Pekoudah

Amen. An interesting way of putting it. What I call this is the false assumption that God is looking for an accuracy of beliefs...rather than a life lived in the power and love of Christ. We tend to be once removed from truth...as in..."I saw the man that saw the bear." We are after all, reading an account in the bible of those who interacted with God. So unless we also interact with God...as it is written in the bible...then we will only have a knowledge ABOUT God. And since immature believers still walk with pride...that is where the sticking point will be....at their "menu" as you say...or what they see as accuracy of beliefs.

The way I see it...holiness IS assurance. Let me explain... If we are walking in our own strength and still messing things up from time to time...in a very human way...then any assurance we have may be arbitrary...IOW our hope is intact....but what level of faith are we walking in. Now if a person is walking in the Spirit...filled with love, joy and peace so that NO WAY this is by human power....then one can be assured that they are partaking of the salvation of God. Of course we will all be judged for more than what we experience in any moment, hour or day. But in the same way we know that there is love for God in our hearts and that our hope of a future salvation is alive...so also the spiritual realm which we enter by faith testifies to the angels as well as men...that we are His. THAT is the kind of assurance that is by faith and not just by hope.

Yes....having a forum of godliness and not just a form of godliness!

Those who have a righteous disposition can react badly to a direct intervention of God. This is shown clearly in the reaction to the father's forgiveness of the faithful son towards the prodigal son. He wasn't so happy about his brothers' return. We often tend to react that way because we are not as forgiving or loving as God is. We need to remain aware of that. We see the same thing with Jonah....who was not desiring to be as merciful as God. Who were these Ninevites anyway to merit an unmerited favour of God?!! Zacharias was a righteous man yet he had a hard time with God's miraculous intervention. In the parable of the denarius...were the workers who had been toiling all day happy that the newly arrived workers got the same pay? Were they as generous as the One who hired them? God is merciful. He judges righteously. How would we react to knowing that God will spare many non-Christians...and yet judge Christians more harshly? Would our righteous dispositions not react in a fleshly way to knowing that non-Christians may rule over us in the next age? What a shot to our religious pride that would be. Yet God is greater than we are. We tend to maintain our own idea of righteous judgment. That is, until we learn humility...real humility. We need to remain humble and tread carefully. Let's not judge others...but trust to God's judgment. Let's remain self-aware of our own tendency towards judgment.

There is another side to self-awareness. It is the self-awareness of a saint. One who walks in the power of God realizes that it is not him...it is Christ walking in Him. No one can walk without sin...unless that one walks IN Christ. So then a person who realizes that he is walking in the light...in holiness...KNOWS it's NOT him doing it. That's why Paul said...it is no longer I...but Christ. No one can walk like Jesus...with miraculous signs following...in his own power. So then the self-awareness of a saint is to become MORE humble than before. In the full stature of Christ there are wings to fly in the heavens as eagles...but there are also roots that keep us grounded. Wings AND roots. Those who deceive themselves...that claim their own connection to God...but lie...will become very proud...because secretly they ARE doing everything in their own strength. But walking with God is very humbling indeed. So then a humble person gives the appearance of wisdom..even if that person is not walking by the power of God. But make no mistake...a proud man is NOT with God. At least no longer so. A person who has walked with God but is no longer doing so at a certain time...in order to test the character of that person...can indeed become proud...very proud....since the person feels special...as in..."I must be very special to have walked with God"!! But that person is immature and lacks self-awareness. Returning to the carnal walk can induce a return to the carnal mind from whence we all came. Humility is far better. Even if we have walked with God...it is by HIS strength. His grace. Nothing that we do can attain this. It is a gift. A man should never boast himself for a gift he has received. God gives...but He can also take away. Better to remain humble and thankful for any visitation and revelation from God. May the Lord be glorified in us all. We have this treasure in ordinary earthen vessels. It is not the vessel that is special and precious....but what the vessels contain.

Good observations. I would add that when the young man asked what he needed to do to be saved...Jesus only lists the 6 righteousness commandments...the 2nd tablet...leaving the first tablet, the holiness tablet, out of the conversation. So when the young man asks what is more than that...Jesus reveals that forsaking all to follow Him FULFILLS the first 4 commandments of the first tablet which is to love God with all we have and are.

Just as there are two steps of grace...so Christ is to abide in us AND we are to abide in Him. His divine nature is within us at regeneration...but not His perfect walk...as Paul attests to in Romans 7. Without abiding in Christ we don't have the victory over the flesh that Jesus imparts to us through His resurrection. Jesus went through death and came out victorious...for US. In Him we have victory over sin and the power of death that causes us to sin. So then we give thanks to Jesus for His victory that WE can walk in by faith. Grace through faith! IOW...we only enter His life by abiding in Him... If we have received the initial grace that is Christ IN us...then we are to then go to God (the throne of grace) to get the fullness of grace and power. John 1:16 Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. It should really say...His fullness is grace on top of grace. It is His faith added onto our faith. The faith OF Christ was worked out in Jesus' humanity as He walked in this Earthly place. It is available to us as we enter into Him. We put on His victorious humanity when we put on Christ.

Hey Jostler...yes. The young ruler was speaking idly about something important. Jesus was indeed good...but not in the way the young man was saying it. Jesus was actually Good. So then the goodman in Prov.7 is indeed Jesus...gone on a long trip.

To add to this post on Proverbs 7. Prov. 7:5 That they may keep thee from the strange woman, from the stranger which flattereth with her words. Prov. 7:21 With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him. False doctrine is very appealing to the carnal side of men. That is the target of the fair speech. We notice that a false teacher does not differentiate a person who is living by the power of the flesh and one who lives by the power of the Spirit. The teaching is meant to appeal to the uncrucified...those that still seek advantage for themselves. These are susceptible to flattering words. We all know that God loves us...but this truth is used to extend to the part of us that is in rebellion to God. For many it is difficult to tell the difference between what is life giving and what eventually leads to death. The thing that we see over and over again is the way a lie will seek to flatter a person as they are. As if God loves us in our sin. But God is seeking to love us AWAY from our sin.We need to cultivate a good understanding of God's ways...and what His holiness means to us. There is more hidden messages in this chapter...for example...who is the "goodman" in the verse below? Prov. 7:19 For the goodman is not at home, he is gone a long journey:

Here is a harder one that shows the depth of the word. It involves Proverbs 7. This chapter about the "strange woman", which, on the face of it, is about physical adultery and a warning against it. It concerns they who lack "understanding." More on this later. Prov. 7:7 And beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding, The Hebrew shows a deeper meaning on a spiritual level. (Should we be surprised at this?) It involves false teaching. Spiritual error. In Hebrew the words for "strange woman" or...isha zarah... אשה זרה is in the feminine form... and this is an obvious play on words that refers to, and closely resembles, another biblical idea, that of "strange fire"...esh zarah. אש זרה which is the same idea but in masculine form. In order to get "strange woman" we only have to use the feminine form of "strange fire"...by adding a "hey" (meaning "behold") to the word for "fire". Play on words like this are very common in the OT and are one of the more common ways to convey deeper truths. God likes these. He loves to hide the truth in plain sight. This refers to the dangers of false doctrine...with many warnings and allusions in the chapter to that effect. If a man has no understanding of the word...then he can be easily "flattered" into believing a lie. He falls prey to what sounds good to the ear..but is meant to deceive and take one into spiritual adultery. it would take a lot of explaining to get into all the hidden references in the chapter that shows that there is a hidden spiritual message underlying it. How many care to know more about this? I wonder if anyone wants to try looking for them...

Here is one that surprisingly few believers know. It brings 2 prophetic verses into one statement by Jesus as He hung on the cross. That statement is...אלי אלי למה סבכתני or in English transliteration "Eli Eli lama sabachthani" (Mat. 27:46) Eli Eli Lama sabachthani? refers to the opening words of Psalms 22:1 "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me" There is a hidden word being used here that ties this statement to another word found in Gen. 22:13 The word "forsaken" has been replaced from "My God My God why have you forsaken Me?" (from Psalm 22:1) for what Jesus said on the cross which actually means... "My God My God why have you entangled Me?" (the word "entangled" coming from Gen. 22:13) So Jesus fuses these 2 ideas together to make up a new statement. When Abraham was about to sacrifice Isaac...the angel said "God Himself will provide a sacrifice" and then a ram was seen caught in the thicket. The Hebrew for thicket (entanglement) is סבך which in noun form sounds like "sevach" but in verb form is "sabach" (as in sabachthani meaning "entangled Me" in the past tense). So then Jesus is claiming to be the sacrifice that God promised to Abraham. To prove this He wore a crown of thorns...as if He was caught Himself in an entanglement...just as the ram. So then 2 prophecies were fulfilled in one statement and one act...which requires such a depth of sovereignty to accomplish...that it bears meditating on!

Have you ever read a verse in the bible and saw new meaning in it as if you were reading it for the first time? Even though you had read it many times before? There are layers of meaning in the bible....especially in the OT....since the gospel was truly hidden at that time. But not so hidden that it can't be revealed by the Spirit and careful study. i would like to list some of these verses and I hope others will contribute as well. The goal is to encourage study of the bible for the purpose of edification, encouragement and general biblical understanding. Ok, here is one that kind of sets up all the rest..and shows that God is encouraging us to dig deeper into His word because He has hidden many treasures therein. It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, But the glory of kings is to search out a matter. Prov. 25:2 The word "matter" used here is the Hebrew דבר Davar...which is better translated as "word". So then God hides meanings in words. He hides words (in plain sight) that have new layers or depths of meaning that convey His will and His ways. Many of these examples are too difficult to explain in short posts so then I'll try listing only those that can be more readily understood. (I read the bible in Hebrew as this is something that the Lord told me to do...by saying simply "learn Hebrew"...and from there on I've had a passion for reading the OT in the Hebrew.)

It's a very human thing to make things one thing OR the other. That being said, it is a good question. God loves us IN His glory. It isn't one or the other. It is who He is. He can't love us in what He is not. Eternal love and eternal glory are fully compatible...one cannot exist without the other. That is the nature of God and eternal things. What isn't compatible is a selfish love and eternal glory. That would be a selfish love and vainglory. God does not love us selfishly...He doesn't love as we do. So there is no compromise in His love. God will pay every cost for His love. The problem is that we would make God pay and pay...for ever....that is unless we get with the program. God is selfless. He considers what is pure and eternal in nature. People who stand against all that is love, and pure, and eternal...will not be permitted to interfere with they who do. Anything that offends will be cut off. Otherwise eternity would just continue to be chaos and wars. A house divided cannot stand. We have been given free will. God has laid out the parameters. If we want to live then we will heed God's warnings...and live. But if we are indifferent to God's will...and seek another way than God's....then that way will be cut off. God is patient with us. He gives us time to get in tune with what brings life. But He has shown us both the way of life and the way of death. We are responsible for what we choose. Taking responsibility for our actions is no longer seen as something important or necessary. But if we realize that every action we do has eternal repercussions....then we would have a different attitude.

We are indeed presented with 2 opposing Jesus'. When Jesus was tried before Pilate...there was another Jesus there for the people to choose from....his name was Jesus Barabbas. Why Jesus Barabbas? Many of the earlier Greek manuscripts have the full name of Barabbas listed (including his first name...Jesus)...but it was deemed by translators to be too confusing for readers...so eventually the texts were abridged to leave out Barabbas' first name. But what is the significance of Barabbas? Well, first his name is identical to that of Jesus Bar Abba...or..Jesus son of the Father. So we are to choose between 2 seemingly identical Jesus'. Now the people chose to free the one that represents humanity...and condemned the One representing divinity. (people are still doing this) No one wants to identify with and follow a Jesus to the cross. We all just want to be pardoned and set free...like Barabbas. Nobody wants to lose their lives for any reason. So people will choose Barabbas and getting off scott free over being sacrificed. That is unless we love the Lord and the truth. This is reminiscent of Lev.16 and the day of atonement..where there are two goats presented before the people. One for sacrifice (like the real life-giving Jesus)...and the other to be released as an escaped goat (like Barabbas). Will we choose the way of sacrifice...as in giving up our lives for Christ? Or will we choose our own freedom while desiring Jesus just to die for us as if he was OUR sacrificial Lamb...rather than being the Lamb of God? Who will follow the real Jesus through death and into His life?

Authority from God comes with responsibility. But God never expects us to follow our own understanding. We are never to judge....we must only speak what God is saying....no more, no less. Have we not read where it is written...lean not on your own understanding. So then every scenario is meant for us to look to God for help and guidance. Jesus said "I ONLY do what I see My father doing". You'd think that Jesus, of all people, would be able to make His own decisions...no? Are we more capable than Jesus? Our opinions so often are crying out for satisfaction. But this is by the power of the flesh. Even Jesus put no confidence in the flesh....but looked above for guidance. If this does not paint a clear picture...then we are willful and blind to the truth. God never delegates authority. All authority is His and remains His. He allows us to partake in His will by coming under HIS authority. In the church only men who are following Christ and doing as Jesus does...have any authority. It is God's authority THROUGH an obedient vessel that any real authority is perceived in a man. There is a demonic exousia that raises men up to be as gods. THAT is what we sometimes confuse real authority with. Men understand authority as a hierarchy of luminaries. But Jesus submitted to the baptism of John...even thought the authority of John was far less than that of Jesus. Jesus respected the order given to John from God to baptize and preach. Jesus respected GOD'S authority...not John's. John received his authority from God. Jesus was obeying God not John. Jesus does not respect men. Jesus does not do things to please men...or receive honour from men. We would be wise to do likewise. We are to receive men in HIS name. Or we reject men in HIS name. No opinions are necessary or sought after. They who reject a man sent from God are not rejecting the man....but God who sent him. THAT is what authority is about in Christ. Inasmuch as you did it to the least of these My brethren...you did it to Me!

Holiness divides the world into they who are loosed into righteousness and those who are bound into condemnation. Jesus came to bring a sword and a challenge to mankind in the form of an invitation into the truth. Mat 10:34 Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. Mat 10:35 For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. Mat 10:36 And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household. It is unavoidable that many be bound up by the introduction of truth and holiness and the challenge that entails to the limitations we may have grown accustomed to. But we can know that as easily as we can reject the truth..we can also receive the truth so as to be loosed (set free). At one time or other we have all rejected the truth. We have all experienced being bound by the light of the truth; the penetrating light of truth that sought to expose the dark corners of our souls. What we do when this happens determines the possibility of intimacy with God. As we try to interpret the truth, the truth is interpreting us. Seeing that we have all fallen short of the glory of God and the grasp of the truth, we ought to go easy on those who react negatively towards it. We need to treat others with the kind of patience that God has shown (and continues to show) towards us. People, instinctively, tend to resist the efforts of eternal truth to break them out of the constraints that they have imposed upon what is possible for God to do both in and through them. But those who try to bind up the truth will themselves be bound up by it. We imprison ourselves, and even build thicker walls, as we reject God’s efforts to free us into a larger world where God dwells. He calls to all those who listen for His word. A spiritual person can discern others by watching the effect that the truth has on them. Those who receive the larger vision of eternal truth will be set free or “loosed.” These have been “enlarged” into a greater realm. They have been “edified”….or “built up.” But those who have reduced the truth and continue to resist any enlargement into the bigger world of God through submission to the truth by a humble and teachable spirit…these bring condemnation on themselves. We limit ourselves through our lack of faith…or we grab hold of grace by faith. Our character and our openness to the truth determines the outcome. We are to receive the things of God like little children, hoping and believing that with God nothing is impossible. If we remain teachable, God will draw us into His kingdom where there is life and peace forevermore.

A person who seeks to have authority over another is ALWAYS doing so by the power of the flesh. It is a denial of grace. It is an effort to dominate through the law and this is in stark contrast to grace. Being under grace means that we have ceased from our own efforts in favour of an empowerment (grace) from God. The anointing of a person under grace is by the will of God, not men. There is One Teacher (Mat. 23:8) and we are all brethren. The Head of every man is Christ (1 Cor.11:3). There is no need of rabbis and interpreters of laws in the Body of Christ. We have no need for a shepherd (pastor) or any other authority over our heads other than Jesus Christ Himself. We each have recourse to a direct guidance by the Holy Spirit. But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher, and you are all brothers. Mat. 23:8 Under grace, we are to walk in the Spirit and speak the truth in love without thinking or worrying who will understand or believe. The minister of God simply obeys the directives of the Spirit. The binding and loosing happen automatically, as it were, as men receive or reject the display of holiness in the form of a visitation by a person who is an ambassador or “sent one” of Christ. Holiness, as does the truth, divides people between those who are consequently bound or loosed by the reaction to the words or the very presence of one who brings Christ into their midst. In regard to binding and loosing, God retains complete authority as to who is doing the promoting of truth. Again, under grace, it is the Holy Spirit at work; the efforts of men to choose who is to be bound or loosed is not required or even desirable. It is in fact forbidden. It is the Spirit that guides us into all truth. The flesh profits nothing. The one who walks in the power of the Spirit is alive to both the kingdom of heaven and this temporal world. Everything a person so empowered does affects the temporal world one way or another. The subsequent binding or loosing that takes place when the kingdom of heaven (by word or presence) encounters the temporal world brings an opportunity of life for they who are still in the bondage of an existence outside the direct fellowship with God. How many realize what is really at play when a person neglects to discern the Body of Christ? As it is written…”what you have done to the least of these My brethren, you have done it to Me.” (Mat. 25:40) “The one who listens to you listens to Me, and the one who rejects you rejects Me; and he who rejects Me rejects the One who sent Me.” Luke 10:16 Therefore, anyone who rejects this instruction does not reject a human being but God, the very God who gives you his Holy Spirit. 1 Thess. 4:8 So we could say that the spin-off of holiness in the world is either righteousness or rebellion. Righteousness is either being loosed or being bound up by the receiving or rejection of the truth. This is as true IN the church as outside the church. Too often we see grace being frustrated, or outright rejected, by a reliance on a human effort towards the law rather than a faith in God’s grace. Few people, it seems, trust that God can build His own church. When the mob challenged Jesus to judge the case of a woman caught in adultery on whether she should be put to death according to the law, they sought to bind Him and justify their action by His agreement. But Jesus in turn bound them by stating “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.” Jesus tied their hands, so to speak, so that the woman was “loosed” from her condemnation. But the presence of holiness is often enough, even when no words are spoken, to divide people by who is being bound and who is being loosed. The 2 thieves on the cross who were crucified with Jesus illustrate this.

Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.” Mat 18:18 When Jesus spoke these words His listeners already knew something about binding and loosing. In the Jewish tradition these we called “asar ve-hitir“…or “what is prohibited and what is permitted.” Basically they amounted to a list of do’s (heterim) and don’ts (isourim) concerning the law of Moses. By interpretation, the Torah lists 365 isourim and 248 heterim; when added together these make up the 613 laws of the Torah common to Judaism. The religious leaders of the day, the rabbis, were the ones who interpreted the practical applications of these laws for the people. This gave them a position of authority over them. And this is still the case till this very day. All this, of course, is (was) under the law. But we are no longer under the law if we are in Christ. We are under grace. So what did Jesus mean when He said… whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven?? Was He creating a new rabbinic order (as in Judaism) with the requisite knowledge and understanding to interpret what is true for others? Are men to rule over the faith of other men? The answer to that is a resounding NO! Men cannot be trusted to rule over others in a way that is even close to being perfect and certainly not while under grace. In fact men have proved themselves very far from perfect in this regard. “They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger. Mat. 23:4 Giving power to men corrupts them. Giving men religious power over others has only ever served to bring people into bondage. It is certainly not God’s way to have His own authority superseded by mere mortals. Of course we can’t say that this effort by the flesh to rule over the faith of others has not been repeatedly attempted over and over again…even till our day. Even in the church that is called by the name of Christ. This ought not to be. Jesus never meant for His disciples to lord it over others but rather He sent them out as “sheep among wolves”(Mat. 10:16), not as lords (dogs) over the flock. Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith. 2Cor. 1:24

God is love. But God doesn't love us in our sin. He loves us out of our sin. Love that condones sin isn't really love...it is permissiveness. Those who count on God being permissive about sin...have not met Him. People tend to love the hell in others...just look how many women fall in love with the basest criminals on death row! There is a wickedness that attracts people to each other...because of the flesh. But God loves the hell...out of us. As we who are in Christ also should love. God loves the death out of us by offering us to partake of HIS life. God stands for, as we also should stand for...only that which is eternal and gives life. But there is a love and fascination with death in the world. All who turn their backs on God, even for a moment...are attracted to death. Self-awareness doesn't mean we are without the love of death and the world. It means we are aware of this pull within our hearts and minds. The righteous are they that hate their sin natures. These make no excuses nor are they trying to get away with their sins. Just like the publican who beat his breast and couldn't even look up to heaven...such was his shame and disgust at his own inclinations towards sin and wickedness. God justified this appeal since it is only right to come clean with one's sins. The righteous take responsibility for their sins with self-loathing. God is then free to love and justify such a one...since the truth is already being embraced. God is love IN truth. Not away from truth. Likewise we are to speak the truth in love. Jesus said.."I did not come to call the righteous to repentance"...since they are already self-aware and esteem their sinfulness correctly. But then there is the rest of us...and among us many who are looking to get away with their sins. The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, they who are called to repentance....so that we might go to God for forgiveness and a change of heart. (The human heart is very wicked and selfish of itself) But in today's society and churches...we see something else. We see self-love promoted as if it was a requirement to higher virtues. When a person is "loved" just as they are...without the change of heart in a deep repentance...and offered a religious justification IN their fallen sinful state...a worse situation is created. Jesus said to the Pharisees ... Mat. 23:15 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel across sea and land to make a single proselyte, and when he becomes a proselyte, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves." It's one thing to justify the wicked OUT of their sins...and quite another to justify the wicked IN their sins. Add to this the desire to fill the pews for human purposes such as success in ministry and increased finances...and we get the perfect storm of wickedness and iniquity whereby we do exactly as the Pharisees that Jesus condemned so roundly. Actually we become worse than the pharisees because we have the bible as a testimony to the truth. Repentance is not popular any longer...as if it ever was. But today this is seen as disrespectful and intolerable. Even in the churches. There is a lack of taking responsibility for one's own sins and general behaviour....using Jesus as a license to remain carnal...based on this notion of preemptive forgiveness. (Actually a blatant disregard for the serious nature of sin) So then people don't realize how evil they really are. Many have become much worse than before and under a worse judgment...all the while claiming to be saved. The spiritual battle that was once outside the church..in the darkness of the world...has now entered into the church. The inconceivable has taken place. The light has been quenched by the darkness. The devil has penetrated the defenses and is in the courtyard. Are we his unwitting slaves who have not gone to the cross to be liberated from the sinful nature so as to become DEAD to sin? Are we so self-absorbed that we can't see how the devil uses us to bring divisions and death to the brethren? There is an urgent need for repentance in the churches of today. We have been caught trying to serve more than one master. And that other master...the one who hides insidiously in our own self-love....has come to collect his due.

I like the Yogi Berra quote...."the future ain't what it used to be" (I like the practical nature of honesty...even with a tinge of humour. ) Now salvation isn't what it used to be. It used to be where Jesus wasn't worried about being "accepted" by people. John 5:41 "I am not looking for human praise." But with all the people mercifully accepting Jesus...does this make Him feel more accepted? Does it improve the divine self-esteem? Or is God not like us. Is God worried about what people will think? Or is that us projecting our own neurosis on God? The truth has been inverted so that people can get with it. I say inverted....not just subtly changed. The whole purpose has gone from serving God and His will to serving men and their will. This is the modern approach. It's about respect. Respect of persons. It used to be that God was not a respecter of persons. But now God has no choice. If we call ourselves Christians...then that belief behooves God to give us everything we want. We can't help but have a rosy future. Our own beliefs dictate that. Enter subjective assurance. You are what you believe you are. It used to be that God had a say in things...but that was before grace (or our understanding of grace) took judgment out of the hands of God. In modern society people ask "what is YOUR truth." Does truth vary with opinion? It used to be where people submitted to the truth. Did I mention that grace is a substitute for truth in today's society...and the church which fully immersed in it...and is happy following it?

You aren't asking the right questions if you are concerned about real salvation. This way of thinking is the product of the modern heresy of "claiming salvation" for oneself by a properly formulated belief statement...or lip service....by "accepting" Jesus and claiming all benefits for yourself based on the selfish motive of saving your own skin, as it were. These are come-ons made by religious establishments looking to become successful and wealthy in this world...deceiving others to gain from a false gospel. It is based on quick and easy "conversions" to get more numbers and the appearance of success. And it appeals to the wrong nature in man. It appeals to the part of us that will perish. Jesus died for the sins of the whole world. The salvation part is in the resurrection for followers of Christ. We are to seek the Lord for His life....His resurrection life. THAT is eternal life. But there is no quick salvation statement that is in truth. If you want to live with Jesus Christ you have to give up your own life. Salvation is a life for a life. There are 2 steps... 1. Jesus did His part by giving His life in exchange for the life of the world....all of us. 2. We lay down our lives in exchange for a life to be lived in Christ. In this way the covenant is fulfilled...remaining faithful to this until we leave this world.

This statement is false. Whenever life is compared with it's corollary...it is always death. As in...choose between life and death...and not...choose between life and torture. The god of torture is not the living God. You are confusing the devil with the living God. God is love. God gives life and takes it away. Jer. 21:8 "You shall also say to this people, 'Thus says the LORD, "Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.

Here is a challenge in more than one sense. Not only is the challenge of faith present but also there is a challenge to understand the biblical meaning of the text. But I find this very important...hence my mention of it. 1 Tim: 3:1 It is a trustworthy statement: if any man aspires to (the office of overseer,) it is a fine work he desires to do. While this verse seems innocuous enough...there is a meaning added into the text in the translations that is not there in the Greek. The whole phrase "the office of overseer" is from one Greek word...episkopay...meaning visitation or inspection. So right away the real sentence should read..."If any man desires visitation" One need only go to Strong's concordance to check this out. There is no office of overseer....it is a function of God and of a man ordained by God....to inspect, oversee, visit... The Greek does not say in the verse... episkopos..or...overseer...no it is talking of a function of an overseer....or...episkopay. Why is this significant? Because all ministry begins with a visitation or inspection from God. God needs to approve a worker for the work of the gospel. God can also send a man..an episkopos (overseer)...who visits in the Lord's name....since he himself will have been visited by the Lord and approved to the work. We are to desire God's visitation in order to be anointed for His work. I know that very few people will see this...but to me this is very important that all things be inaugurated by God Himself. Men like to have the initiative...but this cannot be in the things of the Lord. No, God must always retain the initiative. He doesn't need men running around doing things for Him. Can you say...half-baked? Whatever is not planted by the Father will be rooted up. Mat. 15:13 But Jesus replied, “Every plant that My Heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by its roots. This is no small thing to get wrong in my view. Why lose everything for a lack of the Great Inspector's approval?? The challenge of faith here is to wait for power and anointing from above before embarking on ministry in the Lord's name. Didn't Jesus have His disciples tarry in the city BEFORE beginning their ministries?

Let's look deeper into the challenge. (as if we have not already been challenged) There is a popular verse that everyone knows...yet the depth of it is not readily understood. הִנֵּה עֻפְּלָה, לֹא-יָשְׁרָה נַפְשׁוֹ בּוֹ; וְצַדִּיק, בֶּאֱמוּנָתוֹ יִחְיֶה. Hab. 2:4 Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith. Now this can be taken 2 ways...depending on whose faith we are talking about. A person's own faith leads to righteousness...but it takes the faith OF Jesus Christ to take us into holiness. At the holiness level our lives are hidden with God...so that His life is made manifest in us and through us. As in...No longer I but Christ. The Hebrew "emounato" does not specify who the "his" pertains to. But that the beauty of the word of God...it has multiple layers. So then a man's own faith leads to his own righteousness. But the faith of Christ leads to the righteousness of God. The New Testament is about God upping the ante...from faith to Faith. In the OT there was no higher level of faith. But with the coming of Jesus Christ...God takes us to the level of Jesus' walk through abiding in Him. As we enter into Christ we take on HIS life, His nature, His attributes. And HIS kind of faith. Rom. 1:17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it has been written: "And the righteous will live by faith." (interestingly Paul here is only referring to the new faith by saying "by faith"...rather than "in His faith") One last thing to consider... Gal. 3:23 But before faith came, we were kept in custody under the law, being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed. ....before faith came??? Didn't people have faith in the OT? Of course...but not THIS kind of faith! The challenge of faith and the purpose of grace is to transform our lives from our power into HIS power.

There is a whole miraculous world hidden in the details. When speaking of believing in Jesus or on Jesus the.... "in" or "on" can make all the difference in the world. Do you live in a house or on a house? The latter makes me think of Snoopy. Do we pour water on a cup or into a cup? The former makes me think that the cup has been turned over. The bible is all about the details. Did Jesus walk on the water or in the water? The former is a miracle. (A misreading here fully takes the miraculous event away from us.) If our faith is meant to take us TO Jesus or INTO Jesus that that is very different from believing ABOUT Jesus. IN English, when we believe in something, we are believing about something. That's all we can humanly do. But is the bible about what is only humanly possible? Or is it something far more profound and miraculous....like walking ON water rather than IN water? So then the bible is very transportable.....very easily accessed. But the meaning is too deep to be understood properly by the natural man. It would be just foolishness to such a person. We can read the bible with our natural eyes, but we will never understand it with our natural minds. It is spiritually discerned...only. Logically, knowing the greatness of God, should we opt for the easy way to understand something....something the flesh can handle? Or should we allow our human understandings to be surpassed in the wonder of it? Jesus says abide in Me. We know that Jesus has come into our hearts. He is in us. But more mysteriously...He wants us to enter into Him. How we understand that will determine the nature of our walks. It will determine if we are to seek God or not...and how fervently we do so. Do we already have the fulness of grace? Or is there more that we are missing? Are we not being challenged in our faith? Here is a question regarding this challenge... How did Cain know that his sacrifice was not accepted by God? What was the sign that Abel's was?