Rom 6:5 Each of us is raised into a light-filled world by our Father so that we can see where we're going in our new grace-sovereign country. (msg)

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POWER OR LIFE?

By: Bob George

I discovered why Christian service had been killing me. I already knew about the Holy Spirit; in fact, I had taught lectures about His ministry in our lives. But I always associated Him with power: giving me power to share Christ, power to understand the Bible, power to teach, power to serve. Of course, there is truth in that. But I was missing the single most important aspect of having the Holy Spirit ­ the fact that through Him I have received the very life of God.

As long as I associated the Spirit's ministry only with power, the emphasis was still on me. My prayers were most often, "God, help me to do this activity." God may have been providing some help, but I was still doing it. When I was doing it, there was no lasting joy or fulfillment, and eventually I reached a state of total burnout. Finally I learned that Christ did not come to "help" me serve God; He came to live His life through me! That is why Paul wrote:

'I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me." (Galatians 2:20)

Failing to hold onto these truths, the Christian world has become so frantic in its activity that it reminds me of the well-known definition of a fanatic: "A person who redoubles his efforts after he has lost sight of his goals." Over and over we have witnessed the spectacle of people coming forward in a service to recommit their lives. In essence, they are coming down to say, "God, I'm really serious this time. This time I'll do it if it kills me!"

To them I say, "Don't worry. It will!" I know, because it killed me. We have simply not come to grips with the fact that it isn't hard to live the Christian life. It's impossible! Only Christ can live it. Our only hope is to learn that Jesus Christ did not come just to get men out of hell and into heaven; He came to get Himself out of heaven and into men!

Many Christians have been trying to ground out the Christian life on their own, resulting in failure. They cry out for God's help. I respond; a dead man doesn't need help. "A dead man needs life!" Salvation is not just something that Christ did for us, but it is Jesus Christ Himself living in us.

From: Classic Christianity. Eugene: Harvest House Publishers. ©1989.

(It is my prayer, as we embark upon a New Year, that the above truths will permeate our souls and bring us to a place of Inexhaustible "Life"! The "Life" of Christ which is our Life........ Grace to each of you and Happy New Year!! tripp)

THE MYSTERY OF GODLINESS

By: Major W. Ian Thomas

Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh" (1 Timothy 3:16).

Godliness is a mystery! Fail to grasp this fact and you will never understand the nature of godliness.

God did not create you to have just an ape-like capacity to imitate God. There would be no mystery in that, nor would this lift you morally much above the status of a monkey or a parrot! The capacity to imitate is vested in the one who imitates, and does not derive from, nor necessarily share the motives of the person being imitated, who remains passive and impersonal to the act of imitation.

In direct contrast to this, godliness ­ or Godlikeness ­ is the direct and exclusive consequence of God's activity in man. Not the consequence of your capacity to imitate God, but the consequence of God's capacity to reproduce Himself in you! This is the nature of the mystery!

Remove the mystery or try to explain it away, and the result must inevitably be disastrous, for you will no longer be anchored to anything absolute; you will be at liberty to choose your own God ­ the object of your own imitation; and your "godliness" will be the measure of your conformity to the object of your choice.

The moment you come to realize that only God can make a man godly, you are left with no option but to find God, and to know God, and to let God be God in and through you, whoever He may be ­ and this will leave you with no margin for picking and choosing ­ for there is only one God, and He is absolute, and He made you expressly for Himself!

From: The Mystery of Godliness. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House. ©1964.

Mat 3:10 What counts is your life. Is it green and blossoming? Because if it's deadwood, it goes on the fire.

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Sons!

By tripp campbell

Just a few Thoughts:
If you feel like you are on the back side of a desert and just Wasting away. Consider how God looks at the word Waste. So many times we Identify ourselves and others by what we Do, instead of Who we Are. Naturally this begs a question! Who are we?

Listen to Paul in Romans 8:14-15:
"For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
For [the Spirit which] you have now received [is] not a spirit of slavery to put you once more in bondage to fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption [the Spirit producing sonship] in [the bliss of] which we cry, Abba (Father)! Father!"

Wow! what a glorious truth. We are Sons! We are Sons! We are Sons and Daughters of God!

Characteristics of a Slave:
1.) Hireling, obligation to serve for reward.
2.) Performance oriented.
3.) Slaves leave at the end of the day, Sons stay.
4.) Motivated by Fear.
5.) In Bondage

Characteristics of a Son:
1.) Motivated to do the Father's will.
2.) Enjoys Intimacy with Daddy.
3.) Sons have ears to Hear.
4.) Listens to Abba (Daddy) and does what He tells us to do.
5.) Does not fear, Free.


Now read the story of Mary who Lavished, Worshipped, Jesus in loving devotion, with an alabaster vial of costly perfume.
Matthew 26: 6-13

"Now when Jesus was in Bethany, at the home of Simon the leper, a woman came to Him with an alabaster vial of very costly perfume, and she poured it on His head as He reclined at the table. But the disciples were indignant when they saw this, and said, "Why this waste? "For this perfume might have been sold for a high price and the money given to the poor." But Jesus, aware of this, said to them, "Why do you bother the woman? For she has done a good deed to Me. "For you always have the poor with you; but you do not always have Me. "For when she poured this perfume on My body, she did it to prepare Me for burial. "Truly I say to you, wherever this gospel is preached in the whole world, what this woman has done will also be spoken of in memory of her." "

The Disciples believed Mary's act of Worship was a Waste. No! Why? Because the Disciples had a different idea of waste to God's idea of waste. Waste is determined by value. Value is determined by purpose or placing value in the things we do. The Disciples believed the perfume should had been sold and given to the poor. (Doing Ministry) Mary understood, Enjoyed, Being with the Father. (Intimacy) The Lord did not consider this act of worship a Waste.


You see, we have bought into this idea that our purpose is Doing, (i.e.. to win the lost). No. Our purpose should be, to do the Father's will. Our purpose is to "be" Sons and Daughters of God. Many of us have determined that doing things for the Father is better than just being with the Father. So the next time you believe you are just wasting away on the backside of a desert. Just remember who you are! Sons and Daughters of God!

BEING AND DOING

By: Major W. Ian Thomas

This is divine vocation into which you have been redeemed, as "His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before ordained that you should walk in them" (Ephesians 2:10) can only be fulfilled in the energy and power of the One who indwells you now by His Spirit, as He walked once only in the energy and power of the Father who indwelt Him through the Spirit. Of Himself He said, "I can of mine own self do nothing" (John 5:19), and of you He says, in John 15:5, "Without me you can do nothing."

How much can you do without Him? Nothing!

It is amazing how busy you can be doing nothing! Did you ever find that out? "The flesh ­ everything that you do apart from Him ­ "profiteth nothing" (John 6:63), and there is always the awful possibility, if you do not discover this principle, that you may spend a lifetime in the service of Jesus Christ doing nothing! You would not be the first, and you would not be the last ­ but that, above everything else, we must seek to avoid!

So you discover that the life which you possess as a born-again Christian is of Him, and it is to Him, and every moment that you are here on earth it must be through Him ­ of Him, through Him, to Him all things! "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice" (Romans 12:1).

The Lord Jesus Christ claims the use of your body, your whole being, your complete personality so that as you give yourself to Him through the eternal Spirit, He may give Himself to you through the eternal Spirit, that all your activity as a human being on earth may be His activity in and through you; that every step you take, every word you speak, everything you do, everything you are, may be an expression of the Son of God, in you as man.

If it is of Him and through Him and to Him, where do you come in? You do not! That is just where you go out! That is what Paul meant when he said, "For me to live is Christ" (Philippians 1:21). The only Person whom God credits with the right to live in you is Jesus Christ; so reckon yourself to be dead to all that you are apart from what He is, and alive unto God only in all that you are because of what He is (Romans 6:1 1).

It is for you to BE ­ it is for Him to DO! Rest fully available to the Saving Life of Christ.

From: The Saving Life of Christ. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House. ©1961.

EXCHANGED LIFE

By: Major W. Ian Thomas

Christian living is not a method or technique; it is an entirely different, revolutionary principle of life. It is the principle of an exchanged life" not I, but Christ liveth in me" (Galatians 2:20).

This is all part of our Gospel - it is not the Gospel plus! We must not get our terminology wrong. To divorce the behavior of the Christian from the Gospel is entirely false and is not true to the Word of God, yet all too often such is the characteristic of gospel preaching.

I would like to explore with you what is the true spiritual content of our Gospel ­ not just heaven one day, but Christ right now! Christ in you, on the grounds of redemption ­ this is the Gospel! To preach anything less than this must inevitably produce "Evan-jellyfish" ­ folk with no spiritual vertebrae, whose faith docs not "behave!"

Do you remember what James says in his epistle? "As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead" (chapter 2:26). The "spirit" there means breath, and a body without breath is dead. Stop breathing ­ and folk will bury you! In other words, a living body breathes, and a living faith breathes, and a living faith breaths with divine action. A living faith breathes with the activity of Jesus Christ. That is why the Lord Jesus, in John 6:29, said, "This is the work of God, that ye believe on Him whom He hath sent."

That is the work of God. It is your living faith in the adequacy of the One who is in you, which releases His divine action through you. It is the kind of activity that the Bible calls "good works," as opposed to "dead works."

"Good works" are those works that have their origin in Jesus Christ - - whose activity is released through your body, presented to Him as a living sacrifice by a faith that expresses total dependence, as opposed to the Adamic independence (Romans 12: 1,2).

It is only the life of the Lord Jesus -- His activity, clothed with you and displayed through you, that ultimately will find the approval of God.

From: The Saving Life of Christ. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House. ©1961.

Jesus Christ is our "LIFE"

Jesus Christ is our "LIFE"

Gal 2:20 "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

Col 3:3 For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

It seems to me that there is still a systemic notion of doing.... rather than just being!

Why do we continue to live in the illusion of life apart from Him, when He is our "LIFE"

The New Deal (Poles Apart)

by Jim Minker

'Behold, days are coming,' declares the Lord, 'when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,' declares the Lord. 'But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,' declares the Lord, 'I will put My Law within them, and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. And they shall not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord, 'for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.' (Jeremiah 31:31-34)

Long before Jesus spoke of 'a new commandment' He was the very Word which moved Jeremiah. He was not the ink on the page, but He was the Word which went forth out of the mouth of God performing that which His Father desired. Here is the new agreement of God promised way in advance. The Word not only issued forth the promise, but He became flesh to fulfill it. In doing so, He became the promise.

Without understanding what the old covenant is and why it didn’t work, and why a new covenant was needed we will eventually gravitate back to the old but still use the terminology (wording) of the new. Here is Jeremiah’s comparison/contrast:

The Old Covenant The New Covenant Law on stones ------------- Law on the heart Taken by the hand ---------- Led from within Covenant Broken -------------- Covenant Kept A broken relation -------- Unbroken Relation Man's teaching -------- No need for teaching No knowledge of God ----------- All Know Him No true forgiveness ------ All sins forgiven Constant reminder of sin ----- Sin forgotten

The New Covenant is NOT like the Old!

Have you ever driven through a paper mill town? It stinks ... to the visitor. You see, those who live there don’t smell it anymore. The senses still work, but the brain kinda tunes it out. It’s called 'getting used to it'. And this is exactly what happens to those who are inundated with certain words and phrases, they become so familiar that the words lose their distinctiveness. In the case of the old and new covenants, both the bondage of the one and the miraculousness of the other have bled together to become unrecognizable to the hearers.

We are now part of the 'New Covenant'. We are not left in the dark, for the Bible, which being inspired by God, is our authority, our 'owner’s manual'; for in it we have explicit instructions as to what is required of us. It is important to know that we are not under the Law of Moses, but instead we have in the New Testament the guidelines of Christian conduct. And because we have the written word of God in it’s completed form we can now understand much more about the things of God...for God has preserved the Bible so that we could know Him. In this, we should consider ourselves blessed by God; but we need to understand that 'to whom much is given much is expected', for God requires us to be students of His Word. But as God is gracious, He did not leave us on our own, but gave us gifted pastors and teachers; and by their teaching we can know the God of the Bible. But remember this, God does not expect perfection, for He knows that we will sin and break His laws...after all, 'Christians are not perfect, just forgiven'. But as we mature in Christ we will become better, and not break His laws as often. And the Holy Spirit will convict us of our sin so that we will know that we are offending Him. What God requires is that we 'trust and obey', living our lives knowing that we will stand before the judgment seat of Christ, where our deeds will be judged by God. Keeping our thoughts on this judgment produce in the believer the balanced 'fear of the Lord' to help us stay sober in this world. We need not worry about losing our salvation, for it is by grace through faith, but our sins will be replayed as on a movie screen and we will suffer loss of reward. Though we have been forgiven in the judicial sense, we still need forgiveness in the parental sense as children who continue to offend their Father. But as long as we are not flippant about our sins, but instead continually confess them, then God will forgive us and keep us in fellowship.

Shovel ... what are you saying???

Please, tell me you didn't read all the way through that blather and find yourself agreeing with it. It would be incredibly heartening for me to know that your nose was wrinkling from the stench, as a visitor from another place passing through an open graveyard of death. For though it forms the better part of many 'Statements of Faith', I wrote it based on the list under 'The Old Covenant'. That’s right...the above paragraph -- all of it -- is a restating of the Old Covenant using New Covenant jargon!

Taken Christmas Morning in Corpus Christi.

Corpus Christi is latin for "Body of Christ"

(originally posted on brother Greg Burnett's Blog)

Meeting Together

by Jack Gray

HEBREWS 10:25


"NOT FORSAKING THE ASSEMBLING OF OURSELVES TOGETHER, AS THE MANNER OF SOME IS". The quotation of this verse is the main ammunition of those who oppose people, whose view of the Church has led them to abandon regular attendance at "services" or religious meetings. What these proof-text-quoters fail to realise is that the verse will not bear the meaning they wish to read into it. In an endeavour to be honest with myself and to face up to the real meaning of the original of this verse, I did some research.

Firstly, I found that most modern translations simply say, "Not neglecting to meet together." Now, I suppose one may construe that in the sense that we are not to neglect attending meetings; but equally it would support quite informal times of getting together. The important point, from the context, is what we do when we do meet together. This context makes it clear that meeting together should be the occasion of "provoking one another to love and good works" and of "encouraging one another". The meeting is for interaction, relationship and mutual encouragement. My personal experience would strongly suggest that these aims are much better served when I am together with two or three brothers and sisters in an informal situation, rather than in structured "meetings". But maybe I too am guilty of making the verse say something to suit my position, so let us go to the original Greek text of the verse and seek the independent and authoritative interpretation of "The Expositors' Greek Testament."

The word here translated in the King James version, "Assembling yourselves together" is "Episunagoge" rather than the simpler word "Sunagoge". Here is what Expositors has to say, "Delitsch suggests that the compound word (episunagoge) is used instead of the simple one in order to avoid a word with Judaic associations, but "sunagoge" might rather have suggested the building and formal stated meetings, while the word used denotes merely the meeting together of Christians." In other words, it would seem that the writer to the Hebrews had been at pains to indicate that his meaning was not formal religious gatherings in a religious building, but rather any coming-together of Christians.

Further, I would suggest that there is much less true "meeting" in "Meetings" than in times when we sit down together, two or three believers, to open our hearts to one another, and to talk about the Lord. It is on such occasions that I find myself being encouraged and provoked to love and good works more than in formal services.

The other point of considerable importance is this; when these early Christians came together, they did not gather in the name of any denomination, but simply as members of the one Body of Christ, the Church. They had no Christian denominational menu to choose from, such as is set out in the "Church Notices" in our newspapers. If they belonged to the Lord, they belonged to the one and only Church, and meeting together was only unto Jesus Christ the Head of that Church.

No matter how fervently we sing, "We are gathering together unto Him", so long as we are meeting under denominational banners and the names and organisations of men, we are giving the lie to our words by our actions. So, if those who quote Hebrews 10:25 to me can show me where in this land I will find Church as it was in the New Testament, there I will be glad to assemble together with my brothers and sisters in the Lord, but I will not gather in the divisive denominational churches of today, whose very existence denies the unity of the Spirit we are exhorted to maintain.
To summarise: I reject the way in which this verse is used by those who would persuade us that, because we do not "go to church" and attend services and religious gatherings, we are in disobedience to the word of God. I reject it for the following reasons:

1) The original Greek text does not specify attendance at regular organised services, but rather the evidence strongly suggests that it means something less formal, which does not take place in religious buildings. Indeed, the whole Epistle to the Hebrews is aimed at demonstrating that the "Old Covenant" with its "Regulations for worship and an earthly sanctuary"(Hebrews 9:1) has been abolished and the "New Covenant ", which needs none of these things, has been established.

2) I would hold that wherever and whenever Christians come together, and they encourage one another and provoke one another to love and good works, then they are meeting in the true sense of this verse.

3) True meeting of heart and spirit is much more likely to occur with twos and threes than in larger formal gatherings.

4) Even should we concede that larger gatherings are what is meant in this verse, we have departed from the original ground of gathering, simply in the name of Jesus, by meeting instead in churches with denominational names. When Christians in a town gather in a dozen different churches on a Sunday they are not "Assembling together" but assembling separately.

5) Finally, Jesus said, "Wherever two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them." The verb, "gathered" is in the passive mood. Do we trust Jesus to do the gathering, or do we arrange gatherings? We are finding that, as we allow Jesus to do it, He provides times and occasions of rich intimate fellowship and times of mutual encouragement, quite often when we have not expected it. I look forward to the time when there will be a restoration of that original creation of God, a pure unified Church, unified, not by the ecumenical schemes of men, but by the Holy Spirit of God, released in fresh Pentecostal power among us. Then, I have no doubt, there will be large "family reunions", joyful gatherings with wonderful fellowship, but no religious services conducted by men. These gatherings will be creative events directed and orchestrated by the Holy Spirit.

Famous Atheist Now Believes in God

Mat 6:9 "With a God like this loving you, you can pray very simply. Like this: Our Father in heaven, Reveal who you are."(msg)

By RICHARD N. OSTLING
NEW YORK (AP) - A British philosophy professor who has been a leading champion of atheism for more than a half-century has changed his mind. He now believes in God - more or less - based on scientific evidence, and says so on a video released Thursday.

At age 81, after decades of insisting belief is a mistake, Antony Flew has concluded that some sort of intelligence or first cause must have created the universe. A super-intelligence is the only good explanation for the origin of life and the complexity of nature, Flew said in a telephone interview from England.

Flew said he's best labeled a deist like Thomas Jefferson, whose God was not actively involved in people's lives.

``I'm thinking of a God very different from the God of the Christian and far and away from the God of Islam, because both are depicted as omnipotent Oriental despots, cosmic Saddam Husseins,'' he said. ``It could be a person in the sense of a being that has intelligence and a purpose, I suppose.''

Flew first made his mark with the 1950 article ``Theology and Falsification,'' based on a paper for the Socratic Club, a weekly Oxford religious forum led by writer and Christian thinker C.S. Lewis.

Over the years, Flew proclaimed the lack of evidence for God while teaching at Oxford, Aberdeen, Keele, and Reading universities in Britain, in visits to numerous U.S. and Canadian campuses and in books, articles, lectures and debates.

There was no one moment of change but a gradual conclusion over recent months for Flew, a spry man who still does not believe in an afterlife.

Yet biologists' investigation of DNA ``has shown, by the almost unbelievable complexity of the arrangements which are needed to produce (life), that intelligence must have been involved,'' Flew says in the new video, ``Has Science Discovered God?''

The video draws from a New York discussion last May organized by author Roy Abraham Varghese's Institute for Metascientific Research in Garland, Texas. Participants were Flew; Varghese; Israeli physicist Gerald Schroeder, an Orthodox Jew; and Roman Catholic philosopher John Haldane of Scotland's University of St. Andrews.

The first hint of Flew's turn was a letter to the August-September issue of Britain's Philosophy Now magazine. ``It has become inordinately difficult even to begin to think about constructing a naturalistic theory of the evolution of that first reproducing organism,'' he wrote.

The letter commended arguments in Schroeder's ``The Hidden Face of God'' and ``The Wonder of the World'' by Varghese, an Eastern Rite Catholic layman.

This week, Flew finished writing the first formal account of his new outlook for the introduction to a new edition of his ``God and Philosophy,'' scheduled for release next year by Prometheus Books.

Prometheus specializes in skeptical thought, but if his belief upsets people, well ``that's too bad,'' Flew said. ``My whole life has been guided by the principle of Plato's Socrates: Follow the evidence, wherever it leads.''

Last week, Richard Carrier, a writer and Columbia University graduate student, posted new material based on correspondence with Flew on the atheistic www.infidels.org Web page. Carrier assured atheists that Flew accepts only a ``minimal God'' and believes in no afterlife.

Flew's ``name and stature are big. Whenever you hear people talk about atheists, Flew always comes up,'' Carrier said. Still, when it comes to Flew's reversal, ``apart from curiosity, I don't think it's like a big deal.''

Flew told The Associated Press his current ideas have some similarity with American ``intelligent design'' theorists, who see evidence for a guiding force in the construction of the universe. He accepts Darwinian evolution but doubts it can explain the ultimate origins of life.

A Methodist minister's son, Flew became an atheist at 15.

Early in his career, he argued that no conceivable events could constitute proof against God for believers, so skeptics were right to wonder whether the concept of God meant anything at all.

Another landmark was his 1984 ``The Presumption of Atheism,'' playing off the presumption of innocence in criminal law. Flew said the debate over God must begin by presuming atheism, putting the burden of proof on those arguing that God exists.

Merry Christmas!
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Much More

" For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life. "(Rom 5:10)

Christmas
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NOT FORM BUT LIFE

By: James M. Campbell

From beginning to end the teaching of Paul was opposed to the religion of form. It was decidedly anti-ritualistic. Paul never ceased to thunder against the religionists of his day, who put stress upon the puerilities of piety. So little value did he put upon rules and ceremonies, that he seems at times to disparage the externals of religion. "Weak and beggarly elements" he calls them (see Gal. 4:9-11). At best they were crutches for the lame, to be thrown away when the vivifying power of Christ had been experienced. Dependence upon them, on the part of a Christian, was a return to legalism. To assign saving efficacy to them was to fall from grace.

On the other hand, Paul put emphasis upon the religion of the spirit. In his contention with his Judaizing opponents his battleground was that of the spirit versus the letter. He stood for the spiritual interpretation of Christianity. The keynote of his ministry is contained in the words, "Neither is circumcision anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation" (Gal. 6:15). All his interest centered in the vital things of religion; and he never wearied of warning against the danger of making the performance of prescribed ceremonials the test of discipleship, instead of the transformation of the heart and life through faith in Jesus Christ. Rites and ceremonies were to him the mere costume of religion. Their value lay in their spiritual significance. The material emblems of the Lord's Supper spoke to him of a mystic bread and wine with which the soul was fed. He saw beneath the circumcision which was " outward in the flesh," a "circumcision made without hands" (Col. 2:11); a circumcision" of the heart in the spirit, not in the letter, whose praise is not of man but of God " (Rom. 2:29). There was nothing he dreaded more than seeing his converts "subject themselves to ordinances" (Col. 2:20); thus bringing themselves under the heavy yoke of ceremonialism from which they had been delivered. He repudiated the idea that Christianity is an ironclad system of rules; and declared, " Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty " (2 Cor. 3:17). Forms he used just so far as they were of use; but he did not tie himself down to them. He was freed from their slavery. He exercised his common sense in adapting them to existing conditions, breaking, if need be, "the law of commandments contained in ordinances" in the letter, that he might keep it in the spirit.

Mysticism has always come in as a rebound from formalism in religion. The use of set forms tends to formality; ritualism has a way of becoming mechanical; the strict observance of the letter is apt to strangle the life of the spirit. This tendency to externality, which is especially strong in the Western mind, will, if allowed free course, develop into a religion which consists in something lying outside of experience, something to be studied as you might study botany or astronomy. To this tendency mysticism furnishes an antidote, by appealing from form to life. In times of barrenness it exerts a freshening force, by bringing the Church back to what is vital in religion. Professor Stearns says, "In every age when the life of the Church grows weak, and its inner fires die down, mysticism is needed. Christians must be made to realize that the hidden life of faith and communion with God is their true life."

From: Paul the Mystic: A Study in Apostolic Experience. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. 1908.

Christmas
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Renewing of the Mind

by Jim Minker

“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.” Romans 12:2

Does this verse represent the “HOW TO” practicality of the grace life? Are you sure? Truthfully, we have had to make some very obvious oversights to produce such a concept in the first place. Just take a good look at the syntax (phrase structure):

“And do not BE CONFORMED to this world, but BE TRANSFORMED by THE RENEWING of your mind,”

Where is the action in the above statement? Re-read that and notice it does NOT say: “Do not conform yourself to this world, but transform yourself by renewing your mind“. No, we have been taught to automatically rearrange the sentence structure in our minds so that we miss the simple expression of a STATE OF BEING. Of course, when we're trying to get a handle on how to live this miraculous life it's not at all surprising that the miraculous gets bumped right out of the life!

“And do not BE CONFORMED to this world...”

Now, I realize this is a novel idea, but what if we were to assume that everything Paul wrote in this letter was so connected that it built upon itself? Imagine that! Paul presented the truth of the good news of Christ in his letter to the Romans by alternating between declaring the reality and then the logical human reaction against it. He posed fleshly objections in the form of questions throughout the whole letter.

These questions represent the wisdom of this world that is pushed at us all day, every day, from every side. It is nothing less than a bottom-line rejection to the life of Christ. And the religious world has capitalized upon it, having done so by veiling it with Christian lingo and Bible verses. But you know what? There is only one reason why we even HEAR this passively-phrased declaration: we have been given ears to hears!

Let me tell you what this statement -- “do not BE CONFORMED to this world” -- does to me. It CONFIRMS the reality of Christ's life within me, for I desire the reassurance that I'm NOT crazy for questioning the BS in the world around me!

You see, we're often so ready to “DO“ this Christian life, especially egged on by fleshly demands of religion, that we will act against the wisdom of Christ within us. We've been duped! The religious lie of this world would have us suspect our problems are found by running after SIN, when in fact, we've been tricked into pursuing a fleshly “RIGHTNESS” ... which is nothing but LAW! It is right here that we need to be reassured of the miraculous life of Christ within us that speaks: “Don't take heed to these lying demands no matter how right they sound!”

“but BE TRANSFORMED...”

In Galatians 5, Paul also wrote this: “For we through the Spirit, by faith, are WAITING for the hope of righteousness.” (5:5) Different words, same truth. Both in the letter to the Galatians and in the letter to the Romans (chapter 4) Paul called up the imagery of Abraham's forced wait for God's miraculous working to produce what He had promised! Abraham had given in to that shared fleshly sense that says we need to DO something in order to make God's work happen. Though we may regard Abraham to have lost faith when he had sex with Sarah's slave-girl, thereby producing the fleshly-son Ishmael, Paul states clearly that his faith did not waver but that he grew in faith knowing that God was able to perform what He said.

“But be transformed” is a summary of the reality Paul described in Romans 8. For what the law could not do Christ does IN us. It is all HIS doing because HE is our righteousness. Once again, WE HEAR THIS because of the Spirit who is in us.

“But be transformed” is like having it said, “Stand still and watch the deliverance of God!” Hmmm ... sounds like a scriptural theme, huh? :) The truth of the matter is that God IS and HAS BEEN working His deliverance in us the whole time. This is also the meaning behind this statement: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.” Eph 2:10. For we, just like Abraham, continue to question the true value and reality of the works God has us walking in because the perception based upon fleshly appearances demand that nothing is happening, nor ever will.

One more part to consider: “but be transformed by THE RENEWING OF YOUR MIND”

Remember how I asked where the action was? Ever notice the little word “the” preceding “renewing”? How is it that we so quickly read OVER it as if it's not there? As a verb of action we could say, “I need to renew my mind,” but if we had to fit the word “the” in front of it we would be hard-pressed to make an intelligible sentence.

“The renewing” is a noun; as in, person, place or thing. I think it has been read as if it describes the course of action believers are supposed to perform ... but this actually violates the passive “be transformed by ...” It is a call to the miraculous work of God, the hope of the very righteousness that God works within us.

“Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet “OUR INNER MAN IS BEING RENEWED DAY BY DAY.” 2 Cor 4:16

There is no suggestion here that WE are the performers of this “being renewed” is there? This is a statement of the reality of the contrast between the constant decaying outward and the constant renewing inward. “Therefore we do not lose heart” Why not? Because of its reality, for God Himself is the sustainer of our hearts. Remember, this is the same man, who in this same letter had just said,

“For God, who said, 'Light shall shine out of darkness,' is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, so that the surpassing greatness of the power will be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” (2 Cor 4:6-10)

God is the one who lit up our hearts! The treasure is Christ, but it is contained in earthen containers. “The surpassing greatness of the power WILL BE of God and not from ourselves.” Notice the contrasting language used to describe how this affected Paul as an earthen vessel: “AFFLICTED IN EVERY WAY ... PERPLEXED ... PERSECUTED ... STRUCK DOWN ... ALWAYS CARRYING ABOUT IN THE BODY THE DYING OF JESUS,”

You know, if it were not for the reality of Christ that would be a very sad story! Somehow, the reality of the life of Jesus renewing his inner man made it so “that the life of Jesus also may be manifested.” For though afflicted he was not crushed; though perplexed, not despairing; and so on. In other words, Paul counted on this miraculous renewing of his mind, which is his inner man. This renewing does not stop ... but our eyes can become clouded so that we think nothing is happening, and then we become discouraged so that we question God's non-stop work inside us.

“And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind,”

This is a reinforcement of the miraculous work of Christ within us to simply wait upon the righteousness of God as it works itself out in our lives despite all the sneering and ridicule from the world logic as its collective voice says, “Where is this 'miraculous' God who can't seem to bring about anything of real value in your life? What does Christ do for you ... really? Why can't you measure up to those who far outshine you?”

I tell you, don't listen to these lies, even when you are the one repeating them! God is the one who renews your mind ... count on this faithful and consistent renewing, for it is Christ himself who IS this to you! Stand still and watch the salvation of your God!

BORNE BY CHRIST

By: James S. Stewart

The evangel of an ethical example is a devastating thing. It makes religion the most grievous of burdens. Perhaps this is the real reason why, even among professing Christians, there are so many strained faces and weary hearts and captive, unreleased spirits. They have listened to Jesus' teaching, they have meditated on Jesus' character; and then they have risen up, and tried to drive their own lives along Jesus' royal way. Disappointment heaped on bitter disappointment has been the result. The great example has been a dead-weight beating them down, bearing them to the ground, bowing their hopeless souls in the dust.

One of the vital distinctions between true religion and false is that, whereas the latter is a dead burden for the soul to carry, the former is a living power to carry the soul. Paul's mysticism grows lyrical with precisely this great discovery. "Christ in me" means something quite different from the weight of an impossible ideal, something far more glorious than the oppression of a pattern for ever beyond all imitation. "Christ in me" means Christ bearing me along from within, Christ the motive-power that carries me on, Christ giving my whole life a wonderful poise and lift, and turning every burden into wings. All this is in it when the apostle speaks of "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Col. 1:27).

Compared with this, the religion which bases everything on example is pitifully rudimentary. This, and this alone, is the true Christian religion. To be "in Christ," to have Christ within, to realize your creed not as something you have to bear but as something by which you are born, this is Christianity. It is more: it is release and liberty, life with an endless song at its heart. It means feeling within you, as long as life here last, the carrying power of Love Almight; and underneath you, when you come to die, the touch of everlasting arms.

From: A Man in Christ: The Vital Elements of Paul's Religion. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House. Pgs. 168-170.

Luther

Checkout the movie Luther!

This is a very good interpretation and followed the outline of history quite well.


On October 31, out of love for the truth, the Priest and Reverend Father Martin Luther, Master of Arts and Sacred Theology, and lecturer at Wittenberg, nailed his 95 Theses upon the door of the Wittenburg church. These statements stood against the current trends of the church and pronounced truths. The church of today has greatly benefited from Martin Luther’s efforts. We can now both use and now update his ideas.

1. God is love.

2. He has a great unfolding plan.

3. That plan includes us.

4. His plan is for us to love.

5. His plan is to eternally live in us, in order to express His eternal life through us (2 Cor. 4:10)

6. The redemption of Jesus allows us to participate in His plan.

7. God is always ever present. Now the tabernacle of God is ever with us – Emanuel.

8. Believers are to become conformed and transformed into the image of God.

9. They are to walk in the restored dominion authority of the garden.

10. Jesus is held in the heavenlies until the fulfillment of all things (Acts 3:21). He’s waiting for us to be transformed.

11. Sin caused us to miss the purpose of God, but redemption by the Blood of Jesus causes us to be adopted and to be full heirs of God.

12. Jesus came to this world to inaugurate God’s new redemptive plan for humanity.

13. God’s plan to conform us to His image includes all races, male and female, all ages, and all classes which are equally and highly cherished.

14. Christ died for a total forgiveness of our past and present sins. We are pardoned from our sins because of that inestimable gift of God.

15. Jesus initiated God’s message of Good News (Lu. 2:10 LB).

16. We seek the unfolding Gospel of the power of God’s non-judgmental, non-condemning love and new life.

17. Believers are entrusted with the privilege of enacting God’s mercy and compassion toward one another and the world..

18. Believers are co-crucified with Christ (Rom. 6:6, 11, Col. 3:1-4). We have already died. We don’t need to die to our old man any longer. Wrongly emphasizing our personal sacrifice to need to continually die, denies the power of the resurrection. When Jesus died, we died.

19. Believers are co-buried with Christ (Col. 2:12, Rom. 6:3-4).

20. Believers re co-resurrected with Christ (Col. 3:1, Rom. 6:9).

21. Believers are co-seated in heavenly places with Christ (Eph. 2:5-6).

22. Believers are already made alive together with Christ (Eph. 2:1-2, 1 Cor. 15:23).

23. We are partners with God for His plan concerning every living human being.

24. Jesus offered up the only sacrifice that takes away the sins of the world (Jn. 1:29).

25. Believers are anointed of the Holy Spirit by the miracle power of God to do His work.

26. Jesus established a new covenant of mercy (Jn. 1:17, Heb. 8:8-10).

27. Jesus provides redemption that enables believers to possess or share all that exists only in Jesus.

28. Truth proceeds ongoingly, giving greater accuracy. And through this accuracy, the Spirit of God brings powerful demonstrations.

29. Jesus abolished the law and established a greater commandment (Jn. 13:34). To LOVE others.

30. Christ living in us enables His love-power to reach others with the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit.

31. Jesus instituted a new priesthood (Heb. 8:6, 12:24, 9:11).

32. Believers are Christ’s body today on earth who image that priesthood.

33. Christ’s priesthood is not Aaronic… He was a Melchedezic priest.

34. The Melchezdic priesthood holds the power of endless life (Heb. 7:16).

35. Believers are a community of priests (1 Pet. 2:5). Jesus made us a priest like Himself. His power was not derived from another man -- it’s not Levitical. His priesthood came from the LIFE OF GOD itself. It’s the power that arises out of the life that lives in Him. He gives us HIS power -- and that power is after His endless life. Ours is a priesthood “by virtue of an indestructible Life (Wey), … according to the energy of an indissoluble life (Min), But with the power of an imperishable life (Con.), But on the basis of a power flowing from a life that cannot end (Wms), But by virtue of a life beyond the reach of death (Tcnt).

36. Jesus has the power to save us to the uttermost (Heb. 7:25).

37. Jesus has the power to restore the kingdom and all things (Col. 1:20).

38. Believers have the power to draw near God’s presence and fellowship with Him there.

39. Believers have the ability to communicate to others the power of a life within the veil.

40. Before the believer are the ever opened doors (Ps. 118:19, Rev. 22:14).

41. Jesus established total healing for our body, soul, and spirit.

42. Believers are to become whole and have a sound mind and body.

43. Our body is the temple of God. We are to care for our bodies and present our body as a living sacrifice (Rom. 12).

44. Every day is holy and set apart for us.

45. Jesus initiated a new relationship and covenant with God (Je. 32:38-41, 2 Co. 6:16-18).

46. He birthed a new lifestyle for us to imitate (Jn. 1:4, 10:10, 11:25, 14:6, Rom. 5:21, 2 Ti. 1:10, Heb. 10:20, 1Jn. 5:12).

47. Believers become God’s honored representatives on earth.

48. Jesus sat down and said that His work was finished (Heb. 4:3). All things are consummated in Christ.

49. The job of the believer is to incorporate the finished work of the cross, overcoming evil with good, walking in holiness, and becoming a demonstration of His glory.

50. God’s infallible plan for our life is to tell the untold, love the unlovely, heal the hurting, and to activate God’s love and anointing.

51. Satan is a created being who is not able to create life.

52. John 5:19 states: “The whole world is most certainly under the control of the evil one.”

53. But, believers are not to be of this world (James 4:4, 1 Jn. 2:15-18).

54. The Son of God came to earth to destroy the works of the evil one.

55. He finished the work. The enemy is defeated – now. Satan and evil have no jurisdiction over the believer (1 Jn. 2:3, 4:4, 5:18, Rom. 6:14, Col. 1:13).

56. His death enabled each of us to become a “son of God” who can also destroys evil works (1 Jn. 3:8). The power given us to subdue all God’s enemies (Eph. 1:19-23). As He is, so are we in this WORLD (1 Jn. 4:7). All believers have been given Divine authority over all the POWER (dunamis) of the enemy; and nothing shall by any means hurt them (Lk. 10:19). All hell comes to a halt because we are invested with the God-given authority of heaven over the power of the enemy.

57. We can overcome evil with good (Rom. 12:21).

58. At the cross, our LIFE-GIVER, Jesus became the Redemptive Seed that could be planted in our hearts to grow the TREE OF LIFE once again in our garden heart.

59. The POWER of God is the Gospel (Gal 2:16).

60. The Gospel enables people to live in victory above their circumstances.

61. Therefore, the gift of the Holy Spirit is accessible to each believer.

62. God created us for His glory (Is. 43:7).

63. We are to declare His glory among the nations (I Chrn. 16:24). We declare His glory among all people.

64. They shall open their eyes from darkness into light.

65. Our WHOLENESS brings glory to God (Mat. 5:16).

66. God’s holy Word is settled (Ps. 118:99).

67. All things are possible through faith if we only believe (Matt. 19:26, Mk. 10:27).

68. Redemption provides for our health and soundness of mind and body.

69. Redemption provides for our total forgiveness of sin. Redemption gives believers the power to live with a cleansed conscience.

70. We have been given the power to manifest His breathtaking glory on earth.

71. The hatred of the old nature must be replaced with the discovery of being part of the New Creation.

72. We are to ask the Lord of the harvest for laborers and for rain on behalf of all humankind, that they be brought to repentance by the goodness and love of God.

73. We lift up our eyes to see the provision of God. For the Lord will hasten to perform His Word and reveal to His people the abundance of peace, truth, health, prosperity, deliverance, safety, and abundant life.

74. We, the people of God, put on love and walk in absolute trust and confidence of His power, wisdom, and goodness.

75. The Word dwells within us, in all richness.

76. The Spirit of Death has no power over the believer.

77. We are ransomed by His blood, and walk in the Spirit of Life.

78. We don’t need man’s approval, distorted prosperity, self-exaltation, or popularity.

79. Believers do not flinch in sacrifice, hesitate in adversity, negotiate with the enemy, or wallow in the maze of mediocrity.

80. The giving of money should be a free will and generous act of the heart – the believer should not be concerned about “the penalties of sacramental satisfaction” established by man. Any true Christian, whether living or dead, participates in all the blessings of Christ and the church; and this is granted him by God, even without indulgence letters (extracted from a partial quote of Martin Luther). Christians are to be taught that God desires their pure motive and devout lifestyle rather than their wrongly motivated external activities.

81. Jesus is the Head of the Church; that means He is the source of it. All church activities should glorify Him and not a person.

82. God established a pattern for the church and allows certain individuals to hold the responsibility of leadership in love.

83. The leaders of the church were elders.

84. Without proper church leadership there would be lawlessness, anarchy and disorder. (Ju. 21:23, 2 Peter 2:10, James 3:16).

85. Government is a blessing of God giving security and freedom within a God-given framework of order (Heb. 10:19-25).

86. God’s government is not hierarchical. It was never meant to be a ranking of superiority. No hierarchy or position qualifies a person to have any power over another. Even the God-head pictures equality.

87. Leaders are to lead with humility and wisdom.

88. Godly government works as leaders set aside their own preferences and submit to the Lordship of Jesus – in honor preferring one another. The greatest of all are the servants of God’s people.

89. Leaders are to mature and equip the saints, to enable them to (fully) walk in newness of life and inheritance.

90. Every member should mature to fully function according to his/her gift (I Peter 2:5).

91. Continual repentance from sin and selfish motives is available for all of us (Acts. 3:19).

92. God’s people need to work happily and not act big.

93. God’s people need to use their talents to the fullest for the gospel.

94. In God there is only goodness and no shadow nor variance of turning (Jms. 1:17).

95. There is no fear in life or death when we are secure in the Lord’s love.
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Real Life in Christ

I know this post will be a little different from what I normally engage in and/or comment on. However, it is exciting to witness others breaking free from the "religious bondage," which has held them captive, and then begin walking in the freedom appropriated by the cross.

The below comments were recently posted on a website which I highlight on this blog, The ShovelShack. I encourage each of you to check out this site, and allow the Lord to "Minister" His Grace, through this forum.

See link to the right, or click on the above title for continued comments:

Please do not allow the frankness, of some of the comments below, hinder you from hearing the Heart of this ongoing Revelation! Grace! Grace! Grace!

"I really appreciate your guys' comments...thank you.

Today somebody went ahead and told me that I'm too hard on
myself. Out of the blue. twas the holy spirit

im so thankful God brought me here to theshovel. he was fully
aware with my discontent with the church and much of what I
learned in its religious environment..

the depth of the insanity taught by some churches is off the charts
guys. i honestly
believe that Ive been taught all my life to reject grace..to inflict pain
on myself when I fail...to try and love others without loving myself.
to act like Jesus without understanding why. frankly it pisses me
off to see how distorted the message has become...some of these
churches are raising worry freaks who feed their flesh the very
ideas that will only stimulate it. anxious, confused. and they think
its the result of having their eyes "open." lots of church goers are
turning into psychological nightmares.

i hate how we're taught to WORRY about the will of God (people
teach that to walk in the will of god, one must examine their life
for any sign of sin and never make any mistakes which can cause
some type of random riff in all of Gods plans. people also teach
that to hear gods voice, you cannot make a single mistake..if you
do hear gods voice and your making mistakes, your listening to
satan)

I hate how we're taught to condemn ourselves when we are
conscious of some sin..then taught to feel holy if we think we've
been on a sinfree streak.

i hate how my friend doesn't feel welcome at our church because
he smokes. more than that, he feels condemned. the other day he
said "I'll start going to church after I change, because I have a bad
reputation there so when I go back I want to show people I am
different". I DONT EVEN WANT TO GO INTO THIS ONE.

i hate how "prayer request times" are composed of nothing but
gossip or sharing their worries. i think sharing ones worries is
ok..but we have a solution: christ. people must think that
worrying is some kind of holy struggle. they share their worries to
show that they are "keeping God on top of things" because they are
"mature" and "spiritually aware"

its SO wrong. so OPPOSITE of what God intended for us. its
so...INSANE.

im done venting, sorry guys. haha. really though..no more am i
gonna keep my mouth shut. just the last week i went ahead and
expressed my disappointment with my mens group and their sin
consciousness. funny thing is, that night was the first night these
guys had their eyes wide open, nodding their heads in agreement
at everything that was being said about God's grace. it was the
first night they smelled freedom from a God who to them was the
cause of their unnecessary bondage.

i cant wait till i see their reaction to the REAL jesus. the freedom
fighter..liberator..friend...model..king."

Rom 15:13 "Oh! May the God of green hope fill you up with joy, fill you up with peace, so that your believing lives, filled with the life-giving energy of the Holy Spirit, will brim over with hope!" (msg)

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A DIFFERENT GOSPEL

by: Charles Swindoll

It is a "different gospel" that says, "salvation is not by faith alone it requires works. Human achievement must accompany sincere faith before you can be certain of your salvation". We continue to hear that "different gospel" to this day and it is a lie. A theology that rests its salvation on one ounce of human performance is not good news; it is bad information. It is heresy.

A salvation that begins with God's love reaching down to lost humanity and is carried out by Christ's death and resurrection results in all the praise going to God. But a salvation that includes human achievement, hard work, personal effort, even religious deeds distorts the good news because man gets the glory, not God. The problem is, it appeals to the flesh. Paul's twice-repeated reaction to the one who introduced that doctrinal heresy is "Let him be accursed!" The original word is anathema! It is the strongest single Greek term for condemnation.

Nevertheless, the heresy goes on. Most every cult you could name is a cult of salvation by works. It appeals to the flesh. It tells you, if you will stand so long on a street corner, if you will distribute so much literature, if you will sacrifice so much of life, if you will be baptized, if you will contribute your money, if you will pray or attend numerous meetings, then your good works and hard effort will cause God to smile on you. Ultimately when the good is weighed against the bad on the Day of Judgement, you will finally earn His favor. The result in that, I say again, is man's glory, because you added to your salvation.

Grace says you have nothing to give, nothing to earn, nothing to pay. You couldn't if you tried! Salvation is a free gift. You simply lay hold of what Christ has provided. Period. And yet the heretical doctrine of works goes on all around the world and always will. It is effective because the pride of men and women is so strong. We simply have to do something in order to feel right about it. It just doesn't make good humanistic sense to get something valuable for nothing.

Please allow me to be absolutely straight with you: Stop tolerating the heretical gospel of works! It is legalism. Wake up to the fact that it will put you into a bondage syndrome that won't end. The true gospel of grace, however, will set you free. Free forever.

From: The Grace Awakening

THE GOSPEL

by: Malcolm Smith

The Gospel is the call to rest, to receive the free, undeserved gift that God has given us in Christ. There is nothing man can do to earn salvation from his past, or his present acceptance and walk with God. It is, from beginning to end, the grace of God, which can only be received by faith.

The body of truth that proclaims the revelation of God is called the Good News. News, by definition, is the announcement of something that has happened, not a list of things that must be done! All that must be done for a man to live in perfect union with God has been accomplished by Jesus in His death and resurrection.

The heart of the Christian life is to stand in wonder before His love and say, "Thank You!"

The Gospel is not a call to do something, but the announcement that all is done in the One Who stood for all.

The Christian life is not living in our own strength and resources, but from the infinite Christ Who lives within those who believe. All human strength will come to an end sooner or later, leaving each of us with charred, burned out life. But His strength knows no end!

We have one function in life: to be the manifestors of His life to the world. Only when we are living His life are we truly living our own! This is the reason for our creation.

We realize that He is not only the past tense Savior from sin, but also the One Who now lives within us in the present tense, our life and breath. Christianity is not a formula, but the Person of Jesus Himself.

Never think that Christianity is a matter of adjusting behavior, but rather, of letting Christ live through us in His strength and power.

From: Spiritual Burnout

2Co 3:17 Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.

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Psa 72:19 Blessed always his blazing glory! All earth brims with his glory.

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Law and Grace: Mortal Enemies

By: Dan Stone

Law and grace are mortal enemies. Religion asserts, "No, they aren't mortal enemies. They can flow together, like the Missouri and Ohio rivers flow into the Mississippi, and they become the Mississippi." Every place I've ever been in organized religion, I've found that belief. But Paul was saying, "NO? They never flow together. They've always been mortal enemies. They will always be mortal enemies. You can never marry the two. And you have to make a choice, Galatians. Are you going to live under 1aw, or under grace?"

Paul wasn't saying that if they stepped back into the law, they wouldn't be saved anymore. But he was telling them, "If you go back to the law, you're giving up the way of grace. Now, let me tell you something about the way of the law, Galatians: you have to keep it all."

They couldn't just pick out the law they wanted to keep. That's what I used to do. I'd pick out those parts of Mosaic Law, Sermon on the Mount law, Baptist law, my personal law, and whatever other law I thought I could keep at least some of the time. I didn't see that law and grace are mortal enemies. I didn't see that you can't live under both.

It made sense to me to be religious. It made sense to be an external Christian, trying to keep an external set of rules. I couldn't do anything else, because I had always been an external person. So were you. We all grew up as external people, defining ourselves in relation to other persons, things, and events that told us who we were. That's why as new Christians we were so prone to asking external questions: "What should I do?"

There's no life in the law. The only thing the law tells you is what you ought to do, but can't do. It will never relinquish its demand that you ought to do it, because it's a divine ought-to; God gave it to Moses. We'll keep ourselves under that divine ought-to, and the condemnation and death ministers (2 Corinthians 3), until we learn to live from the Person who dwells within us. Because there's nothing in our flesh that wants to say, "I can't do it. I can't keep the law through my own effort." Everything in our flesh says, "I want to try to do it, and with God's help maybe I can do it."

Like my friend Burt Rosenburg says, everything in that program is designed for futility, frustration, and failure. But they don't tell you that up front, do they? When you sign up, no one makes this announcement:

WE'VE GOT A WONDERFUL PROGRAM HERE, THE END RESULT OF WHICH WILL BE FUTILITY, FRUSTRATION, AND FAILURE! WHEN YOU HAVE COMPLETED THE COURSE, WE WILL GIVE YOU A DIPLOMA, SAYING:

"CONGRATULATIONS, YOU HAVE FAILED!"

I remember talking to a group and proclaiming, "We have succeeded! In what? In failing!" And everyone smiled. For we finally recognized that we had succeeded in what we were supposed to do, which was to fail. "Everyone is telling us that we failed in what we were supposed to succeed in. But the truth is we have succeeded in what we were supposed to fail in. Now, we can get on with it. We can get on with what is true life."

We usually quote Galatians 2:20 apart from its context. It immediately follows Paul's admonition to Peter concerning the law. When Paul said, "I have been crucified with Christ," he was referring to his death to the law. Paul was saying, "The old me died on the cross with Christ, and when I died, I died to trying to keep the law. Trying to keep the law is living according to the flesh, with me and my efforts as my point of reference. I died to myself as my point of reference. Now, Christ in me is my point of reference. He is living His life through me."

As believers, we no longer live under the law, looking to it to tell us what to do and not do, then trying our best to do it. Instead, we live on the faith principle, the inner life principle, of who really is our life-Christ. We trust that He directs us, opens or closes doors for us, and speaks directly to us, giving us a message or whatever is needed for the occasion. We trust that He is living through us. We may not feel it at any given moment, but we live by faith that He is our life.

From: Stone, Dan, The Rest of the Gospel: When the partial Gospel has worn you out. Dallas: One Press. 2000. pgs 143-145.

Everything In Him!

We gain everything in Jesus Christ!!

"Everything comes from him; Everything happens through him; Everything ends up in him. Always glory! Always praise! Yes. Yes. Yes." Rom. 11:36 (msg)

Gen 9:16 When the rainbow appears in the cloud, I'll see it and remember the eternal covenant between God and everything living, every last living creature on Earth."

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Can A Believer Sin Anymore?

Lately, I have encountered the perplexing question, "Can A Believer Sin Anymore?" What follows is a good understanding surrrounding the "sin" issue.

I know how hard it can be to transcend "Old nature" mentality, (Illusion), which always has a view toward the dead, versus the True Reality of Jesus Christ(Life), of being Dead to Sin, but Alive to God in Christ Jesus!

(Rom 6:11) "From now on, think of it this way: Sin speaks a dead language that means nothing to you; God speaks your mother tongue, and you hang on every word. You are dead to sin and alive to God. That's what Jesus did." (msg)

Jim Minker answers this all important question below:
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Romans 6 - can a believer sin anymore?

Can a believer sin (miss) anymore? If so, how is it that we are dead to Sin?
Allow me to rephrase your two questions by joining them into one as the combination pretty much answers itself: "If we are dead to sin how CAN we sin anymore?" Ironically, this ends up being the very same question already posed by Paul: "How shall we who died to sin still live in it?"

Of course, one can approach the question from two totally different angles, for while Paul posed it in view of the impossibility factor (by virtue of death) it is more often asked in view of what SEEMS to be an obvious observation (by virtue of living). In other words, in view of sin, we easily determine that many, if not all (even those who call themselves "believers", especially our own selves) are still "missing the mark". What we want to know is how we are able do what we're not supposed to be able to do? Hey, I understand the confusion all too well. :)

Questions of this nature have been asked many times in many different ways in the attempt to solve the contradictions demanded by a totally baffling form of life--a life that has passed out of the realm of everything we knew, or thought we knew. Our problem hangs upon an inability to process the obvious answer according to the reasoning and judgment we learned according to this world. The most one can ascertain by such logic is that those who are dead are no longer subject to the former demands of the known world. Death makes its own case as to why.

That's why there remains an insatiable quest to explore and speculate on what might lie beyond death. Of course, Paul's demands regarding the finality of death also make the contradiction between our "doctrinal" and "practical" understandings even more contradictory and oppositional.

It doesn't seem to be death that confuses us for its finality is too blasted inflexible, despite our many attempts to defy it. The confusion of the gospel issues from the absurdity of a co-experienced death and new life with Christ that just doesn't seem to pan out according to what we see in the world around us. You know, if it's supposed to be an actual death and resurrection it sure doesn't offer any indications to the senses or to the computations of logic. Then again, maybe death still confuses us beyond our imagination, since our perception of it seems to be bound by what appears to be, or not to be.

So, did we really die with Christ, or is this merely a teaching that rests upon symbolism? Ah yes, now this distinction really explains quite a bit of "Christian" teaching on the subject. As I mentioned already, while we might talk about Christ having died FOR us, we pretty much gloss over this demand of the good news of having died WITH Christ -- as if it were little more than a symbolic reference to how we OUGHT to think in order to better motivate a deeper devotion to God.

Heck, an experience involving a sudden encounter with water is so much easier to deal with. No wonder there are so many arguments based around it. :) Yeah, here we are yakking about rituals and ordinances, or symbolism and doctrinal viewpoints while the reality of having truly DIED with Christ escapes our notice! Just because we cannot go to the morgue or to a gravesite and verify the physical evidence of our own dead bodies, in the expected manner, WE did indeed die.

The truth of the matter is that we had already experienced death in another - the first man, Adam - so that our existence clearly reflected it in everything we thought, said and did. Geez, we hadn't even noticed it, except in the extreme cases, because the world around us made us assume it was "normal" to exist in deadness.

In Adam we were dead IN sin (as well as, dead in our sins), while in Christ we were made dead TO (as in, toward) sin. The death we shared with Adam brought us into this world totally in relation to sin, but the death we shared with Christ removed us from its association. Both refer to a death that is as dead as dead can be. Morgue dead. Rotting-in-the-grave dead. Devoid-of-life dead.

Can a believer sin (miss) anymore?

Before I push on, let me address another issue lingering within the phrasing of this question (whether or not it had any bearing upon your thoughts in question). It has to do with our assumptions surrounding the mention of the word "believer", as well as the accompanying concept inherent in our common religious designations. Now, I'm not against using the word, though I think it has become amazingly overused, misused and abused.

My consideration here has to do with how often the word "believer" (or variation thereof) gets thrown into the mix so that we are often asking another question altogether, such as: What is there in believing (or being a believer) that would cause one to sin or not sin?

Consider how Paul phrased his question: "How shall we who died to sin still live in it?" Notice how his question couldn't be even remotely reworded, "How shall we who BELIEVE still live in sin?" Now, Paul obviously had no problem declaring the wonderful reality of the miraculous faith to which we have been called in Christ - because it is totally intertwined within the truth of the good news that he preached - but when it came to the sin question he did not pit it against (or ask it in relation to) our BELIEVING in Christ but against our DYING with him.

The truth is that our having died with Christ is an integral part of THE faith of Christ that has been declared. Unfortunately, we have fallen victim to the contemporary hocus-pocus that says faith in Christ is about what WE have done with Christ as opposed to it being the very essence of the good news of Christ ... so essential that it is the very embodiment of our hope, who is Christ himself.

Can a believer sin (miss) anymore? If so...

There is a perspective that demands that to think otherwise is ludicrous. This is the viewpoint that is based upon the examination and judgment of sin, and it is called law. The law convinces us that even though we are supposedly "saved" from sin through Christ we are still sinners who are subject to the law of sin. It's only reasonable, isn't it? After all, why would we ever think that just because we believe in Christ we would not still have to deal with sin? Unless, of course, we really did share in Christ's death and also have been raised to new life in him.

"I know and am convinced in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself; but to him who thinks anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean." (Romans 14:14)

This always used to stump me because I would always do the "Yeah, but..." You know, as in KNOWING that Paul obviously wasn't referring to those things that ARE unclean in themselves! Haha! So, how could it be that Paul could have ever been "CONVINCED in the Lord Jesus that NOTHING is unclean in itself"? What about all the evil stuff in the world? And yet the only exception he made had to do with the PERCEPTION of the one who regards something as unclean: "...to HIM it is unclean."

Can a believer sin (miss) anymore? If so...

He who regards himself as a sinner, to HIMSELF he IS a sinner.

"But if, while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also been found sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? May it never be! For if I rebuild what I have once destroyed, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God." (Galatians 2:17-19)

This rather potent statement of Paul's to the saints in Galatia describes through different wording what he also addressed in Romans 6-8, especially chapter 7. "Seeking to be justified in Christ" was one of Paul's summations of the "other gospel, which is really not another" to which the Galatian believers were giving ear. "Seeking to be justified in Christ" is nothing other than a "Christianized" version of living by law, and this is what happens when we give heed to "another gospel".

Simply stated, if the life to which Christ has called us is in fact based upon a seeking of acceptance in Christ so that our continued following Him - whatever one believes this to be - only proves how unacceptable we are, then Christ would be nothing but a dealer or an enforcer of sin. But then, that is totally absurd since Christ is the one who did away with sin. If I rebuild another "gospel" that re-establishes a relationship with God through some form of legality, then I am the one proving myself to be a law-breaker, or sinner.

Notice how Paul continued his point: "For through the Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God." Exact same thing he told the Roman believers, for through death we were made alive to God. Now, why would I try to re-establish the thing that can only bring knowledge of sin when that thing is what killed me so that I could be delivered from it?

Can a believer sin (miss) anymore? If so...

I can't disagree with someone else's affirmation, because to them it IS the only truth that makes sense, and it can be verified by a written code and the violations thereof -- only it's ANOTHER gospel. After all, if one's answer is "yes" it must be found in the law of sin and death. However, the good news of Christ declares the removal of all that offends, so that there is nothing to miss in Christ!!

I'll continue later. :)

Jim Minker