We don’t love others because God first loved us, in the sense of a quid pro quo.  We don’t feel compelled to love because of how thankful we are of what He did for us.  He is love, and His Spirit lives inside us, so we are love.  We can’t not love, that is who He is transforming us to be.  It should slowly become who we are.  It shouldn’t be a difficult choice we have to make or feel compelled to make, it should be normal, or easy, like breathing air, or walking on water. 

I do believe walking on water was a simple task for Jesus or Peter, just like walking on land.  It wasn’t anymore difficult than breathing or doing anything we do daily…….when we are focused on Jesus, or as Jesus said, when we remain in Him.  When we remain in Him, much fruit is produced.  Not because we are trying to produce fruit, or struggling, like it is the 100^th pushup we are on, but rather like taking a the 10^th step of the day or the 100^th breath, it is almost unconscious.  This shouldn’t be a struggle to love or do bear any fruit of the spirit.  It only becomes a struggle when we get distracted with the worries and dangers of this world or the spiritual realm.  Like Peter, once he turned his eyes away from Jesus, he slowly started looking or hearing or acknowledging the waves and wind and then walking on water was a difficult thing.  With all his might, and I am sure he tried hard to continue to walk on water, he could not do it.  Anymore than we can love another person when we are distracted by the world and no longer remaining in Him.  That is why “apart from me, you can do nothing”.  Remaining in Him, walking on water or loving others is as simple and natural and unconscious as breathing or walking on land.  But distracted from Him, it is as difficult as walking on water or loving others, and no matter how hard you try, you will fail.  He doesn’t want your goal to be to love others or to walk on water, just as being a moral person was not the goal of Jesus, merely a byproduct.  The goal of Jesus was to honor the Father and remain in Him, and in that, much fruit was produced without even trying.

I heard a message the other day about encouraging/comforting/reassuring those who are scared/concerned by “the unpardonable sin”.  What if I committed it in my past?  What if I mess up and commit it in the future?  And they are reassured that “nothing can snatch you out of my Fathers hand” or other verses that can reassure one who is concerned.  And that is good I guess to reassure folks with those verses.  But why exactly do they need reassured?  And of what do they need reassurance of?  That they will be in heaven?  Have eternal comfort?  They know it is not of their doing that they get that, they know they don’t deserve it, but thanks to Jesus they get to partake of it.  But do we need to reassure them that they get to partake of it?  What do they want to partake of?  Is life not more than chasing personally favorable eternal outcomes?

First I believe the only unpardonable sin, is the one being willingly and unremorsefully committed.  That is to say that murderers, thieves, adulterers ect., will not be in heaven.  Heaven is a place where everyone there actually wants the will of God done.  The also want this on earth, but fail, but they do want God’s will.  When they spend time with God, and reflect on what they actually desire, it is God’s will done, they know God is the only God, the perfect, righteous, loving and merciful Creator who’s will is perfect and what they desire in that moment.  But on earth in the bodies of flesh, we get distracted and lose sight of that ultimate desire and end up sinning.  To which we again have time to reflect, confess, repent and try again.  Only God knows our hearts and what we truly want.  But if you want credit for your efforts, if you think you can do a better job than God, heaven would be hell.  That is why no active sinners will be in heaven, because they don’t want heaven, they don’t want God.  The holy spirit inspires or reveals the truth of God to us.   Jesus is the Truth, He says it Himself.  And when you reject that Truth, the Spirit revealing that to you, you are rejecting God.  Of course that is unforgivable.  But not that God refuses to forgive you, but that you won’t allow Him to because of your pride.

But lets say there is an unforgivable sin.  The very notion of this possibility is what I don’t like about traditional doctrinal teaching.  It almost makes a game out of life.  How you have to follow these rules and formulas to win it (or let someone else win it for you).  But lets say there was a sin that God refused to forgive no matter how much you asked/begged.  How would you live?  How would your life change? 

Maybe earlier in my life I did commit this unforgivable sin, and in those traditional doctrinal eyes, I am now going to hell when I die.  So what do I do now?  Live all the desires of my flesh while I have life here? May it never be!  If that was your answer, I would greatly question your salvation.  You don’t just believe in Jesus to be saved from hell, He isn’t a fire blanket.  Or believe in the Bible because it is right and try to follow the rules of the Bible.  It is a transformation, you now know why you were created, and want to live life that way.  Understanding you were created to honor God and have Him help you do that.  That is what salvation is to me, a Truth.  Once you know something, you can’t unknow it.  Once you learn 1+1=2, you can’t unknow it.

 I don’t live a ‘good/moral life’ because God sent His Son to save me, or because heaven might be my reward.  I live my life to honor God because I now know that is what I was created to do.  It is a Truth/revelation I can’t unknow.  It is a firm foundation that cannot be shaken.  No one can scare me or change the way I fundamentally live.  This is a Truth the Father has given to me, and no one can take it from His hand.  This salvation isn’t some mystical force God gave me through belief in His Son’s atonement and because a scripture says no one can take it from His hand, it’s a mantra I reassure myself with because I believe the Bible is the Word of God (or I keep telling myself that because if I lose faith in what I say I believe I fall apart).  It is a truth, a truth that can’t be taken away from me. 

If I am doomed to hell, I still praise God for who He is.  This isn’t quid pro quo.  I don’t praise God (just) because He saved me or sent His Son to save me.  I can’t not praise Him, just like the Sun can’t not burn gasses, it is what it does, what it was created for.  I am not living a good/moral life to be an example (though in living a life connected to God in obedience, it is a great example that can lead others to know Him), I don’t live my life in thanks (though I am thankful for the many blessings of God).  I live my life in truth, the truth that Jesus revealed to us, the Truth that Jesus is/was that all things were created for His glory.  God created all things and is sovereign over all things and He deserves all the credit and glory.  I do my best with what He has given me, give thanks for His blessings, thanks for the ‘hard times’ (that point me to Him) and am fully aware that I am but dust.  Just dust, yet He still loves me as an individual and wants to use me for His glory. 

If I end up at the judgement seat and God says to me “Well, sorry, but you committed the unforgivable sin, so you go to hell”.  Praise to God, all praise always belongs to God, as His goodness isn’t circumstantial, it has nothing to do with my well being, it is a truth!   I do believe I would be annihilated and rightly so, for we should all be annihilated and have the blessing of life what God gave us taken away as we perverted it.  But He is too merciful and loving, and forgives us and wants to help us honor and obey him. 

God was not forced to sacrifice His Son to save us.  He wanted (His will to crush Him) to sacrifice His Son to save us, because it ties all the OT together and is the greatest demonstration of love, which is who God is.  Jesus is God revealed to man, God is love, He wanted to show His love to help us attempt to fathom it better and did so by Himself dying for us!

This is what I long for and why I write all the ramblings of this blog.  One to glorify God, and in hopes that one day someone will read these and see God and want to know and glorify Him!  Christianity is so simple and logical and amazing, if only you can humble yourself.  You will experience a joy you never had before!  You might end up being a more ‘moral’ or ‘good’ person just as Jesus was a very moral and good person, but this is a byproduct.  Jesus never tried to be moral, He simple wanted to honor the Father, and the Spirit lived in Him and helped Him do moral things which honored the Father.  A tree can’t try to grow fruit, it just accepts the water and nutrients, the fruit is a byproduct.

What if you lived in a world where everything was ‘fake’ (like the Truman show), it is all just props and ‘actors’ made up by God to see how you would live. It wouldn’t matter if we thought that person went to hell, because that person really doesn’t exist, or if we thought that person dies, because they really don’t exist. Would you live life any differently?

I would hope not. If you would, this would say to you, that you haven’t let go of all control or trust the sovereignty of God. Because you don’t have control over these things.

Truman thought he had built a relationship with his wife and his best friend, would he be sad if that person died? Of course he would. But that would be from a personal relation manner. If some person across the world died, it would too be sad, but certainly not in the same personal manner. If you had influence or power bestowed upon you by God, it would absolutely be your duty to try to change things you could change and even more so to pray for those things you wanted changed. But if these people didn’t really exist would you still do the same actions? Why sacrifice and give your last bite of food to the starving man next to you, if he doesn’t even exist. You know you exist and you need food to live. Or do you? Don’t we live on the words that come from the mouth of God and not bread? Should we not give that man bread because we acknowledge the sovereign God who supplied us with that bread and could give us more if He deemed necessary, give that man bread so God may be glorified in our actions with the blessing He gave us? That whole “you never know when you may be entertaining an angel”.

I think we should live as if all people are props or angels being entertained. We don’t live or act because of the outcome or physical result we can control, but rather for the moment, because this act glorifies God, and that is why we exist. We don’t exist to manipulate outcomes, that is a burden we put on ourselves, this trying to become God burden that is so heavy, and always leaves us exhausted and often times turn away from Him to achieve that result we think is needed.

I am not saying don’t build relationships with others, we absolutely should. Loving others is the second greatest commandment. But don’t forget who is in ultimate control, and that you aren’t needed, treat that person as if they are a prop and don’t exist and so of course your actions have no bearing on how they will turn out eternally….because they don’t. Because we are not supposed to be in control of their destiny. Imagine if Truman wanted to save his friends life, but the writers already wrote him out. He would die no matter what, and once ‘off the set’ that guy would live completely independant of ever knowing Truman. If Truman thought he had any influence over that guys destination or life, he was foolish. As foolish as we are when we change the way we live to attempt to control the lives of others in this world, we have no control. But we don’t live for control, but for the moment. I know I keep repeating myself, but it is hard to explain. I want to make it clear that I don’t think we should be selfish or not caring of others, but it is very important as to why we care for others. We care for them, to glorify God, who will be glorified when He helps us do these things and that glory isn’t taken or changed in any way based of what happens after our actions. We share the light of God with others so He may be glorified and that person can repent and now be another who glorifies God, not because we want to prevent that person from eternal suffering, because we have no control over those things. Whatever the “Writer” writes for them will happen.

Generally I would not ‘preach the gospel’ to an agnostic as the ‘first step’.  First, relationship building is important, but even when a relationship is established, it doesn’t do a whole lot of good to preach something that they have to believe in our Bible to follow.  We tell them according to our Bible, our beliefs, they are sinners, they failed their Creator, but He loves them so much that He sent His Son to die on their behalf.   But if they don’t believe, the penalty for disbelief Is eternal pain.   They must suffer for their past (is basically what we tell them).  What if they don’t believe in Bible, we can’t exactly preach the Bible to them.  We can’t tell them our Bible says they are sinner, so they now are.  We can get to that point, but I would challenge you to start from a different narrative, one anyone can relate to, agnostic, atheist, Buddhist.  We have all done bad things in our lives, we all are searching for belonging and acceptance (God created us that way). 

God loves you.  God tells you the exact opposite of above, there is no need to suffer because of your past, you are accepted and loved for who you are, because of who He is.  God doesn’t look at you because of your past achievements or failures, there is no negative bias towards because of your failures, because of hurting or rejecting Him.  Nor is He going to give you an ‘atta boy’ for the ‘good things’ you have done in the past.  He has a plan for you, He has great potential for you, He wants to use you starting now, and forever on.  He wants to use the unique gifts and blessings He gave you, and give you more, so you can magnify Him, and give glory to Him.  That is the simple summary of the Bible, and what my doctrine is based on.

God doesn’t want perfection, He wants us to want perfection.  If a man was perfect and he gave God glory for that perfection, that would be ok, that is basically what Jesus did.  But if a man were to achieve perfection, and boasted about it, what good is this?  Filthy rags.  In order to have any purpose or eternal effect, all things point to the Creator of all.  And if it doesn’t point to the Creator, it is useless, like a filthy rag, a filthy rag cannot be cleaned it is lacking the ability to achieve the purpose it was created for. 

This is the problem with the WWJD mantra or claiming that we want to emulate or be like Jesus or live like Jesus lived.   God doesn’t want us to achieve the status of perfection for perfections sake.  We didn’t offend God by damaging a perfect status.  We offended God by refusing His help to achieve perfection, or claiming we could achieve it of our own strength, or taking credit for anything.  If you want to follow the WWJD or be a disciple of Jesus, then you should absolutely want perfection, but that is only to glorify God, so that God gets glory when it would be achieved, not just to achieve perfection.

I hear in songs of how “it should be my hands where Jesus’ were” or “Jesus did something that I could never do, and we praise Him for that”.  My problem with the first statement is that is makes it seem as if all we have to do is to be crucified and all would be made well.  I know most don’t believe that, but using verses like “The wages of sin is death” and saying that is why Jesus had to die, paints that picture.  And the second statement, makes it seem like all we are trying to do is achieve something, like that is our goal in life, but we failed, good thing someone else did it for us.  What if you could have achieve perfection, what if you never sinned?  Are you then accepted by God?  Do you impress Him?  Did you ‘catch Him on His heels’?  “AHA God, now you have to let me in, I achieved perfection and that is all you wanted of humans?”  You want to shove it in His face? Call Him out on it?  Again, I am sure that is not what people mean by such statements, but that is how that picture is painted.  I have been around enough atheist to see how they rightly and logically see some of the ‘gospel’ arguments/apologetics, and why so many are turned off by well meaning phrases.

But we all know perfection of man is not only not possible, but it is also not the intent.  Again, if God wanted a man to be perfect, He would help Him to achieve that status, like He did Jesus, or possibly Job in his early life of Noah or many of the others in the Bible who are quoted to have been ‘righteous’.  But I don’t think for one second that any of those would have bragged about their righteous status, they knew is was only from God.  God wants us to grow, and to want to achieve perfection.  That is what remaining in Him means.  It means trying your best to follow God’s commands.  But not because He wants those commands followed, but because He wants us to live the most abundant life, and do to that, we must try our best to attain perfection with the only end goal is to praise Him for helping us to achieve that.  Obviously one must know His commands to follow them, but one must also want to follow them, want the will of the Father.  And as that is practiced more and more and focused on, it changes us Rom 5:3-5, that remaining in Him, following His commands, allowing His truths to transform us, slowly changes who we are, and then we are no longer giving to the poor to honor Him, but He is who we are.  We give to the poor because we are love, we become the characteristics of God, achieve that perfection, and then we must always point to Him and thanks Him for transforming us into Him.  If anyone was to claim it was their hard work, their hours of Bible reading, the countless hours of work helping others that transformed them, they lie and all of that was for not.  Their transformation came from God, from them remaining in God, and God transforming them, for His glory, which also mutually beneficial is our lives are abundantly lived, because that is what we were created to do.

Anyone who can look at their lives, truly reflect on it, wonder what their purpose is, see why their were created and who their Creator was/is, if they truly seek Him, I believe they will find Him.  They will find a God who loves them, who wants nothing but the best for them, and does not care 1 iota of a bit of anything they did in their past.

1 Cor 6:9 Unrighteous, thieves ect. Will not inherit the kingdom of God.  Why?  People currently practicing evil are not what God wants.  God wants us to repent.  The Ninevites were instructed that God would destroy them if they did not repent.  They repented, and God did not destroy.  God did not require a sacrifice to stave off His wrath nor did He need to spend His wrath on a substitution.  He has no wrath on the repentant.  The only wrath God has is on those who will not repent, the current sinners.  And His wrath is not an angry God or even a loving God, it is not a God bound by some unwritten rule that God must be angry with sin and sin has a penalty that has to be followed, like God’s hands are tied and though He doesn’t want to carry out a penalty, He has to.

If you go to heaven, and you see Hitler their or Pharaoh or and ‘bad guy’ from the past, would you really accuse God of being unholy?  Demand they must suffer for eternity for the past?  I don’t know if those mentioned above any of all would be in heaven, but would that upset you?  Were you upset when the adulterer didn’t’ get stoned?  The law says adulterer’s must be stoned right?  Isn’t God “bound” by some made up law above Him that sin must be punished?  Jesus didn’t know about this ‘law’.  Was Jesus unholy for not upholding this law?

In order to have a baby a man needs to lie with a woman right?  Luke 1:37 say “For nothing will be impossible with God”.  But scriptures say a Prov 11:21 says the wicked will not go unpunished right?  Isn’t that saying sin must be punished?  Surely a just God HAS to punish sin right, or He is not just?  Heb 9:27 says “It is appointed unto men to die, but after this is the judgement”.  So the ‘rule’ is that one can only be saved during their life on this earth, but once they die, they are screwed, nothing can save them.  But remember, a woman can also not have a baby unless a man lie with them right?  Did we forget that all things are possible with God? 

Now it might be possible that in Hades (which is where every unbeliever is right now) might be void of God (though we don’t’ really know that for sure).  And if a place was void of God, then no man could repent, as it is God that leads us all to repentance, if in a place void of God no repentance could occur.  If this was the case, I would believe that on the final judgment day that anyone before God as He judges them who attempted to either say “screw you”, or to the one who attempted to justify themselves in front of God, would of course be cast into Gena/hell.  And in hell the fire burns eternally, but I believe the person perishes, is consumed by fire and ceases to exist.  This is an eternal punishment, no chance of coming back.  You were given the gift of life to praise God and use His blessings for His glory and you failed to do so, so you lose that blessing and your life is done for eternity.  This is a great tragedy.  Someone who could have praised God and magnified His glory even more as He deserves it all, will no longer be able to do that.

But I think there is a possibility of people in Hades and even before the judgment seat, will come to a realization of who God is, and they can repent and be saved.  I do believe God will instantly and like everyone human accept them into His loving arms.  A penalty does not need to occur, God is not unjust for not punishing them.

I could be wrong, and there is plenty of scripture that says that in order to be saved, a human in the flesh must repent and call on Jesus to save them.  But I also remember plenty of scripture that spoke of the Israelites as a ‘child of God’ and they were to be redeemed by God one day by the Messiah.  It wasn’t until Jesus came and revealed the meaning ‘behind’ the scripture that all mankind was to be redeemed by God.  Or when Peter had a vision saying “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean”.  And all of a sudden one could see that it wasn’t just the Israelites that were allowed to be redeemed, but the gentiles too.  What if it is also ‘hidden’ that the dead can be redeemed, not just the living?

God punished and killed many people in the OT, He wiped them from this earth.  Why?  It is a bit of speculation, but I think it could have been merciful of Him to take them, before the did anything worse that what they were already doing.  These were hard, prideful people, maybe the fire of Hades would be enough to help soften and break them, bring them to repentance as God did for Nebuchadnezzar when He made him as an animal.  This man of pride was humbled, and repented and gave praise to God.  Would this man have been humbled if God never brought him from his throne?  Would those from Sodom and Gomorrah have done worse things had they been allowed to live?  I am sure they probably would have wrecked God’s world even more.  I think God wiped many from this earth so that they would stop wrecking His creation and to stop them from becoming worse. 

So did God change in the NT?  No more wiping people from the earth?  That was because Jesus came.  Now God was instead transforming people from the inside, He no longer needed to wipe the wicked to prevent wickedness from spreading, rather to use that wicked and transform them to a holy person, displaying His power and love for all to see so they might be transformed by the same.

So if we can just repent and be saved, then why Jesus?  First of all, that is what God wanted and chose to do.  God wanted to send His perfect Son to die for us to show us the extent that He loved us, that He would withhold nothing from us.  And if one wants God’s will and repents, and it is God’s will they confess to Jesus and allow His death to atone for their sins, that is clearly what one who wants God’s will will believe and do.  Isiah was given a hot coal and his sins were forgiven.  God is the only one offended when we sin and only He can forgive and it has the authority to set any conditions as to how to achieve forgiveness He wants.  If He wanted to snap His finger or speak some words (as Jesus does do to forgive sins of the adulterer) He could.  But God chose Jesus’ atoning death on the cross to achieve that, and that is how He wrote the entire OT and the customs of the Israelites to foreshadow what Jesus would ultimately do for us.  Second, we didn’t think it was that simple.  God’s people thought to be holy, one had to follow many rules abstaining from offending God and it was ones own strength, character and desire that holiness came from.  Jesus greatly had to fix that and reveal the truth to that.  That holiness is obtained from remaining in God, it comes from God and He allows us to display it for others to praise Him.  God used the Spirit in Jesus to reveal the hidden truth to us and then gave us that Spirit to reveal more things to us and help us.  But just as the sacrifices of the Israelites became an abomination to God, the act of calling on Jesus’ name is just as much of an abomination to God if one does not repent and want the will of God in their lives.

This is to speak on those who feel motivated to preach to others because of what they call love. That they don’t want them to spend eternity suffering in hell so they preach to them from the perspective of a fire blanket. I love others, but I also love God, and I want them to glorify God here while on earth and for eternity, I want to pull them out of the hell they are in now not knowing God. I really don’t see the benefit of a death bed conversion, like it is a last min save, or getting someone to say a few words hoping they believe it in hopes to prevent them from going to eternal hell, as if that is some change that happens when they die. How are they not in eternal hell now? The wages of sin is spiritual death, they have been dead for a long time, in hell for a long time, this isn’t just something that is going to happen when they physically die. Like you think you can trick one past God last min. God know when they are going to die, and there is probably a reason they are going to die, they need Him. If He can’t get their attention on earth, well maybe it would be better for some suffering in Hades to soften them and bring them to the light. Isn’t this what happens to gold? Isn’t it thrown into intense fire to burn off the impurities, so that one can have pure gold? Could not the fire of Hades soften a man and get him to finally give up and turn to God?

The Bible does say that every knee will bow and tongue confess that Jesus Christ is LORD. It doesn’t say this will come from only those in heaven. But if one was to call on the name of the LORD, they shall be saved right? If every tongue confesses He is LORD, they every tongue shall be saved. This is also why I believe in annihilation. If you do not exist, if you have been consumed, you no longer have the ability to confess or not. And those that haven’t don’t exist, and those that still exist will confess. Either that, or this is speaking of those in Hades who have been softened and will all confess, and be saved. There is no word for penalty in the Hebrew or Greek language used in the Bible. There is no such word that suffering has to happen because of acts committed. Whenever God commands those to be killed or kills someone it wasn’t because of the acts they committed in the past, it is because He knows their hearts and knows they want to still commit those same acts. But if there was such a rule or a word, we must remember nothing is impossible with God. In fact that very statement is made right after the parable of Lazarus and the rich man. They claim how a chasm is fixed and for man it is impossible to cross. Matt 19:26 Jesus says “With man, this is impossible, but with God all things are possible”. This is true even on earth though with the living. By mans efforts alone, we could not achieve salvation or admittance to the kingdom of heaven, or be seen as righteous to God. But with God, all things are possible, and God made this possible for man, by sending Jesus to save us, to grant us admittance, to make us righteous when we repent. I don’t see why this impossibility is seen as so ‘easy’ to overcome for God, but the possibility for someone to be saved from Hades is too impossible for God? So “impossible” that we even started to make up doctrine about how God must be holy, and can’t allow anyone to repent in Hades, or it would contradict His own holiness. This is almost like the poor Jews who were burdened with all the extra rules the Pharisees laid upon them. We shouldn’t be burdened by the souls of others, we cast our burdens on Him, for He cares for us. We trust His sovereignty. We simply do our best to show His love and light to others to glorify God and let Him take care of the souls.

I don’t have all the answers, and if you are looking to beat a technicality or to use my words above to not worry about saving anyone because they might have other chances. I would greatly question your salvation. Stop trying to follow rules and formulas. Do your best, love God and love others. Jesus even ‘sat around’ for 30 years. I am sure He followed God and remained in Him for that time and He grew in His body and the Spirit. But it wasn’t until God called Him to ministry that He began to minister. I am not speaking of a general command like the great commission, but God directly called Jesus around 30, Jesus even said that before then, it wasn’t His time. I don’t know how old Saul was when he became Paul. Just imagine what good Paul could have done if he started 30 years earlier, or Jesus right? What if He had began His mission at age 20, when considered an adult fit for war? God has plans for you, and in His perfect timing will let you know what they are if He was to call you. But for now, we wait, trust and remain in Him. Don’t think you are supposed to do the things now that you might end up doing at age 60 and look back and wish you could do those things now. Or wish if you were where you are now 10 years ago, you could have done such great things. God will get those things done (those things being His will) regardless of you, or your age, or your spiritual maturity. Stop trying to achieve what God has planned for you in chapter 40 in when your life’s story is only in chapter 28. Cast your burdens of what you think should/could be achieved on Him, trust in His sovereignty, and just remain in Him, ask Him to help you follow His commands, give Him the glory for where you are now, trust Him as to where you will be later.

The sum of my beliefs. Do God’s will, or wanting to do God’s will.  That is my core belief.  I believe that God is just, righteous, merciful, and loving. 

My religion isn’t ‘all inclusive’ in that anyone can believe what they want or all paths lead to God.  But it isn’t formulaic either, where you must believe this, speak this and do this and you are saved.  I would wager if you are attempting to follow a formula, you might not be saved.  When you follow a formula or a recipe, it is because you are wanting an end result.  If I can do this and this, I get this.

Christians know to well, and harp far too much (in my opinion) on how works cannot save us (to which I emphatically agree).  However my issue is when they instead say, Jesus is what saves us, you must believe in the death and resurrection of Jesus, ask Him to forgive of your sins (and hopefully some add, and ask Jesus to be your King).  I think the last is really the only ‘requirement’ (for lack of better term) but unfortunately too many use it as empty words spoken, or lack the knowledge/wisdom of what those words actually mean.  And some might ( I would wager many that I do know and can clearly see the Spirit of God in them, possibly more than myself) be ‘saved.  But I believe what saves them is different then what they proclaim is what saves them.

I don’t want to go off on too many tangents, but the word “saved” is such an ambiguous term and almost cliché.  Saved from what?  I again, believe many Christian know the true answer, but unfortunately that is not what many of them will speak.  It would take many questions and prodding to reveal that they doctrine they claim to cling to, isn’t what they believe.

Some say we are saved from hell, which they don’t believe, because that would belittle God to just being a fire blanket.  Merely preventing us from eternal harm.

Some say we are saved from the wrath of God.  That isn’t true, we are enemies of Him (we refuse to acknowledge His rightful status as ultimate dependence on accomplishing anything and all credit for accomplishments), He is not our enemy, and there is not a SINGLE verse in the Bible that shows God has any malice towards anyone ever!

They some argue the “wrath of God is righteous” or “God has to punish sin”.  Which is probably one of things I probably disagree with the most.  God is not bound by rules, His hand is not forced to do anything.  Or “holiness demands sin be punished”.  What?

It appears to me that the OT is catering to the flesh.  That is what man wanted and God was showing us that no matter what you do, you cannot win in the flesh.  

We are mixing the flesh and the spirit like old wine in a new wineskin, it doesn’t work.  Our flesh believed that power was Jesus taking Jerusalem back in force, power was having ultimate influence through direct force of man.  Jesus showed us that great power is love, and love comes from God, love is the most powerful force as God is the most powerful force, and humility and servitude is power.  Because humility and servitude shows love, which shows God, which is true power.

Another word of the flesh is “life”.  How it is a blessing of God, but we can do with it what we want, but be careful, you can get punished if you do the wrong thing.   Like the wages of sin is death, like God punishes us with death because of a sin.  If you are not living to glorify God with full dependence on God for achieving that, that you are living.  That is to say that if you reject God’s help, don’t think you need it, or take any credit for anything, or if you do something God told you not to do, you are no longer glorifying Him.  If you aren’t glorify Him, you are dead.  That is the wages of sin.  It is a truth.  Life itself IS glorifying God, and if one is not to glorify Him, one is not living, if one is not living, one is dead.  This is like all righteous deeds are like filthy rags.  A filthy rag is pointless, it is purposeless, it isn’t a rag, a rag is something that can be cleaned with.  If you can’t clean with it, it is not a rag.  If you cannot glorify God, then you are not a life, a life is something to glorify God with, it is a blessing from God to be able to glorify Him.  This is why all deeds (apart from doing Gods glory) are filthy, they are pointless.  Giving to the needy, helping the poor, helping the widow, upholding justice….if you don’t give God the glory for them, they are pointless.  We exist, everything happens for His glory, and if it doesn’t, it has no purpose for happening.  Though God can and does use bad people for His glory.  If a selfish man gives for man’s glory, but the one who receives knows that the gift they received was from God (whether the bad man wants to admit it or not, it is the truth), then God received glory from it.  But it wasn’t the deed that was good, but God that was good.  Just as when a good person does a good deed, and gives God glory for it, they give God glory because it wasn’t the deed that was good, nor did the good deed come from them, rather from God.

Another word of the flesh is “justice”.  In the OT, God tells man to seek and to uphold justice.  David writes about it frequently in the Psalms “Break the teeth of the wicked”, “Declare them guilty”, “Banish them for their many sins” ect.  I get it, David was a man after God’s own heart with his heart of flesh, that is what you got.  That is kind of like when Jesus says, there is no man on earth greater than John the Baptist, BUT, the least in the kingdom is greater than he.  Basically saying, the flesh is never good enough, if you are in the Spirit, you are always ahead of the flesh.  So we can’t use OT quotes and claim that God wants us (as members of His heavenly/Spiritual kingdom, to abide by that. 

Example of is when the Jews were instructed by the law of God, the very words/commands of God, to stone an adulterer.  This OT command has the same bearing as “man seeking justice for the aflicted”.  And Jesus reveals to us the Spirit, the truth, and shows mercy.  Also, there are times when a man is wronged, and they could seek justice, but instead chose to forgive, to show mercy.  Surely man is not more merciful than God, the author of mercy?  Who is to say that mercy isn’t Justice, mercy isn’t the right thing to do?  Maybe Jesus followed all laws and imparted justice that day He said “Go, and sin no more”.

The flesh has this sick twisted view on power, justice, and punishment.  The Spiritual definition of punishment is not a requirement for one to suffer (as it appears the flesh is).  Rather the intent is to correct or to fix the wrong doing.  Once one stops the doing of wrong, truly stops, not just pauses or hides the wrongdoing so as to avoid punishment.  But truly repents, is able to see the err of their ways, is in deep mourning over having done those things and never wants to do those things again.  THIS is repentance, and really only God knows when true repentance occurs, though we have a few hints that could help is probably guess the truth or not, only God really knows.

 Its like someone on a diet, they fail often, the can’t resist the smell, and they fail.   BUT, they really hate it, they want to diet with all their might, and they might never reach the goal they hoped for, but you do see improvements.  Just as a college graduate cannot or should not be little a 6 year old for not understanding algebra.  That 5 year old knows his numbers now!  That is great, they used to not even know them.  Do you think God would like to see you look down on a 5 year old of his because you are a college graduate now?  Who gave you the skills, resources, and experiences to learn what you learned?  Or many you don’t even know anything about numbers, but you know enough about another field to know that a 5year old is not a master mathematician, so you belittle them for not being where they might one day be.

Back to punishement.  People quote Prov 11:21 and say, the wicked will not go unpunished.  Yet what does God Himself not do to the Ninevites?  Jonah relays the message of God to them, to REPENT, or I will punish.  They do repent and God spares them.  Is God violating His “holy law”?  I thought he HAD to punish them though?  Once the bad/wrong/incorrect thing is no longer being done, there is no need to punish or fix or correct as there is nothing to correct of.  It is absolutely true that (active) sin must be punished, no that person sinning must not suffer for their past deeds, rather that active sinning needs to be stopped.  Many times in the OT, God seems to wipe that person from the earth.  That is one way to stop those deeds from occurring.  The heart that did those deeds wasn’t fixed, but the deeds can no longer be done on earth.  Then it seems in the NT, that Gods plan is to reconcile, to transform the heart, and THAT is how He stops those bad deeds from occurring.  We don’t know what happened to the Ninivites later on.  Did they repent because they were in avoidance of punishment?  And when it seemed the punishment when away, they went back to sin?  Or did they truly want the will of God done?

Speaking of punishment, that reminds me of another word of the flesh, forgiveness.  The flesh finds it so difficult to forgive?  Why?  Because the great deceiver has a hold on them, he has them convinced to hold on to that hate, to grudge, to have a negative bias towards someone based on their past.  The Spirit doesn’t even have forgiveness in that it is a difficult thing to do, it is truth.  God holds no negative bias towards anyone, His future decisions are not based on the actions of our past.  In the flesh we call this forgiving, but to the Spirit, this is life, it is love, it is God!  Some are so amazed at how God could forgive, only because they are looking through the eyes of flesh were forgiveness is somehow a challenge or a difficult thing for God to overcome, it isn’t.  God doesn’t need to dig deep, to try hard to forgive, it is automatic.  BUT, forgiveness is a two-way street.  If the one side cannot or will not repent, then the forgiveness can be offered, but it won’t be accepted.  Just like I can give you a gift, but if you don’t take it, it is not received.  God not only ‘just’ forgives us from His side, but even THAT isn’t enough, He wants us so bad to receive that forgiveness, to repent and live, that He orchestrates our entire human history around the cross showing His love and desire for us to repent so that we can accept His forgiveness!

  Somehow, Christians treat forgiveness from God, as if it requires a formula.  This is probably from the OT, where God did basically put a formula in place, called a covenant (but rememeber, old win should not be put in new wineskins).  The covenant basically said, don’t sin and He will bless you, but if you sin, His blessing will be removed, He will even punish you.  Again, why punish?  To make them suffer for their actions of the past?  By no means!  This is only a belief/idea/characteristic of the flesh. Rather to fix what was being done, that is why a punishment is necessary that is why a good Father punishes those He loves (which is all of humanity).  God has always been the one that forgives and He forgives instantly and effortlessly, but for a small amount of time and for a specific small group, to a covenant that the Israelites agreed upon (they could have said no) God decided to forgive them through this ‘formula’ of animal sacrifice.  But it was NEVER the blood of the animal that was magical or special, it never provided forgiveness, GOD provided forgiveness through the MEANS of a sacrifice!  This is who Jesus was, God’s perfect and final means of forgiveness through the loving sacrifice of His only Son.  But it is God that is forgiving us, not some ‘magical blood’!  God is the one that provides food for us and shelter, though He decided to use the means of money/currency as a way to directly provide for us.  Should we worship the money, as the money is providing for us? Of course not!  God provides for us.  Should we worship the animals that died for our forgiveness? Should we worship Jesus for His blood?  I guess it gets a little tricky on that last one, I am not saying not to worship Jesus by any means.  In heaven the angels sing worthy is the lamb that was slain.  But we should not worship the act of it, rather the provider behind it.  Glorify God for the amazing means He went through to maneuver all of time and history to come to the culmination on the cross, that demonstrates for all to see of the unmeasurable lengths that God will go to, to redeem His people, to demonstrate His love!

I would understand if a non-Christian heard the Gospel and was amazed by forgiveness of God, but of a Christian to be amazed by it baffles me.  Only the flesh would think it that forgiveness is a difficult task or a burden.  This is how/why Jesus frees us from our burdens.  When we live in the Spirit and the Spirit lives in us, forgiveness is not something we need help from God to give, it becomes as normal as taking a breath, it is automatic.  God is sovereign, why would allowing a negative bias towards someone based on their past actions benefit us, how would it glorify God?  We exist to glorify Him, ask the Spirit to help you let it go, and not through some overcoming/possessive strength, rather through truth, real strength, through God, Jesus, Truth, that forgiveness is automatic!

I was reading Exodus 22 the other day and I was a bit lost on some of it (as I was looking at it through the Spirit and not the flesh).  Why is God demanding if a man steals an ox, repay 5 oxen for and ox?  I think like much of OT, the heart of God is difficult (possibly impossible) to understand fully without the Spirit.  But I think God is getting at restoration.  Sure when the man realizes the err of his ways, he repents, no longer to steal, but is repentance enough?  That man is also commanded to restore.  Not just 1 for 1, but a man of true repentance will gladly give 4 time, or whatever it takes to restore, like Zacchaeus giving back 4 fold of what he stole.  The heart of a truly repentant man wants to go above and beyond to restore. 

But some things can’t be restored.  What if you kill a man?  Can you bring him back?  You can repent, but nothing you can do can bring him back.  But a truly repentant and mournful man will offer to serve that man with their life.  Giving the life for another, the greatest act of love.  At first when I read that, I would think that dying for a man is what that meant (and it slightly does).  But I think more so that it means living for that man, devoting all actions of your life to benefit or help that man, and if it comes to giving your life, you will gladly do as you have already devoted your life and waking moments for that person, dying for them is not an isolated act, rather a continuance of what you have already been doing.  Yes Jesus did die for us, but He also lived for us, in showing us how to live (true life in His kingdom), what our purpose is, and was willing to and continued this process on the cross.  The cross is not an isolated event, Jesus was not merely born to die, or else he would have as a baby or a kid.  But more than just live for us, secondary to that was He lived for God.  He gave/devoted His life to the will of the Father, which was in agreeance of His love for us, because They have the same will.

The wages of sin is death.  That ambiguous verse drives me crazy how people use that to mean spiritual death, or death in hell and at the same time a physical death interchangeably.  Before “the fall” we were supposed to live forever or did somehow.  But there was a fruit that gave us eternal life.  Why does a person who can live forever need to have eternal life? Like that we sinned, that wage is death spiritually, but it also means that we lost our eternal life and that we will physically die someday.  But now it is spiritual again, because now when we die physically, or spirit goes to hell eternally (we have eternal life again somehow?) and that wage of sin was death, so it sounds like all we have to do is die physically and that wage is paid?   Or no, that is a spiritual death, so that spirit must die.  But would dying spiritually make that debt right?  I don’t want to digress too far, but the logical inconstancies of many Christians confuse and turn off the outside atheist looking in.  It becomes this game of formulas and who can interpret what right and it because way more difficult and not helpful that what it could or should be.

So back to restoration.  I believe that we were always meant to be physically mortal and die, and life is the Spirit.  When God breathed the breath of life in Adam, he was given a living spirit.  The living spirit can only live when it is doing the will of God, for it you attempt to do anything apart from that will, or take credit for anything He helped you do, your spirit dies, it is rejecting God, it is rejecting life, the wages of sin is spiritual death.  So lets say we repent from that sin, truly.  Even though God was the one wronged on this deal, He still wants restoration, He wants our dead Spirits to be brought back to life/restored.  And with the same utmost fervencies that a truly repentant man has, the same unwavering focus and mission to do whatever it takes to restore, kind of mind set, to give back five or much greater than what was taken, God sends Himself, best part of Himself, in the form of His Son.  He reveals the truth to man, the heart of all the laws, He lives the heart of all the laws, shows us the actual spiritual meaning of power, justice, mercy, and gives/devotes His life to us to God, for us, to glorify God.  He has also been developing this through history, when He redeemed and restored the Israelites, gave them the laws and mentioned sacrifices, priests and atonement, and guilt riddance.  The blood symbolized cleansing, the scape goat symbolized no more guilt from the past, the priest symbolized union, joining of God and man, God being willing to meet with man, that man could not get to God of themselves (of course man can do nothing of themselves) but how God provides a mediator so man can come to God as flawed.  That was because He wanted His Son to atone, to cleanse us, to mediate for us.

God could have snapped His finger and brought our spirits back to life, restored us that way.  But chances are we would not repent then, and He wants repentance and restoration.  And in the way He chose to restore us, He brings about the greatest repentance.  It is God’s kindness that lead us to repentance.  We basically saw God give man a way to restore with the killing of an animal sacrifice and man abused and perverted it to the point where God even says “I have no pleasure in the blood of lambs”.  God always wanted our repentance, but we could not be brought to eternal repentance without the kindness of how He decided to restore us.  And showing He has the power to raise from the dead when He raises Jesus from the dead, He also shows He has to power to restore our dead spirits and brings them to life.  In that process, He brought about repentance, and restoration.

That is a bit long winded and basically agrees with what most Christians agree on, but I hesitate to focus too much, least you attempt to repent or ask God to restore again in a formulaic way of trying to attain something.

 Want the will of God.  Know that He is the creator of everything, and as such, all glory belongs to Him.  Know we were created to glorify Him, but we cannot do that of our own, but must depend on Him to help us glorify Him.  In those simple beliefs, that will lead you to understanding that anything apart from those things is a sin, sin killed our spirit, God restored our spirit through the life, death, and resurrection of His son.  In wanting to honor God in all you do, in asking Him to help you to do that, He gives you the Holy Spirit to help you.  But what does that mean?  Does God posses you?  Do you just lie back and He does things for you, you don’t have to try?  You trying for Him to be glorified and giving Him credit for helping you is how He helps you.  I know that sounds like circular logic so I will provide a analogy.

Lets just say you won the best baseball (insert favorite sport here) player ever award, you have the highest batting stats, fielding stats and pitching stats of all time, twice as good as the best in those individual fields bests.  You were the ones that hit the homeruns, YOU were the one that threw all those strikeouts right?  Who was your coach?  Who taught you how to throw a ball or swing a bat?  It was all because of your coach, and if you didn’t have that coach, you would have never even been good enough for the JV team.  You were trying your best, because you wanted everyone to know how good your COACH made you.  But it doesn’t matter how great of a coach you had if you never tried and laid on your couch all day.  You must do you best, but speak with your coach daily, asking for tips, realizing you could always be better, and thank your coach and give them credit when you succeed and know you would be nothing without your coach.  But know no amount of your trying would amount to anything had you not had that coach.  Your coach saved you, not your effort, but thanks to that coach, you do provide a fantastic thing for others to see, and you can give your coach all that glory, so they may see and ask your coach if He can help them too.  But you want them not to ask the coach to make them the best or better player than you, rather to let them be fantastic so they coach can receive more glory and more flock to that coach. 

Back to forgiveness and why I can’t fathom why most Christians believe in narrative that Jesus took the wrath of God on the cross.  Now I do believe Jesus would have been willing to, as He was willing to do whatever the Fathers will was.  But making humans suffer for their past actions is not what God does, He does the opposite!  He only looks towards our future, and wants it to be the most optimum.  That is why Jesus came, to give us life to the fullest, not to make people suffer for the past mistakes.  But I will bring up a Matthew 8:3, where Jesus touched a leper on purpose.  A Jew could not touch a leper, least he become unclean and then must cleanse before entering into the temple.  So a Priest would avoid touching one at all costs.  But Jesus our great High Priest, touched him on purpose.  But when touching this man, did Jesus become defiled?  No, the leper actually became clean.  Some say that Jesus ‘absorbed’ this man’s leprosy, like He ‘absorbed’ our sins on the cross.  If this was a foreshadow, the defiled state never occurred to Jesus from the leper, so why would the sins of man have defiled Jesus?  Jesus had to be defiled from the sins, because God poured His wrath on Jesus for those sins He bore (according to the common narrative as I understand it).  But Jesus would not have ‘held’ onto the sin, just as Jesus never ‘held on’ to the leprosy, so now God was pouring our wrath on Jesus even though Jesus had no sin on Him?  Or some say that “my God, how has though forsaken me”.  This is known from Jesus’ saying on the cross, and some think that God forsaken Jesus in pouring His wrath on Him, or they say “God turned His face away” from Jesus.  But an interesting thing is that is scripture Jesus is quoting, from Psalms 22, the first verse.  I have heard that at times Jews would say the first of a Psalm to ‘point/allude to’ (like saying “Luke, I am your Father” reminds you of Star Wars, the Empire Strikes Back) the entire Psalm.  In that very Psalm that Jesus refers to, there is references to the prophesy of this very crucifixion moment.  Also, further down if verse 24, it says the exact opposite of the above narrative.  It says “He has NOT hidden His face from Him”.  “But has listed to His cry for help”.  That is what Jesus is doing, as His entire life was an example to us, even here, Jesus was saying, when He needed help, He asked God for help.  The one who healed sick, opened the eyes of the blind, cast our demons, calmed the winds, He did rely on ‘His’ powers to save Him or give Him strength, but GOD!  Jesus was saying, this is really hard, God please help me, and thank you for never turning your face from me.  “declaring to a people yet unborn, HE HAS DONE IT!”  After Jesus prayed for God to help Him finish, Jesus cried out, that It is finished!  It is oozing psalms 22 and it has nothing to do with God pouring wrath on Jesus nor God turning His face on Jesus.

So what about the verses that say “He bore our sins”, if I say Jesus never ‘held onto’ our sins?  I don’t think Jesus ‘magically absorbed’ our sins, just like He didn’t absorb leprosy, nor did the scape goats literally carry the sin and guilt of those who confessed away, that was symbolism.  Jesus did bear our sins, in the sense that I think it is possible that He had awareness of our sins.  Satan was tempting Him, saying, you see the sin this man did to you, how they reject you and your Father, they aren’t worth it.  This sin, that sin, this sin ect.  Bearing the weight, having the knowledge of all of our sins, yet STILL deciding to die for us, for the will of the Father.  That is a weight none could handle, especially without the help of God like Jesus received when praying for help.  For if Jesus was not aware of our sins, the horrendous ways in how we perverted Gods perfect world, then dying for us might be easier.  But knowing what we did, bearing the full weight of our sins, and making that choice, THAT is would have been hard.

What about verses like how God became sin for us so we could become His righteousness? This could be saying Jesus became flesh like us, and He did it so we could become righteousness like Him, that His kindness would lead us to repentance, which would restore us and cleanse us. Maybe I am wrong on that?  I don’t have all the answers, I don’t know why scripture says what it says, I could not even begin to explain many books or chapters or even verses.  I do read and hope to understand God better, but my faith is not built on my understanding of the perfect or the right formula, it is much more simple.  There is no single verse that says what I say, probably because verses can be interpreted differently, but if you look at the overall logical scriptures and words of God, all I see is a God that loves us, ad God that does not hold our past against us, a God that wants us to live most abundantly, a life that can only be lived abundantly with His Spirit inside us, with the Truth inside us, a life that can only understand that Truth through repentance, repentance that only comes through His love and kindness, because of course all things return back to Him, and He deserved all the glory for all things!  That is my core ‘religious’ belief, to do and want to do the will of God.  As you see I can expand from there, but that is the core, and it greatly disturbs/saddens me to see any “denomination” within the church.  You have seen my logic as to why I don’t believe in the “God turning His face on Jesus” but you probably have other verses that support that narrative.  I will gladly serve others with you, if you do and want to do the will of the Father.  I don’t care if you want to baptize with sprinkles or by immersion, if you want to dance in church, or remain still, serve our Father with me please, glorify Him, and it is all good!  I don’t want to start a ‘new religion’, but I almost want to so that I can start one with no denominations, why do we have such division?  Pride that your interpretation of a verse or passage is more correct than theirs?  I don’t care if in ‘my church’ if you want to explain to others your logic, and why you think something should be someway, and if you convince them of such, even if it is opposite of mine.  If you can serve with me, I will still gladly serve with you! And what do I call this ‘new religion’? I believe that I am a follower of Christ, but Christian is already taken. I don’t care what it is called, I just want to see Christianity turned to it, I want to see the children of God glorifying Him together in unity!

I am not trying to gain anything, I don’t want any result whether it is from doing good deeds or letting someone else do it for me.  All I want to gain is for glory to be given to God, perhaps for others to see that so they will too desire for God to receive all glory.  I don’t want to be saved and going to heaven, I don’t want to convert you or have you saved and going to heaven.  Not saved from hell, saved from the wrath of God or saved from dying.  I am already in my eternity, and in that eternal life I have is to honor God with all my strength, mind, and heart, while in this flesh and when my flesh expires.  That is to be saved from despair, for the lies of the deceiver, and yes I want that more than anything for everyone too.

To clarify as it may seem that I am minimizing what Jesus did if you are to assume I am saying that was unnecessary, and that ‘salvation’ comes through good deeds (if that is what you interpret as God’s will) and that couldn’t be further from the truth. I do believe it was God’s will for Jesus to die for us “It was God’s will to crush Him”. But my faith is not in this act of Jesus, rather in God who provided a way of salvation for us through this act.

If I saw a man hitting a hole in 1 on every hole in golf ever time he hit the ball, I would know without a doubt, that man is the greatest golfer that ever lived. Though until that man actually plays on the professional course and wins awards and trophies, no one else would know how good he was. I might look the fool if I try to convince you of how great at golf this man is even though he never played on a professional tournament, but I have seen what he did, so I believe. But forgive me if I don’t often point to the trophies when proclaiming how great this man was, rather I just point to the relationship I had with him, the truths that I already knew of how good he was prior to any professional demonstration. It might even seem like I am belittling those trophies or his professional performance (which I am not). However the reason I do find is troublesome that there are those that insist on those trophies as the only way we can know this person what the greatest golfer ever and use those trophies as bragging rights of ownership (as a kid, the whole “my dad can beat up your dad” type of pride).

That is like faith of those prior to Jesus. People like Cornelius of Acts, a non-Jew Itialian Regiment soldier, who was God-fearing prior to Jesus’ death. They knew God would provide, they knew He was loving, they knew their acceptance by God was only because of who God was and nothing they could do. It was as if only they have known that individually (as if God revealed this to them in their humility), their was no proof of it. Until Jesus came from heaven, born of a virgin, lived the perfect example, explained the Truth to us, and then died for us and in obedience to the Father, and in accordance with the prophesies, rose from the dead. Now we have a public proof of the goodness of God, we can point to Christ as the love of God, the provisions of God, the acceptance of God that had nothing to do with our works. THIS is who Jesus is, this is how we should refer to Him as, the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world, IS the Lamb of God who proves the already known Truths of God that God takes away or provides a way for sins to be taken from us. Speaking of Jesus should be speaking of God. This is why I also don’t believe that Jesus saved us from the wrath of God, as Jesus didn’t need to save us from God, Jesus is the goodness of God How can the goodness of God exist to save us from the wrath of God?

When I stand in front of the judgement seat of God and God asks why should I let you in, what shall I say? Because I followed the formula you gave us, the formula is Jesus blood forgives our sin and clothes us in righteousness. Almost as an “aha” like we pulled one over on God or “beat the system”. As if we forced Him to let us in now? I think those will hear “depart from me, I never knew you”.

Rather I will say, you shouldn’t let me in (that is to say that I deserve to not be let in and no formula I can say or belief I had or anything I could do or believe in should merit my admittance), but I see you have already let me in, and I am thankful for that. Because it is nothing I could ever do to get in, but you provided a way for me in, you loved me so much that you sent your son to die for me and atone for my sins as you decreed, but not just to “let me in” or cleanse my past and future sins, but to reveal the Truths of God to me, to show me the way, to give me your Spirit and reveal the Truth to me. The Truth that you are God, and I am not, that I exist to glorify you, and that all glory and credit belong to you. That I am a sinful man and need you to glorify you and nothing of my own doing (if i was to take credit for the actions) could bring you any glory, but everything I try to do if I succeed must have glory brought to you as you have blessed us with this gift of life to bring you glory in the gifts you gave us. You gave me life, you gave me purpose, and I am honored to be able to honor you for eternity knowing these Truths.

This is why I don’t like formulas.  You shouldn’t want a result/achievement and you shouldn’t appeal to others to want that either.  Rather you should want all glory to go to God, and should inspire others to want glory to go to God as well.  THAT to me is salvation.  That is life, that is TRUTH, that is JESUS!  It begins the second this truth is revealed to you by the Spirit and continues on this earth until our flesh wastes away.

This is Water by David Foster Wallace (Full Transcript and Audio)

I stumbled across this speech the other day.  I think the guy could have been an agnostic (since he claims to believe atheism is impossible), I’m not sure of his religious stance, I could maybe think Buddhist possibly with the only truth or purpose in life being ‘self-aware’.  But it really brings up some interesting points.

It echo’s so much in the Bible, and how the Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak (Matt 26:41).  IF, you give the Spirit a chance, or a thought, it is very willing and strong, but if you don’t the flesh is the default, and it is weak.  What separates us from the animals?  What is the “breath of life” that God gave us?  What allows us to bear the image of God?  Could an animal attain that status?  NO, they are confined to their biology, ‘the flesh’.  Humans were given the ability to connect to God, and when connected to God, produce the goodness of God, to be able to bear His image.  To have the very characteristics of God, is only possible when you connect to that God, and allow that God to live those characteristics in you.  I am reminded of John 15:5 The branches (humans) can do nothing apart from being connected to the vine (God/Spirit).  Now of course man can do many literal things of this world, but what Jesus meant by that is probably something of value.  Just like how all deeds are seen as filthy rags (worthless) apart from God.  God never created us to accomplish good deeds, He created us for His glory, and the only way to glorify Him is to depend on Him, to ask Him to help us to glorify him.  When we act in that sense, it is actually Him acting in us, and then and only then, is our actions capable of glorifying Him, in which case the things we did were something of value or were not worthless, or ‘did things’ as we connect to the vine.  That is what the blessing of life is, the ability to connect to God and glorify Him in that connection, because all glory for everything always belongs to God.

I would guess that most humans that live in the subconscious.  Living in the weak flesh would actually not be that ‘bad’ (I use that term loosely) of a thing, as much as anything an animal does is not ‘bad’.  But if you simply follow your biology as a human (who has been given the blessing of life), you are basically ‘refusing your blessings’, or perhaps ignorant of your blessing, probably why Jesus refers to them as blind, they don’t know the blessing that they have been given.  And some aware that they are blessed with the ability to be ‘self aware’, to ascend above the biological impulses of the flesh (sometimes), refuse to acknowledge who gave them that blessing and what it was for, end up perverting it by becoming their own gods.  Though much like a star that burn (perhaps giving someone cancer that kills them) or an animal that eats another or kills a child, it is glorifying God in that it is doing what it was created to do, and is valuable.  More valuable than the human who refuses to do what they were created to do, which is also the reason for my belief in annihilation.  If there is a thing God created that refuses to do what it was created to do, it no longer needs to be in existence.    

 As David Foster said “the rat race, the constant gnawing sense of having had, and lost, some infinite thing.”  Clearly he feels the gnawing of God, the emptiness of a life void of his creator, being able to connect with Him and have Him help us glorify Him as we were created for. 

It is interesting he says “There is no such thing as not worshipping.”  And then the truth he spoke of that “pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.”  I am curious as to what he worships that will not eat him alive?  If you worship self or self awareness, you exist for nothing and might as well not exist.

“The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day.”  The problem with this idealism is that what good is it to sacrifice to help another, especially if that other person is wasting their life in the rat race?  You might make that tiny moment in their rat race seem slightly not as dreary?  So is your mission to ‘wake’ all them in the rate race?  To make everyone as ‘aware’ as you are?  That is a good plan to save humanity as the god you are who thinks you can save humanity (good luck)?  But then what?  Why do we exist?  The problem being is that that awareness even has to be practiced and grown, and anytime you rely on humans (if we look back through the history of ‘aware’ or ‘unaware’ humans, we see that we will eventually fail at some point)    I say “good luck” as God has actually saved humanity already, and there are still many who refuse to believe that, so if you think you can and have yet to create a few billion galaxies and all the complexities that come from that think you can, then I would say pride is what you worship.

So what is the different between ‘aware’ folks and Christians?  At face value, they seem similar.  Instead of ‘aware’ Christians refer to it as ‘saved’ or ‘born again’.  Jesus says how the blind receive sight.  So we live and we also strive to do things like “sacrifice for others benefit”.  But we don’t (or shouldn’t) (solely) do it to make that rat race slightly more bearable, rather to honor the Father.  If we succeed, Their/Our creator is glorified, if we fail, God is glorified, because we did it to glorify Him, not because of results.  Also if we succeed in shining a little light to those in the rat race, and they become saved/aware of their loving Creator, they can now bring more glory to God, which again is our main goal (should be) and why we exist.  If we die, God keeps on going He is eternal, so we do have a purpose, if we were to cease to exist, that would be one less bit of glory God would receive.  So you can never run out of motivation.  We also have help from the One who created us.  We also have understanding from the One who created us, tremendous love, mercy, grace and understanding.  So as humans are known to do, when we do fail, God will forgive us and doesn’t hold it against us.  He wants nothing more than to help us, help us.  So a ‘aware’ person practices being aware as much as they can to get stronger in it with no help from anyone, and they will still fail, but their life is meaningless regardless and if they cease to exist, there is no difference, nor is there a difference for those in the rat race in first or last.  But a saved/aware person also practices being aware/connected to God as much as they can, getting stronger in it, being strengthened through God/Spirit to overcome the trying times of the flesh.  But when we fail to connect to the Spirit, which will result in a failure to overcome the flesh, God will pick us up, dust us off, and send us on our way.  Sounds a bit more freeing to me, and purposeful.

Which if you read some of my other blog posts, I don’t believe it is good to refer to Adam as perfect, any more than it is accurate to say a pitcher who has yet to throw a single pitch technically has thrown a ‘perfect’ game.  You can’t call someone perfect until the game is over.  Adam simple, did not sin, until he sinned, he was never perfect, and that was the plan.  God didn’t have to fall back onto a plan B when the ‘perfect Adam’ sinned, saving us with Jesus wasn’t His backup plan.  The death of Jesus was known before creation.  Rom 8 or Col 1 speaks of the groaning of creation, waiting for Jesus to come and do what God planned.  God loves us so much that we can’t begin to comprehend it, and that is why He sent Jesus, because He wanted to show us of His love.  Jesus was perfect, He pitched all innings, the game was over, He can rightfully be called perfect.

But Jesus had the same flesh, the same propensity to sin (sin nature) that you, me, or Adam had.  A human biology with the desire to procreate and survive in the subconscious.  But when connecting to God, and never once did Jesus either ignore that ability to connect to the Spirit, nor perverted it.  We see countless times of Jesus not only connecting to God multiple times throughout the day, but recommending (commanding us in love) for us to do the same.  Sure with Jesus, God wanted Him to have a perfect life and I am sure He ‘interfered’ with His sin nature/flesh so that He would not sin.  I am thankful God is willing to ‘interfere’ with my life to break my flesh and open my eyes.  I acknowledge that I am fully dependent on God, meaning I need to Him to interfere with my life and all humans do for us to live a life that can glorify Him, which is to live a life of purpose. 

“”We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” Victor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning”

And to even want to sacrifice and the ability to be self aware.  Where do you really think that comes from?  We can clearly see throughout the Bible that God is the founder of sacrificing.  Sacrificing meaning to be negatively affected for the benefit of others, not so much the sacrifice of flesh on an alter, though He tied those two together quite masterfully as well as He interjected it in such a different (both physically and symbolically) way then the surrounding world was to contrast the world.  But if you have the desire to sacrifice for someone, that comes from Genesis, God breathing life/Spirit into man, creating man in His image, allowing man to have His characteristics, like sacrifice.  Surely one can see that the author of sacrifice and compassion and love deserves all the glory for when we use said characteristic?  Is there anywhere in the world or history were we can see the idea of true sacrifice? 

Awareness is the answer to the biggest question in life, if those where “What is the meaning/purpose of life?” or “What is truth?”  The only real truth is the knowledge and acknowledgment and awareness of God’s righteousness, just, grace, mercy and love.  This is what Jesus taught us, and also why Jesus said “I am the truth”.  Jesus was the manifestation on earth of God’s perfect image, the characteristics of God that are righteousness, justice, grace, mercy and love.  This is water, this is living water, Jesus also claimed to be the living water, the water that fulfills our purpose, that satisfies us, that cleanses us. Jesus is water, God is water.

I wanted to change my stance or beliefs, though I am going to keep up my old thoughts/beliefs on the website so you can see my journey.  That is what this is, a journey about learning more about our Creator. 

Though I still believe in Christus victor, I am starting to understand substitutionary atonement better.  I also don’t see why the false dichotomy of having to choose between one or the other.  Why can’t both be right?

Though I still think I see the substitutionary atonement different than many.  I don’t think it is accurate, nor do I like to view it as something that is required.  Often I think the later part of Heb 9:22 is misused, and it is because they leave out the first part “Indeed, under the law almost everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.”.   Under the law (the key words), or according to the covenant set, yes, blood was required for forgiveness.  But this only applies to those under the law.  I would hope most Christians agree with Paul that we are no longer under the law and we don’t need circumcision anymore either.  This covenant applied to Israelites only, to those physically circumcised.  So to all Gentiles (all non circumcised) this law does not apply.  That means there can, and is forgiveness of sins, without blood.  As I have said in earlier posts, God is the one wronged, forgiveness is up to Him, however He wants to do it.  He is not bound by a covenant to all, just the covenant to the Israelites, with whom have a covenant with Him.

We see twice (that I can think of in Luke 5 and 7) in Jesus (who is God) forgives sin’s with words on the spot, no blood spilt.  God gives permission to an angel to use a hot coal to atone for his sins Isa 6:7

That being said, however, it seems for the majority of the world, God wanted the blood of His Son to forgive our sins.  We could speculate as to why, but we will never know why God does what He does, but we have faith in knowing how loving and just and righteous and merciful He is, so we don’t have to know.  Isa 53:10 “Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin”  It is spelled out right there, for whatever reason, it was His will to crush Jesus.  It was His will for most people to be forgiven by the blood of Christ.  This seems to be the ‘rule’, but all rules can have exceptions grated by the rule maker, and it seems in those examples above, the rule maker made exceptions.  But God is not bound by the later part of Heb 9:22.  It isn’t like God was wanting to save man, but was restricted in how to rescue us, His Son was the only way, and He loves us so much that he allowed that to happen. 

He wanted it to happen, it was His will to crush Him.  Though I agree in substitutionary atonement, my problem is if that is all you see Jesus as.   It is robbing God of so much glory and so much richness as to why Jesus did come.  Its like saying the Grand Canyon small hole in the US, or some people died in WW2.  Both of those statements are true, but they are missing so much more! 

God knew He would come and die, it was His will to crush Him, and he centered the entire OT around that will.  We see the first example of this substation when Adam sinned, and God provided animal clothing for them (an animal had to died for them to be clothed).  This is echoed in the Isaac and Jacob with sacrifices, and the Passover and Levitical law, (many more times) and finally came to an climax with Jesus on the cross.  If God wanted it to happen that way (which Scripture does clearly indicate) I think that made God to want to develop that.  It might have looked weird if that was the 1^st sacrifice.  God also developed that no one has greater love than to lay down his life for his friends.  If that is the measure of the greatest love, than let’s one up that, and have a Man lay down His life for His enemies (those who hate Him, He doesn’t hate us).

One could also say to lay down one’s live is servitude.  Do live for that One person/being.  There are soldiers and many others who die for others, though given the choice to die for their enemies, I am not sure if they would allow that if they had a choice, but it is fairly easy to die for someone (relatively speaking), even to be tortured to the point of death for them.  What no one has ever done (apart from Jesus) is to lay down His life (in servitude) for man and God.  Dying is a 1 time decision, you do it, it sucks (even if it takes a few days of torture), and it is done with.  But to live for someone.  Every waking moment, every decision you make, all of that is for One.  And God wanted Him to obey God, for so many reasons.  One that is His Son, two, it is an example of how He wants (always wanted) us to live.  He created us to give Him all glory, where all glory belongs, with His help, in a relationship.  Jesus lived for God, He gave His life (in servitude) of God, and in servitude of us.  One to be an example for us, and two to be that substitutionary atonement for us, to save us.  Jesus death was SO much more than just a death on a cross, just a means to get ‘perfect blood’ to forgive sins.

The power in the truth and the Holy Spirit is also what allows me to know what I know about God now and what softens men’s hearts of stone to hearts of flesh that even allow us to begin to attempt to contemplate the love and glory of God.

Also on Christus Victor, the powers of Satan were defeated.  Not just from some blood, but from truth.  I think Satan though he won, he thought Jesus’ mission was to come, save/change the world during his life here.  Satan watched men turn on God, he turned men against Jesus, he thought he won, that Jesus was giving up (he knew he couldn’t defeat Jesus if Jesus was trying), he thought if he can kill Jesus before Jesus had a chance to change the world, the world would never change.  For if the very Son of God came to this world and could not do it, it could not be done, or at least that is what he wanted to deceive us with.  Satan is the accuser, the great deceiver, he told Jesus of all the sins of man, how man rejected God and perverted the blessings God gave us time and time again.   Isa 53:11 “he will bear their iniquities.”  He bore our sins, our iniquities, was made known of or perversions and rejections of God and STILL decided to continue with this.  He continued to follow the will of God, so show the love of God in Him.  That love that we can have with the help of His Spirit, so we can bear His image as intended and glorify Him in all we do.  And when He died, and Satan thought he won, Jesus showed him how he actually lost, Jesus showed him how His purpose was not the change the world, rather do the will of the Father, do it in all things, up until the point of death, even death on a cross, even death with the weight of all our sins.  In the past, Satan had powers, authority of from God, though we don’t know what they were exactly, we see comments of how when a man sins, Satan had some authority to punish them for those sins (kind of like the lower courts).  But God is the ultimate high Judge, and when He saw this unfair ruling, saw how Satan attempted to kill a perfect man, with which he had no authority over, over turned this ruling, rose Jesus from the grave, and took the power of Satan from Him, making a spectacle of him Col 2:15 “And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”  I believe that is why there are so very few demon possessions anymore, Satan and the powers of darkness have no authority anymore.  Though, he still is the great deceiver, and if you don’t know what is or isn’t or who has authority or doesn’t, you could still be influenced to believe he has powers.

And above, simply referring to Jesus as our example I think is watering down how rich of a statement that is.  I think too many see Jesus as ‘perfect’ or that “He can’t sin”, as to which I disagree.  He was blames, and perfect in a sense of never sinning, but I doubt He could walk from the womb or speak at 1 month old.  To make mistakes and learn from them is human.  Jesus was tempted as well as we are, He knows what we went through, He can become an intermediary for us, as High Priest did between God.  I think it more fantastic to know that He could have sinned, and didn’t.  I would be more impressed of have more to learn from a Guy who could have sinned, and didn’t than a Guy who couldn’t sin and didn’t.  The later isn’t much of an example.  But we see this Example, who meets with God daily, has the Spirit of God with Him helping Him.  He asks God to help Him, He points to God, and gives all glory to the Father.  Even in before His hardest task/test, He prays for help and in the midst of that task is still asking for help.  That is what we are supposed to do.

I don’t believe in substitutionary punishment.  I don’t believe the wrath of God was poured onto Jesus, or Jesus took the wrath of God for us, like diving in front of a bullet coming our way or pushing us out of the way of a train to only Himself get hit.  As I have said in my other posts, I don’t think God punishes the way we do nor uses our definition of Justice.  He doesn’t need suffering to make something holy or to redeem someone.  I don’t believe God turned His face on Jesus, I don’t believe Jesus literally thought God was forsaking him.  Psalm 22:1 say “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  Why would man who felt forsaken by God, quote God’s scripture?  And then in that same chapter Psalm, that has many prophesies alluding to the very thing He is going through, then on vs 24 say “For he has not despised or scorned  the suffering of the afflicted one; he has not hidden his face from him but has listened to his cry for help.”  The afflicted one, the one with pierced hands (vs 16) That God will never turn His face from Him.  BUT not only will He never turn His face, but actually has listened to His cry for help.  That cry for help being “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me”.  That cry was quoting a well known Psalm, a Psalm full of poetic words of a man really down and suffering, but knowing through all the suffering how God will help them.  And God clearly helped Jesus and helped Him stay the course and live His will.

God punished (in the OT) to end the wicked, to get the wicked to stop doing what they are doing, by means of stopping the possibility of them doing any more.  His wrath is not a wrath of suffering, He doesn’t punish so they suffer.  Hell is not a punishment, a place that we need to suffer.  How could God pour out that eternal suffering that man allegedly will get onto a person for a few seconds?  Why would He?  Because He demands suffering or a great level, He can’t contain it, it has to come out, but only Jesus could have taken it?  But this was a Jesus that could take it, a Jesus who was now at this time forsaken by God.  How could any man that is forsaken by God have any strength to do anything?  Let alone take the full eternal wrath of God for so many in a small time frame?  I guess if you believe Jesus was perfect and could not sin and was God, then He could take the powers of God because He was God.  But then how much of a difficulty or sacrifice is that, for a God to take/endure the power of God?

So in the NT, we don’t seem to see the wicked punished much anymore.  But we frequently see the wicked transformed.  Who is more wicked than a man killing people proclaiming the name of Jesus. 1 Tim 1:15, the foremost sinner (self admittance) the most wicked man alive, was not destroyed, rather transformed!  This is the power of the cross, this is the power of Jesus, this is the power of the Spirit, this is the love of God! 

The one reason I am generally not a fan of preaching substitutionary atonement, is that Jesus is made to be just a ‘glorified’ lamb.  There were so many Israelites who thought they could do what they wanted and just throw up a lamb, be atoned and all was good.  This is what prompted God to say in Amos 5:21-22 I hate you religious festivals, they are a stench to me, I will not accept your offerings.  They had to do these sacrifices once a year for atonement, but with Jesus, it was a once and done.  And the animals were man’s offering to God, but Jesus was God’s offering to us.  The purpose of the offering was faith and repentance, without that, they were detestable, or simple animal carcasses and lamb chops.  You can’t claim Jesus was a substitute for us, He took God’s wrath, so we are free to do as we will.  If you lake faith in God, if you don’t Fear the Lord, submit to His will and repent, you cannot be forgiven.  It isn’t that God won’t forgive you on His end, you are instantly forgiven from Him, but if you don’t want it, and you can’t want it until you understand it, you cannot be forgiven.  Like my kid, there is nothing he can do that I won’t forgive (and I am learning I need to do this for all men, as I am a image bearer of God, the one who forgives instantly, but for now it is easier to understand with a child).  The second he messes up, he is forgiven from my end, there is no grudge held, his next request is not biased by the thing he did in the past.  But he can still be punished, and that is not because I need him to suffer, but until he understands the error of his ways, he is bound to do it again.  If I allow him to do it again, or withhold punishment that could correct him from doing it again, I have no love for him, for erring is the worst thing you can do, and my lives purpose is to teach him to err less and less and watch him grow.  Though I said that erring is the worst thing, it is actually not growing which is even worse.  This is how I see God acting throughout the Bible.  The second a man sins, God has no negative bias towards that person when making a decision in the future about them.  He doesn’t hold it against them, He doesn’t require them to suffer to appease Him.  Though He does hate when that sin is done, and hates it so much and loves us so much He doesn’t want us to continue to do those sins, so we are corrected/punished.  But the second there is repentance, or a realization of what we did and a true effort to never do that again, it is then forgiven on our side. 

Then in the end of the NT, suffering is brought back, punishment, hell.  Life is a blessing of God, God loves to watch us grow.  If we reject Him, continue to pervert His blessings, never repent, why would He continue to punish?  Our suffering doesn’t benefit Him, nor bring Him glory.  I either think 2 possibilities.  Either He will annihilate us, end our blessing of a life and we are eternally dead (the worst form of suffering, it was having the greatest blessing of life and having that blessing removed) or, through suffering and pain, all will turn to repent and be able to receive the forgiveness He already forgave us with.

I hope you also don’t read into the above and think I am in any way saying it is of our effort, that we could attempt to claim any glory for ourselves.   If we do chose to repent, it was only God allowing us to choose that, and all glory will go to where it always belongs and that is with God.  And that is why I am no different of better than those who reject Him.  I long to see them glorify Him, so He receives more glory for that, but I am no better than them.  God created me as He did and worked in me as He did, and them the same.  I also hope you don’t read into that above and say, why try anything if it is as God destined.  I can only say that one who would suggest that doesn’t know God.  I do know that He created me for His glory, and I will do my best to give Him as much as I can, that takes effort, I need to try, but I don’t try to impress God or measure up to Him, but simply and only to glorify Him!

I am not going to answer that, and I will let you decide what you think the answer should be at the end, I bet the answer will change by the end.

First of all, we must decide why we want to know this?  Is it for ourselves, is it for another asking us, is that person a Christian, or not?

We also must ask if we truly care for them and love them as God does.  Or do we just want to be right, or worse, show them how right God is, and how we just agree with the Bible.  “God says X is wrong, and I agree with Him” kind of like placing oneself next to God as we think He judges.   If it is the latter, then please don’t answer them. 

If that person is not a Christian, then I will ask why it matters?  All sins are rejecting God’s way.  This specific deed/thought (sin or not) isn’t going to impress God, but it also isn’t the one thing that God will condemn them for either.  Generally when a non-Christian asks a question like this, it is much like the Pharisees.  It is a trick question, where it will either allow them to accuse you of hate, or to pin you against other Christians.  But if they genuinely want to know, I would ask them why they want to know?   Are they really seeking to know their Creator?  Do they have an empty life full of despair and are truly seeking hope.  Just like being a homosexual or acting on it isn’t going to fulfill them, neither is stopping homosexuality going to fulfill them or give them hope.  Hope only comes from truth, the truth in who God is and how He loves us.  I would share the gospel with them.  How a Being created them, He loves them, and wants a relation with them, and to help them glorify Him.  But when we reject Him, think we fulfill ourselves or find hope our way, we cannot be with Him.  If God is the only way to have hope, then to reject God is to not have hope. 

No matter how many good deeds you have, and satisfying relationships you have, or how many goals you hope to achieve or have achieved or items you own, it is all for not.  You die, and all those things get destroyed, or while you are alive, those things die or get destroyed or turn on you or reject you because of what you might have done.  But the one Thing/Being that will, never die, never turn away from you, never be destroyed, never change, IS God!  The One who created you and loves you, the one who is ever merciful (will never not love you no matter what you do to anyone else or to Him), ever loving (loves you for you, not for what you have done or need to do), everlasting (will never fade or deteriorate or change or be moved).  The One that created you, knows you and accepts you despite what you have done or didn’t do.  He provided a peace and a reconciliation to Him, a guilt free mindset, and rebirth.  He provided that at the high cost of His Son Jesus, the Christ, allowing Jesus (the One whom all things were created for and through, the King of all Kings) to come to serve us, to show us the way, to show us this these truths of God and His love and mercy, to show of a better way to live (in complete submission and allegiance and with the help of God), the hope that man could have in God, thanks to God!  We did nothing to deserve Him, and all we have to do is acknowledge Him, and you too can have hope, eternal hope, and eternal life.  If the One who created you to glorify Him, is able to reveal to you the truth, and to have you want to glorify Him (with His help), then you will be able to glorify Him for eternity. 

Do you want to have that incredible hope?  Do you really care about homosexuality?  God is your hope, not homosexuality or heterosexuality or no-sexuality.  When you seek hope and restoration in the only One who can give it to you, all the ‘shiny’ things of this world seem dull.   So seek God, seek hope, and then you can read the next paragraph to see how I would answer that question from a Christian.

Now if there is Christian who is asking me (not a person that attends a church, or does good things, but a person who has the hope and joy that only comes from knowing and having a personal relationship with their Creator) I would answer differently, depending if I knew them (personally or interacted with them on a semi-regular basis ie. church or work), or if they were just a person who proclaimed the gospel, but I would never see them again or for another few months.  If it was the latter, I would allow their church to answer that.  We are given elders to respect and submit to, God know who they are and has us under their authority for a reason, let them submit to them.  If it was the former, it also depends on if they are being tempted, but know it is a sin.  Or if they truly believe it is not a sin.  They can use scriptures to justify it, or at least say it’s prohibition ambiguous or unclear.  I will still gladly praise God with them, serve the needy with them, do what the church should do with fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.  Help them to see focus on the hope they have in Jesus, is this homosexual relationship really worth it?  Does it bring fulfillment to them?  Can they see how the clearly designed relationship of a male and female can be used as a glimpse of how Christ and the church is?  Can they see that same fulfillment and witness from a male and female, Christ centered marriage can be to the world.  Does their homosexual relationship also shine that light to the world?  Ask open ended questions, allow God to work on their hearts, have faith.

There is Scripture that speaks of the person willfully sinning, and how they should be rejected from the church UNTIL they get right.  That is to say that you don’t want them representing the church anymore, but it doesn’t mean they are unwelcome there.   They either never realized or have forgotten the hope in Christ.  It is a slow fade, it isn’t a switch that get turned one day.  Satan distracts us and blinds us, and we do it to ourselves when we don’t meet with God daily.  Jesus did avoid temptation, but He also met with God daily.  If even the Savior of man and Son of God needed to meet with God daily for help, surely we do as well?  And that is what God wants of us, to meet with Him, so He can remind us and protect us in His truth, and help us to glorify Him in loving Him with our all and others as well.  Even Peter (a man who was able to walk on water when he focused on Jesus), sank in the water when his gaze moved from Jesus when he got distracted with scary waves and our concept of reality.  But Jesus forgave him, and even used him as the head of the church!   We need to pray for the ‘no-longer-a-member-of-the-church’ person, and remind or show them to have hope in God, and they too may become the next Peter.  But that is for the willful sinner or the one falling to temptation, not the one who doesn’t believe they are sinning.

Though I do believe it is very clear of the blessings and benefit of a relationship between a man and a woman can have and a light it can shine to the world, I can also see how it isn’t extremely clear that homosexuality is wrong, other than that if it doesn’t glorify God as a male and female marriage can, than is it really necessary?  Like watching football, and how it might not be bad, but if it isn’t being used to glorify God, is it worth it if God asked you to give it up?  It is more fulfilling than God?

If these homosexual men, and glorifying God in all they do, serving others and proclaiming the truth of God to others (then they should have a really close relationship with God), let God convict them.  All sin I kind of look what if they did that before being saved, now what after?  What about the man that married 8 wives, and then became saved, should he now divorce 7 of them or all of them?  What if they were a homosexual couple married, and then saved, should they divorce?  Again, if they seek God, He can reveal to them His will in the complexities we bring ourselves into that have no easy answer.  But I would hope they are seeking to be a light in the world or to use their ‘flawed’ relationship (as it is not the written about and demonstrated ‘working’ relationship the Bible clearly speaks about).

 

First I will start by saying that I couldn’t disagree more with that statement, but I thought it might catch some attention.  My church recently did a survey of about 150 people and asked a few questions.  It turns out that a third of the church believes that title statement, which is both shocking and heartbreaking.  Though I think I know why that is believed by so many, I think it has to do with the narrative used to proclaim the ‘gospel’ to them.

I visited a another church and heard an analogy that I thought brilliantly illustrated the ‘gospel’ (or at least the gospel as I used to understand it).  The pastor called up 2 people, and to make it easier to explain in text, the pastor is Jesus, “man” was represented by a man, and God was represented by a man to the right.  So God has 200 dollars, and man takes the money.  At that point, God is a bit ticked off (has anger or wants to use His wrath), and hopes the man gives Him the money back. The man than goes and spends all that money, now if we wanted to give it back, he couldn’t, he lost it.  So now God has some serious anger/wrath saved up for this guy.  Then Jesus comes along, and gives God His credit card, and says “whatever that man takes from you, put it on my card and I will pay for it.” 

That is a fairly powerful message and it slightly mimics the good Samaritan, who also says, whatever it costs to fix/heal this man, I will pay for it upon my return.  And I do believe that Jesus would always be willing to pay whatever it takes to save us.  That is the good part of the analogy/skit.

The problem here is it applies the attributes of man, and gives them to God.  This REALLY paints a terrible and inaccurate picture of God.  So there are some that invent an entirely different narrative to deal with that.  They say something how God is so holy, He can’t be around sin, He wants to be with us, but He can’t, and He needs Jesus to reconcile us or pay our debt.  I guess this is slightly better.  At least this crowd belief sees God as loving and not wrathful, but this belief “ties the hands” of God.  As if God couldn’t save us or reconcile us with a spoken word or a snap of His fingers.  they bind Him with a false narrative that God is so holy that a price must be paid.  His holiness somehow binds Him from doing what He wants.

The narrative I believe is that Jesus would indeed give anything and everything He could so save us…..But so would (and did) God!  One because Jesus is God, but also because no matter what, Jesus wanted to do the will of the Father.  God gave us Jesus, God lost/spent something to save us, and Jesus is the means with which He decided to go about to save us.  God loves stories, and created us to connect so well to stories, and wrote the greatest story ever beginning with Adam, and using all of history and it came to a culmination with the life and death of Jesus.  Jesus atones for our sins and the animals sacrifices where bringing their ‘life’ to cover the ‘death’ that we brought from our sin.  And shows us how we are to live, and that is to honor the Father no matter what, to be obedient to the Father even to the point of His death, even death on a cross.  The life is Jesus is so deep and multifaceted, it is SO much more than just an atonement for us, or just to give a ‘reluctant God’ or a ‘bound God’ a way back to us.  So Jesus and God were willing to pay any price to reconcile us, but they wanted so much more than for us to be reconciled, they wanted us to be reborn (having a new wisdom/outlook/purpose) in this life. 

God would and does forgive the man the very second man takes His money.  God doesn’t hold any grudges, He is NOT man, so we need to stop giving Him attributes of man.  Man needs to see the man punished or ‘justice’ be served, the man that wronged them needs to suffer.  That is not how God works.  God forgives instantly and always, He is Love, He is Forgiveness.  The question is whether we will receive it, and we can only receive it is we are truly repentant.  Until we repent, God can and will punish us, and attempt to correct us, because He loves us, much like a child and a father.  The intent of a punishment is not so that you feel better, not that the person needs to suffer, rather to correct, to reveal the truth of what occurred, to have the person eyes opened as to what they did so that THEY don’t want to do it anymore.  Not just so that they don’t want to get punished or caught, or because you don’t want them to do something, you want THEM to not want to do it.  Once that child no longer WANTS to do that thing, there is no longer a need to punish, and of course they are forgiven, they were forgiven even before they wronged you or sinned against you. 

 God never needed us to atone for sin for Him, it was for US.  Because sacrificing the animals was demonstrating our faith in Him, it was faithfully being obedient to His commands (and there was symbolism to it as well), that something had to suffer, that a wrong had to be wrong to make it right.  He gave us the scape goat to free the mind of a guilty man, a man that was convinced by the accuser that He was no longer worthy because of his past.  First, it wasn’t sin that made us not worthy or not God or equal to God, it was the very way God created us.  The only way to ever be worthy or to be able to do what God created us to do, was with the help/acknowledgment of God.  But God, knowing we are but dust, calls us worthy through Him.  God defeats death in His truth, and that truth was made known when Jesus conquered death, and made known to us that our past does not and can not condemn us or make us lose a relationship with God.  The only thing that makes us separate from God is us rejecting Him.  That can be through means of pride, believing we don’t need His help or that any slightest amount of credit for anything good we do is because of who He is, that is rejecting Him.  And acknowledging Him in all things, that is what He wants.  That is why He sent Jesus.  To reveal to us our past doesn’t condemn us (the scape goat) to reveal to us we are atoned (the grace of God is what atones us, the life of God the Author of Life is what heals/reverses the death we bring upon ourselves when we did reject Him) and Jesus our High Priest is who made this known to us, or reconciles us to God in His truth He shared with us.  Jesus was our ultimate example of how to live, but He was also our Savior in revealing the truth that already was.  He fulfilled what was always true and made known to us what was always true, but we couldn’t have known until Jesus paid a high price to make that known with His life.

God=Love.  God is the Author of Love.  Love springs from Him, all love comes from Him.  Jesus is love, Jesus is God.  God used Jesus to show His love to us.  Jesus gave His life in service of God, and in love for us. 

 

“Sometimes God allows us to go through difficult times, even as a result of the wicked actions of others. Yet whatever we have to endure, no matter how unfair, or unjust, we can be sure that God will use it for good.”

When I read the Psalms, I am somewhat baffled by them. I understand God wanted us to seek justice, but there is so much “bless me because I obey you and punish all the wicked”. Clearly these verses come from a people before the Holy Spirit, before Jesus. Before Jesus, the hope of the Israelites was comfort and security in this life and for their children. I don’t think it was ever supposed to be the end goal, and this wasn’t realized/revealed to man until Jesus. The entire point of suffering (whether we did it to ourselves, or God allows other to do it to us) it to point us to God, so we can grow closer to Him. So our hope is not in the eventual outcome or relief. We don’t live a life of suffering now, so we can be rewarded later. If we suffer now, God is good! If we are secure and comforted now, God is good! His goodness isn’t circumstantial, it is a truth. Though God never temps anyone, He does test many. What is the difference between temptation and testing? A test is brings glory to God (through many ways, but one of them is our growth). Where as a temptation is meant to rob the glory of God. But God is sovereign, nothing happens to us apart from His knowledge. Everything goes through God like a filter, and if He doesn’t want to allow it, it won’t happen. So though it may be true that God will never tempt you, He really has no need to temp you. We live in such a terrible world, He just has to allow the things of this world or Satan to tempt us. If God is sovereign, that is basically saying, the powers of darkness require permission from God for every little temptation they have for you. That is why the Bible says God will not tempt us beyond what we can bear. God loves us, and it growing us. A seasoned weightlifter is not going to put 500 lbs on a bench press, and just let go for a guy who has never been to the gym. He knows you can’t lift it. But he also isn’t going to put more weight on it that he can lift either, as he wants to be able to lift all of it when you can no longer lift any of it. God is our ‘spotter’, He isn’t going to put anything on it that we can’t lift, or that He can’t lift (as it is possible the test is to see if we will trust if He will provide all the lifting). He knows us intimately, and know what we can handle, and what amount of weight will grow us. But if we never lift that weight, we will never grow. That is why God gives the Darkness permission to tempt us, because God doesn’t tempt, but He wants us to grow. One day (in Heaven) there will be no more need to grow, and coincidently/conveniently, there will also be no more temptation. Even the bad things that happen that aren’t a temptation, our sovereign God also allows those things to happen to us, and they are for His good. We can only speculate as to how for now, but we are not meant to know the answers to all things, but we have faith in His love and goodness. Duet 29:29 “The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may follow all the words of this law.”