Hello Darren
What I mean is not important. Here is what the scriptures say to which I was refering when I made the comment you have placed under question.
Col 2 : 20
If then you have died with Christ to material ways of looking at things and have escaped from the world’s crude and elemental notions and teachings of externalism, why do you live as if you still belong to the world? Gal 5 : 17
...for the desires of the flesh are opposed to the Holy Spirit and the desires of the Spirit are opposed to the flesh, godless human nature; for these are antagonistic to each other, continually withstanding and in conflict with each other, so that you are not free but are prevented from doing what you desire to do. You say :
So let us before we let our carnal pride get hurt, reach out to the other and seek a greater understanding of their view-point,.....show me the scripture that supports this opinion of yours…..not the scripture you think says what you mean but the scripture that says what you say....that before we let our carnal prideget hurt, reach out to each other......to each other not to Jesus Christ!....Bring me one scripture that says that!......
in away that does not force ones point of view. Being in agreement with one another is ever so much more than simply believing "God is love!" Believing God might be simple but it is not easy. It is a lifes work.
John 6 : 28,29, 35 They then said,
What are we to do, that we may be working the works of God? 29 Jesus replied, This is the work, service that God asks of you; that you believe in the One Whom He has sent, that you cleave to, trust, rely on, and have faith in His Messenger. “I do not cleave to trust in rely on and have faith in Ray or anyone lower than I esteem Ray to be and I esteem Ray VERY highly as a teacher of Christ.
You say :
Rather, being like-minded is being courteous and acting with compassion towards one another, promoting unified understanding. Wrong again : Eph 4 : 11-13
And His gifts were varied; He Himself appointed and gave men to us, some to b e apostles, special messentgers, some prophets, inspired preachers and expounders, some evangelists, preachers of the Gospel, travelling missionaries, some pastors shepherds of His flock and teachers. 12 His intention was the perfecting and the full equipping of the saints, His consecratged people, that they should do the work of ministering toward building up Christ’s body the church. ( I believe I contribute in this way) 13 That it might develop until we all attain oneness in the faith and in the comprehension of the full and accurate knowledge of the SON OF GOD. (Not in the full comprehension and accurate knowledge of each others opinions in order to protect our carnal pride from being hurt! You say :
So let us before we let our carnal pride get hurt, reach out to the other and seek a greater understanding of their view-point, This will not only promote spiritual love amongst us, but also be pleasing to God…..There is no way in all eternity that I desire to agree or even be part of that suggestion!....May God forbid!
Your flattery of what you think I know is noted. I should warn you however, if God wants to send me Alzheimer’s disease, HE CAN! Anything that you see or hear of Christ in me is HIM. ALL HIM.
Sue
Thank you for your kind words. I too am still learning how not to dance with the beast.
“I wish you well” for me represents Agape as the type of love that is on a one way street. The love of God for one’s neighbour as one’s self is the love for and desire expressed in the knowledge that repentance is good, caves are not good, correction is healthy, living in a dark mind is not healthy, and to be made clean and changed from wickedness to holiness is a result of the purifying fire of God that is GOOD. This one way love is not sentimental. To want evil people to repent, be corrected and cleansed under the fire of God knowing that God will correct all crooked paths and right every wrong is better than the desire that evil people be annihilated or sent to eternal hell and endless suffering. I think of everyone I have EVER met, and I have never met Ray personally, but I can still say, of everyone I have ever known, Ray loves himself the best because he does not want anyone to be in eternal pain or suffering and Ray loves his neighbour with the love of God that he has for himself. It shows because Ray doesn’t love caves or hypocrisy or deceit or idolatry. He loves God! I am perhaps correct when I assume that Ray might know that loving God is not easy or all would be able to do it. No one likes persecution and Ray has his fair share as I see it from the hostility that appears in some of the letters he receives from his detractors.
When we see our neighbours in the dark of deception self willed blindness and lost ness of soul, looseness of mind and emotional decay do we think….if that were me then I’d want to be pulled away from the dark even if I lost a limb of pride in the process or do we think, no I’d want my sores to be licked and my errors to be stroked and I would enjoy the company of agreement and agreeableness from those who would join me in my dark leprous self deception and estrangement from God. Drug addicts like company and so does wickedness. Jesus stood alone and so must we. The way we treat our neighbours will show our allegiance to either HIS light or their darkness.
I have seen and I am sure others can also see that the world teaches allegiance to the dark, addiction to approval, going with the flow, not rocking the boat, staying in line, towing the line, being two faced double minded and in short how to become a wolf in any sheep’s clothing who dares to stray into such a cave of darkness. The hand we give a cave dweller will be bitten if not eaten. The only help we can give is the light. Ray shows what allegiance to light looks like! He knows what sticks and stones look like too. Many e-mails to Ray show that cave dwellers hate the light of one way, one sided Agape Godly love.
As we see how Judas kissed Jesus we see a different appearance of love. Pileo two way love should not be taken for granted or demonstrated without mutual consent as did Judas when he gave Jesus a Phileo kiss that Jesus did not return. The church does exactly today what Judas did then.
While Godly Agape love can be given without merit Phileo love has to be mutual. I believe that Peter did not take this Phileo love mutuality for granted. Perhaps he felt that after he denied knowing Jesus three times that he had forfeited the phileo love bond through his own words of denial. Was this why he ran away and cried bitterly once he was brought to realise that the phileo love could so easily be broken from the human side of self preservation? Peter wept but he had not betrayed Christ he had denied knowing him which was an outright lie. In contrast Judas said he knew Christ and he betrayed him and this is exactly the profile of Christendom. Their darkness is great and I am not going in to their cave of horrors!
Judas wished Jesus well in his phileo kiss and made a public display of it but he had no love Agape for Jesus at all. Judas wanted to go on record as showing that he wished Jesus well so as to duck out of blame for betrayal. How many well wishers do you know. They smile at you and say all the right things to you and they convince you they are sincere and will even go on public record to say how much they truly wish you well? Like Judas showing himself to be wishing Jesus well. Getting himself onto public opinion that he wishes Jesus well. “ Here, see how much I kiss you. Hey I wish you well too but I do not love you so do not blame me for your fate….said the wolf to the lamb.”
Peter said I do not know Him. Judas said, sure I know Him, and I wish Him well. Judas had no love and claimed to both know Jesus and wish Him well. The Church also claims to know Jesus also wishes Jesus well but it too has NO LOVE. Jesus entrusted Peter with His sheep and commanded him to feed them. He chose to give Peter Phileo love. Peter had loved him with all his heart and wept bitterly. Do we weep for our failures and weakness and liability to self preservation? Do I? I am starting to from a very deep place inside of me as I write this…… Judas got angry and self destructive. Peter wept bitterly but he did not go and hang himself. I am not going to hang myself either and like you my brothers and sisters I believe we would rather just drown ourselves in weeping into Gods Agape love.
I believe true Phileo love is an elect love for Christ. It can not be paraded as Judas did and as Christandom does. It is entered into and given by Christ to those HE chooses who do love God with all their strength and who do unto others as they would have others do unto themselves. It is an elect love as I see it. This Phileo elect love originates from Christ and was not taken for granted, assumed or imagined by Peter when Jesus asked Peter whether Peter Phileo loved Him. Peter answered Jesus by saying that he Agape loved Him and did not take the status or position of saying assumption or claim to Phileo love. He had denied knowing Jesus. He grieved when Jesus changed His question to ask him the third time if he loved Him with Agape one way love. Will Peter answer in the same way to Jesus if he is asked the same questions after Peter is resurrected? I believe Petrers fidelity to loving God with all his might and heart shows that he is not only called but chosen to share in the Phileo love only Christ gives to His elect.
He chose Peter. He did not choose Judas. Jesus is the groom. HE chooses His bride. HE proposes marriage to HIS Bride. The want-to-be Harlot is
not the Bride of Christ. Peter was faithful and no doubt has a “well done my good and faithful servant “waiting to be heard in his ear at his resurrection! the way Ray is running I think he is going to get the same reward too! We can all hope for the same reward but our work is actually to imitate Christ not as the Church does but as did Peter in humble recognition that he can not get enguaged to Christ, it is Christ who offers enguagement to His Bride.
John 15 :16
You have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you and I have appointed you, I have planted you, that you might go and bear fruit and keep on bearing, and that your fruit may be lasting that it may remain, abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in My Name AS PRESENTING ALL THAT I AM....PRESENTING ALL THAT I AM, He may give it to you. Now you don't have to agree with anything I say or anything I think or share but you do have to know and agree with what He says. That is the truth.
He is our light!
Peace to you
Arcturus