Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Private Forum Does anybody care?

I've already posted this here at the end of a long thread, but maybe it deserves a thread of its own. (Both are equally easy to ignore, of course )

From the Florida keys to Point Barrow, Alaska, and from the Atlantic coast to Ni'ihau Island, Hawaii, Jesus is here in the United States. This country has its share of His disciples, so we know that He's here among us, as He promised us that He would always be. Yes, Jesus is here, all right, but how can any of us tell for sure?

Is the Body of Christ everywhere in the United States doing greater works than He did? No.

Where in this country do we see any part of the Body of Christ doing even the works that Jesus did � let alone the mightier works that He said that we'd do? Nowhere.

Is His Body in this country united, one Body doing His will in His name, as He emphatically said that it should be? No.

Is His Body in this country standing firm against Satan and invulnerable to his evils? No.

Instead, what do we see?
� Lifeless �worship� in many churches
� Division and competition among the churches
� Deception and false doctrines in and out of the churches
� Satanism, both obvious and hidden � deep, far, and wide
� Isolated lone Christians without fellowship or fulfillment
� "Look, everybody! See what a great Christian I am!"
� "Oh, how sweet it is to be a Christian!"
� "I know all that I need to know."
� "I'll decide what's right for me."
� "[X] isn't worth my attention."
� "Jesus is all that I need."

Does anybody care?

Does anybody want the Body to be doing more?

Does anybody want to be part of the Body doing more?

I have long said that when the body of believers quits squabbling and comes together to pray and worship then and only then will great thing be done in His Name.

Yes I care. I see what is happening and it makes me ill.

Kinda hard for churches to get along when people inside those churches can't even do it many times.
I think we all need to leave our baggage at the door when we come in and walk right by it when we leave.

Qtip
Soli Deo Gloria!

What is the "baggage"?

That would be a huge first step.

I disagree ....the baggage NEEDS to be TAKEN in and then left there when ya leave.
Too many folks afraid to expose their baggage thinkin no one else has any. Open it up, unpack those satan weighted bags and haul but, never looking back is what I say.

I say, don't take your "baggage" to the church house. Dump the stuff in the garbage as soon as you recognize that it is garbage and useless to your life in Christ. Why carry it from Monday till Sunday just so you can take it to church? But in principle, I agree with you guys.

Again I ask what is baggage?

Sin and law.

Interesting how that which was to cure the one causes it all the more.

There's a lesson there.

Amen Brother Howell.

1 Cor 11:30 For this cause many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep.

Discerning the Lord's body for starters perhaps.

Just what does that mean though, discerning the Lord's body?

Is it "baggage" or is it something more?

"And every one who has this hope on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure. Every one who practices sin also practices lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness."

Tell us how law is equivalent to sin, please.

He didn't write "equivalent",
Consider I Corinthians 15:56 The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law.

Romans 5:21 The Law came in so that the transgression would
increase;


The typical Jewish view in Paul's day was that God gave the law to counteract the sinful human impulse. In Judaism there is a proverb,"The more Torah, the more life"

But Paul points out that the law came in to increase the trespass.

So as Ricky correctly points out,"Interesting how that which was to cure the one causes it all the more".

Thank the Lord, as Paul continued ,"but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21 so that, as sin reigned in death, even so grace would reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

FVA,

The post clearly says "sin and law" are baggage. And yet apostle Paul says the Law is a teacher to lead us to Christ. It seems you guys are missing something due to incorrect teaching in your churches.

You folks are so afraid of obedience you come up with a foolish name and call it legalism.

Ringman,
You folks? Whatever.
The law is certainly a tutor or teacher of our need for Christ.
I didn't write, nor did anyone else, that freedom from the old covenant era of being under law was freedom sin.

Romans 6:15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? Certainly not!

Grace, faith and obedience are tied together.

Legalism is a different matter.

I've come across this as part of a definition


"Imagined superiority to other Christians (not rules or a lack of rules)is a sign of legalism.

Legalism is the lie that God will find more pleasure in me because my obedience is greater than others or that God looks at me with disgust because I am not growing in grace as quickly as my friends. It is the failure to remember that God�s pleasure in us comes outside of us (in Christ). Legalism causes the heart to forget that God sings over us because of the work He has done, not because of what we have done "

Your aggressive simplistic understanding and putting the weight of such on others more than skirts such in my eyes.

Galatians 3:24 Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
Galatians 3:25 But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.

Nothing like a little Bible to clear up a misunderstanding, huh?

And you are so enamored with the law you wrongly believe it is a part of Christianity. Not only the old covenant law but you contrive law in the new testament as well.

There is one law in the new testament. It is the law that Jesus said all the law and prophets was hung on: love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself. Paul calls it the perfect law of liberty because it frees us from a destructive law that does not save, and only damns. God began with that law to show us that, and gave the untimate sacrifice to get our attention for His new law of Love bought by Grace.

It's a law that will satisfy all the old testament law without giving way to the self-pride that nullifies any and all obiedience done under the Law, because it is based on Love and Love is self-denying.

Read what love is.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7
New International Version (NIV)

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Cross references:1 Corinthians 13:4 : 1Th 5:141 Corinthians 13:4 : 1Co 5:21 Corinthians 13:5 : S 1Co 10:241 Corinthians 13:5 : S Mt 5:221 Corinthians 13:5 : Job 14:16, 17; Pr 10:12; 17:9; 1Pe 4:81 Corinthians 13:6 : 2Th 2:121 Corinthians 13:6 : 2Jn 4; 3Jn 3, 41 Corinthians 13:7 : ver 8, 13

My lunch period is over and that's all I have time for but I hope you will consider this.

Are you a betting man??

I don't always post the Scripture references when I post Scripture. If you don't mind would you post the reference for the above Scriptural quote. I don't recognize it.

That is one of the Scriptures I quoted. What is your point?

Romans 6 tells us,
"Do you not know that when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience, you are slaves of the one who you obey, either of sin resulting inn death or of obedience resulting in righteousness? But thanks b e to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that from of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.

"I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. For just as you presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness, resulting in lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness, resulting in sanctification. But now having been freed from sin and enslaved to God, you derive your benefit, resulting in sanctification, and the outcome, eternal life."

Obviously you have not paid much attention to my posts.



Please show me where Jesus limits the New Testament to this instruction.



Apostle Paul writes,
"If an one thinks he is a prophet or spiritual, let him recognize that the things which I write to you are the Lord's commandment."



Show me chapter and verse to support this claim.

I will show you from God's Word what He says about obedience and one notice of sin.
"For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome," and "Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin."

Why did God give us so many things to do in His Word if He didn't want us doing them; and that from a heart of love?

When I get back from, town I will go through your posted Scriptures.