JD writes: Wouldn't you say that salvation by grace through faith has always been the will of the Lord?
jt: My belief is that God would have preferred for
Adam to have stayed "in His image" and fellowshipped with Him in the garden
daily
but since that didn't happen, he went to Plan
B.
If what we see as Divine Projections (such as Christ dying for our
sins at a certain time) is, in fact, God's reality, then salvation
based upon the condition of the heart and the
consideration of faith for righteousness has always
been what God is about.
jt: Right and the condition of the heart? Not good! "It
is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it?"
I mean, look to David in that 51st Psalm. He contrasts animal
sacrifice with brokenness and contrition.
The latter does not eliminate the former, but it does declare the former
not to be the condition upon which our salvation is based.
jt: David realizes finally that "making a good show
after the flesh" was destroying him; he held out for a year
before
getting on his face before God to repent and admit
that what God desires is "truth in the inward parts" Psalm
51:6
God calls us all to obedience, but saves us anyway
!!!!!!
jt: If we repent and get back up when we fall
and hold fast our confidence firm unto the end
"Go thy way and sin no more" will always be the advice of the
Lord -- and it will always come after we
are saved/forgiven.
jt: You left off the end John, it was "Go thy way and
sin no more lest a worse thing come upon you" and this spoken to a man who
had been debilitated by a spirit of infirmity for 38yrs. He ties sin and
sickness together doesn't he? I mean that man could go his way and keep on
sinning but who wants something worse than that coming on them?
Imagine this; God creates mankind. He wants this creation to love Him,
to seek Him out, to prefer Him.
And He accomplishes this by seeking us out, walking in the garden,
jt: Adam did love Him, wait for Him, and prefer Him -
for a while anyway until he received the wrong counsel..
talking to Abraham -- planning his future, making a
military hero of Gideon, appointing the Baptist, correcting and
calling Paul,
lifting you up in your Messianic's ministry and helping me to understand
Linda Shields.
Yes
And all along, He knows that this creation idea of His would impact
Himself as well as the whole of creation
--------------
He would, in our time, have to experience some things He had never had to
experience:
jt: God doesn't HAVE to do anything. He chose to be the
lamb slain from the foundation of the world... that's love.
learning how to walk and talk, saying "yes" when you as God on Earth
thought it best to do something else
( "My time has not yet come" verses "do it anyway"), being
tempted by someone you created, dying ! ! !,
putting your trust in the hands of another and waiting for the
resurrection, supplied by Another.
jt: He said I and my Father are ONE. How do you figure
he put his trust in "another"
All this and perhaps more -- the Great God Almighty
becoming like us, whom He created, so that we might become like
Him.
Becoming like God. Whoa. It seems to me that becoming
like God would demand His uncondiitional forgiveness as we stuggle to to
become. Think about it; for US to be like HIM
-------------------- how off the mark would we
be as we compare ourselves to this Great God Almighty?
Think of the viod that exists at the beginning or even the ending of this
process.
jt: This is the whole point of obedience, grace,
and all that salvation involves - "so that when He appears we will be like
Him"
Unmerited grace IS THE ONLY SOLUTION. On a good
day, we are nothin like Him, right?
Nothing.
jt: Then this needs to change. Grace is the power to do as we ought and God's commandments are
not grievous he does not expect from us anything that he is unwilling to supply
the power for us to do..
He had no choice but to simply say, I forgive. I am
sorry, but if we do thus and so, how close to Being Like God (Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect) are
we? And so the man says, we have sinned and continually fall short of His
glory.
jt: But when we respond to the heavenly calling - we
put on the Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the
flesh.
