Hi jingle52
Thank you for your invitation to share our thoughts and discuss what we have Learned from the excerpts you have posted. As stated in the General Discussions Board the purpose for this Board is TO DISCUSS what we have learned though it quote:
DOES NOT necessarily represent the views of L. Ray Smith or Bible-Truths.com. Forum Rules Apply. Then Jesus beholding him LOVED HIM [how many times have you read this verse and never saw those two little words ‘loved him?’], and said unto him, ‘One thing you lack:
Ray has expounded further on this Scripture elsewhere in his writing that the One Thing Lacking is JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF. With Christ, nothing more can be desired. It reminds me of Paul who witnessed to this fact also when he said to gain Christ was....
Php 3:8 But no, rather, I also count all things to be loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them to be dung, so that I may win Christgo your way,
Again, as Ray expounds, can anyone save themselves? No. The work of God is to save, redeem and restore. Without Him we can do NOTHING, we can’t even go our way.
sell whatsoever you have
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We know that the sale of everything has spiritual meaning. Whatever we have, we have to know is not ours.
Rom 11:18 do not boast against the branches. But if you boast, it is not you that bears the root, but the root bears you.Rays expose on the King of Babylon not knowing that God had given him everything, also exhibits the requirement to be humble before God. Ray brings to focus that the King had an arrogant and “stout” heart that shows self aggrandizement, self reliance and arrogance before God who Provides everything to everyone. What is amazing is that God did not correct King Nebuchadnezzar for killing and pillaging but for his stout and arrogant heart that falsely assumed that from his own excellence and not God’s, he had acquired his empire and greatness.
Many have failed to see in this verse that Jesus offered this young man the opportunity to not only inherit the kingdom of God, and to have eternal life, and to have treasure in heaven, but to be Christ’s apostle right then and there!
Amo 2:16 And the stout-hearted among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day, says Jehovah. and give to the poor,
Esteeming others better than you is how we lower ourselves and humble ourselves before God. We have to know that the most wretched of us, could have been us had God so authored. Pride and vanity has to go but it can only go in the purging fire of Gods Spirit that repents us to conform to His Image and His Spirit.
and you shall have treasure in heaven:
Of course we shall have treasure in heaven once the purging, cleansing Spirit of God has conformed us to the image of His Son who IS the Treasure in Heaven.
and come, take up the cross, and FOLLOW ME."
Only God can MAKE anyone take up the cross and follow His Son. We need and require His Spirit to follow anything spiritual because our carnality is in deep seated hatred against God.
And the same will happen to you and I over and over again until we are brought to recognize the temporal world does not compare with the spiritual Kingdom of God. Unless we know the value of the pearl of great price to cause us to go sell everything in exchange for it, we will all be distracted by other agendas, other motives and false hopes and an artificial sense of security that pays tribute to idols of the weak heart, as did the man who in bondage to the world, could not come free of the world even when offered by God, to receive appointment in His Kingdom!
That is why it takes next to nothing to persuade the heart of man to DESIRE SIN.
We think we need money, the job, the exotic holidays, liberty from those who Lord it over us, in order to find peace. NO. We need to OVERCOME our false dependence for happiness on money, holidays and externally based pleasures dependent also on our associations and approvals and agreements we assume we have from the people or family in our lives. Jesus did say
Mat 10:35 For I have come to set a man against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.
Mat 10:36 And a man's foes shall be those of his own household.
Mat 10:37 He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.We need to overcome oppressors in whatever form they emerge in our lives and emerge they do! God makes sure of it so that our false reliance on anyone or anything other than Him will be purged corrected and made right. Try drinking sea water and see how much that will quench your thirst! God will show you! We all have to experience evil in order to come to know and appreciate God for He is good.
All our wrong desires, leaning on our own understanding that causes us to believe false teachings and blasphemies, following after illusions in our desert wildernesses, have to be repented. The Spirit of God is the living water. He is our thirst quencher and our soul provider.
By contrast, the only kind of peace we need, is what God provides and not what the world offers to the lust of the eyes, flesh and pride of life. We will repent if not in this life in Judgment now, then in the next, in the Day of Judgment. God will teach us all that no peace can come from worldliness just as Ray shows us that nothing spiritual can ever be attained physically. Same thing. It is not worldly comfort that produces love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, patience and endurance. These attributes can only come from the Fruit of HIS SPIRIT.
Regarding your desire to see your family in SA. This is not a sin. Paul also ached to be with his brethren for reasons of fellowshipping with like minded believers. I personally have NO ONE who is like minded in my family. It has hurt so much to be purged to the realization of that fact. It has liberated me but as the man who went away sad, I could not have agreed to the purging or the consuming fire of God. God had to make me and sustain me as He does in each of our circumstances according to His Plan and Purpose Timing and Wisdom and Love.
It is good that you are grateful for your job. Be grateful that you are healthy and that God is providing you what you need and purging you of what you want. That is a privilege of great value and merit in the work He is doing in you to prepare you for His Kingdom.
God’s Will always and everywhere, BE Done! May you and I and all, always prefer to will His Will as did the Son of God in Gethsemane. We all have to go through that garden of circumstance in some of the most heart agonizing conditions where our pain also bleeds out of our minds in anguish and hurt from our experiences authored for us to experience and only through God’s Mercy, endure. It is appointed to us all, to experience evil that few will overcome. The one thing we need IS Christ who has overcome the world.
Perhaps God is teaching you to eat the Fruit of His Patience for now jingle52.!
Thank you for the Thread
Arc