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I don't know what a "Gnostic" Christian is. I have heard the term many times. I once think I looked it up and it means something who believes in secret teachings or such. If that is what it means then if I believe in something then it is no longer secret to me. So I may have the meaning all wrong. All I know is what the Word of God teaches me by the Holy Spirit.
Secret teaching was an overused term in that day unfortunately. You can basically for get it. In that day mostly all the temples and schools had their secret side. Even today if you look at some of the social clubs you will find secrets that are not secrets.
Yes, I agree with sciotamicks here. I don't why people claim Adam was perfect. Everyone shows that was not the case.
To the contrary. God is perfect and can only create that which is perfect. Adam was created humanly perfect. Without sin. He had a relationship with God which was based on love and which would continue as long as he obeyed the one prohibition that God had placed upon him. When Adam sinned he acquired a propensitity for sin. Adam's disobedience brought about immediate spiritual death and eventually physical death. This made salvation necessary, and shifted Adam's and all subsequent mankind's point of contact with God to justice rather than love. When God saw all that He had made, including Adam, He said it was very good (Gen 1:31). God cannot create anything that is imperfect and then say that it is very good.
Just as Adam had been created perfect but chose to disobey God, so also Lucifer had been created perfect and rebelled against God.
Ezekiel 28:11 'Again the word of the LORD came to me saying, 12] ''Son of man, take up a lamentation over the king of Tyre (reference to Satan who was the power behind the throne of Tyre), and say to him, 'Thus says the LORD God, ''You had the seal of perfection, Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty, ...15] ''You were blameless in your ways From the day you were created, Until unrighteousness was found in you.
The angels were created perfect, and man was created perfect. Both fell through a volitional decision to disobey God.
God gave them the law and told them to make a choice as to who they would serve. They SAID they would serve God but we know that they didn't and what God showed was that they couldn't. That is the message we learn of the Old Covenant. But the reality is that all that believe DO OBEY His Commandments and that eventually ALL will obey. So His DESIRE is still unfolding.
It's not that the Jews couldn't serve God (which is not the same as keeping the law - which man can't keep) but that they wouldn't. Some who did serve God were Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. There was Joseph. There was Moses, Caleb, and Joshua. There was David. There was Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah. There were of course others. Though Israel as a whole disobeyed God, there were individuals who did serve God.
I won't reply to your last sentence because that's getting into Universalism which is still temporarily not supposed to be discussed on the forum.
Not at all. Satan doesn't exist apart from man. No man = no Satan. You can't have Satan without there being man. Also, realize that the verses you quoted shows that this person will eventually be ASHES and "never shalt thou be any more".
To the contrary. Satan is not a manifestation of Man's nature. Satan is an angel who fell.
Job 1:6 'Now there came a day when the sons of God (angels) came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them. 7] And the LORD said to Satan, ''From where do you come?'' Then Satan answered the LORD and said, ''From roaming about on the earth and walking around on it.
Revelation 12:7 'And there was war in heaven, Michael and his angels waging war with the dragon. And the dragon and his angels waged war, 8] and they were not strong enough, and there was no longer a place found for them in heaven. 9] And the great dragon was thrown down, the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was thrown down to the earth, and his angels were thrown down with him.
And who do you think tempted Jesus in the wilderness but Satan. Simply read Matthew 4:1-11.
And who is it but Satan who gets locked up in the abyss for the duration of the Millennium (Rev 20).
Yes it was by design for those things to happen at this time at least according to God:
Rom 8:20 For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope,
So God is saying that were were made subject to vanity by His will - and not our own.
God condemned all mankind for Adam's original sin, and then provided the promise of salvation. Man must choose to say 'yes' or 'no' to the gospel message.
Now listen. Man has free will because man was created in the image of God. This refers to a shadow image. Just as God has invisible but real attributes, God created man with certain invisible but real attributes. For instance, just as God is sovereign, He gave man volition - free will.
Man has free will because God desired a relationship with His creatures - both angels and man, based on reciprocal love. Apart from free will a reciprocal love relationship would not be possible.
Man has free will in order to resolve the angelic conflict. The invisible spiritual warfare in which man is involved.
God's will falls into three categories. 1) His overruling will, 2) His directive will, and 3) His permissive will. Man's free will functions under God's permissive will. Simply do a search on these terms.
But I WONT respond if I'm carnal. That is the point. The carnal mind HATES God.
Rom 8:7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
enmity = hate
So if I'm carnal, that scripture tells me that I hate God, and therefore, it is incomprehensible that something that hates something else will then choose it.
Yes the carnal mind is at enmity against God. But when an unbeliever makes a volitional decision to say yes to the gospel message then he is no longer carnal until the moment he commits his first sin as a new believer. At that point, he becomes carnal again until he chooses to name his sin to God the Father as per 1 John 1:9 and becomes once again filled with the Holy Spirit.
The unbeliever is always carnal. That in no way implys that he cannot respond to the call of the gospel. When the Gospel message is given to an unbeliever, the Holy Spirit convicts the unbeliever of sin (the sin of unbelief), of righteousness, and of judgment (John 16:8-11). This is the common grace ministry of God the Holy Spirit at the point of Gospel hearing.
As for the believer, he is either in a state of carnality or spirituality depending on whether he has any unconfessed sin. This is why the believer is commanded to be filled with the Holy Spirit (Eph 5:18).
In 1 Corintians 3:3 believers are being called carnal (fleshly) by Paul. Yet they can choose to get back into fellowship with God at any time by simply availing themselves of God's grace provision of naming their sins to God. Then it is up to them to make the right decisions regarding taking in the word of God and advancing spiritually.
It is a gross distortion of the principle man's depravity to say that he cannot respond to God's call.
The carnal mind is at enmity with God. But with a simple volitional decision to respond to the gospel (unbeliever) or to name your sins to God (believer), there is no more carnality and thus no more emnity. The believer has the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, but also retains his old sin nature. Which of the two is in control of the believers soul depends on the volitional choice of the believer.
Last edited by Michael Way; 01-21-2011 at 01:20 AM..
If God has this great plan, that we and he cannot deviate from, then none of us, including God, have free will.
If we can deviate from it then we can say that we, including God, have free will.
To believe in the plan is to believe, as I do, that all is perfect at any given point in time.
Most do not follow my thinking on this because they do not understand the perfection of the reality we live in.
Most believe we live under imperfect condition.
If things are not perfect right now, then it would mean that we are off the plan.
Imperfection within the perfect plan.
Is that even possible in your thinking?
How do you resolve this catch 22 paradox?
Regards
DL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hk41Gbjljfo
The weird yet perfect plan.
Satan, a surprise to God.
Losing 1/3 of angels.
Eden, the fall.
Exodus, harden Pharaoh’s heart.
Repent of creating man.
Use genocide on man.
Having his son murdered.
End time, another genocide.
Having more souls in hell than heaven.
Begin as master of all. End as a back sliding master of just some.
All these failures for God in his perfect plan?
I think things kind of fall somewhere "between" free will and no free will.
In the sense that God indeed has a plan for humanity, and He has loved and justified all mankind through His Son, and this because He put us all in Adam first.
This to me, doesn't mean that we aren't "free" to do a lot of things, at least pertaining to this life: buy the house we like, marry the person we love, do work we enjoy, etc. But none of these things affect God's overall plan. And His plan is to bring all men to salvation: some now, some later. But all through the Son. (There is no other way, because only Jesus was a "successful" Adam, and His death and Life cover us all.)
To the contrary. God is perfect and can only create that which is perfect. Adam was created humanly perfect.
In Genesis we read God created and saw it was good or perfect (depending on the translation)
Quote:
Without sin
But it doesn't state Adam was without sin.
What is perfect? That greatly depends on the context.
For a churgeon perfection is so cure all patients.
For an army general perfection is to wipe out 10,000 enemy troops in one hour.
So to know what God calls perfect you have to know what His plan is. (Teaching according to me)
If Adam was perfect just like Father Himself then Adam would never have sinned. Father can not sin.
Father is perfect. Father called Adam perfect.
Perfect Father never sinned. Perfect Adam did sin.
Did the perfect Father create a not so perfect world?
That's a contradiction if you believe the only perfect thing can be something without sin.
My take on this is that perfect is about that creation was exactly as God intended it to be for His plan of the Ages.
To the contrary. God is perfect and can only create that which is perfect. Adam was created humanly perfect. Without sin. He had a relationship with God which was based on love and which would continue as long as he obeyed the one prohibition that God had placed upon him. When Adam sinned he acquired a propensitity for sin. Adam's disobedience brought about immediate spiritual death and eventually physical death. This made salvation necessary, and shifted Adam's and all subsequent mankind's point of contact with God to justice rather than love. When God saw all that He had made, including Adam, He said it was very good (Gen 1:31). God cannot create anything that is imperfect and then say that it is very good.
Just as Adam had been created perfect but chose to disobey God, so also Lucifer had been created perfect and rebelled against God.
Ezekiel 28:11 'Again the word of the LORD came to me saying, 12] ''Son of man, take up a lamentation over the king of Tyre (reference to Satan who was the power behind the throne of Tyre), and say to him, 'Thus says the LORD God, ''You had the seal of perfection, Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty, ...15] ''You were blameless in your ways From the day you were created, Until unrighteousness was found in you.
The angels were created perfect, and man was created perfect. Both fell through a volitional decision to disobey God.
Mike,
If Adam were perfect, he wouldn't sin. You know why because that is what the perfect man can do:
Jas 3:2 For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.
The perfect man can put down ALL sin. Adam was not a perfect man. The scriptures prove it.
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