I think you are thinking like a human, AG. It seems you believe that all our afterlife will be spent entartaining us. True love is always and only concerned with the one who is loved, not the one who loves.
With cleansed souls and new bodies we will be born, again, — in the world to come!
The Protestant notion that this is all taken care of here and now is appealing, and assuring, but sadly mistaken.
kosta50, I am not at all like the person I was before Christ “knew” me. Back then I was self-serving, mean, rude, hateful, vain. No one wanted to be around me, I was truly unlovable. When I describe myself as a filthy, scraggly little goat, half-eaten, bruised black and bloodied hanging out of a wolf’s mouth when I heard the Master’s call – I am not kidding.
The person I am now is a brand new “me” that never existed before then - and exists not alone but by the power of God. I am more aware of being alive in Him than in the flesh. And I have experienced Him personally in precisely this fashion for nigh onto a half century.
IOW, the new me is spiritual, not physical, and already exists with Christ in God - in timelessness - even though I am yet anchored to this body. Someday I will weigh anchor from this physical body. The physical body will die, the spiritual body will not.
But while I’m still anchored to the body, the natural “me” rears her head now and again and I stumble. When this happens, I confess it, pray for His healing – and He always picks me up just like a loving father would when his child has injured herself.
As I've mentioned before, I pray "up papaw, pweese" like a toddler. I want to be transparent in Him, not wiggle down and play with other lambs in the pasture. Every time I do, I get hurt.
Over the years I have learned that I am in control and can choose to reject the urgings of the natural me. Pride, ego and vanity are the “cross-eyed bears” of the natural me - but they are no longer the boss of me, the living me, the spiritual me.
Salvation occurred in an instant for me, kosta50 – but sanctification has been a very long walk.
As to how He might choose to anchor me in the future Messianic age on earth – or the new heaven and earth – I cannot say, but I’m sure it’ll be according to His will. Christ appears in different forms in Revelation, but He remains Christ.
Perhaps He will give me a new physical body for an anchor. Or perhaps He’ll let me fly without a physical body. Perhaps both. Or perhaps He’ll merge me into someone else. Or perhaps He’ll make me stationary.
I don’t know the answer. But I know Him and I trust Him and therefore I am very sure it’ll be beautiful.
I do experience the mind of Christ as described above. Moreover, I easily recognize others who have the same mind. And we speak a different language, a spiritual language which the natural man cannot understand.
It saddens me that you reject Paul.
Of a truth, we individually make the scales whereby we shall be judged. By whatever measure we judge others, we’ll be judged. By whatever measure we condemn others, we’ll be condemned. By whatever measure we are merciful, we shall obtain mercy.
Likewise, if we believe a certain thing is sinful – then for us, it is – and we’ll be judged by whether or not we do the thing willfully having that belief. I imagine the Amish will be judged by a different standard than the Catholics than the Southern Baptists and so on.
And since you reject Paul, I’m certain that will figure into your personal scales but how I cannot say.
You: I think you are thinking like a human, AG. It seems you believe that all our afterlife will be spent entartaining us. True love is always and only concerned with the one who is loved, not the one who loves.