Jump to content


Photo

Answer!__Test_Truth or Error??


  • Please log in to reply
5 replies to this topic

#1 Tkulp

Tkulp

    Advanced Member

  • Members
  • PipPipPip
  • 212 posts
  • Location:Arkansas
  • Interests:Studying the Word as the Spirit directs.
    Sharing what I learn about the Truth of the Word of God.
    Aquaponics / rooting plant starts / Living on God's provisions
    Learning about wild edibles, Herbs and God's natural provisions for life, both physical and spiritual.
    Raising cattle
  • Gender:Male
  • I am a Layperson

  • I attend a non-Alliance church
  • Coop Prairie

Posted 15 April 2017 - 08:45 PM

1 John 4:1  BELOVED, DO not put faith in every spirit, but prove (test) the spirits to discover whether they proceed from God; for many false prophets have gone forth into the world.

 

I once again want to express my appreciation to Evan for becoming a member of the forum, just to answer my challenge to find the truth and error in a devotional written by C.H. Spurgeon.

 

This devotional is made up of a number of quotes taken from one of Spurgeon’s sermons. The sermon was taken from Acts 4:13 and can be read at...  <ttp://www.spurgeon.org/sermons/0021.php>

 

My first response to reading this devotional was surprise at the statement of truth that we must look like Jesus Christ.  I do not find this belief demonstrated in very many lives or taught in many churches today.

 

This may have been the reason for such a small participation. Most people who call themselves by the name of Christ do not believe that they are supposed to really look like Christ; be an imitator of Christ. Therefore they may have questioned most of the devotional.

 

Christ is perfect; but, the common belief is that no human can be perfect as Jesus Christ was perfect.

 

What does the Word of God say? Jesus said that if you had seen Him, you had seen the Father. Jesus looked like the Father. Jesus imitated His Father as a pure child, copies a much loved father.

 

Paul tells us to be imitators of, not only Jesus, but imitators of the Father.

 

Eph 5:1  Therefore BE imitators of God [copy Him and follow His example], as well-beloved children [imitate their father].

 

 

1Co 11:1  PATTERN YOURSELVES after me [follow my example], as I imitate and follow Christ (the Messiah).

 

 

1Pe 2:21-25  For even to this were you called [it is inseparable from your vocation]. For Christ also suffered for you, leaving you [His personal] example, so that you should follow in His footsteps.

He was guilty of no sin, neither was deceit (guile) ever found on His lips. [Isa. 53:9]

When He was reviled and insulted, He did not revile or offer insult in return; [when] He was abused and suffered, He made no threats [of vengeance]; but he trusted [Himself and everything] to Him Who judges fairly.

He personally bore our sins in His [own] body on the tree [as on an altar and offered Himself on it], that we might die (cease to exist) to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds you have been healed. For you were going astray like [so many] sheep, but now you have come back to the Shepherd and Guardian (the Bishop) of your souls. [Isa. 53:5-6]

 

 

There you have the Truth of the devotional's message, that we should look like Jesus. I have included a few of the many Scriptures that support that idea.

 

 

 

What about the tiny element of error?

 

Here is the direct quote from the sermon and the devotionals that contain elements of Spurgeon’s beliefs.

 

So submit yourselves to him. Was he patient? So learn to endure. And best of all, as the highest portraiture of Jesus, try to forgive your enemies as he did; and let those sublime words of you Master, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” always ring in your ears. When you are prompted to revenge; when hot anger starts, bridle the steed at once, and let it not dash forward with you headlong. Remember, anger is temporary insanity. Forgive as you hope to be forgiven.”

 

What does the Bible say about ‘forgiveness’? Jesus Himself said to pray, “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven (left, remitted, and let go of the debts, and have given up resentment against) our debtors. And lead (bring) us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen."

 

"For if you forgive people their trespasses [their reckless and willful sins, leaving them, letting them go, and giving up resentment], your heavenly Father will also forgive you.

But if you do not forgive others their trespasses [their reckless and willful sins, leaving them, letting them go, and giving up resentment], neither will your Father forgive you your trespasses.” Mat 6:12 -15

 

How long have people been trained in the world to succeed, to become perfect through practice; but in the their spiritual lives to TRY”; depending on some kind of ‘grace’ to pull them through?

 

Jesus left no room for error in the matter of forgiveness.

 

If you have prayed the Lord’s Prayer then you have asked for the same kind of forgiveness that you have given to others.

 

Jesus went beyond that though. He said that if you did not forgive, your Heavenly Father would NOT forgive you; no matter how much you had tried or hoped, you will receive no forgiveness, if you did not forgive.

 

These TRUTHS do not fit with the doctrines of man, especially in our current society that sees no possibility of true Holiness, Purity, and the concept that a human could or should say, “If you have seen me, you have seen Jesus Christ.”  ...even as Jesus said of His Father!

 

Paul tells us that we should have the mind of Christ.

 

1Co 2:16-3:  For who has known or understood the mind (the counsels and purposes) of the Lord so as to guide and instruct Him and give Him knowledge? But we have the mind of Christ (the Messiah) and do hold the thoughts (feelings and purposes) of His heart. [Isa. 40:13] However, brethren, I could not talk to you as to spiritual [men], but as to non-spiritual [men of the flesh, in whom the carnal nature predominates], as to mere infants [in the new life] in Christ [unable to talk yet!] I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not yet strong enough [to be ready for it]; but even yet you are not strong enough [to be ready for it], For you are still [unspiritual, having the nature] of the flesh [under the control of ordinary impulses]. For as long as [there are] envying and jealousy and wrangling and factions among you, are you not unspiritual and of the flesh, behaving yourselves after a human standard and like mere (unchanged) men?

 

According to these verses, I see very few people, in this generation, with the doctrines that they hold, ever growing up, achieving the ‘Deeper Life’!

 

 

What do you believe, truth or error?

 

Do you try the spirits? Do you know the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of the Word of God? Do you know the heart of God? ...the mind of Christ? Are your influences divine or are you continually feeding at the table of the world, with a double mind (two spirited)?



#2 Fireweed Trekker

Fireweed Trekker

    Advanced Member

  • Members
  • PipPipPip
  • 40 posts

Posted 08 May 2017 - 09:43 PM

Food for thought. feed back later.


B?  & C?
 


#3 Ndidi

Ndidi

    Newbie

  • Members
  • Pip
  • 3 posts
  • Location:In Abuja or village in Delta State, Nigeria
  • Interests:Food, glorious food! Global current affairs, Renewable energy especially solar and biogas, Care for the environment, Social justice.
  • Gender:Female
  • I am a Layperson

  • I attend a non-Alliance church
  • None available; internet sermons instead

Posted 09 May 2017 - 07:53 AM

1) I agree that we must test every spirit, and it's a pity that more of us don't because we have our Lord's clear saying about the "many" who don't make it. My regular prayer for myself is not to be so foolishly stubborn as to find myself among the many. Further, I see myself as having 11 Commandments - the 11th being, "And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you...." (Matthew 24 somewhere)

 

2) I agree that true Christians ought to resemble Lord Jesus so that they can rightly refer to God as, "Our Father". Scary though that Lord Jesus said to the pharisees that they are like their father the devil. So it's either a person resembles God, or the devil. No other choices, no other realities.


  • Tkulp likes this

#4 Tkulp

Tkulp

    Advanced Member

  • Members
  • PipPipPip
  • 212 posts
  • Location:Arkansas
  • Interests:Studying the Word as the Spirit directs.
    Sharing what I learn about the Truth of the Word of God.
    Aquaponics / rooting plant starts / Living on God's provisions
    Learning about wild edibles, Herbs and God's natural provisions for life, both physical and spiritual.
    Raising cattle
  • Gender:Male
  • I am a Layperson

  • I attend a non-Alliance church
  • Coop Prairie

Posted 11 May 2017 - 01:22 PM

Ndidi,

 

Thanks so much for your post here! Since you posted this I felt to go ahead and share my thoughts on John 17, Jesus' prayer to the Father as He was preparing to return to His home in Heaven with His Father.

 

I will try to compact this for readability rather than prove every point that I make.

 

John is known as the Love book to some, but I do not think that they realize the true depth of the love of Jesus for His Father, as well as us.

 

In all of John's letters, including his gospel, he is, I believe, establishing who Jesus is as the Son of God, to explain all that Jesus did and was, as the Son of God.

 

I have not gotten all of this into my heart or spirit yet, but here goes, with what I understand so far, from John...

 

John establishes Jesus as the Word, a perfect son a stamped image of His Father. Psalms 119:11 David, a man after God's heart said, "Your word have I laid up in my heart, that I might not sin against You." Just in the last month a Sunday School Teacher in Tenn. used that verse in sharing about John 1. What a concept and Truth beyond what David was actually saying; the Word actually living within us, not just learned or memorized.

 

Let's jump ahead with the concept found in John 15 and the thought on the vine. The Holy Spirit is not mentioned by name, but could the Holy Spirit be the sap that flows from the vine into the branches?

 

John 15:1  "I am the true vine and my Father is the gardener. He takes away every branch that does not bear fruit in me. He prunes every branch that bears fruit so that it will bear more fruit. You are clean already because of the word that I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it remains in the vine, so neither can you unless you remain in me. "I am the vine; you are the branches. The one who remains in me — and I in him — bears much fruit, because apart from me you can accomplish nothing.
 

Then jump to Jesus' Prayer in chapter 17:17-23...

 

"....Set them apart in the truth; your word is truth. Just as you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world. And I set myself apart on their behalf, so that they too may be truly set apart.

 "I am not praying only on their behalf, but also on behalf of those who believe in me through their testimony,  that they will all be one, just as you, Father, are in me and I am in you. I pray that they will be in us, so that the world will believe that you sent me.

 

The glory you gave to me I have given to them, that they may be one just as we are one —  I in them and you in me — that they may be completely one, so that the world will know that you sent me, and you have loved them just as you have loved me....."

 

The same author that wrote about the oneness of the Father and the Son in John 1:1-4 is now sharing Jesus' heart that as He, Jesus, is one with the Father, so His disciples and those that have an active belief, from their testamony, should be one with Himself, Jesus!

 

From this, my goal is that I experience God's True work of Grace, (the divine influence; the sap of the Holy Spirit, changing my heart which is reflected in how I live) inside of me, leading and guiding me, that some day I could say as Jesus said of the Father, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father. That is the real power and miracle of Christ and His death; that I can be born again, not of flesh and blood, but of the Spirit of God. We can become new, transformed into His image. The flesh, me, dead! ONLY Jesus alive in this body.

 

In the Epistles, 2 John touches on what he calls the deceiver,  the anti-Christ.

 

2John 1:6-9  (Now this is love: that we walk according to his commandments.) This is the commandment, just as you have heard from the beginning; thus you should walk in it.  For many deceivers have gone out into the world, people who do not confess Jesus as Christ coming in the flesh. This person is the deceiver and the antichrist!

 

Watch out, so that you do not lose the things we have worked for, but receive a full reward. Everyone who goes on ahead and does not remain in the teaching of Christ does not have God. The one who remains in this teaching has both the Father and the Son.

 

Conclusion, what John says to me,... Jesus, who was before creation and, the Word during creation, choose to yield to the will of God, His Father, and become human. ("Jesus as Christ [the Anointed One] coming in the flesh") ...even to suffer and die. ...to be a supreme sacrifice so that any that will, can become brand new creatures, with Jesus' Spirit living inside our bodies.

 

Doctrine may say that Jesus is God, the Father, in the flesh, rather than Jesus, the Son, in the flesh. John says to me, that this is antichrist. Jesus is the 'Word' that was an instrument of God in creation, agreeing to come in the flesh, to become the only begotten Son of God.

 

This same Jesus wants to dwell within anyone that will repent, die to the self-life, surrendering all, to walk in obedience to His Holy Spirit. ...and remain faithful to that Spirit. The five foolish virgins, sadly, did not remain faithful to the Holy Spirit and did not have enough oil to take them through an extended time of darkness.

 

Yes Ndidi, we are really to be in the image of Christ, more so than most people understand or even want to be.

 

Jesus said,  ...."But I say to you, love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be like your Father in heaven, since he causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.  For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors do the same, don't they?"...  Matthew 5:44-46

Paul says that we should,  ..."Therefore, be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live in love, just as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God." Ephesians 5:1-2



#5 Tkulp

Tkulp

    Advanced Member

  • Members
  • PipPipPip
  • 212 posts
  • Location:Arkansas
  • Interests:Studying the Word as the Spirit directs.
    Sharing what I learn about the Truth of the Word of God.
    Aquaponics / rooting plant starts / Living on God's provisions
    Learning about wild edibles, Herbs and God's natural provisions for life, both physical and spiritual.
    Raising cattle
  • Gender:Male
  • I am a Layperson

  • I attend a non-Alliance church
  • Coop Prairie

Posted 24 May 2017 - 11:06 AM

In my time with the Word this morning I was meditating on John, especially Chapters 5 and 6.

 

Chapter 6 contains a very unusual portion on Jesus being the bread of life and Jesus sharing the fact that food for Him was to do the will of the Father,

 

All of this tells me the importance of the intimate relationship and daily communication, submission, etc, with the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. The criticalness of living in oneness with Jesus, Christ in me, the hope of glory.

 

All of this type of study generally brings back to my mind, the teachings of "man" which teach that people can not live a pure, holy, life, without sinning, after we have yielded control of our lives to Christ.

 

So when I read what Jesus said to the man that was healed in chapter 5 I see two things that give issue to modern doctrine.

 

First, the Bible would infer, on this occasion, that there were a number of people that Jesus did 'not' heal. Only the one man that had been seeking healing for 38 years.

 

Second, the Bible says that Jesus told the man to "sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee."

 

Jesus must have believed that it was possible to live without sin, even before He was crucified. As in the devotional above, this does not appear to be a suggestion or encouragement to 'try'. It is a statement, "sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee."   

 

To my knowledge, Jesus is still the same today!



#6 Tkulp

Tkulp

    Advanced Member

  • Members
  • PipPipPip
  • 212 posts
  • Location:Arkansas
  • Interests:Studying the Word as the Spirit directs.
    Sharing what I learn about the Truth of the Word of God.
    Aquaponics / rooting plant starts / Living on God's provisions
    Learning about wild edibles, Herbs and God's natural provisions for life, both physical and spiritual.
    Raising cattle
  • Gender:Male
  • I am a Layperson

  • I attend a non-Alliance church
  • Coop Prairie

Posted 29 May 2017 - 06:48 AM

Monday, May 29, 2017

 

Thank you A.B. Simpson for the words of your devotional and the verse that confirms the desire of Jesus Christ for those that love Him and seek Him with all their heart and mind, everything that they are, who surrender all on God's Altar!

 

 

 

A.B. Simpson     Devotional - May 29 

https://www.cmallian...mpson?mmdd=0529

Monday, May 29, 2017

Just as it was Christ Himself who justified us, and Christ Himself who was made unto us sanctification, so it is only by personal union with Him that we can receive this physical life and redemption. indeed, it is not a touch of power upon our bodies which restores and then leaves them to the mere resources of natural strength and life for the future. Rather, it is the vital and actual union of our mortal bodies with the risen body of our Lord Jesus Christ, so that His own very life comes into our frames and He is Himself made unto us strength, health and full physical redemption.

He is alive forevermore and condescends to live in these houses of clay. They who thus receive Him may know Him as none ever can who exclude Him from the bodies which He made for Himself. This is one of the deep and precious mysteries of the gospel. The body is . . . for the Lord; and the Lord for the body. Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, . . . and ye are not your own; for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, which [is] God's (1 Corinthians 6:19-20).

Scripture

The body is . . . for the Lord; and the Lord for the body1 Corinthians 6:13