Much is made in secular circles about how one life-form morphs into new life-forms. Not new types of one life-form but a brand new species! Gradually, step, by step, by step.
This is not the way with Creator God. With our Creator, something new is brought into existence quickly and abruptly. For example, when He changes a human being from someone who ignores, or despises God to someone who worships and adores Creator God, the change is from darkness to light at the flick of a switch. We are in fact a brand new creation, and it has nothing to do with our own efforts. As atheists are famous for saying, and as everyone has believed prior to conversion, "I couldn't become a Christian even if I wanted to."
“The Messiah has made things right between us so that we're now together on this, both non-Jewish outsiders and Jewish insiders. He tore down the wall we used to keep each other at a distance. He repealed the law code that had become so clogged with fine print and footnotes that it hindered more than it helped. Then he started over. Instead of continuing with two groups of people separated by centuries of animosity and suspicion, He created a new kind of human being, a fresh start for everybody. The mystery is that people who have never heard of God and those who have heard of him all their lives stand on the same ground before God. They get the same offer, same help, same promises in Christ Jesus. The Message is accessible and welcoming to everyone, across the board. ” Ephesians 2:14,15;3:5,6
When God changes a human being from sketchy to glorious, a new type of human arises; a type where there is neither male nor female, slave nor free, no special race, no special status - all are equal under the Lordship of Jesus Christ our Saviour. There are no transitional stages.
We’re either in Christ, or we are not in Christ.
Either old or new.
Lost or Saved.
And here’s the best part.
The choice is yours.
Complete freedom.
Freedom to die or freedom to live.
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...when He changes a human being from someone who ignores, or despises God to someone who worships and adores Creator God, the change is from darkness to light at the flick of a switch. We are in fact a brand new creation, and it has nothing to do with our own efforts.
ReplyDelete...
And here’s the best part.
The choice is yours.
Complete freedom.
==========
Contradiction...
...not very surprising coming from a false idol worshiper who pretends to be saved already, as if the choice was up to him.
It's close to blasphemy, but that's just my opinion...
"I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die."
-The Lord Jesus Christ
The post is admittedly not clear. Much of what I write resembles rambling more than clear coherent thought. Guilty as charged.
ReplyDeleteHowever, “it has nothing to do with our own efforts.”
and “The choice is yours” are speaking to two different aspects of Christianity.
Perhaps your anger at me clouds your ability to picked up on that but again, it may have just been poor writing on my part.
“It has nothing to do with our efforts,” refers to our salvation - Jesus plus nothing.
“The choice is yours” refers to our ability to ignore His offer of salvation as I did for the first thirty years of my life.
I’m curious. Do you see that as poor or improper theology?
Anger? coming from my comments? Surprising interpretation...
ReplyDeleteLet me try to use a more casual "tone" then.
This blog post sounded as if you think that we have a choice to be saved or not, while at the same time claiming that God can suddenly change someone from a non-Christian to a Christian. That was the contradiction.
I still see a problem with your clarifications, even though I would not call that improper theology, that would be strong words for no reason.
The problem I see is that I don't think we have a choice to be saved or not. We choose to believe or not, and then the rest is up to the Lord. Saying, as mortals, that we are already saved, and that others are not, is playing God in my opinion.
In other words, I am not convinced that there are many people who willfully reject Salvation. They simply do not believe it will happen to them or anybody else. It could be that they are among the ones who will be saved, while other who pretend to be Christians will not. Only the Lord can decide, and we all try to do our best until then.
Some of us have faith in the promises made by Creator God when he came down to Earth in the person of Jesus, but some unfortunately don't. I am just not able to take the extra step of affirming that they are automatically damned. God is the essence of Love and Justice, so I trust Him more than any man to determine what constitute willful rejection of Salvation or not.
Saying, as mortals, that we are already saved . . ."
ReplyDeleteWe can't know if salvation is ours?
Much is made in secular circles about how one life-form morphs into new life-forms. Not new types of one life-form but a brand new species! Gradually, step, by step, by step.
ReplyDeleteSort of. As long as you understand _populations_ evolve - not individuals.
:-)
We can't know if salvation is ours?
ReplyDeleteYou used the term 'know', so my answer is No; we cannot 'know'.
You disagree?
"You disagree?"
ReplyDeleteVery much! Every book of the New Testament was written in part to show us how we could come to receive salvation and how we could know that salvation is ours. 1 John 5:13 is just one of literally dozens of verses throughout all the New Testament that explain that we CAN know that we are citizens of God's eternal Kingdom.
Ok then, you are confirming that you are one of these "gnostic" people.
ReplyDeleteNot much to discuss in that case as you are not able to distinguish between what you can know and what you have faith in.
In other words, you are not aware of your own limits as a human being, i.e. that we cannot have knowledge of the afterlife. How can you then pretend to 'know' anything about the divine if you are not even able to 'know' what humans can, or cannot, know?
Anyway, you seem to have more fun being intolerant toward Muslims these last days, so I will let you have "discussions" with the people who reply to that non-sense...
Gnotisism deals with that which is supposedly hidden. The Bible tells us clearly how one may be saved. The only way that a person can have doubts about salvation is if one has added something to "faith alone."
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that we can very rarely know the state of someone else's salvation but we Christians alone, among all the other religions of the world can know whether or not we, as individuals, are part of God's family.
I feel very sorry for you if you are part of some cult like the Mormons who add good works as part of working your way to heaven. If that's true then you have every reason to doubt your standing before God.