Enow, Tommy said this...
1) Season of Deep felt Godly Sorrow for sin. (Invoked by Spirit of Truth working, Jh16:8)
yet you said this...
Your references does not show how believers should repent. It is no wonder why so many, including myself, see you preaching repentance by the flesh instead of by faith in the Son of God.
Godly sorrow for sin wrought through conviction wrought by the Holy Spirit bringing a deep seated conviction in the soul which leads to a change of mind is "preaching repentance by the flesh???" You are using strawman rhetoric to dismiss what the Bible plainly teaches.
It appears you use Hebrews 12:1 and Php 3:12 to imply that believers can engage in ongoing rebellion and still enter the kingdom despite the warnings in Eph 5, 1Cor 6, Gal 5 etc.
Specifically what kind of sin are you referring to? Do you mean the willful sin of indulging unlawfully in fleshly lusts? I would make an educated guess that you do due to many of other posts you have made. Specifically when I have addressed you previously you would respond completely omitting any reference to the points I would make about how a Christian HAS crucified their flesh with the passions and desires (Gal 5:24), those same passions and desires which draw people into sin (Jam 1:14-15), the same passions and desires that drew Eve into sin (Gen 3:6), the same corruption through lust that Christian's ESCAPE FROM (2Pet 1:3-4) and don't walk after (1Pet 4:2) having CEASED from sin (1Pet 4:1).
Tommy is not denying Heb 12:1 which says...
Heb 12:1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,
Heb 12:2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Heb 12:3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.
Heb 12:4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.
Heb 12:5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:
Heb 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Heb 12:7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
Heb 12:8 But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.
The writer of Hebrews is teaching to not despise the chastening of God. He is not teaching that because "God chastens His children" that the unrighteous will enter the kingdom or that the disobedient will not receive wrath.
What is the PURPOSE for chastisement? Well that passage goes on to say...
Heb 12:10 For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit,
that we might be partakers of his holiness.
Heb 12:11 Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.
Why be partakers of his holiness? Well it goes on to say...
Heb 12:14 Follow peace with all men, and
holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:
Which parallels with...
Rom 6:16 Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of
obedience unto righteousness?
Rom 6:17 But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.
Rom 6:18 Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness.
Rom 6:19 I speak after the manner of men because of the infirmity of your flesh: for as ye have yielded your members servants to uncleanness and to iniquity unto iniquity; even so now yield your members servants to
righteousness unto holiness.
Rom 6:20 For when ye were the servants of sin, ye were free from righteousness.
Rom 6:21 What fruit had ye then in those things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death.
Rom 6:22 But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye have
your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlasting life.
Obedience unto righteous, righteousness unto holiness, the
END OF WHICH is everlasting life.
Which also parallels why Peter taught that we must DILIGENTLY ADD TO OUR FAITH...
2Pe 1:3 According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
2Pe 1:4 Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.
2Pe 1:5 And beside this,
giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge;
2Pe 1:6 And
to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness;
2Pe 1:7 And
to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.
2Pe 1:8 For
if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
2Pe 1:9 But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.
2Pe 1:10 Wherefore the rather, brethren,
give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall:
2Pe 1:11
For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
So many treat entrance into the kingdom as a packaged done deal. It isn't!. Israel did not leave Egypt and enter straight away into the Promised Land. They had to endure testing in the wilderness. A Christian first escapes the corruption that is in the world through lust through repentance and faith but they then must become partakers in the divine nature through the great and exceeding promises of God by diligently adding to their faith. It is those who patiently continue in doing good who will receive eternal life, not the disobedient.
It is to twist the Bible to take Hebrews 12:1-2 and imply that "ongoing rebellion" is not a big deal just because it says God is the author and finisher of our faith. The Bible also says that God is the author of the salvation of those who obey Him. Is an individual in rebelling obeying God? No way. The rebellion has to cease in repentance or it never will.
You also quoted Php 3:12-14 to support your contention that "nobody is perfect" and that Christian's still sin.
Yet isn't it interesting how you OMIT verses 11 and 15 and you don't define the TWO DIFFERENT WORDS used for perfect here. Why is that?
Php 3:11 If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.
Php 3:12 Not as though I had already attained, either were already
perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
Php 3:13 Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before,
Php 3:14 I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Php 3:15 Let us therefore, as many as be
perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.
Php 3:16 Nevertheless, whereto we have already attained, let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing.
Perfect - teleioō (G5048)
From G5046; to complete, that is, (literally) accomplish, or (figuratively) consummate (in character): - consecrate, finish, fulfil, (make) perfect.
Perfect - teleios (G5046)
From G5056; complete (in various applications of labor, growth, mental and moral character, etc.); neuter (as noun, with G3588) completeness: - of full age, man, perfect.
The first use of perfect is in the context of the resurrection of the dead. You either snipped off verse 11 to hide that fact or you are just repeating an "isolated proof text" without checking what you have heard. Either way you are teaching a LIE.
The second use of the word perfect is in the context of people who are MORALLY PERFECT and Paul clearly alludes to himself as one of these, and that they must press on to attain the prize.
The above is the perfect example, clear as day, as to how a false teacher will isolate a scripture completely out of context and use it to teach something that is not true. Peter warned of those who would do this with Paul's writings and cautioned believers to not fall for it...
2Pe 3:15 And account that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation; even as
our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you;
2Pe 3:16 As also in all his epistles,
speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which
they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.
2Pe 3:17 Ye therefore, beloved, seeing ye know these things before,
beware lest ye also, being led away with the error of the wicked, fall from your own stedfastness.
2Pe 3:18 But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and for ever. Amen.
When the Bible teaches that the "just shall live by faith" it does not mean they are waiting on God to change them, it means they believe and trust in God and thus do what He commands to do. The just walk by an OBEDIENT FAITH that WORKS BY LOVE. They are doers of the word and not hearers only. There is nothing PASSIVE about faith at all, faith is the active dynamic by which we access the grace, the leading of God, and put it into effect. This dynamic of working together with God results in purity of heart.
