Most people would not think that a "Jew" likes to surf.. when in fact they love it.
Thing is also...... Israel is very much like the United States.....its very democratic, its very liberal, its very religious, and its filled with artists.
Here is the interesting thing about spiritual discernment.
Unbelievers have it, its called intuition.
The born again have it like that, but also, in a way that the unbelievers can't ever have it.
And that is.....the born again, have Christ in them.....>He is eternally joined to their Spirit, as their spirit became Born again when He joined it to His own = as SALVATION and as their Eternal Lif
Well - I am now finding the above post interesting.
First of all, I do know of "surfers" who find surfing "Liberal", "Religious", and "filled with artist" - yet that is not really what surfing is about! It is about catching waves and riding them on your surfboard!!!!
Now it is nice that you do that in the sea because you do feel closer to nature. Still, being closer to nature is not the same thing as being closer to God!!! It may feel like it is, but it is not!
So, some "surfers" I have meet go out in the ocean on their surf boards to get that closer to nature feeling, and they like to relate it to being closer to God? I understood that feeling as a surfer, but I was over 40 when the Lord actually did come into my life and that feeling was simply a misleading feeling!! Someone might think of that to be sometime like our intuition, and I suppose someone thinking they are actually getting closer to God by getting closer to nature might mistakenly think that feeling is God, but it is not!!
The simple reason is that our Lord Jesus Christ is a person!!
So when Jesus Christ that His sheep hear His voice, it is a voice that you hear!!!!
Jesus had to explain this to a very religious people by saying:
Jn 6:63 “It is the Spirit who gives life; the flesh profits nothing; the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life.
What gets missed in the above verse is "the words"!!
That is to say that some think because His words are spirit that they are not actually words! They are like a feeling - something like a person gets when they get close to nature. Yet Jesus said "the words", and what He says does come across as "words" from Him if we are hearing from Him!
Now I admit that His words don't always come across as "word", but they should always come across as words! When they don't it is because we are not really paying attention to Him, or because we are dull of hearing! So, a person could actually hear from Him while in the ocean surfing, but they can just as easily hear from Him while in a busy store shopping. And the opposite is true also. A person can hear from Him while in a busy store shopping or they can just as easily hear from Him while surfing. The problem is to reason that surfing is a religious experience!! That is actually idolizing "surfing" - or that getting close to nature feeling! Again, surfing is just catching waves, even if being in the ocean is a nice place to catch waves and ride them on your surfboard. It does get you closer to God!! Seeking the Lord and actually listening to His words that come via His Holy Spirit gets you closer to God!! That is because He is a person, not a "What", but a "Who"!
Yeah - I knew lots of surfers who thought of surfing as a artistic religious experience but didn't have a clue about the Lord Jesus Christ. For many of them that experience got even better when they got high on drugs.
The group of surfers I mostly hung out with were indeed surfers; meaning that their interest was catching and riding waves for the fun of it. We loved the ocean, and the sunsets, dolphins, and numerous other things help make it enjoyable, but we surfed for that sake of surfing the waves. Some of us were artist, like a friend of mine which once did the airbrush designs on most every surfboard sold in the Santa Barbara Ca. area. But most of us were not artist nor would ever think of ourselves as artists. We were surfers. And not a one of us would have ever had any thought anything about whether a Jewish person might surf of not. Why wouldn't they? 'They should if they didn't', would have been are thoughts if asked, simply because surfing is fun.
And in the same way I think also about Jesus Christ, except knowing Him is more than just fun, thought He is fun. Isaac means 'laughter' and that was the promise son to Abraham. So, if you do indeed hear words from the Lord, understand that laughter is the promise. You also get wisdom, knowledge, counsel, teachings, and instructions which make you a better person. Of course, it is also written that He reproves those He loves, so you should expect a bit of that too.
The point of all this writing is that I hear from my Lord in words!!! His words are not intuition, nor are they a close to nature feeling, nor are they a "religious" experience!! He speaks to our spirit in words, what is often called that small voice. Some are dull of hearing, so they have trouble hearing His words. Of them it is written, 'with their ears they barely hear'.
Mat 13:15 FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL,
WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCARCELY HEAR,
AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES,
OTHERWISE THEY WOULD SEE WITH THEIR EYES,
HEAR WITH THEIR EARS,
AND UNDERSTAND WITH THEIR HEART AND RETURN,
AND I WOULD HEAL THEM.’
I got up this morning and He asked me to go on a walk with Him. It was not a feeling - I heard Him tell me several times, "Karl, let's take a walk." He like to call me by name "Karl" which is a word that I specifically hear from Him! Yes- I that word is spiritual and it comes from the Holy Spirit to my spirit, but never-the-less I hear my name "Karl" spoken to me by the Lord! And I never ever heard Him call me by name while surfing, simply because I did not know Him, the person Jesus Christ, until after I stop surfing because a piece of cartilage in chest that was poking away from my rib cage got hard and stopped me from surfing. It felt like I had a marble on my chest while trying to paddle the surf board, and so it was no longer fun.
The Lord is not a "religious experience"! He is not some feeling you get while you get closer to nature! He is not some artistic impression!!
So to the question asked early in this thread which asked, "What is Christ?" He is not a what!!! He is a person that talks to you. That is why in the beginning of the gospel of John we read:
Jn 1:1:2 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God.
And He said, Rev 3:19,20 ‘Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if
anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.
"Anyone" means Jew or Gentile. The poor to the rich. The black or the white. The surfer on the football player. He wants everyone that is "anyone" to seek Him and what He has to say to them. If you do that you will become His friend, and you will actually hear Him tell you He is your "friend"! That of course does not happen the first time you talk to Him, but you will start to actually get to know Him, the person Jesus Christ, as soon as you and Him start talking back and forth! Hearing may start by you thinking that He voice is kind of like a feeling or intuition, but that is only because you are dull of hearing and can scarcely hear. By spending time with Him everyday your hearing with your spiritual ears gets better and better.
