| Spirit-Filled / Charismatic The forum for all charismatic churches and movements. |
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4th November 2009, 03:36 PM
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 | | Join Date: 18th December 2003
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Reps: 136,831,488,553,016,608 (power: 136,831,488,553,032) | | | Meaning of this passage of Scripture
“You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your hand—even your stronger hand—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. - Matthew 5:27-30 (NLT)
How do you reconcile this passage of Scripture with salvation by grace through faith alone?
If salvation and right standing with God is a gift, how then does hell still hang in the balance simply over a lustful look? |
4th November 2009, 03:44 PM
|  | Staying in the middle of the road.
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| | Join Date: 15th November 2006 Location: Earth
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Reps: 125,078,383,101,838,352 (power: 125,078,383,101,854) | | | Is Jesus addressing Born again Christians?
__________________ Saying the body we receive after physical death is a renewed or ultimately healed body is incorrect, to the point of absurdity; equal to having a 1990 banged up Chevy, then receiving a 2011 Cadillac and telling people it's your Chevy after it was repaired.
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4th November 2009, 03:48 PM
| | Senior Member
| | Join Date: 24th March 2006 Location: NY
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Reps: 52,814,925,875,434,392 (power: 52,814,925,875,441) | | | Absolutely. Truth applies to everyone. Not only that, born-again Christians are even more responsible to walk in it than those who haven't received the Spirit. "And that servant who knew his master’s will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes." |
4th November 2009, 04:31 PM
|  | Legend
  
| | Join Date: 31st January 2006
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Reps: 5,885,458,354,724,726,784 (power: 5,885,458,354,724,763) | | Originally Posted by t1wGl  “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your hand—even your stronger hand—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. - Matthew 5:27-30 (NLT)
How do you reconcile this passage of Scripture with salvation by grace through faith alone?
If salvation and right standing with God is a gift, how then does hell still hang in the balance simply over a lustful look?
Jesus is definately taking it from the physical to the intellectual to make a spiritual conclusion. |
4th November 2009, 05:02 PM
|  | Παρα σοι ιλασμος εστιν
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| | Join Date: 7th March 2008
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Reps: 19,076,711,154,904,352 (power: 19,076,711,154,909) | | | I'm going to try and be careful just how I say this.
Let's examine Ephesians 2:8-10 (NASB).
8For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God;
9not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.
This, among many other verses, state that salvation is by faith alone, in conjunction with other verses such as Romans 3:28, 5:1, and Galatians 3:24. If you look at the verse, even the faith didn't come from you. Faith is the gift of God. When God saves a man, he has no boasting rights whatsoever.
Though at the same time, the very next verse gets skipped over.
10For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
The truth is, as Christians, we are to do good works. Looking at this verse, we are described as being a "workmanship" of God. Imagine taking a marble block and making a statue out of it; that is what God does with us. Our intent in the end is a statue, and God's intent, in part and according to this verse, is to do good works. The end idea is that we look how God wants us to look, and he does this throughout our lives. That includes weeding out sin and pressing on towards good works; you are not doing these to get saved, but you are doing it because you are saved.
But what about those passages you mentioned? Well, Jesus is in fact exposing the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. That's really the point of the Sermon on the Mount. You notice how many times he says, "It is said... but I say to you..."? He'd name what the Pharisees would do, then he would name God's moral law. For example with the adultery, the Pharisees believed that they could divorce for any reason so long as they gave her a certificate of divorce, and because of that certificate they were justified, but Jesus said, "No you are not. According to the law of God, you are only committing adultery." The Pharisees had no problem holding onto secret sins so long as everyone in the public perceived them as being righteous and perfectly observant of all their manmade rules, but Christ saw they had many secret sins. That is why Jesus said to everyone (because all the people looked at the Pharisees as being models of righteousness), "Unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven." That's a shock!! The Pharisees can't make it?? Well, Lord know I can't make it then!
The problem was not that they weren't following all the rules; the problem was that what God meant by the law never got into their hearts. For example, "An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." That was not meant to mean, "If someone injures you, you are fully justified in injuring them back for the same amount." No, the intention was, "If someone wrongs you, don't seek compensation any higher than the state of the injury, but be gracious and only take what you need." Two completely different attitudes, and usually in our courts, we go way beyond this.
Cut off your hand? Don't spare your sins. You may think that your secret sin over here is safe, but don't lie to yourself; cut it out. Don't mess with it! The Pharisees had many secret sins that the public wasn't aware of, but Jesus knew them, and their external appearances meant nothing to Him. He knew the bones that laid in the whitewashed sarcophagus.
Notice that in the middle of all these, "You have heard... but I say..."? He throws in these words in Matthew 5:48: "You shall be perfect, as I am perfect." Perfect?? Are you kidding?? The word there is the Greek work teleios, and it does not mean perfectly sinless. It can all mean mature (in physique or moral development), complete, and sometimes it is translated as holy. In context, Jesus is telling the listeners not to do as the Pharisees do, finding the loopholes in the law to justify themselves, but to understand that what God wants is for them to mature in their understanding of right and wrong, getting rid of sin, growing in maturity in respect to others, and becoming that workmanship that God had intended all along. So Jesus is taking away all credibility from the external, and bringing it all into the heart; in public or behind closed doors, it doesn't matter. Be mature and complete in understanding of such things.
__________________
"Let theologians note the following distinctions. Christians were decretively justified from all eternity: efficaciously so when Christ rose again from the dead; actually so when they believed; sensibly so when the Spirit bestows joyous assurance; manifestly so when they tread the path of obedience; finally so at the Day of Judgment, when God shall sententiously, and in the presense of all created things, pronounce them so." - Arthur W. Pink |
4th November 2009, 05:46 PM
|  | Senior Veteran
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| | Join Date: 22nd July 2005
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Reps: 187,507,601,694,609,952 (power: 187,507,601,694,619) | | Originally Posted by t1wGl “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your hand—even your stronger hand—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. - Matthew 5:27-30 (NLT)
How do you reconcile this passage of Scripture with salvation by grace through faith alone?
If salvation and right standing with God is a gift, how then does hell still hang in the balance simply over a lustful look?
If we have God's Holy Spirit in us, God is Love, love is indwelling us.
Love is fulfilling that part of Jesus command "love your neighbor as yourself"
Lust is selfish, Love cares.
__________________
Watch the Lamb |
4th November 2009, 06:53 PM
|  | Contributor
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| | Join Date: 7th January 2004 Location: kansas
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Reps: 17,214,311,476,182,840 (power: 0) | | Originally Posted by t1wGl “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your hand—even your stronger hand—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. - Matthew 5:27-30 (NLT)
How do you reconcile this passage of Scripture with salvation by grace through faith alone?
If salvation and right standing with God is a gift, how then does hell still hang in the balance simply over a lustful look?
He talking about Adam and Eve. they didn't do that and look at what that gave birth to. |
4th November 2009, 07:09 PM
| | Unregistered
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My Mood  | | | It's a reminder that we should always fix our eyes on Christ as our saviour and to lean on his grace through faith and because of who we are, we will heed these warnings, if not then God will discipline us.
Don't we warn our children about the dangers of crossing a road without looking? But do we allow them to cross the road by themselves before they are ready? No! We hold their hand, we guide them and teach them and if they go to step out without looking then we pull them back and warn them again and again about the dangers.
The grace of God will never allow us to fail so much that we lose our salvation. |
4th November 2009, 07:40 PM
|  | Galatians is the best!
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| | Join Date: 7th September 2009
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Reps: 3,648,695,239,759,241,728 (power: 3,648,695,239,759,266) | | | Actually to me,Jesus made things harder in Matt 5,now I really need justification by faith.
__________________
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Since sin is dead apart from law, what happens if we live under law?
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Romans 7:8 But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead.
The proper way to read Romans 3:31.
3:31. Do we overthrow the OT by the justifying faith of Jew and Gentile? No, we uphold the OT. |
4th November 2009, 08:38 PM
|  | Princess of the Lord of Grace and Power
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| | Join Date: 27th December 2004 Location: Pittsburg, KS
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Reps: 2,009,227,700,350,354 (power: 2,009,227,700,362) | | Originally Posted by t1wGl “You have heard the commandment that says, ‘You must not commit adultery.’ But I say, anyone who even looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. So if your eye—even your good eye—causes you to lust, gouge it out and throw it away.
It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your hand—even your stronger hand—causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. - Matthew 5:27-30 (NLT)
How do you reconcile this passage of Scripture with salvation by grace through faith alone?
If salvation and right standing with God is a gift, how then does hell still hang in the balance simply over a lustful look?
I think Jesus is saying that sin starts in the heart. It does no good just stop doing bad things when the beginnings of the actions are already present in our hearts. It does no good to say, "I'm never going to murder, lie, or commit adultery" because those things are already in you. They were in you from birth. You can't say, "I'm not going to do these things" without having first thought of ever doing them. That's why we need Jesus.
And if our heart causes us to sin, maybe we should get rid of it? Maybe what's he saying in the second part if more of an analogy? If one part of your body is making you sick (like gangrene), wouldn't you cut it off before it spreads to your whole body?
Then again, isn't it interesting, in light of this verse, that we're supposed to get new bodies when Jesus comes back?
__________________
Four beliefs that help me sleep at night:
1. Young Earth Creationism (Genesis 1-3)
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2. Jesus is the only way to Heaven. (John 14:6, I Timothy 2:5)
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3. Eternal Security (John 10:28-29)
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4. Pre-tribulation Rapture (I Thess. 4:13-18, Rev. 3:10)
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"I will lie down and sleep in peace,
for you alone, O LORD, make me dwell in safety."
- Psalm 4:8
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