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Scripture reads;" Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect."
Now, Jesus was talking to the disciples at the time of this saying. The disciples were given a mission to continue in His mission and spread the word of God as Jesus did. To obey the commission is to be perfect, to disobey is to sin because Jesus said that the world sins because they do not believe in Him. He said that those who believe in the son of man is to do the works He did which were the words of the Lord. As He said;" the man who has faith in me will do the works I do." He described the works as the word of the Lord when He said; "the words I speak are not my own it is the Father who lives in me performing His works."
"Anyone who acts in truth comes to the light so his deeds are revealed as works of God."
Scripture reads;" Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect."
But the word translated as "perfect" does NOT mean what "perfect" means in English. It simply means "mature, fully ripe, etc." . . . a huge difference. ONLY Christ is perfect as we mean it in English.
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Now, Jesus was talking to the disciples at the time of this saying. The disciples were given a mission to continue in His mission and spread the word of God as Jesus did. To obey the commission is to be perfect, to disobey is to sin because Jesus said that the world sins because they do not believe in Him. He said that those who believe in the son of man is to do the works He did which were the words of the Lord. As He said;" the man who has faith in me will do the works I do." He described the works as the word of the Lord when He said; "the words I speak are not my own it is the Father who lives in me performing His works."
"Anyone who acts in truth comes to the light so his deeds are revealed as works of God."
We do His works by TRYING to make sure everything we do, think and feel is in "love of God and each other" and by repenting when it isn't. Everything else is the result of human vanity and hubris.
Last edited by MysticPhD; 03-10-2013 at 04:13 PM..
I thought we agreed earlier on living a lifestyle of sin, is wrong. In fact I've said if you live like the world, you are not saved. Yet it seems like what you get from my understandings, that ultimately I'm saying it's okay to sin because of what Jesus has done.
No, this is far from what I'm saying. In fact, a lot of times we are hesitant to think about God's superabounding grace, because we remember what Paul said. (You know, the shall we sin that God's grace may superabound, certainly not!) What Paul is saying is we should use God's superabounding grace, that we should work it. It's God's power to save to the uttermost. To sin just so more grace can come, is foolish. It's like telling Bill Gates "I'm poor", and he gives you a million dollars. Then you say "I'm poor again", and Bill tell you, "I just gave you a million dollars." You respond to him and say, "I'm poor". You do it in effort to receive more money, yet you don't use what you receive.
The purpose of God's superabounding grace, is so sin doesn't have dominion over us. We have to use that superabounding grace, and work that. Christians problem is they don't use that grace, and they sin again as a result. We don't have an understanding of God's grace, His power.
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
Heavenese,
I have repeatedly said that it it is completely possible to live a life as a Christian and not give in to temptation through the power over sin that we have in Jesus Christ our Lord. But you have obviously chosen to ignore those statements which shows me that you are not really interested in understanding the relationship between our faith, repentance and confession. You don't care to be taught, you only want to rant and rave against the whole biblical idea of confession. The only point in which you have shown any teachability in is the use of the word 'if' in the Greek.
You said it, but you're not confident in it. It's no surprise we can't live a sinless life in our strength. That is why we don't believe, we're not confident we will get there. We are looking at ourselves. When it comes down to it, it's unbelief in God's power to cause us to live like Jesus lived. I can sense the hesitancy. If you go back and read some of your posts, you will see what I'm talking about.
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
As I read your post I can't help but read into them a great hatred for he Catholic system of confession, which is completely unbiblical for so many reasons. But even worse is that you can't even see that your own posts talk circles around repentance and confession while arguing against it.
Even though I'm aware of catholic confession to priests, my past history with it doesn't come from looking at it from that way. My history with it is pretty much your understanding right now. That if I sin, I confess the sin to God and receive His forgiveness. Now don't get my words wrong, I'm not saying my sins made me unsaved. Yet if I sinned, there would be a weight on me, and I wouldn't feel right until I confessed my sin. I maybe assuming too much, but I pretty much thought this is the view of all Christians who are of the protestant thinking. (Even though I don't consider myself a denomination)
Yet that word repentance doesn't mean all of what you think it means. It's primarily changing your mind. That is it. That's what you need to know. Your actions will be a result of what you think. So if you change your mind, you change your actions.
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
You are wrong in your assessment that sorrow is not involved in repentance, godly sorrow actually leads to repentance. (2Cor. 7:8-11) And not just for beginning salvation, but also for sanctifying salvation. When, because of our sin, we come under the Father's discipline, understanding why He is disciplining us His children should produce in us godly sorrow resulting in repentance leading to salvation (which can also be translated as restoration). Since Paul was speaking to Christians, restoration is probably the better translation. The reason we repent is because we are acknowledging that God was just in placing us under His discipline as His legitimate children.
Repentance however, again means to change the mind. He was changing the Corinthian church mind about their conduct. Yes, I wholeheartedly agree God disciplines us, but what does He discipline us about? Is it sin specifically, or is it on what caused the sin in the first place? Wouldn't you agree if the Corithian church had the right understanding, they wouldn't have been doing the things Paul mentioned?
Again, Jesus is our ultimate example, for what did He get on the disciples about? Was it their sin specifically? No, He got on them about their unbelief, their doubting. Yes, sin is bad, you shouldn't live in sin, but what caused the sin? If you only look at the sin and not what causes the sin, you will never solve the real problem. You have to change your mind, you have to repent. You know that you sinned, but why did you sin? You see the Corinthian church knew what they were doing was wrong, but probably held to something like God's grace had them covered. They haven't disciplined their body, submitting it to God as a living sacrifice. So it was wrong believing that Paul got on the Corinthian church about. I know you don't agree with what I'm saying, but I encourage you to look at every instance Jesus got on the disciples about confessing their sins.
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
If you can honestly say that you have reached that level of maturity in your life that you are perfectly sinless, praise the Lord. I know I have not reached that point, and I don't know anyone else that make such a claim. But don't make claims against me that I have not made, such as Christians cannot live a life of victory over sin. I will not talk about walking in the Spirit when you won't even acknowledge that your teaching of turning to Christ claiming His righteousness when you sin in fact requires some kind acknowledgement of sin before you can turn and claim Christ's righteousness.
I said countless times I agree with God on what is sin. If I sin, I agree it's sin. I'm not saying it's not sin. I don't have to agree something is a sin, at the very moment I do it. I already know it. What I confess is why I'm still righteous, in spite of me stumbling. In spite of me losing my temper with someone. In spite of me looking at a woman lustfully. When I do that, I'm not going to stay in sin. My mind begins to change permanantly, and as a result, my actions will change genuinely. It's Christ's nature spilling on the outside of me, because the change has already happened on the inside. Yes, I have grown and experienced this myself, not fully but my actions have changed a great deal even from three years ago. Now, I have to continue in that growth. No, I still stumble for now, but not always. I do expect to reach that level.
Yet can we be honest? Have you ever heard of a Christian talking like I'm talking, an honest Christian by the way, and not some weird cat who thinks he is a messiah figure? Have it ever crossed your mind that you will walk sinless one day?
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
Stop concentrating on what is not there and concentrate on what is there. While Jesus may not have expressly taught repentance and confession, He also didn't teach on the triune Godhead. Does that make the doctrine of the Trinity null and void and false? Jesus taught that anyone who desired to be his disciple had to live a life of true righteousness, a righteousness that can only be found in him. But the teaching of imputed righteousness is primarily outside of the gospel accounts. If we limited our teaching to what Jesus didn't say, we could throw out the books Acts through Jude.
Jesus did teach on the Godhead. He taught He and the Father are one, that He came from the Father. He spoke numerous times about a Comforter just like Him. He talked about the unforgivable sin, mentioning how special the Holy Spirit is. He also talked on the imputation of righteousness, that His life would be ransom for many. So He talked on all those things, yet confession of sins just wasn't one of them. Now I can understand there are things that Jesus didn't talk about, many things, but this doctrine right here should be almost a core teaching. Because it would be critical for our growth. Yet, Jesus doesn't say anything on it. I would also argue the Book of Acts didn't talk on it, or show Christians confessing their sins. So if Jesus didn't teach on it, if the Acts didn't show it, is this a true doctrine or a doctrine of men?
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
Of course, if you don't believe that the Father disciplines His children when they sin, then there is no reason to turn from sin because there is no consequence for sin in the life of a believer. God's discipline is not a result of trying to 'do' something to get forgiveness for sin as a Christian because we are not placing our faith in the righteousness we have in Christ, it is because of sin itself. Again, why would we turn to Christ when we are being disciplined by God if we do not acknowledge there is a reason for being disciplined, namely that there is sin in our life? The only reason to turn to Christ (repent) and claim his righteousness is because we have been convicted.
He disciplined David for his sin, but we won't see that kind of discipline. What He disciplines us for, is our unbelief and our doubting. Technically, doubting is a sin, but what we doubt is God's grace. We doubt God's abilities to cause us to live victoriously, to live like He said we should live. We keep producing an Ishmael and presenting him to God, yet God is saying I have Isaac right here for you but you won't take him. (If you understand what I mean by this) We have an obedience by faith, and God disciplines us when are not walking in it. As I said before, what is not from faith, is sin.
Finally, the main thing I want you to know about me, is I'm not saying we should live a life of sin. It's not weird that is the conclusion you get out of me because of my constant mentioning of God's grace in Christ. Yet don't you know Paul was doing the same thing? Always preaching Christ crucified? I strongly believe if Paul preached the doctrine of confession of sins, that accusation would have never come up.
Those who have not matured to understand the "spirit" behind the commands . . . retain obedience as their guide. Those who have matured "put away childish things" and try to understand the "spirit" behind the commands. Following the "spirit" creates far more "do's and don'ts" than can be enumerated or listed. It affects our entire lives and all aspects of them. I do not see myself as an obedient spiritual child . . . I see myself as a mature agape loving spiritual adult. The difference is not trivial.
That is what I said. My obedience hangs on the two great commandment: love God and love my neighbor. When Christ finally welcomes us with the words, my good and faithful servant (slave/doulos), to what exactly do you think he's referring? It is precisely to 'all the things I have commanded.' These are not done out of mere obligation to obey, but out of love for
Him. His commandments are not burdensome but light. It is because we love him that we do/don't do those thing we ought/ought not do. In any event, anything we do outside of love (whether of God, our neighbors or our brothers) is sin, or disobedience because it is done out of some attitude other than love.
Either way, whether as a child or a mature adult in Christ, we start and end with obedience.
Blessings in Christ,
Matthew
(I wonder whne the moderators are going to deem this discussion as strying from the theads OP)
Those who have not matured to understand the "spirit" behind the commands . . . retain obedience as their guide. Those who have matured "put away childish things" and try to understand the "spirit" behind the commands. Following the "spirit" creates far more "do's and don'ts" than can be enumerated or listed. It affects our entire lives and all aspects of them. I do not see myself as an obedient spiritual child . . . I see myself as a mature agape loving spiritual adult. The difference is not trivial.
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Originally Posted by Wretched.elect
That is what I said. My obedience hangs on the two great commandment: love God and love my neighbor. When Christ finally welcomes us with the words, my good and faithful servant (slave/doulos), to what exactly do you think he's referring? It is precisely to 'all the things I have commanded.' These are not done out of mere obligation to obey, but out of love for
Him. His commandments are not burdensome but light. It is because we love him that we do/don't do those thing we ought/ought not do. In any event, anything we do outside of love (whether of God, our neighbors or our brothers) is sin, or disobedience because it is done out of some attitude other than love.
I see from this that we do not SIGNIFICANTLY disagree on what sin is . . . the differences between us are not important.
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Either way, whether as a child or a mature adult in Christ, we start and end with obedience.
We may start with obedience out of a fear motive . . . as our ancient ancestors did. It is the beginning of wisdom. But we end with a love motive that is devoid of fear of consequence . . . so it is not properly obedience.
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(I wonder whne the moderators are going to deem this discussion as strying from the theads OP)
The OP is about sin . . . so we are on topic. You are not alone in thinking sin is disobedience instead of "being wrong."
But the word translated as "perfect" does NOT mean what "perfect" means in English. It simply means "mature, fully ripe, etc." . . . a huge difference. ONLY Christ is perfect as we mean it in English.We do His works by TRYING to make sure everything we do, think and feel is in "love of God and each other" and by repenting when it isn't. Everything else is the result of human vanity and hubris.
As the Lord has said; "Walk in my presence and be blameless."
When a righteous man walks in the presence of God, because of this he will live. To the righteous it is given to know the secrets of God but to the wicked it is not given.
You didn't pick up on my sarcasm. I now you are not antimomian, but what you say can be very close to it.
I think you think too little of repent, and you believe i think too much of it. An ancient Greek drill manual that was found that had as part of its drill commands the word, 'metaneo' which was the command to march in the opposite direction, what we would say as either 'about face' or to the rear march.' The word means quite literally turn around, and as it applies to the thought process, to turn away from the thought, change your mind if you wish. It means jointly to turn from and to change you mind about sin and is used both for salvation and sanctification.
I am glad you finally said that you were not to the point of being sinless. That is ultimate goal, to be conformed to the image of the Son. We aren't there yet, and while do believe we can get get there, it is not that I do not believe I can't get there (at least not on my own). If I said that it is not what I meant. What I did say, and perhaps this is what you think I was saying of myself, is that I believe a great majority of the church will never attain that level of maturity in this life; not because it is not attainable, but because much of the church never grows past milk, the remain children at best, or even newborns. But even Paul, in Philippians 3:12 told them that he had not yet become perfect, but pressed on toward that goal. It is a long road to perfection, and my hope and prayer is that with the Spirit's help I will attain that high calling.
The passage about discipline in Hebrews begins by speaking about sin.
4 You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; 5 and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons,
It is to this striving against sin that the writers then continue:
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
Nor faint when you are reproved by Him;
6 For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines,
And He scourges every son whom He receives.â€
7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. 11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.
The Father disciplines us for sin, not simply unfaithfulness. This was written to believers, not to Old Testament saints, in reference to sin. While faithlesness in a believer may be sin, the writers were mot addressing the faithlesness of the saints to whom they were writing, rather they where talking to sin.
You misrepresent me when you surmise that confession is concentrating on sin. You keep bringing up the idea of constant thought on sin and instantly confessing that a sin has been committed. These are your thoughts alone, not mine.
For me, confession is part of our sanctification. As we grow the Spirit shoes us areas in our life that we need to work on. As He sheds light on those areas of our life we can acknowledge or deny His conviction. Acknowledgement is confession, but even then, we can choose to do nothing about it of we can surrender to His leading. If we choose to ignore or deny His conviction we are at the point where were are saying we have no sin and make Him a liar and we can come under the Lord's discipline. But if we agree with the Spirit and allow Him to do His work in us, then the truth is in us and we have fellowship with the Father and with each other. As we yield to the Spirit, He reveals more areas in our life we need to work on, and it should become easier to yield to Him. There could be any number of areas He reveals to us: anger, unkindness, drinking, selfishness, idolatry, etc. Each of these things are sin because we are not loving as we should. Part of our sanctification is acknowledging the Spirit's conviction (confession) and turning to Him with a renewed mind (repentance).
You didn't pick up on my sarcasm. I now you are not antimomian, but what you say can be very close to it.
I think you think too little of repent, and you believe i think too much of it. An ancient Greek drill manual that was found that had as part of its drill commands the word, 'metaneo' which was the command to march in the opposite direction, what we would say as either 'about face' or to the rear march.' The word means quite literally turn around, and as it applies to the thought process, to turn away from the thought, change your mind if you wish. It means jointly to turn from and to change you mind about sin and is used both for salvation and sanctification.
I am glad you finally said that you were not to the point of being sinless. That is ultimate goal, to be conformed to the image of the Son. We aren't there yet, and while do believe we can get get there, it is not that I do not believe I can't get there (at least not on my own). If I said that it is not what I meant. What I did say, and perhaps this is what you think I was saying of myself, is that I believe a great majority of the church will never attain that level of maturity in this life; not because it is not attainable, but because much of the church never grows past milk, the remain children at best, or even newborns. But even Paul, in Philippians 3:12 told them that he had not yet become perfect, but pressed on toward that goal. It is a long road to perfection, and my hope and prayer is that with the Spirit's help I will attain that high calling.
The passage about discipline in Hebrews begins by speaking about sin.
4 You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin; 5 and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons,
It is to this striving against sin that the writers then continue:
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord,
Nor faint when you are reproved by Him;
6 For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines,
And He scourges every son whom He receives.”
7 It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline 8 But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? 10 For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. 11 All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.
The Father disciplines us for sin, not simply unfaithfulness. This was written to believers, not to Old Testament saints, in reference to sin. While faithlesness in a believer may be sin, the writers were mot addressing the faithlesness of the saints to whom they were writing, rather they where talking to sin.
You misrepresent me when you surmise that confession is concentrating on sin. You keep bringing up the idea of constant thought on sin and instantly confessing that a sin has been committed. These are your thoughts alone, not mine.
For me, confession is part of our sanctification. As we grow the Spirit shoes us areas in our life that we need to work on. As He sheds light on those areas of our life we can acknowledge or deny His conviction. Acknowledgement is confession, but even then, we can choose to do nothing about it of we can surrender to His leading. If we choose to ignore or deny His conviction we are at the point where were are saying we have no sin and make Him a liar and we can come under the Lord's discipline. But if we agree with the Spirit and allow Him to do His work in us, then the truth is in us and we have fellowship with the Father and with each other. As we yield to the Spirit, He reveals more areas in our life we need to work on, and it should become easier to yield to Him. There could be any number of areas He reveals to us: anger, unkindness, drinking, selfishness, idolatry, etc. Each of these things are sin because we are not loving as we should. Part of our sanctification is acknowledging the Spirit's conviction (confession) and turning to Him with a renewed mind (repentance).
Blessings in Christ,
Matthew
I'll continue to study these things out and get back to ya. Yet let me make mention about this. Why is it we always see the Holy Spirit as pointing out something wrong? Jesus mentioned what the Holy Spirit will do when He comes, was to take of His, and declare it to us. To remind us of all that He taught us. Why is it I never hear that among Christians? It's always, "The Spirit convicted me of my sin" or "The Spirit wants me to clean up my act". It's never, "The Spirit reminded me I am the righteousness of God in Christ" or "The Spirit convicted me of righteousness". You never hear a Christian say that, but that is what Jesus said He will do.
I'll continue to study these things out and get back to ya. Yet let me make mention about this. Why is it we always see the Holy Spirit as pointing out something wrong? Jesus mentioned what the Holy Spirit will do when He comes, was to take of His, and declare it to us. To remind us of all that He taught us. Why is it I never hear that among Christians? It's always, "The Spirit convicted me of my sin" or "The Spirit wants me to clean up my act". It's never, "The Spirit reminded me I am the righteousness of God in Christ" or "The Spirit convicted me of righteousness". You never hear a Christian say that, but that is what Jesus said He will do.
Again, I'll continue to study these things.
If you prefer you can think of it in the positive. The Spirit convicts of righteousness, and leads us into all righteousness. In doing so He is leading away from all unrighteousness. It is a two-sided coin. Some see the Spirit guiding them into all righteousness while other see Him pointing out where we need to grow. Both praise God for the Spirit's work in their lives. It is very much a glass half-full or half-empty situation. We could say the God has been working with me to he more kind, but that is just a positive way of saying God has convicted me of being unloving. Either way the Spirit is working toward our sanctification by convicting us of sin and leading (guiding) into righteousness.
Scripture reads;" Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect."
Context, context...
Matthew 5 is an elevator of things harder and harder for the flesh to accomplish, and those who heard them were mentally trying to keep up.
"That's hard but ok, wow - even harder but I'll try..."
Then Jesus drove the nail in Adam by saying be perfect. Let those who have an ear understand that He was saying only by Me will you have righteousness that exceeds the Pharisees, and is acceptable to the Father.
When it's all said and done, no matter our deeds or accomplishments, the Father will say, "Come here - let me see how much of My Son I can see in you."
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