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Who is my brother? NO REALLY
ciy:
I believe that this is a big struggle for all of us (especially me) to stay the course of Christ and let go of all of our idols of the heart and do what he commands. When we are focused on "Who is my brother?' We are yet carnal and our focus is in an old idol.
3Jo 1:5 Beloved, thou doest faithfully whatsoever thou doest to the brethren, and to strangers;
Mt 5:47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
Stay focused on filling up with the Word so that you will be attaining the mind of Jesus. These words are spiritual. We must stop trying to make them physical and make the physical spiritual.
Stop thinking like a man thinks. It will only make you return to the law and you will become more of a pharisee. When we say, "Oh I see now. I need to be as good a husband to my wife as I can and then I will become like Christ." NO. You will go back to Egypt and puff up like a pharisee.
Focus on these verses. Ponder them for a long time. Think of what it means. It does not have any carnal meaning you can come up with.
Pr 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.
Isa 55:8 For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
Isa 55:9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.
Ps 37:4 Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart.
We cannot reason out evil with a manufactured evil mind. You have to believe God. We say be balanced. You cannot, will not, ever be balanced and be able to attain that mark which is set before all of us in Christ.
Impossible.
If I do not realize it is God's plan and above my own prideful reasoning then I will always be taking side roads that look good to my carnal mind. A carnal mind that has moved to a new spiritual level, but that ain't the last level and I must continue to wipe it clean or seven demons that I never knew before will come in and make home and I will think "Well I am a lot better than I use to be so this must be the place. Now I can spread out in my new abode and furnish it with my new understanding and make my place here for the rest of my carnal life".
Do not stop fighting the good fight for that next precept or line. Do whatever is on your heart to do. If you physically restrain a deep, ugly desire and are abel to keep it down even though it is still there then you are deceived and will die in your sins. You must not resist evil but let evil do its job. God made it all good for his good will and his plan. Until you stop trying outwardly to love a mate that you do not like but you carnally disguise it the rest of your life, you build yourself up and take your eyes off of the only true way to love her. Christ in you. The only way for evil to kill off the flesh is for you to delight yourself in the Lord and then always act out the desire of your heart until it is purged out and no longer a desire.
Hope this comes into to your ears and heart.
CIY
YellowStone:
Well said CIY. :)
We must never loose site of the calling, the past is history and should be used as such. God was with us then, and he is with us now.
Great post! :)
Your brother in Christ,
Darren
Kat:
Hi ciy,
I would like to comment on a few things in your post.
--- Quote --- When we are focused on "Who is my brother?' We are yet carnal and our focus is in an old idol.
--- End quote ---
When you state "we are yet carnal," in the scripture this is referring to those who are remaining as infants in Christ on milk only, not moving on to spiritual maturity.
1Co 3:1 But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people, but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.
v. 2 I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not ready for it. And even now you are not yet ready,
v. 3 for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh and behaving only in a human way?
We are to be striving towards maturity in Christ, which is necessary to move on from being infants. WE are becoming mature by putting aside these old carnal things of the flesh.
Heb 6:1 Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God,
v. 2 and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.
v. 3 And this we will do if God permits.
Col 1:27 To them God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.
v. 28 Him we proclaim, warning every man and teaching every man in all wisdom, that we may present every man mature in Christ.
--- Quote ---I need to be as good a husband to my wife as I can and then I will become like Christ." NO. You will go back to Egypt and puff up like a pharisee.
--- End quote ---
We are still physical and in so being we do need to be striving "to be as good a husband to my wife as I can," or wife to a husband. And I do not consider that in doing so that I am getting puffed up, but rather it is helping me become more like Christ, in putting somebody else's needs before myself.
1Peter 3:1 Likewise you wives, be submissive to your husbands, so that some, though they do not obey the word, may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives,
--- Quote ---We cannot reason out evil with a manufactured evil mind. You have to believe God. We say be balanced. You cannot, will not, ever be balanced and be able to attain that mark which is set before all of us in Christ.
Impossible.
--- End quote ---
Of course we can not attain the mark without Christ, but for those with Christ in them, well here are a few of the scripture on this.
Mat 19:26 But Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."
Mar 9:23 And Jesus said to him, "If you can! All things are possible for one who believes."
Mar 10:27 Jesus looked at them and said, "With man it is impossible, but not with God. For all things are possible with God."
We are not still carnal minded, those with Christ in them have been buried with Christ and have a"newness of life," not the old carnal self.
Rom 6:4 We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
v. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
v. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
2Co 5:17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
I am not trying to sound harsh, I'm just seeing these things differently :)
mercy, peace, and love
Kat
Nelson:
Hi folks,
Well put CIY,
* "Him it behoveth to increase, and me to become less" (Jo 3:30)
Love, grace and peace to you all
Nelson
YellowStone:
Kat, please forgive me if I am wrong here, but I think you might have missed CIY's point. :(
You wrote: "We are to be striving towards maturity in Christ, which is necessary to move on from being infants. WE are becoming mature by putting aside these old carnal things of the flesh."
While I certainly agree with you that we should be striving towards maturity, by whoses eyes are we "becoming more mature?"
Paul clearly recognized his problems with the sin in his yet carnal body.
Rom 7:18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but [how] to perform that which is good I find not.
Rom 7:19 For the good that I would I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do.
Rom 7:20 Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.
I tend to think that Paul was one of the most enlightened and mature person in the Christ / post Christ era, yet he still fell victim to the the evil within him, the same evil that is in each of us. Paul had long since left the elementary doctrine, yet had not left sin. Will any man, woman or child ever be found spiritually mature enough to be found sin free?
Luke 18:8 ... when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?
This is a very good question. By whose measure are we to guage faith? By our own, or by the one who gives it.
Luk 17:5 And the apostles said unto the Lord, Increase our faith.
Luk 17:6 And the Lord said, If ye had faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye might say unto this sycamine tree, Be thou plucked up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea; and it should obey you.
By all accounts our faith is as nothing, when compared to that of our spiritual brother, Christ. Yet we are not without hope.
Rom 5:2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
--- Quote ---We are not still carnal minded, those with Christ in them have been buried with Christ and have a"newness of life," not the old carnal self.
Rom 6:4 We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
v. 5 For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.
v. 6 We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin.
--- End quote ---
Kat, Paul say's it say's it all in vs' 6. "We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin."
Christ died on the cross and was rectified in order to pay the ransom for our sins. It is foolish to think that we are no longer subject to the influence of Satan. However, we can rest assured that: "Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me" (Rom 7:20) will not be held against us.
We should take comfort in our Faith and the promise given us, yet we should never become prideful over the "spiritual" knowledge one has.
For all spiritual knowledge, good or evil is of God.
Jhn 3:34 For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure [unto him].
Man cannot think without cause, and nor can man act. All is of God, and I agree with CIY, there are lessons in everything, in the good and the bad.
Kat, I can truly see where you are coming from, but please never forget Satan and his hold on us still, just as Paul clearly did not. We are still of this world.
Jhn 8:23 And he said unto them, Ye are from beneath; I am from above: ye are of this world; I am not of this world.
Please do not take this response as being harsh, for I am able to see the point that CIY was making and your own.
Love to you in Christ,
Your brother,
Darren
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