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The Bible calls Jesus the carpenter.
But the use of that term has slightly changed in it's meaning over time.
We in the modern times tend to think of Jesus the "carpenter" as a guy who built chairs, or fixed a table.
That is not really the best understanding of the term.
A more true idea would be that Jesus was a "Home builder"
The things jesus would do would be to pile up rocks and bricks, then plaster the walls and then add beams overhead to hold up the roof.
This is also why some Bibles will point out that Carpenter also might mean stone mason.
This hints also at another verse where Jesus spoke of going to the father to prepare a place for us.
The words Jesus used are terms a person used to talk of a building project.
45so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous
God's love for all is clearly presented here. God bless.
Well I believe the just to be believers and the unjust to be unbelievers
That can well be true in context.
Lets say you are a big church-going Christian.
Lets also say the guy who lives at the next farm is an evil man who has never once darkens the door of a church or bent the knee in prayer.
The storm comes, should you think for one moment that the hail in the clouds will not fall on your fields?
Should you think for one moment that your field will be missed and only the field of the other guy will be mowed down due to his lack of faith in God?
You cant....
God does not work that way, nor does His world run that way...
The wind blows where it will, we don't even see it coming and we don't know where it is going after it passes us.
Some idea in your head is not sufficient to replace what you do. These days I am using the description, "FOLLOWERS of Jesus," rather than "BELIEVERS in Jesus" as a generic term for members of the Eclessia. "God will recompense the every human according to their deeds." "Be ye doers of the Word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves."
James 1:22-25 (AV)...
22 But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves.
23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass:
24 For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.
25 But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed.
"Perfect" means "finished," "mature." The law of "maturity" is "liberty." You don't get the keys to the car with "freedom to use it until you qualify by "finishing" your instructions on how to use it. In our meetings it is not all bound under one, but it is being subject to one another. The "elders," meaning the "mature" ones, maintain the "liberty" of the Spirit to be the head of His people, preventing whoever would take over the meeting from doing so.
Beyond "just" and "righteous" is "blessed." The "blessed of God" can expect his field to not suffer hail, while a wicked neighbor is hailed out. When I was a boy we went out and looked at just such a marvel. The Godly man and his family had prayed for their their crops near harvest when the storm came. The hail didn't fall on his field but did destroy the neighbors crops on all sides. The hail stopped at his fence line! More stories could be offered. May you find and walk in "the blessing of God!"
Last edited by JamesMRohde; 07-01-2009 at 03:55 PM..
Excuse me Fundy why did Peter say the just for the unjust ? . Like i said on my first post on this thread ,the just and righteous you were referring to no longer exist under the new covenant , for ALL had sinned , there is none righteous no not ONE . There is no escaping this fact . He is our righteousness .
So when Peter says the just for the unjust he was talking about Christ not a bunch of self righteous just men.
1 Peter 3 verse 18
18For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:
45so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Who are the righteous and who are the unrighteous?
You know whats funny is that when Jesus said this there wasn't any such thing as Christianity. By the time he said this the disciples still didn't comprehend that he had to die. I believe what Jesus is referring to here is a little more deep that Christian and non-Christian. First of all he was speaking to the Hebrews, and they were living by the law. In their minds he was referring to the Hebrew and the heathen nations. But he is calling into mind the fact that even those who had the law were condemned by the law as all were trespassers of the law.
Now, we know its deeper than this surface meaning. He also is referring to the very real natures of Good and evil. Though all are affected by both natures, some are particularly predisposed to one or the other and it is evident in the fruit that they bare. Paul mentions that a gentile living by the conviction of his own conscience, doing the things of the law though he has not the law, is a law unto himself. Jesus tells of the Samaritan and the pharisees and the man hurt in the street. The Samaritans were certainly not Christians but in this particular parable the Samaritan was a symbol of someone without the law fulfilling the law. That person may not have a head knowledge of God or particular election in their spiritual "cast", but they have a heart knowledge of God. Just and unjust, good and evil are abstract oppositions that encompass a far greater expanse of reality then believer vs. unbeliever.
it's all up to the context.
Jesus died for the unjust...this is not talking about "non-Christians" but seems to be talking more about the normal unjust way of all mankind.
He died for us while we were yet enemies of God....
Now I have never been a real enemy of God, but I count myself as part of the unjust "we" in this case because I owe my salvation to he Grace of God alone.
So I am in a very real way part of the great multitude of unjust people who have been made just via Christ.
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