" I am born again", are you?
- Thread starter look3467
- Start date
All born in the flesh must one day die. (Inevitable and a given)
But then, there is the spiritual side of which the following applies:
Heb 9:27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
Of which death is it speaking about in that verse: Physical death or spiritual death?
When knowledge first comes into our lives, we find death (Spirit) is our end, but then the judgment begins, for the flesh.
Rom 7:10 And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.
Begins, meaning that now we stand on our own behavior. We are judged daily with every word and action we do, (against that what God's instructions are), by God and the public.
Gal 6:7 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.
This is a personal judgment accountable only to our selves.
But God intervened in our behalf and took the first death away and upon acknowledgment of Him, there is no second death.(Better termed: no more death)
So, if we acknowledge Jesus Christ as our Savior, we are born of Him (His Spirit) and we die no more. (Spiritually speaking)
We understand that separation from God is death? And that that is what Jesus came to fix? And that He has done it for all mankind?
Like all of us, He to died physically, which matters nothing. But that He arose again to life, is what is KEY to our salvation, for if He arose again, so will we.
That is why it says: Rom 6:4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
Now, we have a choice, either accept Him now and recieve the full benefits of His Kingdom here on earth, or wait till you die, meantime enduring this life without Him.
Why when we get sick, or are close to death we suddenly look to God for help? Or when we get into deep trouble we suddenly remember that maybe if there is a God He might help us?
We are human beings with weaknesses of the flesh, therefore, in order to get above that, we need to have in us a higher power that what the flesh can give, and that is Gods power over the flesh.
Yes, many of you may think to be content in your own selves for as long as your health holds out, but get cancer or some terminal sickness, and see if your thoughts don't turn to wonder, if maybe there really is a God?
Why wait for such times, when you can start right now to enjoy the benefits of His Kingdom?
It does not require any of us to reach a certain status of holiness, or belong to any certain church, or to follow any certain rule.
All that is required is that we have a change of mind! Meaning, believe in Jesus as your only and true Savior of your soul, and confess your sins directly to Him, and He is willing to forgive all your sins and cleanse you from with in, and make you acceptable on to God as faultless.
Jud 1:24 Now unto him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy,
Where ever you are, who ever you are all you have to do is call on Him! That simple, no help from anyone else.
Act 2:21 And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.
Rom 10:14 How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?
Well, you've herded it here and now and so you are without excuse.
Look at it, contemplate it and make a decision as to what you want to believe, and act on it.
Notice: that there is no requirement to belong to any church group?
Going to any church is an indication that you want to be close to God. That is acceptable! Worship where you feel comfortable and can be of service. to God and fellow souls.
If you have God quality type of love, then you can fit in anywhere with anybody regardless if they accept you or not, because you are above all that the flesh is, and nothing can deter you from that love. A sure foundation is Christ.
1Co 3:11 For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
1Co 3:12 Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble;
1Co 3:13 Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is.
1Co 3:14 If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
1Co 3:15 If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.
Peace>>>AJ:love9:
The teacher tells me what is, how it is and my options. I in turn choose to believe what the teacher tells me.
Like I said, you have a choice to believe or not. The option is definitely there whether we like it or not.
But then again, if we should choose to believe, then we are guaranteed acceptance and granted the full membership status in the Christs church.
That's a choice!
Peace>>>AJ:love9:
darkbeaver ,
There is no escape, not even in death--------------------------------
Escape from what..........yourself ? Bin there before ,eh ?
There is no escape, not even in death--------------------------------
Escape from what..........yourself ? Bin there before ,eh ?
CDNBear ,.... I agree, we all in this together and no ones getting out alive.
Ok ,let's talk .If you won't be alive ,what are you going to do in the Grat Hunting Grounds. Are the GHG just a faint hope ,or are they reality ? Let's face it ,you don't know ; but we can talk about it .
Ok ,let's talk .If you won't be alive ,what are you going to do in the Grat Hunting Grounds. Are the GHG just a faint hope ,or are they reality ? Let's face it ,you don't know ; but we can talk about it .
darkbeaver ,
There's no escape from the earth (the garden).
...agree , your body might make a fair feltilizer .
____________________________________________________________
Escape from myself is easy.______________________________
....besides your Ego which is "self created", what is 'myself' ?
There's no escape from the earth (the garden).
...agree , your body might make a fair feltilizer .
____________________________________________________________
Escape from myself is easy.______________________________
....besides your Ego which is "self created", what is 'myself' ?
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Atlas, my friends! Death is the reliever of the pent up spirit/soul of which is bought and paid for.
Thankfully, we had nothing to do with that, had we, we'd be in allot of hurt!
Jesus Christ the deliverer of our souls has performed to perfection the requirement for the penality of of death for all of us.
What we now have because in Him, our souls.are ransomed.
Hos 13:14 I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from mine eyes.
1Co 6:20 For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's.
Pro 13:8 The ransom of a man's life are his riches: but the poor heareth not rebuke.
That is, if we can appreciate the rasom!
Peace>>>AJ:love9:
Yes, it's really me this time... ;-)
I've been thinking about this for about 24 hours. I really have no clear idea what 'born again' means in the Christian context, and as far as I know it has no meaning in any other context. It seems to be an idea unique to certain rather literalist and fundamentalist Christian groups and doesn't appear to have any meaning in what we generally call 'mainstream' Christianity. Whatever that means... I don't recall ever hearing a Catholic or Anglican (Episcopalian for you Americans and Scots) or Lutheran or Baptist or etc. talk about being born again. I note that our resident priest, sanctus, has posted only once in this thread, and that was to address a very specific and rather peripheral point made by WMG that he felt was incorrect (and I agree with him), not to comment on the nature of being born again.
I've encountered the usual Christian proselytizers trying to sell me on the idea. I've even once seen somebody going through an experience she later described as being born again, though what seemed to me to be going on was just an adolescent emotional binge. I don't know whether it stuck either, I haven't seen her for many years. Somebody posted early on in this thread about being born again at the age of 8 at a summer camp, which just leaves me incredulous. Nobody at that age has the knowledge, experience, or critical faculties, to make an informed choice about such things. That smacks of brainwashing to me.
From a deeply religious upbringing I arrived by slow and often painful stages, after years of thought and study, at the atheist position. Nothing else seems rationally defensible to me. If religion is going to represent itself as offering explanations that compete with science, evidence, and reason, and it usually does, then it has to offer testable predictions and be responsible to the evidence and reason, and at that it always fails in my view. To explain the cosmos it postulates something even more mysterious and complex than the cosmos, a deity, then declares itself and everybody else to be incompetent to explain the deity. It creates an infinite regress, who created the deity, who created whoever created the deity, who created that being, etc., which it quite arbitrarily cuts off at the first step. That kind of thinking goes exactly nowhere for me. Every discussion I've ever had in real life with believers ends up with them saying, in essence, "There's more you know." Well no, I don't know that, and nobody's ever offered me any evidence or reason to think that might be a correct claim that doesn't admit of much simpler explanations.
And believe me, I've looked for such evidence and reason, long and hard, because for a long time I wanted to believe, and some parts of me still do sometimes. Who wouldn't want to believe that they'll eventually be reunited with loved ones who've died? But the evidence just isn't there.
I've been thinking about this for about 24 hours. I really have no clear idea what 'born again' means in the Christian context, and as far as I know it has no meaning in any other context. It seems to be an idea unique to certain rather literalist and fundamentalist Christian groups and doesn't appear to have any meaning in what we generally call 'mainstream' Christianity. Whatever that means... I don't recall ever hearing a Catholic or Anglican (Episcopalian for you Americans and Scots) or Lutheran or Baptist or etc. talk about being born again. I note that our resident priest, sanctus, has posted only once in this thread, and that was to address a very specific and rather peripheral point made by WMG that he felt was incorrect (and I agree with him), not to comment on the nature of being born again.
I've encountered the usual Christian proselytizers trying to sell me on the idea. I've even once seen somebody going through an experience she later described as being born again, though what seemed to me to be going on was just an adolescent emotional binge. I don't know whether it stuck either, I haven't seen her for many years. Somebody posted early on in this thread about being born again at the age of 8 at a summer camp, which just leaves me incredulous. Nobody at that age has the knowledge, experience, or critical faculties, to make an informed choice about such things. That smacks of brainwashing to me.
From a deeply religious upbringing I arrived by slow and often painful stages, after years of thought and study, at the atheist position. Nothing else seems rationally defensible to me. If religion is going to represent itself as offering explanations that compete with science, evidence, and reason, and it usually does, then it has to offer testable predictions and be responsible to the evidence and reason, and at that it always fails in my view. To explain the cosmos it postulates something even more mysterious and complex than the cosmos, a deity, then declares itself and everybody else to be incompetent to explain the deity. It creates an infinite regress, who created the deity, who created whoever created the deity, who created that being, etc., which it quite arbitrarily cuts off at the first step. That kind of thinking goes exactly nowhere for me. Every discussion I've ever had in real life with believers ends up with them saying, in essence, "There's more you know." Well no, I don't know that, and nobody's ever offered me any evidence or reason to think that might be a correct claim that doesn't admit of much simpler explanations.
And believe me, I've looked for such evidence and reason, long and hard, because for a long time I wanted to believe, and some parts of me still do sometimes. Who wouldn't want to believe that they'll eventually be reunited with loved ones who've died? But the evidence just isn't there.
How we/I would like to believe we'll be united once again with loved ones, human, canine, or otherwise, is beyond measure. Do I count on it? Certainly not. Wow, this is a mindfull Dex. As far as the born again thing goes, born again, shmorn again. And, did you say brainwashing? Bingo.
"Born-again", in fundamentalist terms is a rather new concept developed by Pentecostal people around the turn of the last century. It is, as they describe the concept, foreign to Christian theology. In real Christian theology, it is a term that refers to the conversion experience one undergoes to become a member of the Church, or of the Body of Christ if you prefer. It indicates a change of heart, or living; of throwing off the mindset of the "old" man and adopting the mindset of Christ. It is, in essence, a life-long experience and not typically something done in an instant. I am deeply suspicious of people who have a "conversion" experience that equates to a quick prayer and "presto", they are "saved". This, in the entire 2,000 year history of the faith, is utterly foreign to Christian doctrines. Writing this is not to forget the famous conversion experienced by St. Paul on the road to Damascus, That rather dramatic experience aside, the majority of people are, basically, on a journey of faith and discovery. We are on the way, hopefully on the right road and hopefully staying on that road. Most of us fall off to the wayside from time to time, but the real struggle of conversion is a lifelong process. No instant, magic fix for us!
I have, as you noted, avoided this thread for these very reasons. Namely, the fact that the theology of our friend AJ is so off-base from what is truly the Christian faith it is, frankly, pointless to debate him on this issue. In honesty, I don't usually concern myself with what is, in truth, a small fringe group of people who assume they are Christians because they've learned to worship the Bible rather than God. The fact is, the majority of Christians subscribe to what you define as the mainstream. that these "born-again" types seem to be so prominent is not due to their actual numbers, but more to their ability to monopolize the media to their belief systems.
With over a billion Roman Catholics, approx 500 million Orthodox and 30 million traditional Anglicans in the world, I am confidant that the majority position of the faith is the more accurate to define.
It is interesting to also note that the "born-again" fringe group is mostly found in the USA. Yet even in that country, their actual numbers are far lower than the mainline Catholic "type" believers.
I can see why and how the responses are what they are. There is within all of us a sense of the spiritual. Defining that spiritual is where the problem really exists.
Who has the right to define the true spiritual side of God? But God Himself!
Look, if we could erase everything we ever learned about religion, start fresh as a young Childs mind, clear of all religious clutter, we would see God Himself describing to us who He really is.
What hinders us from experiencing the true mind of God is our own minds. We want an explanation that we could agree with so as to maybe, just maybe, we might just allow God to touch our hearts and change our lives.
True what Sanctus has said about this concept of “Born again” being accepted by Christians for a short time. But to deny it’s reality after the words of Christ, is to deny what Christ said.
Joh 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
Where these words just spoken for no meaning at all? Or do they represent a re-birth of a new creation? Surely, He stated that in order to see the kingdom of God, one must be born again.
You suppose, He knew what He was talking about as in actually experiencing it Himself to know? Obviously, Yes.
But in order as to not confuse us with something that is very deep, He said the following: Joh 3:7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
You see, the nation of Israel had a structured belief system given to them by God in Moses which is representative by the law as given by Moses.
This law which exposes sin in mankind also condemns mankind to eternal separation, or as I’ve have equated it with spiritual death.
So, Jesus understanding all that, had the monumental task of reversing all that was of “old” thought to that of His new Message.
He was saying in fact as written, “You must be born again” if you want to see God. No if’s and but’s.
He then goes on to explain the process by giving the example by understandable earthly things, such as a seed.
The seed of First Adam was corruptible! Meaning that the flesh became corruptible and in need of becoming some other than corruptible.
But once in the flesh (Corruptible) it would necessitate a re-birth, to an incorruptible seed, which is, the spirit of God.
And as you can see on the next verse explaining the process of how we become incorruptible by “the word” of God.
1Pe 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
“The word of God” is Jesus. He is the incorruptible seed second Adam of re-birth.
Second Adam: because it is a new creation. The “Old” has being done away with, (As far as separation [death] from God is concerned, spiritually speaking) and a new creation instituted. Again: spiritually speaking.
We all die in the flesh, regardless of who or what we are, there is no difference to death of the flesh. All must die!
But concerning the spiritual, we no longer die because of the new creation process. There is no more any longer death to our souls.
All that is left for us to do is believe it!
I prefer to believe it now, and have the heavens for my comfort zone in times of trials and tribulations here on earth.
For He has promised: “I will never leave you or forsake you”. Heb 13:5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
What God hath promised, no man can change it. One can bank on it!
I’m making it real simple folks, because God is not complicated at all! We have made God complicated by our own thinking. Our own minds blind us from the simplicity that is in Christ.
2Co 11:3 But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
Your choice.
Won’t you let God into your heart and let Him show you what He really is like, and quit beating around the bush on man’s theologies?
Very easy: Just ask Him to come and abide in your heart! What’s so difficult about that?
Meditate on that for awhile!
Peace>>>AJ:love9:
P.S. The breaking heart is not a symbol of mine, but that of Christ, because He has so much love for us, that we can not see it for our own stubbornness and lack of trust in Him.
Yet, He waits!
I love that Jesus!!
Who has the right to define the true spiritual side of God? But God Himself!
Look, if we could erase everything we ever learned about religion, start fresh as a young Childs mind, clear of all religious clutter, we would see God Himself describing to us who He really is.
What hinders us from experiencing the true mind of God is our own minds. We want an explanation that we could agree with so as to maybe, just maybe, we might just allow God to touch our hearts and change our lives.
True what Sanctus has said about this concept of “Born again” being accepted by Christians for a short time. But to deny it’s reality after the words of Christ, is to deny what Christ said.
Joh 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
Where these words just spoken for no meaning at all? Or do they represent a re-birth of a new creation? Surely, He stated that in order to see the kingdom of God, one must be born again.
You suppose, He knew what He was talking about as in actually experiencing it Himself to know? Obviously, Yes.
But in order as to not confuse us with something that is very deep, He said the following: Joh 3:7 Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again.
You see, the nation of Israel had a structured belief system given to them by God in Moses which is representative by the law as given by Moses.
This law which exposes sin in mankind also condemns mankind to eternal separation, or as I’ve have equated it with spiritual death.
So, Jesus understanding all that, had the monumental task of reversing all that was of “old” thought to that of His new Message.
He was saying in fact as written, “You must be born again” if you want to see God. No if’s and but’s.
He then goes on to explain the process by giving the example by understandable earthly things, such as a seed.
The seed of First Adam was corruptible! Meaning that the flesh became corruptible and in need of becoming some other than corruptible.
But once in the flesh (Corruptible) it would necessitate a re-birth, to an incorruptible seed, which is, the spirit of God.
And as you can see on the next verse explaining the process of how we become incorruptible by “the word” of God.
1Pe 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
“The word of God” is Jesus. He is the incorruptible seed second Adam of re-birth.
Second Adam: because it is a new creation. The “Old” has being done away with, (As far as separation [death] from God is concerned, spiritually speaking) and a new creation instituted. Again: spiritually speaking.
We all die in the flesh, regardless of who or what we are, there is no difference to death of the flesh. All must die!
But concerning the spiritual, we no longer die because of the new creation process. There is no more any longer death to our souls.
All that is left for us to do is believe it!
I prefer to believe it now, and have the heavens for my comfort zone in times of trials and tribulations here on earth.
For He has promised: “I will never leave you or forsake you”. Heb 13:5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
What God hath promised, no man can change it. One can bank on it!
I’m making it real simple folks, because God is not complicated at all! We have made God complicated by our own thinking. Our own minds blind us from the simplicity that is in Christ.
2Co 11:3 But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.
Your choice.
Won’t you let God into your heart and let Him show you what He really is like, and quit beating around the bush on man’s theologies?
Very easy: Just ask Him to come and abide in your heart! What’s so difficult about that?
Meditate on that for awhile!
Peace>>>AJ:love9:
P.S. The breaking heart is not a symbol of mine, but that of Christ, because He has so much love for us, that we can not see it for our own stubbornness and lack of trust in Him.
Yet, He waits!
I love that Jesus!!