Convert Vs. Disciple
- Thread starter th1bill
- Start date
This sort of sin is why I question a number of folks about their salvation. When I married each of my wives it was forever and the first three not only left me and refused to even discuss reconciliation. ( In the end they all agree that they could not deal with my continual return to combat past at night.) I never cheated on any of them and the reason was that I revered them and after my conversion to Christianity, the lady I am going to see in Heaven is not just important to me, she is the flesh of my flesh!
You see, the wife of the Christ follower is a part of him! If you unzip your fly for another you harm your wife, a.k.a. you harm yourself. Why would a man that knows the Word of God cause harm to himself? Your friend might be saved but the key word in this statement is "might." I catch a great deal of flak from folks on both sides of salvation for being narrow minded and judgemental but the truth is that except I make them take note of their sin, I sin! If you find yourself lacking the Intestinal Fortitude required to deal with the issue here, dig into the scriptures. A very useful guide for times like this the Nave's Topical is very useful to help you for research and education. Just do this for the right reason and ignore the protests of people, they do not matter to Christ. You, edifying your brother does!
A good point to ponder and not having all the answers I'm left to consider.
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
If you tell a lie, even a small one, about someone else, EVEN AN ACCIDENTAL one, you cause as much harm. Sin is pass fail. It cracks me up, people will not let Gay people in their churches, but they will adulterers and thieves. ??? Who are the members of the body of Christ, to do the job of the head, which IS Christ?
The fact is, anyone that feels they need to "claim" that relationship, doubts their relationship...
John says some very specific things about that relationship with Him. 1 john 3:6 is one that makes every good conservative go into the Bible editing business.
The fact is, anyone that feels they need to "claim" that relationship, doubts their relationship...
John says some very specific things about that relationship with Him. 1 john 3:6 is one that makes every good conservative go into the Bible editing business.
You've left that so open to conjecture that I hesitate to make comment. Please expound.
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
B, ty for asking and not presuming.... seriously.
I was commenting to the part about speculating who is saved. Who cares what you, major, grace, or I think of them? If they care, their concern is with the living not the divine. If the relationship with the devins is solid, who cares what the living think. Do you feel you should always act Xian? Then you aren't there yet, else you would LIVE Xian, and that requires no acting. If you strive to act Xian you aren't yet changed, in the process maybe, but not changed.
When people worry about their salvation their doubt tells me they may not have it and subconsciously know that to be the fact. If they feel the need to speculate on other's salvation, they are justifying themselves by comparison to others. There is always someone you can find to say you are better than. That person seeking those that are less holy does so because those that are more holy in his eyes intimidate him and cause him to doubt. The person that rides those they find who are less holy acting, is playing god, and trying to judge themselves by judging others. If I paint the canvas black enough, my filthy gray may pass as white.
For most, Xian is nothing more than spitting off the right cliches. Seriously. Not claiming you or anyone else is that, but in the church, most are. The big flaw in theology today is the sincentric teaching. They have wrapped the gospel around the sin. Sin has been made an idol, and is unknowingly embraced and clung to.
The Word's most important reason for manifesting as Jesus from Mary's womb, wasn't salvation. Although me and you and all who have heard the message are sure glad that was part of why He came. But WHY He came is lost behind all the fascist teaching prevalent today.
It's late, I'm coming across hard and blunt, sorry. And I realize I'm summing up 15 years of somewhat intense study and application of my faith and beliefs in mere paragraphs, but even 100 single spaced pages would not be enough to dent the reasoning behind my comments.
So my apologies for my inadequacies.
I was commenting to the part about speculating who is saved. Who cares what you, major, grace, or I think of them? If they care, their concern is with the living not the divine. If the relationship with the devins is solid, who cares what the living think. Do you feel you should always act Xian? Then you aren't there yet, else you would LIVE Xian, and that requires no acting. If you strive to act Xian you aren't yet changed, in the process maybe, but not changed.
When people worry about their salvation their doubt tells me they may not have it and subconsciously know that to be the fact. If they feel the need to speculate on other's salvation, they are justifying themselves by comparison to others. There is always someone you can find to say you are better than. That person seeking those that are less holy does so because those that are more holy in his eyes intimidate him and cause him to doubt. The person that rides those they find who are less holy acting, is playing god, and trying to judge themselves by judging others. If I paint the canvas black enough, my filthy gray may pass as white.
For most, Xian is nothing more than spitting off the right cliches. Seriously. Not claiming you or anyone else is that, but in the church, most are. The big flaw in theology today is the sincentric teaching. They have wrapped the gospel around the sin. Sin has been made an idol, and is unknowingly embraced and clung to.
The Word's most important reason for manifesting as Jesus from Mary's womb, wasn't salvation. Although me and you and all who have heard the message are sure glad that was part of why He came. But WHY He came is lost behind all the fascist teaching prevalent today.
It's late, I'm coming across hard and blunt, sorry. And I realize I'm summing up 15 years of somewhat intense study and application of my faith and beliefs in mere paragraphs, but even 100 single spaced pages would not be enough to dent the reasoning behind my comments.
So my apologies for my inadequacies.
I'm following your thinking in this post, except for the above statement. I'm hoping you can expand on this point. I'm not looking for an opportunity to accuse you of heresy, I'm genuinely interested in what you mean by this statement, what you consider the most important reason for the Incarnation. I'm supposing it fits with the theme of your post, but I'm not seeing where it leads at the moment.
That is Bills original comment to start this thread.
My I say that true discipleship is absolutely necessary if we are to progress in the Christian life beyond spiritual infancy. Let me begin by defining what discipleship means to me. True discipleship is the intentional development of spiritual disciplines for the purpose of personal growth and the transformation of one’s character into Christ’s likeness.
Discipleship is not what you do to help someone else, it is what you do for yourself to take on the character of Christ.
It is an inside job as we submitt ourselves to the work of the Holy Spirit within us. It is allowing God to enter and lives and controle our hearts so that what we do and say always gives the glory to God.
2 Peter 1:3-4...................
“His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires” .
How do we become disciples of Jesus Christ? Let me first say that: True discipleship requires us to be intentional. The work of God is not something that happens automatically or accidentally. It happens as we engage our will and seek the fullness of God in our lives at every level. We do the things that are necessary for spiritual growth. We surrender our will to the will of God, so that God’s will becomes our will. We deliberately and consistently make time for God. Now.........when we do those things, THEN we will not see some the rantings, and insults, and bad and even hateful comments that wind up on our computer screens.
Hi Bill! Good to hear from you.
I have been doing some thinking on ths and it seems to me that it is not what you do for God that is important, it is who you become that matters to God. Why is that the case?????
Well, if you were totally paralyzed and never able to do any work for God, it would not concern God, as far as your value to him. What is far more important to God is the person you become. That is holiness. Holiness is not measured by what you abstain from, but by what you give yourself to. IT is all about SUBMISSION AND HUMILITY.
It is not just what you do, but who you become that is important. God does not want your activity, he wants you. In fact, if you do all kinds of good things for God, without becoming the person he has in mind for you to become, it will mean nothing.
Luke 14:33........
“In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple”.
Just sayin......
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
TY for asking, and not presuming. 
I am a heretic, if the canon for heresy is what the average Church believes. I wouldn't be a heretic based on how the Way lived.
James 1:22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. 25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. (NASB)
Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
Are examples, which are backed up by Christ with the Sheep/Goats parable.
Backed up by the very command, Love neighbor, which requires a charitable action or demonstration to be agapao at all.
The parable of the vine, CHRIST produces the Fruit, we just hold it, bear it, present it to the world. That's GRACE as sure as salvation is. We do nothing for Salvation, and nothing we do could produce that fruit on the vine, HE does. Our job is to present it to the world.
That presentation is WITNESSED in our actions.
Those actions are shunned as WORKS by a lot of the Evangelical community. In fact, the Church of Rome excells here, as do the mormons. They got it right. Neither teaches works save you, but they emphasize if you don't have the works you aren't saved. The Protestant factions, should put more emphasis on what We are saved to do!
It's through works, we are made mature...
Eph 4:12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
Eph 4:13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
You are saved for a purpose.
Many are so selfish, all they care about is the salvation, and they try to cling to that salvation without accepting the other side of Grace which is the works. THE CHURCH teaches it that way, so I can't blame them. The message of the church is sin centric, out of balance, idolizes sin, makes sin more powerful than God, and has people focused solely on saving their own butts, not distributing God's Love to the masses as we were saved/knighted to do.
I am a heretic, if the canon for heresy is what the average Church believes. I wouldn't be a heretic based on how the Way lived.
James 1:22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. 25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. (NASB)
Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
Are examples, which are backed up by Christ with the Sheep/Goats parable.
Backed up by the very command, Love neighbor, which requires a charitable action or demonstration to be agapao at all.
The parable of the vine, CHRIST produces the Fruit, we just hold it, bear it, present it to the world. That's GRACE as sure as salvation is. We do nothing for Salvation, and nothing we do could produce that fruit on the vine, HE does. Our job is to present it to the world.
That presentation is WITNESSED in our actions.
Those actions are shunned as WORKS by a lot of the Evangelical community. In fact, the Church of Rome excells here, as do the mormons. They got it right. Neither teaches works save you, but they emphasize if you don't have the works you aren't saved. The Protestant factions, should put more emphasis on what We are saved to do!
It's through works, we are made mature...
Eph 4:12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
Eph 4:13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
You are saved for a purpose.
Many are so selfish, all they care about is the salvation, and they try to cling to that salvation without accepting the other side of Grace which is the works. THE CHURCH teaches it that way, so I can't blame them. The message of the church is sin centric, out of balance, idolizes sin, makes sin more powerful than God, and has people focused solely on saving their own butts, not distributing God's Love to the masses as we were saved/knighted to do.
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
Not to pick on a poster, but on something posted.....
The ephesians 4 verse above shows that......
What you do for God can't be separated from what you become. You can't become, without doing for God. Trying to split words like that is one result of the Church's sin centric teaching. An intelligent person, doesn't see the trap in how that phrase was worded.
You can't become a left handed pitcher, from a right handed pitcher, without throwing the ball a billion times. I don't care how much film you watch, or books you read. Period. End of story.
The ephesians 4 verse above shows that......
What you do for God can't be separated from what you become. You can't become, without doing for God. Trying to split words like that is one result of the Church's sin centric teaching. An intelligent person, doesn't see the trap in how that phrase was worded.
You can't become a left handed pitcher, from a right handed pitcher, without throwing the ball a billion times. I don't care how much film you watch, or books you read. Period. End of story.
I have to agree, in part, and disagree, in part. YES, He is absolutely, infinitely more interested in the person than what the person can do for Him. (which is limited to what His grace provides) But for the person who is interested in Him, they must demonstrate their love for Him via their love for His creation through works. (aka acts of pure love and kindness)
And, YES, it is about submission and humility. But WHO we become is the end result created by our experiences in our lives. I am a product of all I have done and seen and experienced. God just took the mess and wrapped it up in a pretty package called Love. So, to be more precise, the love we have and give are the defining moments that God is interested in.
2 Cor. 5:10 "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad."
But, I offer this for everyone's consideration: Matthew 21:12-15Jesus showed up at the Synagogue. Business as usual at said Synagogue. The leaders of the Synagogue were busy serving their God by virtue of serving their people. Jesus stepped in and said "business as usual" wasn't good enough and He overturned their tables of peddled mess and began to show HIS WAY of doing things: via UNconditional Love.
We ALL need to WAKE UP and simply realize He is trying to turn over the tables of OUR business as usual!!
Like you pointed out in Luke 14:33, Major, it's not good enough to give up some of our selves, some of our money, some of our time. We must give it ALL to His people via unconditional love, fully setting aside our own selves and our own preconceived notions of how His people need to be loved!
Blessings to each one of you today as He is faithful to provide someone in your path to love!
A
Ah, now I see what you meant. I guess, for me, I have come to view salvation as so much more than merely escaping Hell that I gave the term a "fuller" meaning. I think a lot of people have been shortchanged in their salvation experience because they understand it primarily in terms of saving their own bacon. Either simply that they escape Hell, or that they are going to have a more successful life because now Jesus is going to solve all their problems. I suppose this is where discipleship comes in, not only in teaching knowledge, but in learning to live a life of devotion, service, and worship to God. Something like apprenticeship where a person is taught by word, observation, and participation moreso than a college degree where one studies a subject, takes tests, and gets a diploma.
TY for asking, and not presuming.
I am a heretic, if the canon for heresy is what the average Church believes. I wouldn't be a heretic based on how the Way lived.
James 1:22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. 25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. (NASB)
Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.
Are examples, which are backed up by Christ with the Sheep/Goats parable.
Backed up by the very command, Love neighbor, which requires a charitable action or demonstration to be agapao at all.
The parable of the vine, CHRIST produces the Fruit, we just hold it, bear it, present it to the world. That's GRACE as sure as salvation is. We do nothing for Salvation, and nothing we do could produce that fruit on the vine, HE does. Our job is to present it to the world.
That presentation is WITNESSED in our actions.
Those actions are shunned as WORKS by a lot of the Evangelical community. In fact, the Church of Rome excells here, as do the mormons. They got it right. Neither teaches works save you, but they emphasize if you don't have the works you aren't saved. The Protestant factions, should put more emphasis on what We are saved to do!
It's through works, we are made mature...
Eph 4:12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;
Eph 4:13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the fullness of Christ.
You are saved for a purpose.
Many are so selfish, all they care about is the salvation, and they try to cling to that salvation without accepting the other side of Grace which is the works. THE CHURCH teaches it that way, so I can't blame them. The message of the church is sin centric, out of balance, idolizes sin, makes sin more powerful than God, and has people focused solely on saving their own butts, not distributing God's Love to the masses as we were saved/knighted to do.
Ah, now I see what you meant. I guess, for me, I have come to view salvation as so much more than merely escaping Hell that I gave the term a "fuller" meaning. I think a lot of people have been shortchanged in their salvation experience because they understand it primarily in terms of saving their own bacon. Either simply that they escape Hell, or that they are going to have a more successful life because now Jesus is going to solve all their problems. I suppose this is where discipleship comes in, not only in teaching knowledge, but in learning to live a life of devotion, service, and worship to God. Something like apprenticeship where a person is taught by word, observation, and participation moreso than a college degree where one studies a subject, takes tests, and gets a diploma.
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
While I'm sure I'd find some details in there we would disagree on, YUP, Dem's the Taters!
Cost of Discipleship, Bonhoeffer is a required reading for someone trying to escape the Church today to become what God desires them to be.
Cost of Discipleship, Bonhoeffer is a required reading for someone trying to escape the Church today to become what God desires them to be.
YOU DISAGREE WITH ME????
How dare you!!!!
Just kidding!!!
May I say to all of you who read and post on this site that "covered by grace" just gave the perfect Christian example of how to communicate one with another in love, and respect. We all can disagree. That is not the point of contention.
IT IS HOW WE DISAGREE that causes the problems.
I am troubled by how many people call themselves Christians but seem more interested in calling names, and insulting others in order to prove their point or opinion. I must tell you that personally I JUST DO NOT GET IT.
We should all be trying to get along here for we (?) are supposed to be light and salt in this world but far to many times we give the enemy amunition to use aginst us and Christ.
Example of what I am saying would be something like this...........
"I just can not agree with you on water baptism. It is a basic requirement of salvation.
IF you had read the Bible more maybe you would have know that".
Now we all know what I am saying as we all have seen that take place. Now the words:
IF you had read the Bible more maybe you would have know that";
are completly out of line and are insulting and arrogant and simply do not convey Christian attitude and love.
Why do we feel the need to do such things is beyond me!!! You see, when things like that are said, it promotes and energizes the OLD NATURE in all of us and we all tend to strike back. Then we see this back and forth jawing on each other and all the while the devil sits back and laughs at us.
I encourage us all to use the example "grace" has placed before us and begin to treat others BETTER than we treat ourselves.
God love you!
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
If the most Xian thing we can do is posture, we failed before we began.
Just wondering what that means????? " > _> " ???
I am amazed at the folks that get this all wrong, in the Psalms God tells us to stand still and know that He is God. And when we look at the facts... such a thought as I will be graded by what I do is pure pride. God asked Job where he was when He was creating the worlds to humble him. I will not be glorified for the things I did in His name or His cause, my holiness does and will come from why! People seem to forget that God knows and looks on the inside.
Like Major, I'm wondering!
Xian Pugilist
Inactive
If you don't do things for God, you won't be Glorified. You can sit there on a mountain top, never be tempted, never sin, and go straight to hell because you are not LOVING NEIGHBOR. That requires you to do something.