PERFECT LOVE

[Arsenios]

So if you love your wife and kids, and hate their murderers and abusers,
Does this mean that you are FAR FAR FROM the Love of God?


Arsenios

 

[MennoSota]

So if you love your wife and kids, and hate their murderers and abusers,
Does this mean that you are FAR FAR FROM the Love of God?


Arsenios

Does God hate sin?
Can God be Love, yet hate sin?
I say, absolutely. One can righteously hate evil and yet be loving.
Does God forgive all sinners? No. If he did, all sinners would go to heaven.

 

[Arsenios]

Does God hate sin?
Can God be Love, yet hate sin?
I say, absolutely. One can righteously hate evil and yet be loving.
Does God forgive all sinners? No. If he did, all sinners would go to heaven.

Does one still hate those whom one has forgiven?


Arsenios

 

[MennoSota]

Does one still hate those whom one has forgiven?


Arsenios

That's a different question. Jesus told his disciples this:
John 20:23
If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”
I do not know that it applies to you and me, but it applied to the disciples after the resurrection.

 

[psalms 91]

If you hate then you sin since Jesus said that if you hate your briother then you commit murder. We are held to a higher standard, in the Old Testament you had to do the physical act to sin but now just the thought is sin, we are held to the spiritual application

 

[Albion]

Indeed, 80% of our Services are directly from the Bible...

Protestant Services are 80% Sermon from the human Pastor...


Arsenios

The thread has moved along to other things, I understand, but maybe you should get around a bit more in Protestant circles before making a mistake as big as that one again. <_<

 

[Arsenios]

The thread has moved along to other things, I understand, but maybe you should get around a bit more in Protestant circles before making a mistake as big as that one again. <_<

I probably do need to get out more...

Do Protestant services now no longer center on the sermon?
And are not the words of most hymns written by worshippers?
Is my memory of the hymnal now obsolete?
Are the worship prayers taken from the Bible directly?

The last sermon I heard on Sunday Radio read about 30 words from the Bible and spent the rest of the hour talking about them and singing hymns not from the Bible...

I do paint with a sometimes overly broad brush -
And I do not want to slander anyone -
If their services have changed, then Glory to God!
The Sermon was always like a lecture from a podium...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

Does God hate sin?
Can God be Love, yet hate sin?
I say, absolutely. One can righteously hate evil and yet be loving.
Does God forgive all sinners? No. If he did, all sinners would go to heaven.

Does one still hate those whom one has forgiven?

That's a different question. Jesus told his disciples this:
John 20:23
If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them;
if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”

I do not know that it applies to you and me,
but it applied to the disciples after the resurrection.

Are sinners enemies of God?

You see, the article you printed said we are captured by sin, that even the saved are so captured... That the only way to recover is to repent, and that God alone GIVES repentance to the Saved... The rest are condemned...

Yet Christ said that He came to Call sinners to repentance...

God knows beforehand those whom He will Save, yes?
And He Calls those foreknown...
He Justifies those Called...
He Glorifies those Justified...

And then we have this anomaly...
Just when we think we have it all figured out:

MANY are Called, yet FEW are Chosen...
I came to Call sinners to repentance...

And all are sinners...
And the Bible is filled with all manner of sinners being Saved...
All the saved turned from their sins in repentance...

So what you and your author seem to think is that
those already saved have been given repentance, yes?

Yet the Bible tells us, and Jesus tells us, that we sinners are called TO repentance...
That Justification comes after that...
And Glorification after that...
And that many are Called but Few are chosen...

So are you arguing that when one is Called by God to Repentance one is already Saved?

That God has already Saved them prior to their repenting from their sins?


Arsenios

 

[MennoSota]

Are sinners enemies of God?

You see, the article you printed said we are captured by sin, that even the saved are so captured... That the only way to recover is to repent, and that God alone GIVES repentance to the Saved... The rest are condemned...

Yet Christ said that He came to Call sinners to repentance...

God knows beforehand those whom He will Save, yes?
And He Calls those foreknown...
He Justifies those Called...
He Glorifies those Justified...

And then we have this anomaly...
Just when we think we have it all figured out:

MANY are Called, yet FEW are Chosen...
I came to Call sinners to repentance...

And all are sinners...
And the Bible is filled with all manner of sinners being Saved...
All the saved turned from their sins in repentance...

So what you and your author seem to think is that
those already saved have been given repentance, yes?

Yet the Bible tells us, and Jesus tells us, that we sinners are called TO repentance...
That Justification comes after that...
And Glorification after that...
And that many are Called but Few are chosen...

So are you arguing that when one is Called by God to Repentance one is already Saved?

That God has already Saved them prior to their repenting from their sins?


Arsenios

Sinners are enemies of God until God reconciles them according to His will. The article says that sin can capture us, whom God has reconciled, and that God gives the reconciled saint the capacity (the gift) to repent when we are caught in sin. God sets us free by the redeeming sacrifice of Christ Jesus.
So...yes...a person must already be reconciled to God before they can respond in repentance. God has already made them alive (saved them) before they can repent.
The unreconciled, unredeemed person cannot repent for they are dead in their trespasses and sins. They are lost and in a state of abandonment. There is no hope outside of the miraculous choice of God to graciously save.
Once saved, the sinner will very naturally repent of all the grievious things by which they rebelled against God. They will continue to repent as God graciously sanctifies them throughout the rest of their life on earth. They will discipline themselves to obedience of all that Jesus has taught them in scripture. They will pick up their cross and follow the Master.

 

[Arsenios]

Sinners are enemies of God until God reconciles them according to His will. The article says that sin can capture us, whom God has reconciled, and that God gives the reconciled saint the capacity (the gift) to repent when we are caught in sin. God sets us free by the redeeming sacrifice of Christ Jesus.
So...yes...a person must already be reconciled to God before they can respond in repentance. God has already made them alive (saved them) before they can repent.
The unreconciled, unredeemed person cannot repent for they are dead in their trespasses and sins. They are lost and in a state of abandonment. There is no hope outside of the miraculous choice of God to graciously save.
Once saved, the sinner will very naturally repent of all the grievious things by which they rebelled against God. They will continue to repent as God graciously sanctifies them throughout the rest of their life on earth. They will discipline themselves to obedience of all that Jesus has taught them in scripture. They will pick up their cross and follow the Master.

Thank-you, Menno...

Arsenios

 

[Josiah]

Do you love your enemies?

Not "PERFECTLY" (I don't do anything perfectly) but sorta.

However, I'm not sure I have a specific "enemy." I find all those "my enemies" statements in the Psalms kind of odd since I can't think of anyone I consider an "enemy." Some I don't like and maybe even some who don't like me very much (although I can't think of any such person), but does that make us "enemies?"

Is love an action or a feeling?

Both, but the emotion is pretty meaningless. IMO, "love" almost always in the Bible is used as a verb to indicate sacrificial, giving, serving, action. The paradigm is the Cross (which is why the Cross is the symbol of Christianity, not a heart)

 

[Arsenios]

Not "PERFECTLY" (I don't do anything perfectly) but sorta.

I meant genuinely - Do you genuinely love your enemies?

Few are they who can say yes and mean it...


Arsenios

 

[Lamb]

I meant genuinely - Do you genuinely love your enemies?

Few are they who can say yes and mean it...


Arsenios

We can't even get people to love the President. :tongueincheek:

 

[Arsenios]

We can't even get people to love the President. :tongueincheek:

Well, the politics of hate we see so rampantly running across American politics is but the result of the failure of the Christianity from which it sprouted forth...

And it goes, of course, far deeper...

But hypocritical judgementalism outside the Church then takes over in the secular arena of which politics is but a part...

Antifa, for instance, is but the unleashing of judgmental hypocrites...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

We can't even get people to love the President. :tongueincheek:

Loving enemies perfectly can only come with genuinely loving them...

It means putting them first and one's self second...

And it means doing so whole-heartedly...

Not resentfully, not begrudgingly, not half-way, not in words only...

But genuinely without hold-backs...

To do so with one's enemies is a great attainment...

To do so to an evildoer as he is doing evil to you is a greater attainment...

It is a specifically Christian virtue...

Who* does it?

Who* can do it?

Yet we are commanded to love our enemies and forgive them...


Arsenios

* <YOU> can do it, for you are created in the Image of God...
Maybe not now, maybe not 100%
Maybe not 1%...
But God does not command what we are unable to do...

 

[Lamb]

But God does not command what we are unable to do...

Through Christ we can. But that's because we are covered in His righteousness and all our sins are forgiven.

 

[Arsenios]

Through Christ we can. But that's because we are covered in His righteousness and all our sins are forgiven.

That answer is what is wrong with western theology

It begins with a perfectly true statement that qualifies as useless information...

Like how much runway is behind the plane taking off and can he take off or should he shut down?

Useless information...

And then it draws a "theological conclusion" that justifies doing nothing...

It kills the very works we are to walk in as we walk in Christ...

"Our sins are covered because they are forgiven by Christ's Death on the Cross..."

If I could but say one thing to you, Lamm, it would be: "Look to the practical implications of theological ideas..."

Theology is practical - It is not a logically consistent system of [fallen human] ideas...

THAT, you see, is German Idealism, which took over the Latin Papacy in the 10th century...

Was overthrown in the 15th Century by Luther...

And re-took Europe in the 20th under the Germans...

Never quite able to snatch Britain...

But I wax broad-brush poetic...

You see, we are ALL convicted by the standard of Perfect Love...

That gives rise then theologically to the question:

WHAT are WE going to DO about it?

It does NOT raise the answer of theological self-justification to do nothing...

To say we are covered by the Blood of the Lamb in forgiveness of our sins...


Arsenios

 

[MoreCoffee]

That answer is what is wrong with western theology
...
Arsenios

No, that's what's wrong with Lutheran theology.

 

[Arsenios]

No, that's what's wrong with Lutheran theology.

The Presbyterians and Methodists would not agree?

I guess Lamm is a Lutheran?

Forgive me, I do not pay much attention to those kinds of details...


Arsenios

 

[Lamb]

That answer is what is wrong with western theology

It begins with a perfectly true statement that qualifies as useless information...

Like how much runway is behind the plane taking off and can he take off or should he shut down?

Useless information...

And then it draws a "theological conclusion" that justifies doing nothing...

It kills the very works we are to walk in as we walk in Christ...

"Our sins are covered because they are forgiven by Christ's Death on the Cross..."

If I could but say one thing to you, Lamm, it would be: "Look to the practical implications of theological ideas..."

Theology is practical - It is not a logically consistent system of [fallen human] ideas...

THAT, you see, is German Idealism, which took over the Latin Papacy in the 10th century...

Was overthrown in the 15th Century by Luther...

And re-took Europe in the 20th under the Germans...

Never quite able to snatch Britain...

But I wax broad-brush poetic...

You see, we are ALL convicted by the standard of Perfect Love...

That gives rise then theologically to the question:

WHAT are WE going to DO about it?

It does NOT raise the answer of theological self-justification to do nothing...

To say we are covered by the Blood of the Lamb in forgiveness of our sins...


Arsenios

Do you disagree that you are covered in Christ's righteousness? You are holy because He covers you in His holiness.