". If they were separate groups, the noun cognate and the article would have to be used. Similarly, "faithful brethren" in Colossians 1:2 does not have its own article, indicating it is the same group referred to as "saints".
Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God,
To the saints who are in Ephesus, and faithful in Christ Jesus: (Ephesians 1:1, NKJV)

Excuse me, but the word saints is an adjective as well, describing two groups.... When you actually do a study, you will see that in the OT the saints were a distinct group from the nation of Israel, called to serve the LORD. Particularly, Aaron and the Levites were the saints. Paul, a scholar of Judaism knew this, and knew the distinction existed in the church as well. David never called himself a saint despite being the OT writer who speaks most of the saints.

I do not consider myself a saint, because i am not Holy, but I am on the road to being made holy by the Work of the Spirit in me. I will, when invited to the banquet take the lesser seat, and pray the prayer of the Publican at the judgment seat of Christ when the time comes.... You are welcome of course to do the opposite and believe that you are a saint, but I know I am not because I have been in the presence of a thrice Holy God and know that i am not holy. This has nothing to do with salvation, and everything to do with God's sovereign choice on who is and is not a saint. Sainthood comes not of our own choosing, but by God's choosing (Lagchano, 2 Peter 1:1) Were you saved by divine Lot? Or by the Gospel of Grace.

I Invite you to do a study on this, be a Berrean instead of just quoting indoctrinated doctrines, as this distinction is vital to understanding the end times. Let the Holy Spirit teach you as you do.
 

marks

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those who hunger and thirst for true righteousness in their inner man will be filled. (That’s the promise.)
Galatians 6:7-8 KJV
7) Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
8) For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.

Much love!
The lie is not that positional righteousness does not exist but that no GREATER righteousness exists.

The righteousness of faith is receiving the righteousness of Christ, and there is no, can be no greater righteousness than that of Christ. I'd sooner speak of our fulfilled righteousness, when we become worthy of Him Who calls us. Practical righteousness, where the righteous condition of our new creation gains control over our fleshy ways.

Much love!
 

marks

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One thing about the flesh and it's corruption that you have to remember is that Jesus died for us that he could send the heavenly spirit to be with our souls (body and spirit). And that often has given me moments when I feel that I am with him in a heavenly way.
I think this is exactly what God is doing. His Spirit gives life to our spirit, and we are together with Him in the celestial realm. We can't see it, but it's the testimony of His Spirit to ours that affirms we are His children.

Much love!
 
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marks

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Oh sure! Me too.
Ive thought many times about how it’s even possible to have this down payment when my odious flesh is still in my heart, all that arrogance and selfishness and resentment and anger at others. I think it has to do with the sword of the word being able to divide asunder soul and spirit, joint and marrow…

But there’s a time for moving on from elementary things and a time for faith grown greater so as to begin apprehending and seeing manifest those things He has for us.
The difference is in a new creation. We are born again a new person who didn't exist before. There is the one from the line of Adam, and we've been removed from Adam, now in Christ, except, we still have to use the Adamic body, akin to driving a wrecked and burning car.

Much love!
 

marks

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I think it can be counterproductive to over-think spiritual things. We just need to accept with our hearts not try to work it out with our intellect.
I find it best to just try to order my thoughts according to the words of Scripture. There is a certain way that God presents His truth, I think that is meant to form our minds in a certain way.

I think when we try to overthink things, we drift into our own ideas more. And when we are sticking with Scriptural terms, we come to see them in their own meanings. We don't need extra explanation, because we realize that that very word itself says the truly spirirual truth.

I think that the hidden meaning of Scripture is the plain saying, only, without the Spirit, we cannot understand what is right there in front of us.

Much love!
 
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marks

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You are still conflating the two somewhat. It’s very difficult not to do that in our head.
Righteousness is the one tablet - the treatment of others.
Holiness is the other tablet.
If I'm understanding how you are using the words, "holiness" is when you have no evil desires, because all your desires are for the Lord, and in that way, all you do is from the Spirit, as the Lord ministers to people through you. All you do will be righteous.

Holiness describes being fully set apart for God in thought, word, and deed. We don't "try to be" holy, we aren't "partly" holy, either we are or we are not.

While "righteousness" is describing the actions of the outer man as ruled by the inner man, in which we may be a mixed bag, some righteous, as we rule well, some unrighteous, as we rule poorly, gaining in righteousness as we become more consistent.

Is this how you use the words in this regard?

Much love!
 
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marks

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In holiness there is NO sin, not a speck. In holiness, it’s one strike and youre out.
There's a problem here, if you are "in holiness", there won't be any strikes, how can there be? I'm not sure this is the right way to think of it.

Much love!
 

Nancy

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Yes, things that are holy means they are set apart ONLY for Gods use. But when saying God is holy, we aren’t saying it means God is set apart for Gods use. Are we?

I definitely dont think holiness is goody two shoes, and there is only one Holy.

God doesn’t exactly make us holy. It’s more like some of us walk IN His very own holiness. Or you can deny that holy men who walk in the Spirit with God doing miracles through them don’t, can’t and never have walked on earth.

In Gods Kingdom there are both the righteous and (the rarer) holy. One is good and acceptable to God and one is better than good and acceptable. Unless you want to say Paul, who walked IN the Spirit is no better than us. You are trying to say there is no better than you. No one has gone past your righteous by faith and into Gods holiness.

For your next statement, I totally agree. But He lets us wear ourselves out in the trying until we will accept it has to progress through trust and not our Own power.

As to the last there, yes, and I WAS one of those people, stuck there. But I am not saying what would, or should, make the righteous sad. I’m saying DONT take away the good and acceptable to God but also DONT degrade holiness or the men who have walked in it.
Bottom line it seems is that we will get from (of?) God as much as we "study to show ourselves approved" , "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you"...not that others that do not have good study habits or desires to dig deeper are not saved. God simply meets us, blesses us and grows us all where we are at right now.
For myself personally, I desire greatly to become more fervent in study, not just "reading", and to understand the deeper things of God especially as I have no other happenings in my life that demand my time right now and it should be that focus should be TOTALLY on Christ and serving Him as best I can either through prayer, study so as to be led better and hopefully to learn how to actually "walk" in His Spirit more and more until I "get it". TRUST is key.
 
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marks

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Actually, not so much. In between the words for THE (article) faithful and THE (article) saints is the conjunction "kai" which means "and".
Kai has the "copulative" use, adding, "The saints and the faithful", that is, two groups, also the "explicative" use, explaining, "The saints, even the faithful", that is, a single group.

Both are correct translations, to be determined according to context.

Much love!
 

stunnedbygrace

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No I don’t. And I don’t have the desire to spend a lot of time on this as you do. I’m not going to answer all those posts you just did either. I’ve never understood the phrase personal call but if you want to use it there, then yeah, I think everyone has a “personal call” to walk in the Spirit so that they won’t fulfill the lusts of their flesh. I don’t think only certain people get called personally to not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. I think few seem to get there-whether because of cares of this world or whatnot but…i don’t think God calls few to this, I think He calls many to this
 
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marks

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This is from a Michael Reeves telling of what he said was an analogy from Martin Luther, so you're getting it 3rd hand . . . what follows will be my re-wording so don't blame them . . .

When the king married the prostitute, all she had ever known was being a prostitute. Having now been wed to the king, she was now in point of fact the queen. She didn't know how to dress as a queen. She didn't know how to talk like the queen, or act like the queen. She didn't now the decorum of the king's court. But she was nonetheless the queen.

In time, she would be cleaned up, and taught how to groom and dress in the queenly fashion. In time, she will look the part, and act the part, and she will become that thing she is, the queen.

Much love!
 
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stunnedbygrace

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There's a problem here, if you are "in holiness", there won't be any strikes, how can there be? I'm not sure this is the right way to think of it.

Much love!
I have no idea what you just said or asked here.
 

marks

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I have no idea what you just said or asked here.
You said, if you are in holiness, one strike and you're out, right? What would that look like? If you are in holiness, what would be a "strike" that would take you out of holiness? Because the way I'm thinking, if God has caused you to be holy, so that all you think and do is righteous, from His Spirit, in agreement with His Way, what would be the sin that would interfere with holiness, to take you out of it?

If you are made holy by God, you won't sin, so nothing ends that holiness. Unless God releases you Himself. If He put you there, and being there means you aren't sinning, what is to take you out?

Much love!