Posted on 07/17/2016 3:53:05 AM PDT by mdmathis6
The template as to how all inter-relations between Christians of the Church should work is to be found here in Galatians 3: "For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise."
This passage ALSO provides a NATIONAL roadmap for reconciliation of all persons of all races and walks of life with each other; but notice what it says..."For you are sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus"!
If there is ever to be TRUE unity between the peoples of this nation, then Christ will have to be the mortar of it...aye and the straw with which the bricks are made as well! There is naught else to say except "Blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord!"
So if any side continues to 1)Bring up race 2) accuse others unrighteously 3) Consistently bring up past sins they would not be doing it right!
UNITED WE STAND, DIVIDED WE FALL...
(Luke 22:44), Jesus looked to Heaven and prayed,
“My prayer is not for them alone [his disciples]. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you.
May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity.
Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me.
I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.” (John 17:20-26)
Galatians 3 is the template, the “devil” always tries to muddy the details. The handling of sins is another issue covered by other passages of the Bible but yes...if sins are repented of and forgiven, then the past must not be used as a weapon to knock people down since Christ has forgiven them and especially as they have remained penitent and walking in faith! In Christ, there is no separate race, no rich no poor, no slave or free! We are all spiritual heirs of Abraham and to the grace of God! Notice it also says “no man or woman” as well which harkens back to what Christ says about the lack of marriage or the need of it between men and women in the day of the Resurrection of the saints of God! Now while we exist in this present age, yes there are still stipulations on the roles of men and women in the church but ultimately they are just differences in function...not differences in spiritual equality! In that sense, God sees men and women as equal in terms of worth and value in his sight! We have no idea what a wonder it will be to see women, fully expressed as such in the day of the Resurrection...they will be totally awesome to behold!
Received....peace to you!
At least, that's what FORMER Evangelical Baptist minister Steve Ray (and his wife, Janet) thought before he (and she) converted to Catholicism. :o)
1. PRIDE, arrogance, the foundation of SO many of the other sins,
2. anger
3. greed
4. gluttony
5. envy
6. lust
7. sloth
I recognize a few there myself!
Only a few? Sadly, I am or was, familiar with all of them. Of course, I’m the chief among sinners, St. John Chrysostom to the contrary notwithstanding.
Well aside from a dispute over Biblical canon, the protestants recognize the “7 deadlies” as well. Many great men from both persuasions have won many to the Lord so I’m not into disputes between Catholic or Protestants. The Lord Jesus when he rules out of Jerusalem(and not Rome) will correct a great many distortions and will create a situation as the Bible says “No more will they say to one another “Know the Lord”!” For the knowledge of the Lord will cover the Earth as waters cover the sea!
Matthew 10
[16] Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
[17] But beware of men: for they will deliver you up to the councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues;
[18] And ye shall be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for a testimony against them and the Gentiles.
[19] But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak.
[20] For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you.
[21] And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death.
[22] And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.
[23] But when they persecute you in this city, flee ye into another: for verily I say unto you, Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come.
[24] The disciple is not above his master, nor the servant above his lord.
[25] It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebub, how much more shall they call them of his household?
[26] Fear them not therefore: for there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.
[27] What I tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light: and what ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the housetops.
[28] And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.
[29] Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.
[30] But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
[31] Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
[32] Whosoever therefore shall confess me before men, him will I confess also before my Father which is in heaven.
[33] But whosoever shall deny me before men, him will I also deny before my Father which is in heaven.
[34] Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
[35] For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
[36] And a man's foes shall be they of his own household.
[37] He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
[38] And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me.
[39] He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it.
[40] He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me receiveth him that sent me.
[41] He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.
[42] And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.
The deadliest sin is the rejection of his Torah.
The first “protestants” were the Netzerim that rejected Constantine’s rejection of The Way. They are the only true protestants.
All the rest are just as “catholic” and lost as Rome.
Even the Baptist preachers I knew never went that far though some of their flocks would often “jump the gun” in declaring their knowledge of how God would judge! The parable of the marriage supper sheds the most light on how God sees the situation. Many who were initially invited wouldn’t come so God invited sinners, harlots, publicans, and just the most disgusting riff raff you ever saw. Yet one of the riffraff was discovered having crashed the party without a proper wedding garment so he was cast out into outer darkness. So no mention of preferred religious persuasions in that parable, you just have be clothed in Christ’s righteousness to attend!(yeah the parable was paraphrased in conversational style but everything is backed up in Luke 15)
I’m not disputing your macro points from scripture as it relates to the eventual tribulation of the world as well as the effects of Jesus’(or Yeshua if you like) death and resurrection upon the evil spiritual powers both in the Earth as well as the principalities and powers of the air! Satan will continue to fight until he is bound for a 1000 yesrs then released for a season to deceive the nations until thrown directly into the lake of Fire.
Galatians 3 speaks of the unity that should exist between believers and in sufficient numbers could effect the course of individual nations. It is a vastly different vision of unity then what the Marxist social justice warriors speak of! You are right that the general course of history and God’s judgment is set and this world eventually along with the heavens will be dissolved by “fervent heat” then remade. Until the time, God will still raise up the nations in righteousness and will bring them down when they fall into sin and chaos. God spared Nineveh for a time when they repented under the preaching of Jonah...yet eventually after a generation or 2 they again fell into sin, and troubled the nation of Israel and God brought wrath upon them as Nahum had prophesied prior to Jonah. Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty and that only through the blood of Jesus Christ(or Yeshua if you prefer).
So we must act and pray; encouraging the unity of Christ between Christians first and then, hopefully as the world sees our love for one another, will encourage others to want that same faith. And that is how Godly nations can only be birthed into being(line upon line precept upon precept, here a little there a little)...with Christ being the mortar as well as the straw with which the bricks are made!
And yet through all the dust and the vehemence of history and through all the tumults that the gaits of hell throw up against the catholic(small “C”, not Rome!) body of believers that exist across dimension and time, religious practice and denominations, those alive in the flesh and those dead in the grave but alive in Christ(since God is a God of the Living not the dead),.....through all that God still finds his own who will worship him in Spirit and in Truth! He finds them and like stones uncut by metal utensils he fits them, these living stones, into his Church! Not a protestant church, not a Catholic church, not an Orthodox church...but the Bride of Christ! Peace to you!
And yet through all the dust and the vehemence of history and through all the tumults that the gaits of hell throw up against the catholic(small “C”, not Rome!) body of believers that exist across dimension and time, religious practice and denominations, those alive in the flesh and those dead in the grave but alive in Christ(since God is a God of the Living not the dead),.....through all that God still finds his own who will worship him in Spirit and in Truth! He finds them and like stones uncut by metal utensils he fits them, these living stones, into his Church! Not a protestant church, not a Catholic church, not an Orthodox church...but the Bride of Christ! Peace to you!
To worship him in truth, one must worship as the apostle John called for in his first epistle:
One must walk as He himself walked.
If one rejects his Biblical Sabbath, or his appointed days, they worship not in truth.
If one keeps not his commandments, one walks not in truth.
If you feel you must in good conscience keep the Sabbath on a Saturday....then you must do so earnestly lest you sin before God by violating your conscience as per the admonition of Paul concerning the keeping of feasts and of Holy days that were sacred to some but not to others! But to others who may read this reply, the keeping of any Sabbath despite the disagreement over the day...is no good without the Lord of the Sabbath indwelling you via the Holy Spirit. When the Lord of the Sabbath is with you, it is Sabbath time forever! Hail the great high priest Jesus Christ after the order of Melchizidek...the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world!(That WORD that is God, having been made Flesh that dwelt amongst us...see also 1 John 4 should you have any other issues with what I just said! Yeshua is the Anointed savior made flesh...the begotten son of the Living God!)
No, "they" don't. Mr. Ray can speak for himself for what he "thought" but no Evangelical that I know would presume to know what is another's heart. It is faith in Jesus Christ that saves because of the grace of God and not because we deserve, merit or work for it.
Amen!
Oh AMEN!
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