Hi Ricky,
is it possible to do these things, serve, obey, and even love God without believing the truth ? about Him.
We are all carnal through and through until we receive the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to obey and serve God and bare the fruit of the Spirit. I believe that the Truth is the foundation that all believers must stand on.
Rom 8:7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be.
http://bible-truths.com/lake15-B.html ----------
"And we are His witnesses of these things; and so is also the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to them that OBEY Him" (Acts 5:32).
And so Romans 8:7 teaches us that we can’t obey God without His Spirit, and Acts 5:32 teaches us that God only gives His Spirit to those who do obey Him.
v
Man’s will is not free. Man has a will, but it is not free from the causes that make it do what it does.
v
Remember in Part A I showed you that it all starts in the HEART and mind, not in the will. Just start adding up all the Scriptural truths that we have learned and this whole thing of human will becomes very simple to understand.
"For from within, out of the HEART of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, Thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: All these evil things come from within, and defile the man" (Mark 7:21-23).
The HEART is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked [Hebrew: ‘exceeding weak’] who can know it" (Jer. 17:9).
"Because the carnal mind is enmity [hatred] against God: for it is NOT subject to the law of God, neither indeed CAN BE [neither is it ABLE]" (Rom. 8:7).
"Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then may ye also do good, that are accustomed [carnal-minded from our birth, as the nation of Israel was] to do evil" (Jer. 13:23).
"For it is God which works in you both TO WILL and TO DO of His good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13).
"In Whom also we have OBTAINED an inheritance, being PREDESTINATED according to the PURPOSE of Him Who works ALL THINGS after the counsel of HIS OWN WILL" (Eph. 1:11).
There are FIVE "causes" listed in just this one sentence.
"For we are HIS WORKMANSHIP, [this is the cause an force behind our Christian walk. We are ‘His workmanship’ in action, not some presumed freedom of the will in action] created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has BEFORE ORDAINED that we should walk in them" (Eph. 2:10).
Etc., etc.
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Mat 11:27 All things have been delivered to Me by My Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father. Nor does anyone know the Father except the Son, and the one to whom the Son wills to reveal Him.
Until the Holy Spirit comes in we do not even know God, much less love Him.
mercy, peace and love
Kat