Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
January 25, 2008
ESV Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
In recent days I have spent time in Lima and Sullana Peru and Mexico City and I have discovered that people by nature are the same. Man has a heart that is inclined to selfishness and idolatry. Sin abounds in the remotest parts of the land because the heart is desperately wicked. Thousands bow before statues of Mary and pray to her hoping for answers. I have seen these people stare hopelessly at Mary icons, Jesus icons, and a host of dead saints who will do nothing for them. I have talked with people who pray to the pope and say that they love him. I talked with one lady who said that she knew that Jesus was the Savior, but she loved the pope. Thousands bow before Santa Muerte (holy death angel) in hopes that she will do whatever they ask her. I have seen people bring money, burning cigarettes, beer, whiskey, chocolate, plants, and flowers to Santa Muerte in hopes of her answers. I have seen these people bowing on their knees on the concrete in the middle of public places to worship their idol. Millions of people come into the Basilica in Mexico City and pay their money, confess their sins, and stare hopelessly at relics in hope that their sins will be pardoned. In America countless thousands are chained to baseball games, football games, material possessions, and whatever else their heart of idols can produce to worship.
My heart has broken in these last weeks because the God of heaven is not honored as he ought to be honored. People worship the things that are created rather than worshiping the Creator. God has been gracious to all mankind and yet mankind has hardened their hearts against a loving God. God brings the rain on the just and unjust. God brings the beautiful sunrises and sunsets upon the just and unjust. God gives good gifts unto all and above all things he has given his Son that those who would believe in him would be saved. However, man has taken the good things of God and perverted them unto idols and turned their attention away from God. I get a feel for Jesus as he overlooked Jerusalem or Paul as he beseeched for God to save Israel. When you accept the reality of the truth of the glory of God is breaks your heart that people would turn away from the great and awesome God of heaven to serve lesser things. Moses was outraged by the golden calf, the prophets passionately preached against idolatry, Jesus was angered that the temple was changed in an idolatrous business, and Paul preached to the idolaters of Mars Hill by telling them of the unknown God.
I arrived back at home wondering how I should respond to all the idolatry that I have beheld in these last three weeks. I wondered how our church here in the states should respond to all of the idolatry in the world. What are the options? First, I suppose we could sit around and hope that people chose to get their life together and stop being idolaters. However, I do not know how that could ever happen apart from them hearing the truth. Second, I suppose we could spend a lifetime studying cultural issues and customs in hope that we could somehow learn to relate to the people of other countries. However, the bible is quite clear that all men are the same. Men are dead in sin, shaped in iniquity, and by nature are the enemies of God. Thirdly, we could pay other people or other agencies to go and do a work for us while we remain comfortably in the states. However, there is no way to insure that there will be doctrinal accuracy or integrity. If we only pay other people to take the gospel we will miss out on all of the benefits of being obedient to the mission of God. Lastly, we could seek where God would have us to do a lasting work and then invest our lives there for the glory of God. The gospel has the power to raise the dead in any culture and we must be willing to take the gospel wherever God would have us take it. It is for sure that our church cannot go to every country and reach every people group, so we must determine where God would have us work and seek to be obedient wherever that is.
It seems that some doors are opening in the Spanish speaking countries below us and perhaps God is beginning to reveal where we are to work. There are some options for work to be partnered with in Peru and there could be a couple of options in Mexico. The need is greater than I can express upon this paper for a biblical gospel to be proclaimed in Peru and Mexico. Oh, that God would glorify his great name in Peru and Mexico by using a small little church in a town that does not exist to proclaim his great gospel amongst a people who desperately need the truth.
I give thanks to the LORD for allowing me the privilege of going to these countries and broadening my horizons. The things that I have seen will be forever engraved upon my heart. I will long remember the pastors that I spent time with in Peru and I will never forget Adolfo who translated for me in Mexico. I will relish the time that I spent with Paul Washer and the others. When I think of church I will forever remember being on top of that mountain in Sullana at that church which had no electricity and no roof. I am convinced that heaven was looking down on that little church on top of that mountain and very few people on earth even know that it exist. Oh, God I pray that the things of this world will continue to grow dim and that God’s people will be caught up in his glorious presence.
Because of the truth: Pastor: J. Randall Easter II Timothy 2:19 "Our God is in heaven and does whatever He pleases."(Ps. 115:3) "He predestined us according to the good pleasure of His will."(Eph. 1:5) Those who have been saved have been saved for His glory and they are being made holy for this is the will of God. Are you being made holy? Spurgeon says, "If your religion does not make you holy it will damn you to hell."
Randall didn’t go to Latin America to find “poorly catechized Catholics”. He went to help equip pastors of local churches, so they would be able to teach and preach the Word of God. He merely reported what he saw as idolatry and the RCC “watchdogs” on this forum jumped on this thread with fervor.
You've misstated this continually. Let's try for a final clarification.
God's gift of faith in Jesus Christ is not simply the knowledge that Christ is Lord. It is the understanding that Christ is the Saviour.
Do you know any fallen angels or demons who believe Christ is their Saviour?
Me, either.
The knowledge that Christ is Lord should be evident to every created creature in the world. It is self-evident.
But the understanding that Christ is the Saviour who alone paid for every one of the sins of His flock is not so common. It is only held by those to whom God has given new eyes and new ears and a new heart with which to understand and be grateful for the fact that Christ is their Saviour.
No demon, no fallen angel, no Satan believes Christ is their Redeemer.
Hope this helps your misunderstanding of God's word and promise.
But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness." -- Romans 4:4-5"Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt.
Do you understand what Paul is telling you? Are you saved by debt or grace?
Good works are the evidence of God's grace; not a requirement for it.
Amen. That's where all understanding begins and ends.
What does Scripture lack? What are we Bible-believing Christians missing by holding the word of God preeminent in our lives?
Where in Scripture are we told that Angels are given souls to be redeemed by the Sacrifice of Jesus?
Belief is far more than acknowledging Christs Kingship.
What do think Born Again Christians mean when they say they Believe in Jesus?
No demon or fallen angel believes Christ paid for their sins and is thus their Saviour.
By the grace of God, I believe Christ paid for my sins and thus, He is my Saviour.
As previously posted, faith alone - properly comprehended - is not cheap grace. For your edification, since you seem to have missed it on the previous page:
As I said in post 165: “So it’s an active trust - not merely mental assent. As you sit in a chair, you put your trust in it as you plop down. That’s a fairly good metaphor for the kind of trust “believe” carries with it. If one’s belief does not affect one’s behavior, it merely assent and not a true belief.” This is what James’ letter is talking about. Works do not and can not save one - Christ is the only One who was without sin and, therefore, eligible to save anyone (For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous). Our (Christian’s) works are the result of believing in Him and trusting in Him - similar to trusting in the chair to hold us up as we plop down on it. One might say he trusts the chair, but if never sits on it, he has only words.
Taking up the cross - die to self, mortify the deeds of the flesh, etc. - ARE the actions that one who has been saved by the Lord Jesus would take.
Faith precedes good works and is needful or else the works would be rubbish.
You mistakenly think that sola fide is of the devil. “faith plus works” for new birth is of the devil. Faith plus works for the sanctification of the Saint is of God. To be born again, as the Lord put it, is completely the work of God - as your physical birth was none of your work, neither is one’s spiritual birth. A spiritually dead man (Ephesians chapter 2) can do NOTHING of spiritual worth. God must take the initiative (Romans 3:9-18), He choses who will be saved (Ephesians 1:3-8), and He finished the work (Heb 10:1-14).
Romans 3:
“21 But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;
22 Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:
23 For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
24 Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:
25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;
26 To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.
27 Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.
28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.”
That seems like a very nonsensical question.
Of course JESUS IS THE SAVIOR.
He is not . . . in any Biblical construction on reality I’m familiar with . . . scheduled to be the savior OF FALLEN ANGELS.
Hell was Scripturally made for the devil and his angels.
I wasn’t aware that the magicsterical had so confused such a simple issue that such a nonsensical question would even be imagined.
Oh I think it's pretty cut and dried. What would you call someone who abuses another, then claims the abuse was for the good of the abused when the abuse is so obviously enjoyed by the abuser?
Then add the attempt to deflect responsibility for the abuse by claiming the vicitm is too picky...well, let's just say it's well traveled ground for those of us familiar with patterns of abuse.
My favorite are the newspaper ads:
“Thank you St. Jude - for prayers answered”.
1) It’s one thing to say that only God the father answers prayers, as he is sovereign over all events and affairs of men; not the deceased.
2) It’s one thing to say that we have only one intercessor to God the Father, and that is Jesus Christ.
3) It’s one thing to say that dead people can’t hear you, nor respond to your prayers.
It’s entire something new to suggest that they read the newspaper from beyond the grave. Just sort of takes RCC idolatry to a whole new level!
Why doesn't he report on the illegitimate children of the reformation: the cults?
They're right down the street from him.
i THOUGHT it was well understood that I didn’t support the RUBBER DICTIONARY of the RC edifice.
Guess I learn something new every day.
Soooooo the magicsterical that was sooo many times in history the world’s experts and chief administrators of physical sadistic torture . . .
has now decreed? Where’s the encyclical?
that
ALL disagreements with the magicsterical’s positions on virtually anything to virtually any degree and particularly with any forcefulness above the burp of a gnat
ARE to be construed as
HORRIBLY SADISTIC, ABUSIVE and otherwise dispicable, beyond the pale of civil society and quite akin to slug burps and volcanic eruptions all over sight-seeing priests and nuns . . . as well as ash falling on icons of the archetypal EARTH MOTHER—in other words—terminally dreadful.
NOTE TO PROTTYS: Please ammend and annotate all copies of your RC rubber dictionaries.
My favorite are the newspaper ads:
“Thank you St. Jude - for prayers answered”.
1) It’s one thing to say that only God the father answers prayers, as he is sovereign over all events and affairs of men; not the deceased.
2) It’s one thing to say that we have only one intercessor to God the Father, and that is Jesus Christ.
3) It’s one thing to say that dead people can’t hear you, nor respond to your prayers.
It’s entire something new to suggest that they read the newspaper from beyond the grave. Just sort of takes RCC idolatry to a whole new level!
= = =
INDEED.
Sounds like ABUSE-OF-SAINTS, to me.
I mean, requiring them during their eternal rest to read the MSM!
I’d think that was more a requirement of hell!
Good point, but what is a soul? Now the fallen angels have chosen hell and will not be saved, that was not my point, the point is that belief is far more than acknowledging that Christ is King and Redeemer. Belief is the marriage of faith and works made possible by Grace. Grace is salvific, the born again believer is capable of real faith and real , that is to say grace enabled, works.
Life.
What are we Bible-believing Christians missing by holding the word of God preeminent in our lives?
Unity.
HOGWASH on both counts.
Scripture is FULL OF LIFE.
And I’ve had wonderful spiritual JESUS FOCUSED unity with quite a number of precious RC’s.
Meant to ping you to #356, sorry.
My take on
SALVATION
is that EVERY SCRIPTURE HAVING ANYTHING TO DO WITH SALVATION
WILL BE LITERALLY FULFILLED
. . . OFTEN TO THE SHOCK
of probably every magicsterical of every denomination on the planet.
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