Dear Gregory:
Interesting that you bring up Aristotle.
He believed that the EARTH was the center of the universe. He believed there were five elements, fire, water, earth, air and another element the planets were made of ether. Not bad thinking for the apparent greatest thinker of all creation.
What scientist said that in LOGIC there are no MORALS." everyone is at liberty to build up his own logic that is. his own form of language as he wishes. All that is required is that if he wishes , to discuss he must state his methods clearly and give snytactic rules instead of philosophical arguments. Another way of looking at it is that the most common substance on the earth is common sense and everyone is a firm believer that he is well supplied in it.( since it is so common ).
Your idea of perfection and why mankind has never been able to "face God " because of our sin needs a little 'gregorising' if I can invent a term. This is where you are viewing God as a God of judgement rather than the God of love that I KNOW.
The reason that Moses saw only saw the back of God, not his face and the reason that to see God face to face is to see death is not because of sin it is because of flesh. You see, God loves the sinner, though your sins are unforgiven he loves YOU. It is the SIN he hates.NOT YOU ( please forgive the CAPS )!! Man. I got to get you to understand this !
God approaches sinners all the time, He reveals himself to them all the time, He is saving hundreds of them every day. It is our flesh that stops God from showing Himself to us. To see God in the flesh, our flesh cannot stand it. You would go into cardiac arrest, He revealed to you this way would, be so beautiful, so awe inspiring , that it would bring death because our nervous systemn could not stand it.
After salvation, the Holy Spirit indwells every believer. His spirit ministers to our spirit . Remember his kingdom is a spiritual kingdom.
Yes God's standard is perfection but that perfection will never be gotten in ourselves. It was the perfection of Christ that God attributes to Christians. When you accept Christ you must become as a little child for you are reborn in the spiritual realm as an infant.
This is what the world does not understand about Christians. We are in the process of being made Christlike not having obtained that goal here nor will we ever on this earth. It is a process. But through the blood of Christ we are viewed as spotless.
Your attempts to querry me about my works or deeds or giving of my time is none other than an attempt to get me to admit to myself that I am not perfect. For what is the limit of my good deeds what is the limit of my giving to the hungry or charities. There is no limit in these acts of kindness. What God requires is that the heart be right not the act. When the heart is right God leads me and guides me into areas where I give generously, and not grudgingly, not out of compulsion but freely in Christ.
God forbid if I view grace as an excuse to neglect my Christian responsibilities.
I have discussed at length on these threads how grace is the greater responsibility. Greater than under the Law.
Likewise the penalty for refusing the dispensation of grace must, should, has to be, more severe . Also the penalty for living under grace and then falling from grace is almost unthinkable.
I however am excited about the possibilities of the Lord reaching out to you. Please consider me a lowly servant of the Lord on the one hand ,but on the other hand I thank the Lord for sending you to me. I see you as a future member of a Royal Society. A future citizen of a Holy nation . A royal priest. A future Ambassador of the God of all Creation. In Christ.gregor |
