Points of View

redleghunter said:

Actually on this site a lot of OPs used to challenge the Gospel of Luke, Acts and all of Paul's epistles as not inspired by the Holy Spirit. That actually prompted a site rule change.

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Kind of defeats the purpose of claiming to believe the Bible, if you eliminate the books, doesn't it? After all, if they eliminated those, how do they know the others are inspired? They can't. And, if they can't, what can they really rest their hope in? It is really kind of sad what some people have faith in (or don't and claim to) today.

dreadnought said:

I don't think they like the idea of repenting. They think there is a better way.

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If they reject the idea of repentance, then their disagreement is with Jesus, because that is how He began His ministry.

Matthew 4:17 From that time Jesus began to preach, saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”

dreadnought said:

But they will claim that we can't stop sinning.

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Not of our own effort, but by the grace of God alone, we can stop sinning.

Emmy said:

Dear dreadnought. In Matthew 22: 35-40: Jesus tells us: The first and great Commandment is: Love God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. The second is like it: love thy neighbour as thyself. In verse 40 we are told: On these two Commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets. God is Love, and God wants loving sons and daughters. The Bible tells us: give up all selfish thoughts and wishes, Love God and love thy neighbour. Neighbour is all we know and all we meet, and we treat them as we would love to be treated. Jesus died that we might live, and Jesus is our Saviour. God is LOVE, and Love will always lead us aright. My point of view is: Love God and love each other. Love will always lead us aright, and Satan and his followers will always run away from LOVE. Let us all follow Jesus: Jesus is the WAY. Let Love rule us, and always bring the best out in us. God is LOVE, and Love will ALWAYS be the VICTOR. Try it, dreadnought, and we will always be the Children which God wants us to be. Love will ALWAYS be victorious. Greetings from Emmy, your sister in Christ.

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Yes, Jesus said Matthew 22:35-40. And, Jesus also said: "Woe to you scribes and pharisees, you hypocrites...." (Luke 11:37-54 and Matt 23:1-39) Jesus also said: "Woe to you Chorazin! Woe to you Bethsaida! For if the miracles that were performed in you had been performed in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes." (Matt 11:21, Luke 10:13) Jesus exalted Peter in one breath and then said: "Get behind me satan!" a few verses later (Matt 16:23). Jesus announced to Peter that satan asked to sift him like wheat. (Luke 22:31-34). Jesus said: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth. I came not to send peace, but a sword." (Matt 10:34) Jesus also said that "many will say to me in that day 'Lord, Lord'.... I will profess unto them I never knew you; depart from me, you that work iniquity." (excerpt from Matt 7:21-27) And, then again in Matt 25:11-12 for the virgins who were waiting, but didn't have oil so they had to leave and came back saying "Lord, Lord, open to us"--He responds "I know you not". Jesus told people it was better to pluck out eyes or cut off appendages, so they can get to heaven with what remains than their whole body being cast into gehenna--where the worm doesn't die and the fire isn't quenched (See Mark 9:42-48). Love, as expressed by Jesus is a lot more than His Love is given credit for. We can't just read what we want to. Even when the rich man talked with Jesus, he said "what must I do" and after he said he did everything Jesus told him, Jesus said: "Go and sell everything you have and give to the poor and come follow Me." And the rich man wouldn't do it and left--making his choice. (Matt 19:21, Luke 18:22) In John 6, it seemed like Jesus went out of His way to lose disciples. He wasn't concerned about attracting a mega church worth of people. He only spoke what The Father gave Him to speak (according to Jesus, The Word of God). Jesus even talked about the importance of "remaining/abiding in His love" (John 15). Jesus spoke to John in Revelation about the churches Rev 2 & 3 and seemed to suggest only those who overcame would be blessed with the gifts he talked about and even suggested in Rev 3:5 that some might be blotted out of the Book of Life. Jesus also talked about the judgement of the sheep and the goats in Matt 25 and the list goes on. He even said His Words will judge in that day. (John 12:48)

Even Paul called Peter a hypocrite to his face (Gal 2:11-13), talks about God turning people over progressively toward a reprobate mind (Romans 1:18-32) and that God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." (2 Thes 2:11-12)

God is love and Love is a much bigger entity than the human "love" concepts we latch onto.

dreadnought said:

I wonder if we don't see things from different points of view. My point of view is that the Lord led me to repent of sins I was committing, and suddenly my life was transformed into something very beautiful. (I think that is what Jesus was describing in Matthew 4:17.) However, when I share this with people, some protest vigorously.

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Like many others who have already commented, I find it strange that some people would protest against your testimony, Dreadnought.

But like you also say, we (as individuals in large groups of people) see things from different perspectives. And that is VERY clearly the case on CF.

Perhaps both the term and concept of "repent" is understood differently, in part due to our different experiences of encounters with Jesus. Personally I consider repentance to be an essential step, both in establishing and maintaining a relationship with Jesus - keeping an attitude of repentance and continuously reminding myself that he is my LORD as well as my Saviour. But for me repentance also implies an acknowlegement of my sin, indeed my sinfulness, asking for forgiveness and accepting his grace and healing.

But not everyone seems to come to know Jesus in the same way. Or He sees implicit acknowledgement of sin and a repentant heart even when it is not explicit. While we read of Peter preaching in Acts calling people to repentance, I do not find any explicit story of him or any of the othe disciples repenting. (If any reader of this can point me to a chapter and verse, I will gladly concede my error here.) We find that Peter was overawed and shaken so deeply by (possibly) his first meeting with Jesus that he asked Jesus to leave him, because he felt so inadequate by comparison. It was Jesus who took the initiative and said "come follow me, and I wil make you a fisher of men." Peter obeyed ... and turned from his normal life and followed Jesus. Yet he continued to have struggles with this new calling, misinterpreting what it was really about, and after the resurrection even thinking it was time to return to his former career.

It's all about a personal relationship. And if we think of the "love stories" of our friends and acquaintences, we see that there is no single way people "meet and fall in love." For some it's "love at first sight" for others it's years of "pursuit" before there is deep friendship. So is it with Jesus - for some it's sudden, maybe in a traumatic experience, for others it takes years of slowly becoming convinced of the truth, some are deeply convicted of sin, others respond to a challenge or specific "command" - "come follow me. "

I know the story of my own journey. I am not in a position to challenge yours. But I can rejoice that both took place.

dreadnought said:

But I think you're wrong. I haven't reached perfection but I think it can be achieved. It doesn't have to wait till we die.

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And because you believe it, you will receive....

"Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom"

dreadnought said:

No, I disagree. Resisting temptation takes effort on our part. We need the Lord's guidance, but we don't just sit back and let him do all the work.

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Yes, but even the ability to resist temptation is solely by the grace of God. God has given the believer in Jesus Christ a new nature at the point of salvation. Before salvation and the work of God's grace, no one has the ability to repent from sin, in and of themselves. The believer repents by the sanctifying work of God.

dreadnought said:

I wonder if we don't see things from different points of view. My point of view is that the Lord led me to repent of sins I was committing, and suddenly my life was transformed into something very beautiful. (I think that is what Jesus was describing in Matthew 4:17.) However, when I share this with people, some protest vigorously.

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That's just your point of view.



Forgive me...as someone else once said.

dreadnought said:

I wonder if we don't see things from different points of view. My point of view is that the Lord led me to repent of sins I was committing, and suddenly my life was transformed into something very beautiful. (I think that is what Jesus was describing in Matthew 4:17.) However, when I share this with people, some protest vigorously.

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Hey, it's your relationship with God, not theirs. You are to please God, not man. Enjoy that wonder that is our Father in heaven.

dreadnought said:

I've decided my point of view will prevail.

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Somehow I think we've all decided that about our POV. At least for the time being.

dreadnought said:

I wonder if we don't see things from different points of view. My point of view is that the Lord led me to repent of sins I was committing, and suddenly my life was transformed into something very beautiful. (I think that is what Jesus was describing in Matthew 4:17.) However, when I share this with people, some protest vigorously.

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Hi Jesus taught repentance for the remission of sins and clearly taught that a conversion of the soul from lost to saved is necessary. The thesis statement in the gospel of John is found in Ch 20 And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name.
This thesis found near the end of the book of John is the goal he is writing towards and in the famous John 3 exchange with Nicodemus we see a line that your belief on one side of Jesus or the other determines weather you are born of the Spirit or not. As Jesus spoke of the condemnation He said,
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”
Your experience shows that no one is born into faith that we all must come to belief and some who believe they were born believers have trouble accepting they too need a conversion experience. The passages in John and the rest of the Bible teach we have choices to yield to the call of God or not and our choices do determine weather we are elect of not. This predestination, election debate is useless as we are told to preach the gospel in season and out. Lastly I look at Rev 9 where after many plagues this is written
8 By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed—by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. 19 For their power[fn] is in their mouth and in their tails; for their tails are like serpents, having heads; and with them they do harm.
20 But the rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. 21 And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries[fn] or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

God holds them accountable for not repenting thus a choice. I am glad you have been converted and have the fruit of a life filled with Christ.

Johnny4ChristJesus said:

Kind of defeats the purpose of claiming to believe the Bible, if you eliminate the books, doesn't it? After all, if they eliminated those, how do they know the others are inspired? They can't. And, if they can't, what can they really rest their hope in? It is really kind of sad what some people have faith in (or don't and claim to) today.

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What I've found the posters who denied the Pauline epistles also, after me and others pointed out, the Petrine epistles say the same things. They would jettison those too.

Another interesting trait of such postings showed some Gnostic themes from the so called gospel of Thomas .

dreadnought said:

The NT epistles contain some great stuff, but it seems to me the words of Jesus Christ (from the four gospels) should be the first thing in the New Testament we familiarize ourselves with.

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That seems to be why they are the first 4 books of the Bible .

dreadnought said:

I wonder if we don't see things from different points of view. My point of view is that the Lord led me to repent of sins I was committing, and suddenly my life was transformed into something very beautiful. (I think that is what Jesus was describing in Matthew 4:17.) However, when I share this with people, some protest vigorously.

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PRAISES.. that is what happened to me at the age 31. I give myself no credit because He totally drew me to repentance, and it was a once I was blind now I can experience. He who the son sets free is free indeed. New creature in Christ, old things have passed away, all is new, and yes radically BORN AGAIN.

What are they protesting exactly?