[TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything

Wed, 22 Feb 2006 06:57:15 -0800

 
This appears to be a 'one way street' at this point
Tell me Lance - are you open to correction?  By whom will you be shown?
Most definitely not by David Miller - this is quite obvious.

From: "Lance Muir" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
No SHOUTING!! from my end, David. I see you as someone who, for whatever
reason, needs to be right about things. I also see you as someone not much
open to correction. Both of these are denied by you. Where does one go from
here? One cannot show you David, if you will not be shown.
 
 
From: "David Miller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org>
Sent: February 22, 2006 09:00
Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
 
 
>I am not pushing MY truth, Lance.  I believe that we are constantly
>changing
> into the image of Christ. You seem to see me and everybody else as static.
> I do not.  I am constantly changing and modifying the way I think,
> building
> upon the foundation that has been established.
>
> Victor and you do not illustrate in any way how my theological
> understanding
> is off the mark.  I'm not disagreeing with either of you that my
> theological
> understanding is off the mark.  It probably is because I am not trained in
> theology like you guys are.  I'm asking you to explain what in my
> theological understanding is off.  Is it because I believe James 4 is
> talking about repentance?  Is it because I believe that the culture of
> Luther had a sinful mindset centered on penance and indulgences as
> solutions
> to deal with sin?  Is it because I do not think repentance and joy go hand
> in hand?  Is it because I believe that the church had a business going in
> indulgences and the role of priests to bring forgiveness?  Is it because I
> believe we are to move past repentance and onto perfection?  Neither of
> you
> are explaining what is disagreeable.  You both are just shouting that I am
> wrong.  I'm asking how.  Explain.  Let's discuss this.
>
> David Miller
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Lance Muir
> To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
> Sent: Wednesday, February 22, 2006 8:06 AM
> Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
> I know Victor personally and well, David. In this post you simply confirm
> that which I had to say re: plurality/pluralism and THE TRUTH. Even were
> it
> the case that YOUR truth were NOT the truth, I have every confidence, from
> reading you the last couple of years, that you would not change. I've
> always
> 'read' you as a believer. I've also 'read' you as a believer who has
> constructed his own theology on some important matters. Some of your own
> theology is thoroughly unbiblical and, will not stand in 'that day'. Fear
> not as fire will burn it away.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: David Miller
> To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
> Sent: February 21, 2006 14:26
> Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
> This coming from someone who reasons with "First" and "Two" instead of
> "First" and "Second" or "One" and "Two"?
>
> 1.  Please ask Victor to elaborate on how my theological understanding is
> wholly wide of the mark.  Such a statement does not convey to us any
> greater
> understanding of the issues here.  What is repentance?  I suspect this man
> Victor and I define it differently.  He probably views repentance as
> simply
> being a life that is constantly humble and devoted to God.  I would ask
> him
> to explain James 4:8-10 as something other than repentance.
>
> Check out the following link, which is an article that I think comes from
> the fruit of this "theology" you had quoted:
> http://www.greentreewebster.org/Articles/All%20of%20Life%20is%20Repentance.pdf
>
> This article to me is like puke.  There is no understanding of the value
> of
> the kind of repentance described in James 4.  The Anabaptists didn't have
> it
> all wrong and Luther was wrong to think them to be fanatics.
>
> David Miller
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Lance Muir
> To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
> Sent: Tuesday, February 21, 2006 10:29 AM
> Subject: Fw: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Victor Shepherd
> To: Lance Muir
> Sent: February 21, 2006 09:44
> Subject: RE: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
> First, who is David Miller?  His theological understanding is wholly wide
> of
> the mark.
>
> Two, Debbie is a surer guide.
>
> Victor
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Lance Muir [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: February 21, 2006 9:34 AM
> To: Victor Shepherd
> Subject: Fw: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
> Victor:
>
> Please read on through to Debbie's comments. Would you offer up a couple
> of
> thoughts?
>
> Lance
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: David Miller
> To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
> Sent: February 21, 2006 09:29
> Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
> I think Martin Luther and many of the reformers were wrong in their
> concept
> of sin and repentance.  This was the cultural mindset then, that the
> depravity of man was so great that nothing could be done about it.  Their
> thinking was that everybody sins even when they are unaware of it.  This
> actually was good business for them, given the position of the church in
> relation to the people. They practiced confession to priests and even the
> selling of indulgences.  While Luther saw the evil in the selling of
> indulgences, his culture hindered him from understanding the greatness of
> the righteousness that Jesus imputes to those who believe.  You have to
> understand that perceiving that we are justified by faith was a huge
> revelation for him in itself.  If that concept was a big deal to him, how
> could he possibly understand all the benefits that come with faith, such
> as
> the prophetic gift, miracles, healing, and sanctification?
>
> One of the greatest hindrances to sanctification is the knowledge that we
> are sinners.  It is the knowledge of sin, the consciousness of being in
> sin,
> that paralyzes a person.  Such a person has no boldness to stand before
> God,
> much less enter the throne room of heaven.  He can do nothing but be in a
> mournful state of repentance.  James teaches repentance, however, as being
> a
> process with an end.  What does he say?  "He [the Lord] shall lift you up"
> (James 4:10).  If we really were suppose to be in a constant state of
> repentance, this last phrase has no meaning.  Is such were so, we should
> then all be sad, mourning, without joy.  No, I'm sorry, but this is not
> the
> purpose of the Lord Jesus Christ, to keep us in a state of perpetual
> repentance.  Rather, his purpose is to clear our conscience of all guilt,
> so
> that we feel as if we have never sinned, and can say like Paul, "receive
> us;
> we have wronged no man."  His purpose is to give us a heart of joy, that
> we
> might walk in a state of righteousness, peace and joy, knowing that we
> have
> been delivered and cleansed of all sin.  To think otherwise is the
> manifestation of doubt and unbelief.
>
> David Miller.
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Lance Muir
> To: TruthTalk@mail.innglory.org
> Sent: Tuesday, February 21, 2006 6:25 AM
> Subject: [TruthTalk] Fw: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Debbie Sawczak
> To: 'Lance Muir'
> Sent: February 20, 2006 22:43
> Subject: repentance & sin and everything
>
>
> I came across this section on the first of Luther's 95 theses and thought
> of
> the sinless perfection discussion:
>
> We commit the same error nowadays, with the superficial difference that we
> have changed penance into a psychological or emotional work of
> self-purgation. Luther insisted that although repentance is something we
> will for ourselves, we can do so only because God has first willed it for
> us
> and in us. Moreover, it is to be lifelong and “lifewide”, inasmuch as sin
> is
> lifelong and lifewide; repentance is not an atomistic act we perform to
> compensate for an atomistic sin. Even in our hearts as believers there is
> a
> residual depravity so deep that we cannot see it. We have an inkling as to
> when and how we have sinned, but it is only an inkling. In fact, our whole
> existence is tinged with this residual sinfulness, hence our whole
> existence
> must be repentant.
>
> Luther’s view contrasted not only with the Roman understanding, but also
> with that of the Anabaptists, the radicals of the Reformation. According
> to
> the Anabaptists, unbelievers needed to repent, certainly, but not
> believers,
> because to become a believer was ipso facto to be wholly sanctified. To be
> a
> Christian meant you were perfect and sinless. Both the Roman and the
> Anabaptist, according to Luther, had a shallow and inadequate view of sin,
> and both needed to know repentance as a lifelong exercise in grace.
>
> Luther was an Old Testament scholar first of all, and repentance in the
> Old
> Testament always has the sense of a 180-degree turn. The Hebrew Bible uses
> three major images of repentance. One is the unfaithful wife returning to
> her husband: having disgraced herself and violated her husband, she
> returns
> to longstanding love, patience, and acceptance. The second is the idolater
> turning from the worship of idols to the worship of the true and living
> God.
> On the one hand, idols are nothing—the Hebrew word for them is literally
> “the nothings”—but on the other hand they have great power, just as a
> vacuum
> has power to suck everything into it and a false rumour has the power to
> destroy a person. The idolater who repents turns from nothing to
> something,
> from unreality to the reality that is the Holy One of Israel. And in the
> third image of repentance, rebellious subjects return to their rightful
> ruler. They have brought chaos upon themselves and the wider world, and as
> they turn back to proper authority, the chaos within and around them is
> dispelled.
>
> Luther was familiar with all of these images. In saying that Jesus willed
> the entire life of believers to be one of repentance, he was acknowledging
> repentance as reorientation to the love and service of Jesus Christ, as
> that
> resetting of the compass we must will for ourselves every single morning
> when our feet hit the cold floor. Without it, we blunder farther down the
> wrong road every day.
>
> Earlier this evening I was thinking of sins of omission, and also of the
> whole web of corporate, systemic sin in which we exist and are complicit.
> The other night after watching Constant Gardener we talked about this
> too--about how a "garden" can be our refuge from knowing about the evil in
> which we're enmeshed, because knowing produces a responsibility we almost
> cannot bear and cannot adequately discharge. How can we deny that we share
> in this corporate responsibility, and does that not also count as sin?
>
> And that's apart from our very subtle rationalizations of personal,
> individual sin. To what degree is our will involved in that? Unconscious
> is
> not the same as involuntary. This thought was raised by something from CSL
> on the Narnian this aft, about the small act committed between one swallow
> of beer and the next, the smile or word whereby we seek admission into the
> circle and close the door behind us, silencing the qualm. Then my thought
> went to what JD has been saying about God's complete freedom, similar to
> what TFT said about Christ's complete integrity, as compared to our lack
> thereof. Until our total selves are restored we do not have that freedom
> and
> integrity. We live, though, knowing we are headed there, anticipating it
> even as he begins to grow it in us, and that is a source of tension.
>
> It reminded me of a conversation I had with Cas tonight. Apparently one of
> his teachers admitted to wondering sometimes if everything he believes is
> false. We talked about how certainty is simply not within the grasp of
> humans in any belief system, and that for us who have put confidence in
> Jesus Christ, the moment of recognizing that we do not know might as well
> be
> a lifetime. Our whole life, our whole self is in that moment--every
> time--and we can respond in terror and despair or in trust. Similarly--I
> find this hard to articulate--our whole life and self are there in the
> instant of sinning; it might as well be a lifetime, ontologically. There
> is
> no point saying we are only a little bit sinful, even if we are David and
> sin only every third or fourth day. But we need not respond in despair and
> defeat. The alternative to a claim of sinlessness is not defeatism.
>
> Is that intelligible?
>
> D
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Lance Muir [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Sunday, February 19, 2006 5:55 PM
> To: Debbie Sawczak
> Subject: Re: quasi-adventure
>
>
> OK then, I've got season 2 and, the Pledge.
>
> L
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Debbie Sawczak
> To: 'Lance Muir'
> Sent: February 19, 2006 17:02
> Subject: RE: quasi-adventure
>
>
> What?? What are you saying? Don't trifle with my feelings!
>
> D
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Lance Muir [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Sunday, February 19, 2006 4:46 PM
> To: Debbie Sawczak
> Subject: Re: quasi-adventure
>
>
> MI-5 vol 2???????????? See it? Not see it? Keep watching this site for
> further updates.
>
> Lance
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Debbie Sawczak
> To: 'Lance Muir'
> Sent: February 19, 2006 12:33
> Subject: quasi-adventure
>
>
> In the last kilometre or so of our trip to the MH, the van began making a
> hideous noise whenever we turned, which Jan said was the steering going at
> last. So rather than risk driving back with it, he called a tow truck near
> the end of the service, and when it was over he stayed with the van while
> the rest of us had to come home by cab. (I'm not sure whether our Canadian
> Tire Gold Card, which covers towing over enormous distances, covers the
> cab,
> but I hope so!) We know two other Georgetown parties who go to the
> Oakville
> MH, but neither was there today, unfortunately.
>
> Little thing--we were standing in the lobby watching all the people come
> out
> and looking for our friend in order to ask for a ride, when Jan decided to
> locate him by calling on his cell phone. Turned out he was out in the
> Beaches in Toronto. The funny thing was, while Jan was talking on the
> phone
> his eyes continued to search the crowd of exiting & milling MH-goers, till
> finally he said into the phone, "What am I doing, I'm still looking for
> you
> here even though you've told me you're in Toronto! I guess I can stop
> looking now!" It seemed to me to be a parable for something...
>
> D
>
> ----------
> "Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may
> know how you ought to answer every man."  (Colossians 4:6)
> http://www.InnGlory.org
>
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----------
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