I was reading and doing research on teaching, and communicating ideas, and ran across an article on Family education on Teaching your baby to speak.
Science and education, has proven, that in order for baby's ever to speak, they must be allowed to speak and hear you speak, to formulate language.
Common Sense, huh?
The article was summarized with the following statement.
"Talk a lot to your baby if you can, but don't monopolize the conversation. Remember to give your infant a chance to talk while you listen."
Why do we ever suppose that our heavenly Father, would have ever intended the body of Christ to come together, and be silent while only one person speaks.
Pastor, Teacher, you wouldn't do that with your own children, so why would you dare do that with God's children?
I know as a Pastor and Teacher, I learned a lot from others, as I moved into "Dialegomai," the word so often mistranslated in English to preach which really means to discuss. This was the tradition of the Apostles, not our tradition of men.
Pastors and Teachers we don't hold the corner on God or truth, and it is very prideful and arrogant of us to think so.
I know, I have been there and done that.
I was miserable as a Pastor, as a Teacher, I was miserable in my own spiritual growth.
We should rightfully should be miserable when we are creating children that will have a speech impediment!
Doesn't it only make common sense that our Heavenly Father who has given EACH of us, this new birth in Jesus Christ, where we all start as babies, unable to barely walk, only making non-nonsensical sounds, still needing care, that we as Pastors and Teachers allow all the body of Christ to mature, to grow up, to become all that God has given them to be in Jesus Christ. To become in essence - Pastors!
Well just like for a baby, they have the same need and we need to treat the body of Christ with the same respect as we do our own children born to us.
I have had a friend for many years now, that when I first was told by the Holy Spirit to change to do things God's way rather than mine, a huge transformation for him took place as well as for I, once I listened to God, and begin to listen to others.
He was always quiet, never said anything, never asked questions, he would just sit their listening when I preached or taught at church or Sunday School or the Youth group, as was expected of him, I might add.
Once the door was open for Him to speak in open dialectic fellowship, He began to grow as did I. He had and has a lot of nuggets of godly wisdom to share with the body of Christ.
Did he speak perfectly about Jesus in the beginning? No, but is He learning to do so now? Yes, exactly like myself. None of us are perfect in speech or our deeds, but we would think so, with the practice of church today.
I believe Jesus is the Head of the church. Jesus would never design a time that we come together as His body, that He would tell the one acting as an earthly parent of new born babies or even that of the full grown adults, to tell His children to sit down and be quiet, and don't dare speak. Our practice in many churches today, relays that message to those sitting in the pews.
Nor would Jesus bring together those that are mature, and tell them they have nothing to add to the lesson, He would listen.
You know, Sunday School was largely an attempt to return to early Apostolic practices but it has failed because it too remains yet organized, planned and supervised. It's not spontaneous fellowship, it's not something we are part of, but something we go to.
It has become a place to come together that it has become usually no more than a microcosm of church service.
One person, leads, he uses a book or lesson approved by those in charge, and very little becomes a part of the discussion or time together outside of that parameter.
Oh! you may talk and ask questions, but we are so ingrained with listening and not speaking very few ever do. They are careful not to do so, or just don't know what to say, or they are afraid it might sound like babbling or they may not sound spiritual like the leaders.
Often times, we won't give them the opportunity to speak about something that may be weighing heavily on their minds and hearts on truth, and their fellowship in Christ, as it would get us off "our lesson."
Well that's where we all began, just babbling as babies do.
So be courageous and babble or speak, and teachers and pastors let them talk and let us learn to listen.
Let's get back to practice the way God designed it both for His heavenly children and our earthly children.
We wouldn't treat own children in the way that we do so many of the children of God. So why would our Father in heaven have such a practice for us to treat his children that way?
Our Heavenly Father would not ever be so cruel just as we wouldn't to our own. We need to ask ourselves, are we painting the right picture of Family, when we do so?
The church is in need of return to the traditions of the Apostles and Scripture not men that came after them, (The Reformationist Martin Luther by the way, is the one that said you can't have a 'church service" unless their is a sermon)
There is nothing in Scripture that states what Luther taught and that has so brain washed the church to make this our sole practice of the time we spend together.
Let's hear God speaking to His body, He has the sense and love of any good and true parent.
He allows His babies to speak as well as those of us, who may think we are the parents in the body.
This is what He designed for our times of coming together.
So, we can listen, speak and learn. Just as we did as a baby. Just as babies do to develop proper speech. Just as parents do, to assist them. They stop and listen.
They don't put their hand over their mouth, and say, you don't make any sense, or what your saying isn't correctly, grammatically formulated, so be quiet.
I looked for one scripture that admonishes 'the church" to preach a sermon in fellowship or to come together to hear one, there is not one, yet I counted TWENTY THREE Scriptures and there may be more, on what as Christians we do in fellowship with "one to another." Look them up.
If you need, I will be glad to mail you a list of scripture references.
They all are pertaining to the subject "one to another."
I have not yet found one that tell us to do as common church practice is as so many believe it is suppose to be at present. This is found especially in certain circles of churches and denominations.
There are many like myself, that found the riches of organic church and are practicing such now and are letting the children grow up, and funny thing, it's a joy to see them grow up, but even more, because you grow up with them.
Let's hear Paul speak on this when writing to the church of Corinth, we must read those "23" scriptures on "one to another" to understand this passage in light of all these other twenty three. This is what is called reading the Bible in context by the way.
Paul was not making a negative statement or a statement about what was going on at the church of Corinth, in the scripture to follow, but he was stating this is what fellowship was all about. How do we know that? How can we be sure? Easy, by the context of all the other scriptures that tell us what true assembly is- "one to another".
Thus Paul lays down some ways it can be achieved as well.
What he was criticizing at the church at Corinth was that there was a church full of babblers. The body was meeting but not for fellowship but just for a few to show off how spiritual they were. When in fact they were showing they were still babies, carnal yet, he states this in the beginning of His letter to them.
They had not yet learned "the equality of believers."
That speaks to us Pastors and Teacher, when we organize the time for fellowship that is centered around our sermon or lesson for today.
Thus Paul proposes a question as all good, dialectic speakers do. If you follow Paul, he used the common method of the day, for individuals to arrive at agreement in truth.
Dialectic is based on a dialogue between two or more people who may hold differing views, yet wish to pursue truth by seeking agreement with one another.
So here what Paul was saying in the verse in 1 Corinthians 14:26- So now that I have corrected you, you will now ask me, well if we aren't doing it right, then how do we do it, Paul?
Paul is not making a statement of not what to do, after the "What then brethren", this is a dialectic statement as a question, then he makes the statement after that one, to what the solution to their fellowship time together was to be, to avoid the problem they were already in.
Corinth had gone haywire where only one or the few monopolized the time of the body coming together, the Babblers.
Children all the same, but that is where they were stuck and because of this supernatural gifting, they were trying to make everyone else believe they were the parents, the only one's with true spiritual faculty.
Boy, did Paul turn that upside down on them.
Where was the head, the eye, the arm, the leg?
Answer he made clear earlier.
Read the verse in light now, of the twenty three other verses on "one to another."
What then, brethren?
When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for edification. {1 Cor 14:26 RSV}
See if he was saying only one thing a lesson (sermon) or one thing a revelation, or one thing,tongue, or on thing when we meet, interpretation, he would have said so, but he makes it clear by adding the last sentence, that our coming together is encompassing all these and more, for he use LET ALL THINGS...that's permissive not restrictive...be done for edification.
He is not condemning open organic fellowship, he is naturally advocating it.
Just like we naturally advocate and practice it as parents for our children, Our heavenly father advocates and wants us to practice it as His children.
"Talk a lot to your baby if you can, but don't monopolize the conversation. Remember to give your infant a chance to talk while you listen."
So, now how do we incorporate that, for our love of God's children? First off we don't fear that which is natural for children, or God's children, let them speak.
Second, we can either force a change (bad move, makes you an authoritarian more then we have already been acting as), leave where we are at, and form a new church
(I did that, but I wasn't full time, only filling in my last pastoralship), or ask God for wisdom, especially if we have people we love in our church and wouldn't want to abandon them. Offend some for the change, yes it is going to happen, but are we more worried about pleasing men or God?
Here is what I would do now, if in the position of many Godly Pastors who want to do what God would have them do. Then slowly you can wean the children from the bottle and they will get up, take a few steps and fall down, they will babble at first, but then as they hear you and others, they will begin to finally speak like adults, just like we do as children growing up. Try starting with a few pauses in your sermon pose some questions to the body. This a good start to moving the body to share in the fellowship of "one to another" and a better proven method of teaching anyway. Don't say a word, wait until someone answers, then listen to them. If God gave you something to be said that day, believe me, He will get said what He wants the body to hear, even if your sermon goes south.
The question that has to be faced is, whose church is it anyway?
Dr. J.
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Friday, November 19, 2010
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Three Legged Chicken
Larry was driving down a country lane in his pickup when suddenly a chicken darted into the road in front of him. He slammed on his brakes, but realized that the chicken was speeding off down the road at about 30 miles an hour. Intrigued, he tried to follow the bird with his truck, but he couldn't catch up to the accelerating chicken. Seeing it turn into a small farm, Larry followed it. To his astonishment, he realized that the chicken had three legs. Looking around the small farm, he noticed that ALL of the chickens had three legs.
The farmer came out of his house, and Larry said, "Three-legged chickens? That's astonishing!"
The farmer replied, "Yep. I bred 'em that way because I love drumsticks."
Larry was curious. "How does a three-legged chicken taste?"
The farmer smiled. "Dunno. Haven't been able to catch one yet."
Now, that's funny!
I laughed at this joke, then I thought, you know, how often do we as Christians become three legged chickens.
We come into our faith in Christ, then somewhere down the line, religion gets a hold of us, and that beautiful new
creation of God, that is just absolutely everything Christ intended, rather than developing and maturing in His trust alone in Christ we get bred into three legged chickens, thinking that religion will make us a littler more desirable, then what God has made of us in Christ. The world prefers us to be religious as well, like the farmer desiring more drumsticks, we let the world conform us to give them more of what they want.
Religion so spoils the work that Jesus did, we might look more desirable to the world, the church, our community, even some of our friends, as long as we keep that third leg on, of religion. The sad thing, is no one will taste the beauty of who we are in Christ.
It's so much easier to rest in Him and just live that way, ever trusting in Him, what He has accomplished that we never could nor ever will.
The sad thing, is religion breeds us into three legged chickens.
We might run faster with religion, and find it easier to get along with the world but in the end, do we really serve the purpose for which Christ made us.
We were made to be light and salt to a world lost in sin and death.
Paul said this when reproving the Galatian Christians for growing a third leg...the third leg of religion.
Galatians 3:2-3
2This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?
3Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?
Let's slow down, throw off the third leg, and let's keep trusting Jesus, and not religion. God wants to catch up with us as well, He has great things in store for us, when we leave Him to do the job.
Dr. J.
The farmer came out of his house, and Larry said, "Three-legged chickens? That's astonishing!"
The farmer replied, "Yep. I bred 'em that way because I love drumsticks."
Larry was curious. "How does a three-legged chicken taste?"
The farmer smiled. "Dunno. Haven't been able to catch one yet."
Now, that's funny!
I laughed at this joke, then I thought, you know, how often do we as Christians become three legged chickens.
We come into our faith in Christ, then somewhere down the line, religion gets a hold of us, and that beautiful new
creation of God, that is just absolutely everything Christ intended, rather than developing and maturing in His trust alone in Christ we get bred into three legged chickens, thinking that religion will make us a littler more desirable, then what God has made of us in Christ. The world prefers us to be religious as well, like the farmer desiring more drumsticks, we let the world conform us to give them more of what they want.
Religion so spoils the work that Jesus did, we might look more desirable to the world, the church, our community, even some of our friends, as long as we keep that third leg on, of religion. The sad thing, is no one will taste the beauty of who we are in Christ.
It's so much easier to rest in Him and just live that way, ever trusting in Him, what He has accomplished that we never could nor ever will.
The sad thing, is religion breeds us into three legged chickens.
We might run faster with religion, and find it easier to get along with the world but in the end, do we really serve the purpose for which Christ made us.
We were made to be light and salt to a world lost in sin and death.
Paul said this when reproving the Galatian Christians for growing a third leg...the third leg of religion.
Galatians 3:2-3
2This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spirit by the works of the Law, or by hearing with faith?
3Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?
Let's slow down, throw off the third leg, and let's keep trusting Jesus, and not religion. God wants to catch up with us as well, He has great things in store for us, when we leave Him to do the job.
Dr. J.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Rise and Shine
We accept that Jesus died for our sins, we accept the poorly defined evangelical portrayal of being born again, "easy believism" but many of us, haven't even got out of bed of old thinking, and lack understanding Christ resurrection and the present resurrection we have in this new life in Christ in the here and now.
If we do, we too often, negate the life of Christ being expressed in the world to those around us by a life that is exemplified much by this cartoon.
Our typical carnal thinking usually goes something like this:
"OK, I have risen as a new creation in Christ, but that doesn't mean I have to shine, or I won't shine until Jesus comes, All of these are but the same thing, "not at the same time".
Well let's look at one Scripture that tells us just the opposite of what we have so often falsely believed in.
We aren't like Maxine in this cartoon, scripture tells us just the opposite, that He has given us everything we need to rise and shine at the same time.
2 Peter 1:2-4
2Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord;
3seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.
4For by these He has granted to us His precious and magnificent promises, so that by them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world by lust.
So let us claim the truth of God's Word in both our words and our actions, because it's not that we need more to get out of bed, we just need to appropriate more of what God has already given us.
I'm not waiting until Jesus comes, that's a cop out. Yes, we can lively godly lives right here and now.
Brother Joe Black
Monday, November 15, 2010
How I Pray For the Restoration of America to Christianity
We have far too long in this nation, have disobeyed the life of Christ, his death, and teachings.
We have done this through one of the worst false doctrines that has seized the "church", the teaching of "christian zionism" and "Dispensationalism" by the twisting of scripture to our own destruction.
America and the world is in grave danger and because of it.
I would ask anyone visiting this page to take time to view the videos, by a Christian who is telling the truth.I have placed one of the links to his videos in this article.
I have never viewed Ted Pike's videos before today, but I have known these things and have taught these things, trying to correct those that claim to be "Christians" for the last 5 years.
I have opposed violence since I was young. Why, because Jesus opposed violence by acting in sacrificial love in the same we are to do, if we are born of His Spirit.
Please take the time to watch these videos. These will make you understand in my study of the
Word of God, and church history, and history, that these things, and mostly the love that God has shed abroad in my heart proves that Christian Zionism is Anti- Christ.
Please I pray you will watch these, check it out for yourself in personal study, I did long before I ever heard or read, or watched any videos, these are truths, that point to the one truth- Jesus Christ.
I love all people, and pray for peace to come to this world but it won't until we hear the Messiah's voice speaking to us right here right now, and hear what He says to all people.
There is no way to the Father but by Him.
Every Hebrew or Zionist or for that matter anyone on this earth that died yesterday, today or tomorrow without Christ is hopelessly dying in their sin. Christ came to defeat, sin and death.
Christ came first to the lost sheep of Israel, then to the Gentile, Israel rejected Him, all but the remnant - who received Jesus as Messiah or are receiving Him today are saved or ever will be. They will continue to live under the wrath of God, and not His grace.
Watch and learn, "church" and "christian religion".
Awake! Oh people of the Lord, and know that the Lord our God is Lord, not Zionism or a false state of Israel.
Jesus Christ is Israel now, and only those who know Him and have received Him as Messiah, the Anointed One, have received the spiritual promises of God. All the Old was pointing to the new, which is only fulfilled for Jew and Gentile alike, by absolute trust and obedience to Christ.
No man shall be saved by doctrines, church practices, membership, baptism or other ingenuity of men.
There is no other name in heaven, on the earth or under the earth whereby men may be saved.
Salvation delivers us eternally but it is not from a hell that has been created by men's lying and deceiving and making salvation only something that deals with the afterlife, salvation was given to us by Christ to deliver and set us free from sin and death, beginning here and now and then into eternity. I didn't come to Jesus to get free fire insurance. I came to Jesus because it is He that gave me life and delivered me from the sin and death (hell) I was already suffering in.
Watch these videos. Ted is a futurisist only- in eschatology, I am not, but at least His futurism has not kept Him from the truth on this matter of Zionism, and the evil that it is.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4452153918748081072#docid=7713806100545252588
I pray everyday for every Jew in the world, that they may come to know their Messiah, who Has come, and came to offer them as well as us all the promises of the Old Testament, and they weren't for physical things, but for eternal things, which are found only in Jesus Christ the Messiah.
Brother Joe
aka Dr. J.
BTW- How many of you know that the "reverend Hagee, denies Christ as Messiah.
Hear him deny Christ as Messiah for yourself at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ah1sx_93EoE
We have done this through one of the worst false doctrines that has seized the "church", the teaching of "christian zionism" and "Dispensationalism" by the twisting of scripture to our own destruction.
America and the world is in grave danger and because of it.
I would ask anyone visiting this page to take time to view the videos, by a Christian who is telling the truth.I have placed one of the links to his videos in this article.
I have never viewed Ted Pike's videos before today, but I have known these things and have taught these things, trying to correct those that claim to be "Christians" for the last 5 years.
I have opposed violence since I was young. Why, because Jesus opposed violence by acting in sacrificial love in the same we are to do, if we are born of His Spirit.
Please take the time to watch these videos. These will make you understand in my study of the
Word of God, and church history, and history, that these things, and mostly the love that God has shed abroad in my heart proves that Christian Zionism is Anti- Christ.
Please I pray you will watch these, check it out for yourself in personal study, I did long before I ever heard or read, or watched any videos, these are truths, that point to the one truth- Jesus Christ.
I love all people, and pray for peace to come to this world but it won't until we hear the Messiah's voice speaking to us right here right now, and hear what He says to all people.
There is no way to the Father but by Him.
Every Hebrew or Zionist or for that matter anyone on this earth that died yesterday, today or tomorrow without Christ is hopelessly dying in their sin. Christ came to defeat, sin and death.
Christ came first to the lost sheep of Israel, then to the Gentile, Israel rejected Him, all but the remnant - who received Jesus as Messiah or are receiving Him today are saved or ever will be. They will continue to live under the wrath of God, and not His grace.
Watch and learn, "church" and "christian religion".
Awake! Oh people of the Lord, and know that the Lord our God is Lord, not Zionism or a false state of Israel.
Jesus Christ is Israel now, and only those who know Him and have received Him as Messiah, the Anointed One, have received the spiritual promises of God. All the Old was pointing to the new, which is only fulfilled for Jew and Gentile alike, by absolute trust and obedience to Christ.
No man shall be saved by doctrines, church practices, membership, baptism or other ingenuity of men.
There is no other name in heaven, on the earth or under the earth whereby men may be saved.
Salvation delivers us eternally but it is not from a hell that has been created by men's lying and deceiving and making salvation only something that deals with the afterlife, salvation was given to us by Christ to deliver and set us free from sin and death, beginning here and now and then into eternity. I didn't come to Jesus to get free fire insurance. I came to Jesus because it is He that gave me life and delivered me from the sin and death (hell) I was already suffering in.
Watch these videos. Ted is a futurisist only- in eschatology, I am not, but at least His futurism has not kept Him from the truth on this matter of Zionism, and the evil that it is.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4452153918748081072#docid=7713806100545252588
I pray everyday for every Jew in the world, that they may come to know their Messiah, who Has come, and came to offer them as well as us all the promises of the Old Testament, and they weren't for physical things, but for eternal things, which are found only in Jesus Christ the Messiah.
Brother Joe
aka Dr. J.
BTW- How many of you know that the "reverend Hagee, denies Christ as Messiah.
Hear him deny Christ as Messiah for yourself at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ah1sx_93EoE
Monday, November 8, 2010
Clarification to the Offended
I want to make something clear, I know often in my rants, that many individuals who may run across what I write here, seem to think it is personal attack, against them.
Nothing of what I ever write is to condemn others, or to judge them, only God is judge, I like the prophets of old am compelled to speak only against their practices, beliefs or teachings that oppose the Who is God, and Who is the Son.
What we believe doesn't change that Christ came to die for all of us and that we all needed that, but it is His life - the message we must understand as well. It must be applied in every area of our lives.
Nothing of what I ever write is to condemn others, or to judge them, only God is judge, I like the prophets of old am compelled to speak only against their practices, beliefs or teachings that oppose the Who is God, and Who is the Son.
What we believe doesn't change that Christ came to die for all of us and that we all needed that, but it is His life - the message we must understand as well. It must be applied in every area of our lives.
However, history proves that people will kill to defend their beliefs, doctrines, or practices and thus the world rages now. The message cannot be applied but by His grace in our lives, but we must first approach God the Father through the Son always in prayer, not by doctrine or our "Orthodoxy or Orthopraxy."
Religion, Politics, Foreign Policy, Criminal Justice you name it, has it's roots in the sinfulness of men.
Systems are not pure, as the early Christians so better understood.
They may have used the term Devil or Satan but they had a definition outside of what later developed within the context of church. They didn't believe in the Devil, as an entity in competition with God, a second god. They were not dualist. They understood that "Adversary" was all that opposed God's love and mercy, and that individuals, groups, governments and the world are the "Satan".
They never perceived of Him as the church does or we have been taught to do. The Satan is not some weird little pointed ear, long tail, horned and red in color individual that was a "fallen angel" that is in some great cosmic game of chess with God using mankind as the playing pieces.
This teaching so widely accepted with all religions which are pagan, even our "christian paganism," are false and do more to excuse all people from personal sin, then anything else. It has done more to produce the very opposite of what God's revealed love in Jesus was to produce within His people.
All of the "adversaries" of God that I have not completely listed above are the "Satan" they are merely a reflection of the entire human condition of sin and death in this world.
Just as we are, and can be, when we fail to receive God's grace in our lives. We become and are the "Satan" - the adversaries of our Creator.
There is much more that could be said here on the dualism teachings of the church, and the gnostic origins of the church for what is taught but that's for another book perhaps. There have been some very good books written on this matter as well, by men who are thinking men, who have opened their eyes and ears to Jesus Christ, and not Jewish myths, traditions of men, and all the things Paul warned the body of Christ of, time after time. and John and Peter as well.
I love people of all races, because Jesus didn't die for the Caucasian race only as some would have us believe. He lived and died for all men regardless of race, color, creed or religion.
We all needed Him. We all still do.
Religion, Politics, Foreign Policy, Criminal Justice you name it, has it's roots in the sinfulness of men.
Systems are not pure, as the early Christians so better understood.
They may have used the term Devil or Satan but they had a definition outside of what later developed within the context of church. They didn't believe in the Devil, as an entity in competition with God, a second god. They were not dualist. They understood that "Adversary" was all that opposed God's love and mercy, and that individuals, groups, governments and the world are the "Satan".
They never perceived of Him as the church does or we have been taught to do. The Satan is not some weird little pointed ear, long tail, horned and red in color individual that was a "fallen angel" that is in some great cosmic game of chess with God using mankind as the playing pieces.
This teaching so widely accepted with all religions which are pagan, even our "christian paganism," are false and do more to excuse all people from personal sin, then anything else. It has done more to produce the very opposite of what God's revealed love in Jesus was to produce within His people.
All of the "adversaries" of God that I have not completely listed above are the "Satan" they are merely a reflection of the entire human condition of sin and death in this world.
Just as we are, and can be, when we fail to receive God's grace in our lives. We become and are the "Satan" - the adversaries of our Creator.
There is much more that could be said here on the dualism teachings of the church, and the gnostic origins of the church for what is taught but that's for another book perhaps. There have been some very good books written on this matter as well, by men who are thinking men, who have opened their eyes and ears to Jesus Christ, and not Jewish myths, traditions of men, and all the things Paul warned the body of Christ of, time after time. and John and Peter as well.
I love people of all races, because Jesus didn't die for the Caucasian race only as some would have us believe. He lived and died for all men regardless of race, color, creed or religion.
We all needed Him. We all still do.
What I stand against if you have read my writings enough is the total disregard, we, Christians, have for all people, just because of their race, color, creed or religion, and don't see ourselves in light of the living Word of God, that all men are in the same condition, and all institutions are in the same condition, all governments are in the same condition and all religion is in the same condition.
We are without redemption from our evil, ourselves, our violence, our hatred, our selfishness, without Christ being the centrality of our life. Not the Jesus that has so wrongly been portrayed to the world, but the Jesus of the Gospels.
We are without redemption from our evil, ourselves, our violence, our hatred, our selfishness, without Christ being the centrality of our life. Not the Jesus that has so wrongly been portrayed to the world, but the Jesus of the Gospels.
We have far too long focused on doctrinal matters (and most often, been wrong) and not enough on living matters.
God loves the hater as well as the hated, the evil doer as well as those who oppose evil, but without Him, Jesus Christ coming to us, changing us, by seeing the life he lived, the death he died, and what resurrection and Pentecost really mean, we are hopelessly lost in our hatred, and our being a victim of it. We are lost in our doing of evil, and our being a victim of evil.
It is the love of God, that has been shed abroad in our hearts that Christ body needs and the world at large.
Far too long traditional Christianity has defined the atonement in terms that are falsely Judicial rather than Christ the Victor terms.
God's mission to bring Justice, was in the person of Jesus Christ while He was here both in the life he lived, and the death he died.
God loves the hater as well as the hated, the evil doer as well as those who oppose evil, but without Him, Jesus Christ coming to us, changing us, by seeing the life he lived, the death he died, and what resurrection and Pentecost really mean, we are hopelessly lost in our hatred, and our being a victim of it. We are lost in our doing of evil, and our being a victim of evil.
It is the love of God, that has been shed abroad in our hearts that Christ body needs and the world at large.
Far too long traditional Christianity has defined the atonement in terms that are falsely Judicial rather than Christ the Victor terms.
God's mission to bring Justice, was in the person of Jesus Christ while He was here both in the life he lived, and the death he died.
Biblically to "bring justice" does not mean to bring punishment,
but to bring healing and reconciliation.
Justice means to make things right. All through the Prophets justice is associated with
caring for others, as something that is not in conflict with mercy, but rather an expression
of it. Biblically, justice is God's saving action at work for all that are oppressed:
"Learn to do right! Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the
fatherless, plead the case of the widow". (Isaiah 1:17)"This is what the LORD says:
"`Administer justice every morning; rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who
has been robbed" (Jeremiah 21:12)
True justice can only come though mercy
"This is what the LORD Almighty says: `Administer true justice: show mercy and
compassion to one another. (Zechariah 7:9) "Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you;
he rises to show you compassion. For the LORD is a God of justice".( Isaiah 30:18)
--From Penal Substitution versus Christus Victor Atonement-
"The Rebel God" a blog linked on this page.
I believe sincerely anything outside of the action of love, self sacrificing love, in the exemplary way that Christ lived and died, is not Christian. We can turn the Holy Bible into something more unholy so often by all the traditions of men, then hearing the Word of God and seeing the Living Word. We like to shake our fist at the Muslim and their Quoran. When we treat the Truth of the Word of God, and especially the story, the One we trust in, in disregard of the Story, we have reduced our "Holy Bible" to nothing more then that we accuse the Muslim of having - "a book of violence that propagates it."
Wrong, all religion propagates violence, even ours if we treat the Story- Jesus, as a book, defined and dissected by us, into a few choice verses, to justify our own sin. Then it becomes as unholy, as any book claimed to be God's truth, when it is in contradiction to all Jesus lived and died for. This is what the serpent did in the Garden, he was the first Theologian, a simple animal, became man's first great Theologian. The first to WRONGLY divide God's Word.
When we as men, turn to concepts of man's justice, man's hatred for others, man's pride, man's powering over others, man's solution as war to the problems of the world, we have negated Christ in His teaching, His life, and His death. How dare we call ourselves "Christian."
So what I do is stand against all that makes us less then what we are too be or claim to be in Christ, this includes, false teachings, practices, and living. I stand against those things which say, powering over others, rather than submitting to others, is the way we win.
No we win, when we see the REAL JESUS, and we turn to the love He showed, practiced and gave right down to the Cross. The reasons most Christians don't live this life, is because of false teaching, and listening to evil more than the Holy Spirit and story of God's love to us who deserved none but Christ won the victory for all of us, the victim and the victimizer.
He redeemed us not so we can say, now I can live like the world, think like the world and do like the world and go to heaven. No! He redeemed us, that we redeem others, in this life, by allowing His life to be lived in us, through us and as us. So, that in all that we do and say, it is the same love expressed through Him by the Father to us, that we by the Holy Spirit express that life to others.
His entire story, the message we miss is found in who God is. We have too long tried to define God in every whim of doctrine rather then answering the simple declaration of the Word of God.
God is love!
Thus I oppose war, and power structures, that leave men powering over others.
I believe as Jesus lived and taught, it is in powering under, that we gain real power, It is when we get down and wash each others feet, and the feet of our community, our State, Our Nation and the World, is where real power comes from, resurrection power.
It is when we lay down our lives in love to all men, that we have lived in obedience to the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of this World (this is the Satan).
So, when I attack a teaching or practice it is to redeem God's people from the sinful thinking that it brings in their lives, and in the end when acted out, it destroys them and all those around them. Jesus turned over the tables in righteous anger against those taking advantage of the poor, the widowed and the orphan, I get angry and rant... Jesus loved the table tenders, He hated their belief system that had translated the "house of prayer" into a market system.He may have flogged them, but he didn't go get a AK-47 or any kind of sword that physically kills or maims, if any killing was done, it wasn't people that He killed, He killed their "adversarial actions and beliefs about the Father". He chastised those He loved the Temple market place people. We twist that, and say, well in the New Testament Jesus did get angry, so war and hatred is justified.
Yes, He did get angry, righteously angry and He is still angry at our total disregard of our love for Him first, and then our neighbor. He is still flogging us, as a person, a nation, and world. Not to destroy us but to save us, and make His people not the Temple, His house of prayer.
No we win, when we see the REAL JESUS, and we turn to the love He showed, practiced and gave right down to the Cross. The reasons most Christians don't live this life, is because of false teaching, and listening to evil more than the Holy Spirit and story of God's love to us who deserved none but Christ won the victory for all of us, the victim and the victimizer.
He redeemed us not so we can say, now I can live like the world, think like the world and do like the world and go to heaven. No! He redeemed us, that we redeem others, in this life, by allowing His life to be lived in us, through us and as us. So, that in all that we do and say, it is the same love expressed through Him by the Father to us, that we by the Holy Spirit express that life to others.
His entire story, the message we miss is found in who God is. We have too long tried to define God in every whim of doctrine rather then answering the simple declaration of the Word of God.
God is love!
Thus I oppose war, and power structures, that leave men powering over others.
I believe as Jesus lived and taught, it is in powering under, that we gain real power, It is when we get down and wash each others feet, and the feet of our community, our State, Our Nation and the World, is where real power comes from, resurrection power.
It is when we lay down our lives in love to all men, that we have lived in obedience to the Spirit of Christ and not the spirit of this World (this is the Satan).
So, when I attack a teaching or practice it is to redeem God's people from the sinful thinking that it brings in their lives, and in the end when acted out, it destroys them and all those around them. Jesus turned over the tables in righteous anger against those taking advantage of the poor, the widowed and the orphan, I get angry and rant... Jesus loved the table tenders, He hated their belief system that had translated the "house of prayer" into a market system.He may have flogged them, but he didn't go get a AK-47 or any kind of sword that physically kills or maims, if any killing was done, it wasn't people that He killed, He killed their "adversarial actions and beliefs about the Father". He chastised those He loved the Temple market place people. We twist that, and say, well in the New Testament Jesus did get angry, so war and hatred is justified.
Yes, He did get angry, righteously angry and He is still angry at our total disregard of our love for Him first, and then our neighbor. He is still flogging us, as a person, a nation, and world. Not to destroy us but to save us, and make His people not the Temple, His house of prayer.
So, don't become personally offended, but do if necessary.
Become offended enough to re-evaluate your actions and belief system in light of no longer proof texting everything you do believe, this is the worst thing that we can do to God's Word, we have come to think to "rightly" divide the Word, is to divide it up into one or two verses, that will appease our sinful nature, make a doctrine out of it, form a group around it, and hate all those who oppose it.
God's "RIGHTLY" dividing is the opposite of our dividing, rather than division it creates unity among those who believe the story. It will always divide when we "search the scriptures thinking we might find life in them, when they speak of Him."
The Bible is not one million verses on how to keep from going to hell, it is the story of God's love to and for His creation. He doesn't want to deliver us from some future "tormenting fires". He wants to get us out of the hell all men are in right now, in the here and now. This is only accomplished by trust placed in the story of His love expressed through the first human to ever be the full expression of who He is- Jesus Christ- the Second Adam. Our trust is in Him, because of the unity of the story, not it's divisions created by men. This is the worst thing men ever did, at first was to divide it up into chapters, verses, paragraphs, sentences, words, etc. The Christian church has used that division of the story far too long, and miss the entire context from Genesis to Revelation.
God is love.
In light of everything Jesus was, did and is. He is the full expression of the Father. He is love.
Jesus didn't come to formulate a new religion but to deliver us from religion to a life of love for the Father first, and then to our neighbor.
Then we will find common ground as Believers when we trust the subject of the story and it will be "God is love."
Become offended enough to re-evaluate your actions and belief system in light of no longer proof texting everything you do believe, this is the worst thing that we can do to God's Word, we have come to think to "rightly" divide the Word, is to divide it up into one or two verses, that will appease our sinful nature, make a doctrine out of it, form a group around it, and hate all those who oppose it.
God's "RIGHTLY" dividing is the opposite of our dividing, rather than division it creates unity among those who believe the story. It will always divide when we "search the scriptures thinking we might find life in them, when they speak of Him."
The Bible is not one million verses on how to keep from going to hell, it is the story of God's love to and for His creation. He doesn't want to deliver us from some future "tormenting fires". He wants to get us out of the hell all men are in right now, in the here and now. This is only accomplished by trust placed in the story of His love expressed through the first human to ever be the full expression of who He is- Jesus Christ- the Second Adam. Our trust is in Him, because of the unity of the story, not it's divisions created by men. This is the worst thing men ever did, at first was to divide it up into chapters, verses, paragraphs, sentences, words, etc. The Christian church has used that division of the story far too long, and miss the entire context from Genesis to Revelation.
God is love.
In light of everything Jesus was, did and is. He is the full expression of the Father. He is love.
Jesus didn't come to formulate a new religion but to deliver us from religion to a life of love for the Father first, and then to our neighbor.
Then we will find common ground as Believers when we trust the subject of the story and it will be "God is love."
Doctor J.
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