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NASB | Luke 11:2 And He said to them, "When you pray, say: 'Father, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | Luke 11:2 He said to them, "When you pray, say: 'Father, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. |
Subject: help |
Bible Note: Hi Doc..just a few responses from your post. Frankly, if a person does not love the Lord, then they do not know Him (1 Cor 16:22). Hence my concern for the person you were attempting to encourage. - It was my understanding this person was saved already and looking for a more meaningful prayer life. What I did was stear him to Jesus, encouraging him to listen as well as talk. Many times what God says is other scriptures. You wrote: God does not speak through nature. God does not speak through animals. Depends on what one means by speaking through nature. Some examples from my life: 1. Once I was facing a temptation. One morning during this tempatation period I was spending time with God while walking around my backyard, drinking my morning cup of coffee. I walked into a spider web and quickly shook it off. I immediately heard God say, "As easy as you shook off this spider web, so you shall shake off this temptation." This encouraged me and I was indeed able to resist (shake) it off. 2. I had a dog named Guard Dog. Last year she passed away at the age of 16. When she was 15, she developed a large cancerous tumor on her spleen. I asked God to spare her because she absolutely loved my other dog Pumpkin who we were planning on breeding. I wanted Guard Dog who was such a mothering type to be able to see the puppies. God graciously guided the vet's hands and Guard Dog survived. A year later the puppies were born. On July 5, 2004 she died in the place that the day before she had laid in and watched the puppies play. That day we went to my inlaws 2 hours drive away. The Lord spoke to me and told me that she was going to die that day. I couldn't change our plans, so God said to just be sure to get home in time to bury her. So we did. On the way home, as we came into our town (which is very small) we saw three rainbows. God was speaking comfort to us through those rainbows. Reminding us of his promises and goodness. 3.) Every time I see my puppies, I hear God say, "I care. I love you. You are my beloved child in whom I am well pleased." Those puppies are a blessing from God. 4.) God uses my dogs to remind me to show my son the same grace and mercy and consistancy and unconditional love that I show them. I could give many more examples of how God uses animals and nature to speak to me. But time and space to not permit. If it is scriptural proof you want, see Romans 1:20. We can know God by looking at creation a.k.a. nature. It "speaks" of who God is so man is without excuse. You said: Regarding John 10 and the sheep hearing the voice of the Shepherd: This discourse is about salvation. It has nothing to say about "listening for God," nor is it establishing a normative practice for believers. Well, God talked to Abraham, Moses, Joshua, and (if we believe the scriptures are inspired by the Holy Spirit) he also talked to everyone who wrote parts of the Bible. Everyone of these he talked to heard him. That's called listening. Why wouldn't he talk to us today? And if he is, then we are expected to listen and hear. God doesn't change. The same way he talked to them, he'll talk to us. The apostles had scriptures too, called the Torah, the Prophets, Psalms and Proverbs. I'm sure that the Pharisees didn't approve of their writings as scripture, yet we do so today. I guess we should just burn every book written by Christians since the Bible was compiled since according to what you are saying that would be adding to scripture and God doesn't speak through anything but validated scripture. But wait...let's read that scripture again.. REv 22:18 I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues which are written in this book; This was written BEFORE the Bible was compiled. Actually this is talking about only the Book of Revelation. So I guess we can keep the books after all, because God does give us more understanding (revelation) of scripture and who he is and who we are and what he wants us to do. You asked: Isn't the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture taught in your church? No. We are taught in the sufficiency of Jesus. We don't worship a book. We worship God as Jesus Christ, the only begotton son of God, the Heavenly Father and the Holy Spirit. Regarding scripture, we are taught that it is the inerrant Word of God and that we are to study it and meditate on it and use it to teach, reprove and train others with. It is one of our weapons of warfare. All revelation must be in agreement with scripture. I'll address your last paragraph in another post, since this one is getting a bit long. |