A reason why you can't get free from your sin

[BryanW92]

is even now leading us into the valley of decision whereby we all are going to be asked the same questions...

"Lovest thou me more than these?"

How we respond will determine everything.

Fortunately, the question asks "Lovest thou me more than these" and not "Lovest thou me only". Asceticism is not a requirement. In fact, it marginalizes the work of Jesus on the cross. Salvation is through works. But they are His works. Ascetics are saying that his works are not sufficient. Yes, there are verses that seem to point in that direction, but the entirety of the gospel says otherwise.

 

[thesunisout]

hey there "thesunisout" where you been hiding ?

good stuff this post thats what the lord showed me also

Hey brother,

Been super busy these last few months. I'm also getting married soon and my life is changing quite a bit. I've been wanting to post more but I haven't been on the internet much these days.

Praise the Lord both for His revelation to you and His confirmation to me. He has been showing me a lot about the difference between the old and new nature, and the reality of it in my life. It is truly a battle between the flesh and the spirit and recognizing which nature you are acting from. All the while knowing this, that no amount of effort will change anything; our new lives are only designed to operate in Christ. Apart from Him we can't do anything.

How are things with you brother?

 

[MWood]

Gideons and Michael.
Form what you both have said I take it that we are all sinless from the time that Jesus died on the Cross until now? I am taking this to the extreme, but if we are now sinless (because we walk in the Spirit) then all Spirit filled were/are sinless.

I know this is not what your saying. Surely its not.

You are both too knowledgeable in the Word to say such a thing. We all sin every day. We are never without sin. That was the reason God provided a sinless sacrifice for our sins. He knew that we could not be without sin in our lives. So He took this off of our plate, that this would be one thing that we would not have to worry about. We could spend our time on being an ambassador for Jesus.

Mr. Gideon, when you reply keep it short and to the point. I usually skip over your posts because they are so long winded. Though I have read some of them and they were good, but a person has to wade through a lot of talk to get to the message. I don't really like to strip off a lot of skin, fat, and bone to get to the meat. I loose interest and the point you are making.

 

[thesunisout]

Paul said that he count all things as dung that He might win Christ. He told us to lay aside every wright and the sin that does so easily beset us and run our race with a single eye. He told us that it is when we seek Him with ALL of our hearts that we will find Him, amen?

The flesh, and all it promises, is the ultimate temptation for a believer. It promises much, delivers little, and is what stands in the way of our abiding in Christ. They that remaon in the flesh cannot please Him. Cannot.

is even now leading us into the valley of decision whereby we all are going to be asked the same questions...

"Lovest thou me more than these?"

How we respond will determine everything.

Blessings,

Gideon

The tension is between the perfection that God commands, and His mercy which allows us to fall short of that. We know, thankfully, that the word says that mercy triumphs over judgment. This truth though creates a tension within ourselves. A born again believer has a fervent desire to do all of Gods will, never using His mercy as an excuse to sin. Yet, we also know that we can never reach the pinnacle of perfection in this corrupt body. Sometimes, in trying to understand this and walk it out it feels like we are walking a tightrope with 100 pound weights strapped to our legs.

I've failed to walk the way I have supposed to every single day of my life since I came to faith in Christ. This doesn't mean backsliding, or grievous sins, but simply going right when I was supposed to go left. Getting upset with someone and saying the wrong thing. Being selfish and not sharing something that I should have. I confess these things and move on, but they are examples of how the tension between Gods demand for perfection and His allowance for failure plays out in our lives. I don't allow for these things but they are ingrained into me. David asked God to cleanse him from his secret faults. That is a good prayer for the church today.

Is there an excuse for being trapped in sin? None. Is there mercy for being trapped in sin? Abundant mercy. I know I can't be perfect but I strive for perfection every day. I know I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. When I fail, I know He will be there teaching me to do it better next time, if I will only listen.

 

[Alithis]

Do you live a sinless life?

He came to atone for our sins and to live a sinless life to exchange for our depraved life. He did not fail. But to claim that we must be perfect is to say that he failed.

youve kind of slid into another topic .. i was speaking in reference to a singular repetitive sin . to say we can never be free is to say the lord Jesus did not achieve what he came to do ..that's simply not the truth .. but to grasp the truth often means letting go of whatever we are holding onto ..(ie dying to self)

 

[orangeness365]

Do you live a sinless life?

He came to atone for our sins and to live a sinless life to exchange for our depraved life. He did not fail. But to claim that we must be perfect is to say that he failed.

Matthew 5:48
48You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

 

[Alithis]

Gideons and Michael.
Form what you both have said I take it that we are all sinless from the time that Jesus died on the Cross until now? I am taking this to the extreme, but if we are now sinless (because we walk in the Spirit) then all Spirit filled were/are sinless.

I know this is not what your saying. Surely its not.

You are both too knowledgeable in the Word to say such a thing. We all sin every day. We are never without sin. That was the reason God provided a sinless sacrifice for our sins. He knew that we could not be without sin in our lives. So He took this off of our plate, that this would be one thing that we would not have to worry about. We could spend our time on being an ambassador for Jesus.

Mr. Gideon, when you reply keep it short and to the point. I usually skip over your posts because they are so long winded. Though I have read some of them and they were good, but a person has to wade through a lot of talk to get to the message. I don't really like to strip off a lot of skin, fat, and bone to get to the meat. I loose interest and the point you are making.

aah fair question .. th spirit of the lord Jesus within us is sinless ..so if we live in him according to his will we do not sin and he cannot sin .but we do sin when we exercise our own will (knowingly) contray to his perfect will . this is not unusual .. for we say .. we have eternal life by faith in him ...yet somewhere between 60 and 120 years we fall over dead ... so do we contradict ourselves by saying we have eternal life ..no ,we speak of faith as that which though we do not see it we have it .
So it is the same with sin.. in Christ we enter into his sinlessness - by faith ., just as in Christ we enter into everlasting life ..by faith
yet as in the case of everlasting life ..we die in the natural to enter into the supernatural . so to enter into the sinlessness of Christ Jesus we die to the natural to enter into the supernatural ..yet at the same time we declare -by faith ,we have it already .
i think to have something and to utilize it correctly are two different things .
we are called by god to appropriate the sinlessness of the lord Jesus in our lives (im thinking this appropriation is an ever increasing state in the work of what we refer to as sanctification ..) so we are ever being sanctified by faith not always living in perfect but , by faith ever having it ...
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umm ok i would just like to say all i said here is not doctrine ..it is me thinking aloud about this topic ...

and it sounds interesting .i might come over there and have a listen to this lol

 

[Boidae]

Matthew 5:48
48You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

You must look at the context of that verse. When you do you will see that Jesus was speaking of loving your enemies.

Matthew 5:43-48

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

 

[gideons300]

You must look at the context of that verse. When you do you will see that Jesus was speaking of loving your enemies.

Matthew 5:43-48

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

And so brother, this is supposed to make us feel better? Do we realize what Jesus is asking of us and how absolutely impossible it is for us to walk in such a way in our present state? Do we love our enemies? Do we turn the other cheek? Do we forgive again and again, without stop? Do we pray for those who despitefully use us?

The truth is, this verse alone should be enough to bring us to our knees. Sadly, it does not. And until we are a broken people, a hungry people, a people willing to make our calling and election sure, no matter the cost to us, we will continue to think all is well, when the truth is, sin will continue to rule over us,, and we will continue to walk like those in the world, with our fleshly nature ruling the roost.

May God open our eyes.

Blessings,

Gideon

 

[Boidae]

And so brother, this is supposed to make us feel better? Do we realize what Jesus is asking of us and how absolutely impossible it is for us to walk in such a way in our present state? Do we love our enemies? Do we turn the other cheek? Do we forgive again and again, without stop? Do we pray for those who despitefully use us?

The truth is, this verse alone should be enough to bring us to our knees. Sadly, it does not. And until we are a broken people, a hungry people, a people willing to make our calling and election sure, no matter the cost to us, we will continue to think all is well, when the truth is, sin will continue to rule over us,, and we will continue to walk like those in the world, with our fleshly nature ruling the roost.

May God open our eyes.

Blessings,

Gideon

I think you missed the point of my post.

She used that verse to say that we must be completely sinless, perfect, when that is not what that verse is saying. It is not saying that we must be completely sinless. It is saying you must be perfect in loving your enemies. The rest of the paragraph must be used for context.

I like Bryan believe that we will never be sinless in this life time, but we have the ability to confess our sin and be forgiven. Does this give us license to sin, no, not at all, but we do sin and have forgiveness when we confess it.

Gideon, I tend to now ignore your posts because it is the same thing over and over again. We must do this now you say. Yet, the Lord patiently waited for you 38 years, yes? You Gideon say we must do it now. The Lord showed you patience, yet you do not do likewise.

I cannot fault your zeal, but you must be patient with everyone as God had shown you patience.

 

[Boidae]

With that last post, I now change my faith icon to Lutheran as that is the church that I and my family now attend and probably will be joining.

So I can now only post in fellowship within this forum.

 

[BryanW92]

Matthew 5:48
48You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Context is EVERYTHING!

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. 46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? 48 You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

You must be perfect in your love of others, as God is perfect. This is not saying that we must have a Godlike perfection. If we could, Jesus would be unnecessary.

 

[BryanW92]

May God open our eyes.

But open them to see what?

We can open our eyes and see that we are sinners and then we can make ourselves think that we can fix that (with God's help) and that we can become perfect. Once we think that we are perfect, then what is the purpose of God? We have satisfied his perfect standards (in our minds). Then, we begin to preach to others, "be perfect, as I have become".

Or we can open our eyes and see ourselves for what we really are: a bag of meat and bones and blood that was born to sin and isn't going to stop, although we might find ways to tell ourselves that we did". We can see God as a God of justice and mercy who sent his Son, a part of himself, to die for those sins and to provide the sacrifice of a perfect life that we can present to God as our own. When I open my eyes, I see the God who did that for me and I am astounded and amazed. I can stand in awe of that God.

The God of Self-Help who gives me some advice, "straighten up and fly right, or else" is not an awe-inspiring God.

 

[Dpki8p]

You are so RIGHT!!! Good job

 

[JLR1300]

It seems to me that Be perfect as the Father is perfect is found in the sermon on the mount. The sermon on the mount has two purposes, to my way of thinking.

1. It gives unbelievers an explaination of how strict and far reaching the Law is so that they will abandon the attempt to be saved by law-keeping and look to the Messiah for mercy instead. Jesus says thou shalt not kill also includes don't be angry with you brother without good cause. Thou shalt not commit adultery means never lust. We can never speak an idle word. If our hand offends us we must cut it off. We must be as perfect as the Father. etc.

2. The sermon on the mount gives the believer spiritual goals to aspire toward. The closer we get to those goals the more we are spiritually blessed and inwardly joyful and the more rewards we will have in heaven.

At least this is the way I see it. But if any of you guys think you have become as perfect as God is ... I bet if I talk to your spouse I would get a different feeling about it. LOL.

P.S. I have to say I almost always enjoy reading what Bryan has to say because he seems so brutally honest... not saying everyone else is a liar....

 

[Dan Kitzler]

I thought the reason I cannot get away from sin is because I was born a sinner. All my life here on Earth will be vunerable to sin. Can't escape it. I am not God.

 

[endofrope]

You must be perfect in your love of others, as God is perfect. This is not saying that we must have a Godlike perfection. If we could, Jesus would be unnecessary.

On the contrary I believe the verse tells that it is now possible BECAUSE of Jesus' work and the Spirit, or at least to strive for it, with God's blessing. Either way, this exortation presumes Calvary, not marginalizes it.

 

[bottomofsandal]

I thought the reason I cannot get away from sin is because I was born a sinner. All my life here on Earth will be vunerable to sin. Can't escape it. I am not God.

Do you agree with Romans 7 explaining the friction ?

What do you think about Paul's comment ?

Paul says "I am" chief of sinners.......NOT was

 

[Dan Kitzler]

Do you agree with Romans 7 explaining the friction ?

What do you think about Paul's comment ?

Paul says "I am" chief of sinners.......NOT was

Yes I agree. Matthew 7:11
So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.

 

[bottomofsandal]

Yes I agree. Matthew 7:11
So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.

Somehow the "license to sin" fallacy card gets played in this argument.

No one gets up in the morning hellbent on sinning...


Isn't it sinful for a man to claim sinlessness ?