Results 181 - 200 of 500
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Results from: Answers On or After: Thu 12/31/70 Author: Reformer Joe Ordered by Date |
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Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
181 | What do the rest of you think? | Matt 7:24 | Reformer Joe | 54070 | ||
You wrote: "While I'm not the "rest of you", I wanted to share this verse" I hope you always feel welcome to contribute! This is the church at work, gathering around God's word together to understand Him more. You wrote: "We are partakers, not of everlasting life (life which has a beginning but no end), but of ETERNAL life, Christ's life, which has NO beginning and NO end, for He is eternal." I am certainly not "original languages man," but I think that the original words are the same for both "eternal" and "everlasting." If that's the case, then there is not really the distinction between "everlasting life" and "eternal life" that you support. Tim, Greek/Hebrew please? :) You are not really suggesting that our lives as Christians have no beginning, are you? You wrote: "I believe that this is what the writer of Hebrews is saying in Heb 11:39 where he says that all the OT believers did not receive the eternal life that was promised them during their life-times. But, in verse 40, we have received something better than they, eternal life - here and now in Christ." Let's look: "And all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised, because God had provided something better for us, so that apart from us they would not be made perfect." --Hebrews 11;39-40 These verses seem to indicate that we will be made perfect TOGETHER (OT saints and NT saints), because the Old Testament faithful would not be made perfect "apart from us." Therefore, this could very well be talking about the resurrection at the end of the age (1 Corinthians 15). The fact of the matter is that we have not been MADE perfect yet; that still remains for us (Philippians 3:20-21). And to head an anticipated response off at the pass, I do not think that that is what Hebrews 10:14 has in mind, either. --Joe! |
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182 | Holy Spirit and Holy Ghost? | Rom 8:14 | Reformer Joe | 53984 | ||
Nope. Same word in the Greek: "pneuma" Hope this helps! --Joe! |
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183 | Can we put doctrine into practice? | Eph 5:25 | Reformer Joe | 53982 | ||
You wrote: "How about practical stuff." Correct theology is the most practical thing you will ever possess as a Christian. Get as much of it as you can! You wrote: "How can men treat their wives as queen of the home?" By following Paul's advice: "Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her" --Ephesians 5:25 Spend some time with the implications of THAT one! How did Christ demonstrate His love for His people? What lengths did He go to? And that is our role model as husbands! Also note that without a correct understanding of what Christ did for the church (theology), the "practical" just loses its force and impact completely. --Joe! |
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184 | Are you refering to the thief ? | Matt 10:1 | Reformer Joe | 53974 | ||
Yes, I have been forgiven as well. All of God's people have been forgiven. However, you are saying that the thief on the cross was forgiven without any atonement being made for his acts of rebellion against an infinitely holy God. You are saying that God, who is perfectly just, whose eyes are too pure to look on evil (Habakkuk 1:13), simply shrugged his shoulders and said "Okay, you are forgiven; no sacrifice necessary." Wow, I wish Jesus had known how easy that would be! Then he would have NEVER had to come to earth and die for ANYONE. He could have just shown up and said, "Everyone's forgiven! I am going home!" How cruel of his Father to let him think that he would actually have to DIE and face God's infinite and holy wrath when it was completely unnecessary! Remission of sins without the shedding of blood! I am going to go clip Hebrews 9:22 out of my Bible right now! Little tip: Go read Romans 3:19-26. Although your eyes are blinded by Satan, you will see in the last verse how Christ' death was the grounds for our justification, so that God would be at the same time JUST and the JUSTIFIER of the one who has faith in Jesus. Leaving the sins of the thief unanswered for would not have been just, and it is thanks to Christ's sinless life and substitutionary death that EVERYONE who has ever been justified has been justified. Jesus died for the sins of Abraham and David and the thief on the cross and Peter and Paul and me. Any other scenario is (a) unbiblical and (b) ultimately makes Jesus' death an unnecessary one. --Joe! |
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185 | Say we that love God so much,Still fall | 1 John | Reformer Joe | 53035 | ||
You wrote: "Can a person that really loves God fall into great sins and yet love God so dear?" King David did. I do. Actually, I believe that our sin demonstrates that we do not love God as much as we ought (John 14:15). Our sin does not mean we are not saved, but rather that are in the midst of a war between the old self and the new that will last until we are with the Lord. "And after repenting is his sin gone?" If you are in Christ, your sins were paid for by Jesus Christ. Repentance is the acknowledgement and remorse of the guilt of our sin and a determination to fight it. Since you brought this issue up, I want to quote something for the forum that I found quite profound. It is from a book I have been reading called _The Pursuit of Holiness_ by Jerry Bridges. It comes highly recommended by me, and here is one of the things he has to share from God's word: "It is time for Christians to face up to our responsibility for holiness. Too often we say we are 'defeated' by this or that sin. No, we are not defeated; we are simply disobedient! It might be well if we stopped using the terms 'victory' and 'defeat' to describe our progress in holiness. Rather, we should use the terms 'obedience' and 'disobedience.' When I say I am defeated by my some sin, I am unconsciously slipping out from under my own responsibility. I am saying that something outside of me has defeated me. But when I say I am disobedient, that places the responsibility for sin squarely on me. We may, in fact, be defeated, but the reason we are defeated is because we have chosen to disobey. We have chosen to entertain lustful thoughts, or to harbor resentment, or to shade the truth a little." Another excellent book which addresses your question directly is _Righteous Sinners: The Believer's Struggle with Faith, Grace, and Works_ by Ron Julian. Both of these give a very biblical perspective on sin in the life of the child of God. Incidentally, Forum, I pretty much will be taking a virtual vacation this week, as AMF's summer missions week starts this afternoon. Please pray for me and the other leaders of this program; for the 85 or so teens that are participating, that they will proclaim God's truth accurately and authoritatively; and that children participating in the "backyard Bible clubs" led by the teens this week will be drawn to Christ or strengthened in their existing faith. Thanks, and may God bless you! --Joe! |
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186 | Dake's Annotated Bible | Bible general Archive 1 | Reformer Joe | 53009 | ||
Keep the price tag on and take it back! Well, that's what I think. Dake was so out in left field that he couldn't see home plate with a telescope. --Joe! |
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187 | Who are the "any" and "all" in verse 9 | 2 Pet 3:9 | Reformer Joe | 53005 | ||
I say the same thing as ye. :) If God is waiting for all to come to repentance, the world is never going to end. --Joe! |
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188 | What is the new self? | Rom 4:6 | Reformer Joe | 52922 | ||
"I am left to conclude then that you think that the new self gets put on when we die." On what do you base that conclusion? I said that the "new self" is something that Christians are to put on, which means that it is not our present nature. We are in tension in this life between the "old self" and our "new self." The old self constantly needs to be put away. Look at the characteristics of the old self. I do not know how long it has been since God has called you to himself, but I would imagine that some of those aspects of the "old self" rear their ugly heads in your life like they do mine. Likewise, have either of us completely put on the "new self" as Paul describes it here? We certainly see some of the characteristics described in Ephesians 4 as characteristic of our new lives, but we have not completely burned the old garments. Notice also that the old self is something that is cast off and the new self is something that is put on. However, a new creature is what we ARE. See the difference here? The new creature that we are initially fits in the old clothes as well as the new ones, but as God gradually renews our mind and wills (Romans 12:1-2), we like the new threads a lot more and more. We gradually become in practice what God has declared us to be because of Christ. In other words, God DECLARES us righteous and then gradually MAKES us righteous (initial justification which initiates lifelong sanctification). --Joe! |
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189 | What is the new self? | Rom 4:6 | Reformer Joe | 52911 | ||
"Then you are striving to become more perfect than Heb 10:14 says you are. More power to ya, bro. You are going to need it." You keep on assuming that you are right in your interpretation of Hebrews 10:14. You aren't. I have already adressed both 1 Thess 5:23 and Ephesians 4:24. You repreating yourself contributes nothing to this discussion. Why don't you address what I wrote before instead of going in circles? You do not become more right the more times you say precisely the same thing. The old nature is one that was depraved and totally bent against God's law. Incapable of submitting to God's law. Totally depraved. The new nature is one that is disposed toward obeying God, and destined for glory. It is not perfect, but becoming so, by the power of the Holy Spirit's work of sanctification. Please explain in detail how the Greek stipulates a one-time act, not that it supports your point that we are already that new self and therefore should have no need to "put it on." --Joe! |
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190 | Predestination of each individual? | Rom 8:29 | Reformer Joe | 52862 | ||
Jeshuafreak gave some good verses. Here are a few more: "But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth." --1 Thessalonians 2:13 "Paul, a bond-servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, for the faith of those chosen of God and the knowledge of the truth which is according to godliness" --Titus 1:1 There are really a great number of threads that have addressed this already, really. As you can understand, it can be a pretty touchy subject, and there have been a lot of people (including myself) who have addressed this more than others would like. I suggest doing a "quick search" at the right for words like "elect" or "chose" or "predestine." If you are looking for a book that examines predestination using the Bible, I would recommend _Chosen by God_ by R.C. Sproul. For a different perspective, I am sure that there is not shortage of people who would point you elsewhere. In addition, you might want to look at http://www.whatloveisthis.com which was set up as a Web site refuting a current book which denies that God chose those whom He would save. You are going to get much more than you expected by asking your question. Brace yourself, and pray for wisdom and clarity! :) --Joe! |
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191 | God of Fear or God o LOVE | Ps 89:1 | Reformer Joe | 52845 | ||
Welcome to the Forum! That may be a first-glance assumption, but the truth of the matter is that we see a great deal of the Lord's lovingkindness toward His people in the Old Testament (look through the richness of the Psalms for example) and much of his holiness and wrath in the New (Romans 1 and 2, Ephesians 2:3, and many of the teachings and warnings of Jesus Himself). The plain truth is that holiness and justice are aspects of God that should cause us to fear him, simply because next to God's perfect hominess and omnipotence we see ourselves as the sinful people that we are. However, God shows his mercy toward us that while we were yet sinners, he sent Christ Jesus to die for all who have faith in Him (Romans 5:6-8, Ephesians 2). So God's justice and wrath and his love intersect at the Cross of Christ. Jesus bore my just punishment as well as God's just wrath that should have been mine. That was the extent of God's love for me, and why Romans 3:26 can say that God is at the same time just (having punished sin) and the justifier (declaring me righteous) of the ungodly (that's me). Hope that helps answer your questions some. Take a look through the psalms and marvel at how much God loves His people! --Joe! |
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192 | English translation before the KJV? | 2 Tim 3:16 | Reformer Joe | 52838 | ||
There are many translations that predated the KJV. John Wyclif was one of the first to translate the Bible into English in the 14th century, and we also have the Douay version and the Geneva Bible, among many others, which were published before 1611, the year of the KJV. A great source for the arguments against "KJV onlyism" is an excellent book by James R. White called _The King James Only Controversy_. You can find it or order it from all of the usual Christian bookstore sources. Hope this helps! --Joe! |
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193 | Does Psalms 22 stand up to the skeptics? | Ps 22:16 | Reformer Joe | 52819 | ||
I am not the Hebrew scholar, so I will leave items 1-3 to someone else more qualified. 4. It is pretty obvious that David was not writing about literal dogs, but that the term is a description for his pursuers. Go tell your friends what a metaphor is. 5. Irrelevant to it being prophetic. Psalms are POETRY, and poetry employs figures of speech, metaphor, and other literary techniques. Saying that "you lay me in the dust of death" does not necessarily mean that he was laid in literal dust. Did your opponents in this debate ever take high-school English. Knowing our educational system as an insider, I am afraid that they just may have... 6. Not necessary for it to be a prophecy. Many prophetic Psalms, including some Messianic ones, describe a current situtaion (in this case, that of David) as well as have a future implication as well. Again, this is a poetic prophecy, not a play-by-play to the last detail of all that is going to happen on the day it predicts. 7. I hope someone else wrote this sentence, because the sentence itself makes no sense. Bitten by metaphors? Okay... 8. Jesus' own people rejected him (John 1:11; John 18:38-40; Acts 2:36) 9. What do they mean that prophecies are "taken out of context"? How is Matthew 22:14-15 a prophecy at all? 10. Jesus was raised from the dead, glorified. Death did not hold Him. Just as Psalm 2 says, God did not let his Holy One see decay. 11. Your pals need to go back and read the Garden of Gethsemane passages more carefully. And they need a lesson in the distinction between persons of the Trinity. Jesus was not talking to Himself there. 12. Yep, they made sure that he fulfilled all those prophecies, in spite of people still living who could easily refute their claims, and they would be imprisoned, endure torture, even die to defend what they knew to be a lie. Makes perfect sense. 13. Tell your friends, "So what?" It makes no difference. If I gave you twenty dollars and my mother 50 dollars, would you be wrong if you wrote, "Joe gave me twenty dollars"? In other words, what they are trying to do is argue from silence. 14. Such as? 15. The Hebrew Masoretic text is actually from the 9th century. While most extant Hebrew texts do have the different wording, it is hard to conclude what was actually there in the autographs. Some Hebrew texts have "pierced" just like our Bible does, and the Septuagint has the hands and feet "pierced" as well. In any case, we cannot be certain that the Masoretic text is the correct rendering in this case. 17. Well, if John puts himself there, then John seems to know, doesn't he? Your fellow debaters are really amateurs who do not know how to read literature very well at all, much less the Bible. If they are looking for reasons to rebel against God, they will always find them, no matter how feeble they may be. --Joe! |
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194 | Are we diosobedient without Faith? | Rom 11:32 | Reformer Joe | 52717 | ||
You wrote: "As God's child I believe I am clothed in a robe of righteousness. I can not enter the kingdom of heaven without this Faith, nor is God pleased." Well, it is more than our belief that saves us. It is the reality of what our faith is in. It is true that we must have faith in order to get in heaven's door, but that faith itself is the gift of God (Ephesians 2:8-9). God is pleased when we have faith, and without faith it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6). However, God is far exceeedingly more pleased by the life Christ lived for us. Jesus is our substitute in every way. He lived for us the life we couldn't live. He paid the penalty that it would take us eternity to pay. He rose from the dead as our elder brother, the first participant in God's resurrection of mankind to be completed at the end of the age. The best way to look at it, I think, is that God sees us as sinful (He is aware of our sins and still disciplines His children for them, so He is not BLIND to them), but considers us as perfectly righteous on account of Christ our representative. He sees the sins, but he sees the "paid-in full" sign on each one of them and sees Jesus' perfect righteousness as applying to us as well. --Joe! |
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195 | "consigned to disobedience?" Free will? | Rom 11:32 | Reformer Joe | 52690 | ||
Hi, Sherri. You wrote: "This verse troubles me...because if God really did shut up all in disobedience (so that he could show mercy on them), then how did we have the free will to sin?" Humanity has always had the free will to sin. As a matter of fact, as a result of the Fall, the unbeliever doesn't have a nature that allows her to do anything BUT sin (Romans 8:6-8). The Bible declares that theough Adam's transgression we were made sinners (Romans 5:19) and we are by nature "children of wrath" apart from Christ (Ephesians 2:3). Romans 3:10-23 gives the clearest picture of who we are by nature apart from Christ. "Were we consigned to disobedience through inheriting the old nature from Adam?" Exactly. Romans 5 compares Adam to Jesus Christ. Everyone who has ever lived was born "in Adam," so to speak. Our first parents, as our representatives, brought about a curse upon the whole human race as a result of their sin. We are born with a disposition against God. Just like I didn't choose to be born male, white, healthy, or American, I didn't choose to be born an enemy of God. It was the result of circumstances outside myself. However, we all live out that nature until some of the human race is transferred to God's kingdom, so that we are no longer "in Adam" but "in Christ." Read Romans 5 and notice the comparison between Adam's transgression and Jesus' perfect obedience. And lest we think this unfair that one man's transgression resulted in a condemnation for other human beings, it is important to remember that we played no role in the righteousness that was earned for us by Jesus Christ, either (other than committing the actual sins that He died for)! :) --Joe! |
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196 | Imputed Righteousness | Rom 4:6 | Reformer Joe | 52688 | ||
Steve: You wrote: "1. Is the Reformed position given accurately?" Not really. The Gentiles were never "under the Law," but as believers we are called to follow God's moral will, which is reflected in the moral commandments of the Law. The whole, "when God looks at me, he sees Christ" thing could not be further from the Reformed position. What the original poster described as his own position is much closer to the Reformed view. Again, imputation does not mean that we are GIVEN Christ's righteousness (i.e. "made righteous"). That is infusion, the position of Rome at the Council of Trent. He is correct about the Greek word tranlated "imputeth," but the Reformers did not declare it to mean something different than reckoning us righteous because of Christ. This may seem like a small distinction, but it is an important one. Faith is not the grounds for our justification. We are not simply declared righteous because we have faith in Jesus Christ. While that is all WE do to be saved, Jesus Himself had to do the work of living a sinless life and dying a substitutionary death and rising from the dead. While God sees us, by means of our faith we are identified with Christ in his sinless life, death, burial, and resurrection. (Romans 5 and 6 explain this in detail). So your fellow poster errs on the other side of the issue. While God does not "see only Christ" when He sees me, He also does not just see ONLY me. In some inscrutible way, the Father sees me CLOTHED with Christ's righteousness; he takes both me AND Christ into account, and sees me as me, but declares me as righteous because of His Son's work on my behalf, applied to me by the Holy Spirit according to the foreknowledge and plan of the Father. All three persons of the Trinity are at work in our salvation, and Christ is the one who is the second Adam, righteously living and dying for all those whom He represents before the Father. --Joe! |
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197 | What is imputed righteousness? | Rom 4:6 | Reformer Joe | 52659 | ||
Properly speaking, Christ's righteousness is imputed to us (credited to our account) by means of faith. The Scriptures variously call it the righteousness that is "of faith" (Romans 4:13), "by faith" (Romans 9:30), "based on faith" (Romans 10:6), "through faith (Philippians 3:9), and "according to faith" (Hebrews 11:7). Nowhere do we see that faith actually BECOMES righteousness. The doctrine of imputed righteousness teaches that the righteousness that gets us to heaven is Christ's very own, applied to us by the Holy Spirit as a result of faith. --Joe! |
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198 | Any other opinions? | Judg 4:21 | Reformer Joe | 52636 | ||
I don't know the physiology involved, having never pegged someone's head myself, but I would think that having a stake driven into one's skull might cause one to wake up before expiring, depending on where it hit home. --Joe! |
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199 | Scandal of the Catholic Priesthood | Jude 1:4 | Reformer Joe | 52600 | ||
I think it was completely unnecessary for you to post it in its entirety on StudyBibleForum.com. The link was absolutely sufficient for anyone to read it without having to scroll through pages of your posting. --Joe! |
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200 | is there gender in the spirit? | Bible general Archive 1 | Reformer Joe | 52599 | ||
Are you asking if the Holy Spirit is revealed as a "He" or if there is a distinction between human males and females who are believers ("in the Spirit")? --Joe! |
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