Christian Laws

"In Him was life, and the life was the light of men." (John 1:4)The implied exhortation is that we should enter into the realm of His life, His Person and His presence. Then His life which is the light of men would be our light also.The receiving of Christ is the receiving of "the true light which, coming into the world, enlightens every man." (v.9)Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

It surprises me that you would say that. I tried to talk about subjective experience of Christ on a practical daily bases before.I talked about the encrease of light leading to confession leading in turn to more light, and more confession. That is the cycle of the ever deepening enfluence of the Holy Spirit in the believer's life.Life, in the New Testament is derived from three Greek words. Depending on the context we ascertain what is being spoken of.Bios - is the physical life and usually involves the body.
Psuche - is the pschychological life and involves the soul.
Zoe - is the divine and eternal life of God."In Him was life [zoe] and the life was the light of men" pertains to the life of God.For God's life to be light to men, I feel refers mostly to the human conscience. The conscience of sinful man is dull. What we do as sinners we have no sense of the corruption and evil of.The life of God entering into man as she receives Jesus into the heart, encreases the inward sense of the conscience. The gradual shining of the light of life (with our cooperation) starts to cause us in our daily life, to see things through God's eyes. It causes us to begin to view and hear more and more matters with the mind of Christ.Our attitudes, tastes, and actions begin to take on more and more the personality Christ.It is not a matter of "What would Jesus do?" It becomes "What is Jesus in me doing?"To the extend I surrender to what Jesus is doing in me, I am being set free. It is very comfortable. And the reason we are so sure that Christ is alive is that we could not draw up these actions in ourselves before. Imagine power steering. He empowers us.At the same time He is very gentle. The symbol of the Holy Spirit in Bible is a dove. He never coerces. He never usurps the human will. But like power steering compounds more power to a simnple human action of turning the steering wheel, so we are empowered by His grace as we abide in Him.

I never mentioned Christianity. When I set out to follow Christ, I asked Him to put me with Christians who would encourage my faith and not discourage it. He answered that prayer.I realize that many people are upset about religious activists. But I did not let these things stop me from learning to abide in Christ. It is not as if Jesus did not warn us. I think you are prone to follow media hype. You are upset and angered. Maybe I have had even more reason to be turned off.But all in all I focused my eyes on Christ and I asked God to put me with brothers and sisters that gave me reasons to continue with Jesus. That was over 30 years ago and God has been faithful.The church life is glorious in many cities over this globe.Sucuri WebSite Firewall - Access DeniedAnd we feel victorious. We're not going to lay down and die because some nut case blew up a clinic. You don't trash Evolution because some highschool kids without a sense of meaning to human life shot up their fellows students at Columbine.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Refering to the personal journal of Eric Kliebold: Now, dance for us."But ... But .... But ... But ... you don't understand Evolution!"Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

To understand what Christians should do we should look to what the New Testament teaches.What the New Testament teaches seems secondary to you. For your purpose of discrediting the Gospel you desire to look at what religious people do as an "anity" focusing on the media's sensational leading stories of violent activism.This bias you dignify with such language as "we look at what is taught within the Christian religion, Christianity." This is contradictory. You are saying we want to examine what "all Christians do" but exclude the one you are presently speaking with.Secondly, what we should be focusing on is what the New Testament teaches. You do not have to go to modern day media hype to find Christians behaving poorly. You would only have to go to the first epistle of Corinthians and see that there were many failures, defects, problems, sins with the Christians in the church in Corinth.But the record of what some of them did is not the record of what is taught by the New Testament as principles to live by. There is a difference between what the Bible teaches and what the Bible records as having happened.The church in Corinth was no utopia. There were varying levels of maturity among the believers. Some were discribed by Paul as being fleshy and fleshly, not a positive discreption for disciples of Jesus. Some Paul rebuked as being carnal.This letter to Corinth was a glimpse into the typical church life of the believers, frought with problems. At the same time we do see many positive testimonies of mature believers throughout the epistles. They were not all a mess.The ones who overcame degradation are the ones who are normal in their following what the New Testament teaches. They are consistent with it. And they became that way often through patience and growth and not because they instaneously became upright people.They learned as Paul and his co-workers did, to walk by the Spirit, to abide in Christ, to let Christ abide in them, as the New Testament TEACHES.In this topic I take "Christians principles" or even your usage of the phrase Christian laws" to mean what the Christian Gospel teaches. Yes, you have said that. And I agree somewhat. But I gave you several cases which you apparently were not too easily able to show were "carried forward" Old Testament laws.In the Old Testament you have no regeneration, no indwelling of God, union of the human spirit with the Holy Spirit - "He who is joined to the Lord is one spirit" (1 Cor. 6:17). You have in the Old Testament no imparting of God's life into man and no co-death with Christ. The revelation of the Bible is progressive and dispensational.For this you do not have to take my word for it. The Old Testament itself tells of God's desiring to make a "new covenant" with the house of Israel not according to the old covenant. I think you are attempting to basically blur the distinction or perhaps prove that there is none.It is true that the distinction is blurred in the minds of many Christians oft times. But that is not the fault of what the New Testament teaches. So you have a book like Galatians in which the Christians were not clear about the difference from the old covenant and the new.Paul labored with them because they had been "bewitched". They had evilly been distracted from the Gospel of grace and were being cheated into going back to Old Covenant Law keeping in the strength of thier flesh. Paul was trying to bring them into walking by the Spirit. And he labored to have Christ formed in them. That is the living and resurrected Jesus imparting His own available nature and Person into them, taking shape, devloping, maturing, and comforming them to His own image.That is what the NT teaches. That is a slight improvement over looking at the shooting of a man at a clinic and claiming and implying that this is a norm for Christian behavior.However, I gave you several principles taught in the New Testament and you seemed unable or unclear about locating what Old Testament laws were being brought forth.You could have turned to question to me to see if I could locate the "seed" commands of these principles. Since I regard that Old Testament as a picture and the New Testament as the caption under the picture, I am pretty certain somewhere in the Old Testament is at least the shadow of the substance of these New Testament exhortations. Some of them would be in typology. Some would be in ordinances delivered in the Mosaic law.And it is through the New Testament experience many of the shadows and types of that reality can be seen more clearly in the Old Testmanet. God's economy was progressively revealed. Yet you could not identify what laws were being brought forward in several cases that I asked you about. So you really haven't proved your case in those instances. I could probably mention many more.Why have you not been able to demonstrate what Old Testament law was being brought forward? You could simply admit that you cannot find them. I am not freting at all. That was my point. That is true, if they grow. So many parables of Christ teach this. The parable of the sower and the different kinds of soil in Matthew 13:1-23 teaches that the heart the receives the word of the kingdom of the heavens needs cultivation.There was the seed sown by the wayside. There was the seed sown on rocky soil. There was the seed sown among thorns. There was the seed sown on cleared and cultivated soil. It is painfully obvious that the life of Christ sown into the hearts of men must fight through much and grow. Hence we also have Paul laboring with the Galatians that Christ would be formed in them.There is no magic wand that produces mature overcomers in Christ instantaneously.Regeneration is instantaneous. Transformation is not. Birth takes only a moment. Growth into adulthood is not quick. Being born again only takes a second. Dispositional sanctification and transformation of the soul takes a lifetime. I wonder what percentage of your thought is only motivated by the desire to accuse. It is comforting for skeptics to continually point out bad behaviors of anyone lifting of the banner of "Christian" whether they are or not, to rationalize that the Gospel is not worth their serious attention.Some of us are interested in the "normal Chrisitian life" not in the average Christian life. And some of us are interested in what the New Testament teaches not in what it or anyone else simply records as having happened.I showed you I could play your witch hunt game with Evolution.Anyway, if the normal overcoming and victorious walk were evident in all Christians that would be wonderful. In the mean time some of us have a lot to do to cultivate and help the saints to grow as we ourselves also grow.Had I written the Bible I would have not had the letter to the church in Corinth as a representative of a Christian church at all. I see much more maturity in Ephesus or Philippi. Even the letter to the Romans had many examples of relatively more victorious Christians in chapter 16 where Paul recommends so many.I have never been impressed with the rational that because all Christians are not instantaneously victorious from the moment they beleived therefore the Gospel is not valid.And we seek to "become imitators of those who through faith and longsuffering are inheriting the promises" (Heb.6:12) We rejoice that some of us are indeed inheriting the promises of abiding in Christ to be "more than conquorers".So the New Testament has 27 books rather than just a few chapters about people magically changed to moral perfection in an instant. Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Nope.I pointed out that it is easy to be bias. Kliebold proposed helping your beloved natural selection by mass murder.Not much difference in me doing that from PD pointing to the murder of a doctor at a clinic as standard Christian behavior - BIAS.But some skeptics have glass jaws. They want to dish it out in spades to Christians but whine when a serving of the same type comes around to them. Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Off-topic banner.

Basically, the premise is that the there is no difference between the Old Covenant and the New. Purpledawn believe that old laws are simply brought forward, refined, clarified, like many Rabbis did.What do you think? Is the Ten Commandments simply ammended with many "Christian" commandments. For example, "Husbands, love your wives even as Christ loved the church". Should we just regard that as a additional commandment to add to Moses's list? I think I mentioned power steering rather than Purpledawn Richh.But I follow you and agee with you. Was there a time when you realized that there was some difference in the Old Testament Law keeping and the New Testament walk according to the Spirit?Do you recall when that truth first really impressed you? For I think it is natural for us to think we have to grit our teeth and be good people according to our natural strength.What do think?

This is beginning to sound like a disagreement in search of a discussion. I am not arguing Peg's concepts. And maybe I should just let you and Peg hash out whatever it is you have between you both.Or my responses to you are going to be focused and selective on thinks you say to me, not things you wrote to Peg. I already did that if I recall. I don't know what you mean by "straight talk". If you cannot understand the New Testament utterances you need to put forth more effort to do so. I am not going out of my way to be bound by your hypothetical standard of "straight talk".I don't know what could be straighter than the clear warnings that certain continued behaviors will cause a Christian not to inherit the kingdom of God in Galatians 5:19-21 which is followed by positive behaviors which are taught to be "the fruit of the Spirit" (Gal. 5:22-25).You have a similiar exhortation of accountability in 1 Cor. 6:9,10 and a further triple reinforcment of the sense of accoutability in Ephesians 5:5-7)There are three passages of very straight warnings that the disciples are accountable not to live in a lifestyle of practicing such things.If you say "Thou shalt not ... thus and such" is a straight talking law you should be able to appreciate that "those who practice such things" is equally clear on accountability of Christians. What "reality" ? You mean the reality that it is possible for a Christian to be immature and not manifest Christ ? And to your latter sentence you have just received three passages on accountability. I doubt that it the first time they were pointed out.What you haven't done is shown how several principles represent the Old Testament laws being brought forward Hillel style. Readers of the discussion may forget. I haven't forgotten that you have not addressed those requests. I think you're just postering here.You are also talking with great aplumb about things which you don't know much about. I am not sure you even want to know about them. For explanations you dismiss as too metaphorical and not straight talk. They concepts may be profound. But I have labored to help you have some understanding. I know that it is possible for willing hearted people to have at least some understanding of even profound or metaphorical passages in the Bible.I think you don't know what they mean. That is Okay. But I think you don't want to know either.Perhaps you cannot discern spiritual matters and they seem like "foolishness" to you because you are too carnal minded (1 Cor.1:18)Paul had that problem with the recipients of his First Corinthian letter. You should be able to understand life and the growth and maturity of life.There will be no apologies from me because you don't want to know what the New Testament is talking about.You are here apparently Studying the New Testament. But in in actuality maybe you don't want to know what it teaches. Please indicate the New Testament teaching telling the disciples to kill doctors.This is why my focus is on what the NT teaches. By the way, the coercion that I was speaking of was applied to the Holy Spirit. I said that the symbol of the Holy Spirit was a DOVE which was antithetical to coercion.That seemed to go over your head. You shifted the matter to Christian on Christian behavior molding.Now if I tell you that the Paul's illustration of the members of the Body EACH receiving their instructions from the HEAD, you would protest that that is too metaphorical. You want straight talk.Each member of the Body of Christ receives its leading from the Head of the Body Christ. Just like your fingers, you wrist, your hand, your elbows, all receive thier impulses from your HEAD, your brain.Members paralyzed or epileptic may have a problem between them and the HEAD. If the case of the person claiming to be a disciple of Jesus nurdered someone for a supposedly Christian cause, I think it is obvious that between him and his HEAD, Christ, there was a problem. He wasn't following the Head. That is pretty evident because "the wrath of man does not work the righteousness of God". Every principle that I have shared with you has to do with behavior. The second part of your sentence does not make sense to me." .. behavior expected of those who already believe"I am not sure what in the world you have as an objection against this. Of course we are talking about those who have already believed. HELLO !!I have all along been speaking of principles taught by the Christian Gospel in the Christian New Testament written to Christians (those who believe into Christ).Borrowing from Cool Hand Luke, I think what we have here is a failure to communicate. There is more than one judgment. There is not one all-encompassing judgment day.Secondly, we are told not to judge before the time. You are asking me to judge a fellow believer before the time. That is the job of his Master.It is good enough that we are warned of accountablilty which is obvious to me. I mentioned three passages at least that warn us Christians of accountability.Do not ask me to specify what the Master will say to Brother or Sister X before the time when they come to stand before Jesus Christ. That is not my responsibility. I am not going to put words in the mouth of Jesus concerning extactly what He was say to any other Christian brother.My chief concern is what will He say to jaywill. I told you of accountability. It is clear. I am told: [b]"Do not judge, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you shall be judged; and with what measure you measure, it shall be measured to you.And why do you look at the splinter which is in your brother's eye, but the beam in your eye you do not consider? Or how can you say to your brother, Let me remove the splinter from your eye, and behold, the beam is in your eye? "{/bThe princple of the kingdom living of Christians is that we be strict towards ourselves but accomodating towards others. And I cannot usurp the position of Christ to tell you what He will say to ANY brother on the day he gives an account to Jesus. Disingenous. Again I listed many principles which you have been unable to trace back to Mosaic laws. Instead of doing so you either move the goal post, complain that they are not related to behacior (a false objection), complain that metaphors are not straight talk enough, or some other dodge. [qs] quote: Every single principle I mentioned is related to behaviors, specific and broadly general.You have enough examples. You had a good mix of types of examples. it is just that you cannot make your thesis follow through with them. However Christ acts that is the behavior of the divine nature. The principle here is abiding in the non-sinning nature which has been imparted into the believer in Christ.Abiding in another Person is the behavior. The behavior is not being distracted from Christ the Head of this organic Body the church. The behavior is receiving all our impulses from Christ the Head. I dealt with this before. The implied behavior is ALLOWING Christ to be formed in you. Behaving in such a way as not to resist or frustrate that formation of one Person within another - Christ being formed in each disciple.And I have to leave the forum now and attend to other things.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

As far as Galatians is concerned, this epistle is written to the Christian disciples in the province of Galatia. It is NOT addressed to society in general in Galatia.The "fruits of the Spirit" is only possible to those who have received the Spirit. That would be the those who have received Christ.The fruits of the Spirit are not demanded of Galatian society as a whole. The Galatians unbelievers first have to receive the indwelling Christ, the Spirit, and be regenerated.Then the exhortations would apply to them. For the most part they were not. I agree. But Paul is definitely not exhorting the Galatian Christians to return to Old Testament Law keeping in the power of the natural man. Here is the proof of that, though you may not understand it: The were regeneratedd by the Holy Spirit. They should continue to grow and walk by the Spirit. They should not allow themselves to be "bewitched" to return to trying to muster the energy in the flesh to keep the commandments of the Mosian law.As they were reborn with a new life they should learn to continue in that new life. For this reason Paul also wrote: As they have started they should continue, abiding in the Lord Jesus Christ whom they have received. No, I think "straight talk" to you in this case means that you want me to make the New Testament sound like the Old Testament. You want me to take out of my talk reference to the indwelling of Christ.Straight talk to you means that you want me to eliminate the core kernel of truth from the New Testament and reduce the 27 books to a series of Thou shalts and Thou shalt nots. This is precisely what the Judiazers were doing in bewitching the Galatian believers.Paul was trying to teach the behavior which overflows as a by- product of walking by the Spirit.I am sorry that you do not understand these things. First you have to understand Who Christ is. Then you have to understand that He is alive. Then you have to understand that He is available. Then you have to understand that if we abide in Him He abides in us. Christ Himself becomes our righteousness.That is why the Apostle wrote: Elsewhere he speaks of his behavior stemming from Christ living in him: The basic underlying behavior in the New Testament is to live in union with a Person Christ, who is available as "a life giving Spirit" and can be dispensed into man's innermost being.The "fruit of the Spirit" and my own phrase above - "behavior that overflows as a byproduct of walking by the Spirit" are the same concept.It is true that both the Old Testament and the New Testament tell us not to steal. The difference is vast. The New Testament tells us first to receive the sinless One Jesus Christ, the non-stealing Son of God into our being as He is Spirit:" ... the last Adam became a life giving Spirit" (1 Cor. 15:45) Then as we have received Him we are to continue to walk in Him as our realm, as our sphere.The underlining behavior is to abide in Christ Who is alive and is available. Morality comes as a by product of abiding in Christ.And yes, you and I probably are at an empasse and have been at that empasse for a long time. You don't understand what the New Testament means by the behavior of abiding in Christ Who is alive and available.This is probably because you do not believe it to be true.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I know that. And two matters you wrote concerned me that you did not know that.One, you said something about "to understand what is expected of us". Two, you protested something about I wrote about those who were already Christians, which would be quite appropriate. I doubt it. You like to repeat what the thread is about and what is and is not the issue. These are simply tactics to limit the discussion to your strawman arguments.I know this because you are imploying every kind of excuse to not pinpoint what Old Testament laws were being brought forward in several Christian principles. You could not do it. There you go again. Abiding in Christ is a conduct. It is the most basic. Setting the mind on the spirit (the regenerated human spirit) can also be considered a conduct. It is most basic. Holding fast to Christ as the preeminent one, the Head, in the Christian church is a conduct. It is a most basic one. I am not sure what "IOW" stands for.But once again if the fruit of the Spirit is listed in Galatians and the works of the flesh are listed in Galatians, then it should be obvious that the warning (Gal.5:21) is a matter of accountablity." ... and things like these, of which I tell you beforehand, even as I have said before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God." (v.21) The accountability is based on the believer's failure to produce the fruits of the Spirit and thier refusal to be transformed out of the works of the flesh.The penalty could be that they will not inherit the kingdom of God. That does not mean eternal punishment. It does mean that as long as they are untransformed they will not inherit the reward of reigning with Christ in His coming manifestation of the kingdom.You can ascertain this by reading Galatians 5:13 - 25. And the basic positive behavior is to walk by the Spirit. Stop trying to dictate the terms of the discussion so as to give security to your strawman argument.Why is it not about salvation? And it also depends upon what you mean by salvation. The salvation of the soul consists in producing the fruits of the Spirit. For such fruits come from the transformation of the soul (the mind, the emotion, and the will).So there is no way that you can separate the matter of the soul's transfomation from the salvation of the soul. No it is not irrelevant. Abiding in Christ that Christ may abide in the believer is a conduct. Which Old Testament law is being brought forward?Perhaps you should consider trying to answer that. Or you could reconsider your underlying argument that all Christians principles are only Old Testament laws being brought forward Hillel style.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

Richh, So glad to see you participating.The way I put something into quotes is to begin it with a Left Bracket, a qs, and a Right Bracket. Then at the end a Left Bracket, a forward slash, a qs, and a Right Bracket.I think if you look to the left you will see something that says "HTML On {help)". That should be a primer on using some basic HTML directives. I find that I am so prone to try to put forth self effort, that it takes a long time for me to realize before Jesus that I don't have a chance.For some reason the urge to "Turn over a New Leaf" without depending on Christ in a moment by moment way, is very strong. Even some limited success in this is not to my advantage. But letting go of self effort and calling on the name of Jesus - empowering grace flows through me.Why is it so much preferable to go it out of piety than to turn to the Christ in the realm of the Holy Spirit ? We just have too many things other than Christ.Doesn't it require His mercy to let go and let God ?Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I have been thinking about this. I am not sure there is any substantial difference between "a commandment" and "a law".What does it mean that the grace of God is training us in Titus 2:11,12?How is this related to the concept of "Christian laws" as proposed on this dicussion? Does keeping of laws require training if there are laws to be kept ?If there are not laws to be kept, what is this training of the grace of God to the Christians?

Richh,Here are some thoughts of mine on some purpledawn's refered to Messge 6: I am concerned about the failure of purpledawn to realize the the disciples were only representative of all the disciples throughout history:"Go therefore and disciple all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, TEACHING THEM TO OBSERVE ALL THAT I HAVE COMMANDED YOU." (my emphasis on Matt. 28:19-20a)How can one say that Jesus was just talking to the 11 and no others for most of His ministry ? When He told them to go find a room to have the last supper, OK, we can say He was not talking to the modern day Christian. But I think most of us can see the large bulk of His teaching is targeted ONLY to the 11 or 12 in that surrounding group of followers but to all the other followers.He prayed for us to that end:"And I do not ask concerning these only [the 11 disciples], but concerning also those who believe into Me because of thier word, that they all may be one ..." (John 17:20,21a) These are good obsevations about Agape Love. I have no problem with any of them really.But I think it is vital to point out that this Agape love is the byproduct of having received Christ as the divine life, a life NONE of us was naturally born with:"We know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brothers." (1 John 3:14)Passing out of the spiritual "death" through regeneration (being born anew) and walking in that new life ISSUES in the Agape love. We know we have passed out of death because the Agape love which comes from the divine life is flowing out of us who walk by the Spirit of Christ.No unbeliever manifests this agape love though they may be filled with a natural love which is something the natural human soul was created with. The agape love is the evidence of Christ living in the man or woman. And it is proof that that person has been regenerated out of the spiritual death inherited from Adam."The last Adam became a life giving Spirit" (1 Cor. 15:45)Christ the last Adam implants the Agape love into man. And Paul says that this agape love was poured forth into the hearts of the believers "through the Holy Spirit":"And hope does not put to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit." That Holy Spirit is of course the "life giving Spirit" Whom Christ the last Adam became."Now the Lord is the Spirit" (2 Cor. 3:17) What do you say about this Rich?I don't understand this. When we receive Jesus we certainly learn a lot about HOW He loved His disciples. Don't we?But not only so John informs all the readers something of HOW Jesus loved His disciples. He loved them to the end and gave up His life for them."Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come for Him to depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the uttermost." (John 13:1)At least we know that Jesus loved His disciples with this divine agape love "to the uttermost". We certainly know that Jesus loves us to the uttermost to forgive us and come to live in us, as imperfect as forgiven sinners as we are.I have to look back on my life since I received Jesus and know that He must love me to the uttermost. He wants me for ETERNITY. He has to love me to the uttermost. It may not seem different. But the disciples did not have this love until they passed out of death and into life by receiving the new birth in thier innermost being.Peter has a natural love. But it failed him. He swore that because of his love for Jesus he would go to prison and to death with Him. Jesus knowing that the human natural love does not cut it in the kingdom of God warned Peter that he would deny that he knew Jesus before the cock crowed a couple of times in the morning.It was as natural for Peter to forsake Jesus as it was for a rooster to crow in the morning. So Peter denied him with cursing, and that before a little powerless servant girl. The other disciples who did not know themselves also fled to protect their own skins. We all would have done the same thing.The natural love of man does not compare to the Agape love stemming from the divine life. Peter wept bitterly that his "love" was not strong enough to stand by His Master in persecution.Afterwards when Peter passed from death into life he was crucified upside down for His Master Jesus. He then loved the resurrected Christ to the uttermost. The Old Testament was chiefly the demand to expose man's inability to live up to the law of God in the natural being. Man needs another life. He needs the old man crucified with Christ and the new man formed in him from regeneration.By works of the law shall no flesh be justified. And Paul wanted to found in Christ and not in his own self righteousness. He wanted to be found in realm of the indwelling Spirit of Christ. The indwelling of Christ was not brought forward from the Old Testament because God had not yet sent the Son. He had not yet died to create a standing in God. And He had not yet become a life giving Spirit to impart ZOE life or Agape love into His followers.Rich, your comments on this ??Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.

I have emphasized not "Christian laws" but "the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus". That is for the Christians to "walk by the Spirit".I have not been a advocate of listing the additional laws for Christians which we may attach on to the end of the law of Moses. My emphasis has been abiding in the living Christ and allowing Him to abide in the one walking by the Spirit.To be fair, the New Testament does say that those not walking in this oneness with Christ are practicing "lawlessness". So while I am not pushing the umpteen new "Christian laws" I would hasten to add that the New Testament is not condoning "lawlessness". But the law of the Christian is really the indwelling and living Christ as the life giving Spirit.The book of Galatians is all on this matter of living the indwelling Spirit of Christ verses the bondage of Old Testament law keeping. I understand that. We should not think that "going to Hell" is the only accountability man has before God. I had to explain to a poster that the Christian eternally redeemed is still accountable before Christ. That accountability does not have eternal damnation as its penalty. But it can have punishment and the loss of reward as its penalty.If this were not so many passages of the New Testament would not make very much sense. You know that Paul speaks of the being saved yet so as through fire, to some Christians who are to lose a reward. This is accountability.Here is the passage: Words like "suffer loss" indicate a suffering to those who are eternally redeemed. And this is after the second coming of Christ for that Christian is examined in a trial before Him.Words like "suffer loss, but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire." indicate that one eternally redeemed may is still accountable and may be saved as through fire.The specifics are not provided but the warning is extremely clear. The saved Christian, who is redeemed forever, is still accountable and may lose the reward. That reward is not a gift. It is an reward of some enjoyment of Christ in the coming 1,000 year millennial kingdom. The reward can be lost while the Christian is saved yet so as through fire.So, walking in the Spirit is something we must learn to do. And also this walking has the corporate effect of building up the temple of God. To not walk according to the Spirit is to mar the temple and build with inferior materials. These "destroy" the temple of God. And for a punishment God will destroy that person.According to the context of the passage for the Christian to be destroyed must mean the loss of reward, suffering loss, and being saved yet so as through fire. Thank the Lord that transformation take time. We do not know how much time God has alloted the one who has received the Spirit of God. But she or he is to utilize time wisely so as to gain Christ each day and learn to walk by the Spirit. This will cause them to build upon the foundation with the superior materials rather than the inferior ones.Paul writes: The gold represents the divine nature of the Father. The silver represents the redemptive work of Christ. And the precious stones represent the transformational work of the Holy Spirit.This is just the Triune God. The concept is that the proper builder is one building upon the foundation of Christ by what is wrought into his personality and work by - the divine nature of the Father, the redemptive work of Jesus, and the transformation work of the Holy Spirit. He is living in the Triune God Who is operating in him.The wood, grass, and stubble represent inferior aspects of the fallen man. They are found in great abundance.I am called away and will have to continue latter.

As I think you imply, the work of shepherding of the members of the Lord's Body is very important. I think leading a distracted saint back to the enjoyment of Christ is what is spoken of in James here:"My brothers, if any one among you is led astray from the truth and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner back from the error of his ways will save that one's soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins." (James 5:19,20)As you imply, this is crucial ministry, the loving and welcoming back into fellowship the distracted brother or sister. We just have to enjoy Christ with them once again that they may be spiritually fed and nourished within. Then they will be strengthened. There are always activities which seem much more "visible". But someone once told us to look at the ceiling of the meeting hall. He said behind that ceiling are strong boards that no one ever sees. But if it weren't for those boards the ceiling could not be held in place.Likewise he told us to look at a blackboard in the front of the meeting hall. He said no one ever removes that blackbaord and admires the strong bricks which hold it up. So there are hidden members in the church life who are so necessary but less "visible".The Lord sees. Look at the praying ones. How vital are the effective prayers which can touch God's throne and move His hand. Jesus taught that someday the secretive prayers would not only be answered, they will also be rewarded or repayed:"But you, when you pray, enter into your privte room, and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will repay you." (Matt. 6:6)I believe one day we will see that the prayer warriors of the church facilitated so many things to happen to further God's kingdom. Though prayed in secret these warriors will be rewarded openly. We should see also that the building of the temple is building what we are to enter into. Rather than the saved "going to" a happy place the saved are growing into that entity called "New Jerusalem".Just as Noah built the ark and was saved from the flood by what he built, so the builded church is the living building into which we will enter to be saved from this age. Entering into God's mutual habitation of God and man is through our transformation. And our transformation is through God's dispensing His life and nature into our being.The believers are "born anew" that they may grow and develop and be built together in that divine life with which they have been reborn.As you mentioned the crown, I am reminded of Paul saying the "You are our glory and our joy" The saints were his "crown of rejoicing before our Lord Jesus at His coming." Yes indeed. And we have today are foretaste of a fuller taste to come. So let us minister the gift of grace and impart Christ to the members of His Body.Did you notice that John said that we could give divine life to one another? We function as gifts in His Body and can impart divine life to one another. Our prayers also can give life (1 John 5:16).As we are speaking about reward and gift, I also notice that rather than lose the reward John encourages us to receive a full reward."Look to yourselves that you do not lose thethings which we wrought, but that you may receive a full reward." (1 John 8) May the Lord have mercy on us. It is so easy for us to be distracted by the vainglory of this passing age. Notice that the bearing of fruit in John 15 is from abiding in the true vine. In this chapter the "great commission" (John style) is the fruit bearing which overflows from abiding in Christ and allowing Him to abide in us.To John's recollection Jesus stressed that apart from abiding in Him the disciples could do nothing. So to walk in Him and abide in Him is also needed for the evangelism. To "go forth and bear fruit" surely means to go forth abiding in Christ and letting His word abide in us, and letting Him abide in us.May the Lord grant us much mercy. Thanks for sharing your portion. Share again.