Total inability - original sin - inherited from adam

[PeterJens]

Yes Amen.. Each of our walk is unique but none more important than the other.. what is done for one is done for all.. My life is proof that I cannot achieve a thing. To even get out of bed was the biggest effort for me.. I can honestly say I have done nothing but recieve his grace

Our goal to walk as Jesus walks is only achieved by recognising it's him through us .. again because of his grace.. I know the word grace is hated very much that's because of the lack of understanding what it really means.. Not a licence to sin but the power not too.

We CANNOT even 1% walk the way Jesus did without him giving his life for us..

Therefore grace has to be everything. Dya understand what I mean ?

Great response.

At 18 I met the Lord in a profound way. It turned me emotionally upside down. I would say this as I would now, I know Christ crucified and nothing else.

If your have been broken, taken to a place where you know who you are, your desires, your emptiness, your sin, your lostness and need, your failure and you see Christ the overcomer, the lover of mankind, He who gave His life for all mankind, you know you would die for your Lord and God.

That is knowing grace. This is our hearts breadth. This is why monks take a vow of chasticy, poverty and obedience, why people do rediculous things to try and resolve the struggles within with the struggles without. I am not an asthetic, though I understand the motivation.

When you have emptied yourself, the next question is how do you walk. It turns out this is a story of emotions and how we are built. But for most this is too dangerous, and to even talk about such things is self-salvation, or behavioural transformation which is talked about as just being "wrong".

I think this is really about becoming a mature man or woman of God from the foundation of a redeemed sinner. And that is the christian walk of discipleship, turning the seed in the heart into a complete reality in every part of your being.

 

[eternally-gratefull]

Total inability position

The best summary of a belief in total inability is the one below as stated by EG

will be fulfilled in heaven, which is called glorification (where our sanctification matches our justification, ie we become sinless)

It would be simpler to just say, we can never walk truly righteously until we reach heaven.

Peter I love ya bro but this stuff has to stop.

My defenition for walking rightious in my post was sinless perfection. The law. Gods standard.

Are you sinless Peter? If not. Then you have failed to live up to the STANDARD I AM USING in the context of my post.

we have answered your question numerous times, But you never see what we say and continue denying we ever said it.

My question as a response is why?

I will answer your questions 1 more time, This time keep a copy of it, so next time,, Well you get the picture.

why? Because Gods standard is perfection Thats why God said he is continuing to sanctify those whome he has perfected. it is an ongoing process. Not a completed act. Are you perfect peter? Then you have not lived up to Gods standard.

What makes this so impossible other than ones own emotional history of failure?

What? What makes it impossible is we must learn, We do not know everything about God when we are born again, So how can we be perfect (gods standard) and even as we mature, and learn alot more. We still will not follow God 24/7. Does not the first command convict you every day peter?

Gods standard is perfection peter. If you have not obtained perfection. Then you have failed to do the very thing you just judged me of failing to be able to do. So I must ask Peter. Why do you keep failing? Why are you not perfect?

to continue,

It would be fine, if this was the first time you tried to make this argument, (to a few people in here, they are trying to get through this, because this is the first time you have done it to them)

But you have been told time and time and time again (not just by myself, but from others) that You can not make those claims and say I am in error, because you are taking the context of my point, and not using it.

I have said countless times, A christian can walk in righteousness and holiness as he matures in Christ, He can walk in light and not the world. Your continued insistence that I do not believe this nor teach this is for the birds.

I am not getting into a heated battle with you today, If people want to continue to let you talk, and harrass other believers, that they are free to do so..

But if you can not stop with your false accusations and lies about what I am saying, then please. stop responding to me at all..

 

[JennaLeanne]

Please explain what him through us means.

It's the life of Christ manifesting through us as a fruit of union and being one with Him. - it is not a work. The new creation in Christ will bear His fruit in our lives and they will show up as love, peace, joy, etc.

 

[BenFTW]

At 18 I met the Lord in a profound way. It turned me emotionally upside down. I would say this as I would now, I know Christ crucified and nothing else.

If your have been broken, taken to a place where you know who you are, your desires, your emptiness, your sin, your lostness and need, your failure and you see Christ the overcomer, the lover of mankind, He who gave His life for all mankind, you know you would die for your Lord and God.

That is knowing grace. This is our hearts breadth. This is why monks take a vow of chasticy, poverty and obedience, why people do rediculous things to try and resolve the struggles within with the struggles without. I am not an asthetic, though I understand the motivation.

When you have emptied yourself, the next question is how do you walk. It turns out this is a story of emotions and how we are built. But for most this is too dangerous, and to even talk about such things is self-salvation, or behavioural transformation which is talked about as just being "wrong".

I think this is really about becoming a mature man or woman of God from the foundation of a redeemed sinner. And that is the christian walk of discipleship, turning the seed in the heart into a complete reality in every part of your being.

I think it is man looking for practical answers through morality instead of relying upon spiritual answers that require faith/belief. People all too often give tips and tricks to sin less, but they would be better off with a more permanent solution. Renewing their mind and allowing God to have His process of sanctification.

You and those you disagree with share the same goal, but only have different methods to attain it.

 

[eternally-gratefull]

IMO following doctrine that has total inability as a foundational concept. Self-defeating. Baked-in unbelief.

IMHO, Not taking the context of what a person is saying, and twisting their words, to make them appear to be saying something is, is a persons way to hide from the truth, and need to make themselves feel good. instead of wanting to find truth, and see what the other person is actually saying, so you have a basis on which to communicate.

But hey, Thats just me.

for the last time, (and I KNOW everyone will agree with me)

We have the ability to mature in Christ. But even Paul at the end of his life said he continued to run the race. He still had not obtained sinless perfection.

So in my mind, If paul could not do it, Why should I be so arrogant and think I could?

so I "continue to run the race"

I take it from your comments,, you think you have finished the race, and thus no longer have to run?

And remember, this whole converstion is based off you saying people have said this, so we must use their context, NOT YOURS

 

[eternally-gratefull]

It's the life of Christ manifesting through us as a fruit of union and being one with Him. - it is not a work. The new creation in Christ will bear His fruit in our lives and they will show up as love, peace, joy, etc.

Amen

The branch is attached to the vine.

The branch does not work to force the vibe to produce fruit, it is a natural occurrence.. It is the vine who does all the work. the branch is at rest.

As God says, Come to me, and i will give you rest.

 

[JennaLeanne]

At 18 I met the Lord in a profound way. It turned me emotionally upside down. I would say this as I would now, I know Christ crucified and nothing else.

If your have been broken, taken to a place where you know who you are, your desires, your emptiness, your sin, your lostness and need, your failure and you see Christ the overcomer, the lover of mankind, He who gave His life for all mankind, you know you would die for your Lord and God.

That is knowing grace. This is our hearts breadth. This is why monks take a vow of chasticy, poverty and obedience, why people do rediculous things to try and resolve the struggles within with the struggles without. I am not an asthetic, though I understand the motivation.

When you have emptied yourself, the next question is how do you walk. It turns out this is a story of emotions and how we are built. But for most this is too dangerous, and to even talk about such things is self-salvation, or behavioural transformation which is talked about as just being "wrong".

I think this is really about becoming a mature man or woman of God from the foundation of a redeemed sinner. And that is the christian walk of discipleship, turning the seed in the heart into a complete reality in every part of your being.

Beautiful testimony I see you have a genuine heart for the Lord, If you look through a lot of your posts you will notice how much grace u speak of without calling it grace haha, dya see what I mean ?

One thing we must understand is that become a mature woman or man in Christ is not about us as ourselves becoming mature but mature in the knowledge of his finished work, that's where we find humility knowing that it's no longer I that lives but Christ in me

 

[HeRoseFromTheDead]

It's the life of Christ manifesting through us as a fruit of union and being one with Him. - it is not a work. The new creation in Christ will bear His fruit in our lives and they will show up as love, peace, joy, etc.

Most of the fruits of the spirit are things that we do towards other people. Is that not work?

 

[JennaLeanne]

Most of the fruits of the spirit are things that we do towards other people. Is that not work?

If you've ever experienced the joy and peace of the spirit in you then you will respond to a big fat AMEN to that

 

[gb9]

Most of the fruits of the spirit are things that we do towards other people. Is that not work?

it is work. it is the work that God prepared for us after we came to Christ. grace-faith-works. in that order. good works, right living , are RESULTS of salvation, not cause or maintainer.

 

[PeterJens]

EG - "Peter I love ya bro but this stuff has to stop.
But if you can not stop with your false accusations and lies about what I am saying, then please. stop responding to me at all.. "

A few simple observations. You are not my keeper or boss or guardian. I am not lying, but you continually accuse me of it.

If you put up a position, expect people to express it in their own words and how they disagree.
If you cannot handle this then why are you here. It is very agressive suggesting I am lying when I am obviously just reflecting your position. If you do not like how I represent it, then use your own words, it is not difficult.

It is a simple, and the word is simple proposition. Can you walk in righteousness, today, without sin?
It appears to me you believe no. If it is yes, then just say it. I have no problem with that, but you seem to.

Maybe you just want things on your terms only. It certainly comes across that way.

 

[Grace777x70]

If you've ever experienced the joy and peace of the spirit in you then you will respond to a big fat AMEN to that

Well said...

There is a vast difference between fleshly love and the true love of God from our new creation in Christ. There is a humanistic love born from the flesh and then the love of God from originating from our spirit which is in Christ.

We do not produce fruit from our own human self-effort no matter how good intentions they are - we bear the fruit of His life in us. This is the true fruit of Christ in us and He gets all the glory.

Abraham tried to fulfill the word of God by his own self-effort - the flesh and created an Ishmael. God doesn't recognize things done in the flesh....even things to fulfill the word of God.

The Lord told Abraham " Take your son..your only son..." God did not recognize what Abraham had done in his own effort to produce the word of God..Ishmael is not recognized by God. God does not recognize what we do in the flesh either.

We produce no fruit of our own - this is humanism and worldly philosophy which Col 2:8 says to avoid and to make sure no one takes you captive..

We just "Christianize" our flesh efforts by using the words...Jesus, God, Word, Spirit..etc to try to make it look Christ-like.

Only God can separate out what is done in the flesh and what is His life being expressed in and through us.

As we learn to walk by the spirit then He will bear His fruit in our lives. We just look to Jesus for everything in our life.

 

[PeterJens]

Why does it matter to me, the question, can we walk in righteousness today?

Because that is either an attainable goal or it is an illusion. Some will not answer the question because once you admit yes, then you open the gates to working towards it, which many regard as legalism.

But we would say that is always a risk walking with Christ. There will always be sheep and goats. Jesus told us this.
When we started he just planted the seed and the Spirit has watered it in our souls.

The fear of legalism should never stop people realising you need to deal with issues in your life that the Lord lays on your heart and stop running away from it. Our hearts never want to face the big issues, just the minor ones.

Loving a wife or husband when bitterness has come to reign, forgiveness for a boss, a loved one, a church, parents who hurt and continually cause problems etc. these things matter, they make us who we are, and often we are trapped in the cycle and defeated inside. This is where Jesus wants to let His love flow.

All this religious fear just gets in the way. That is why love and righteousness matter. It is life to dead places, freedom to the prisoner, healing to the blind, good news to those who let Him in.

 

[eternally-gratefull]

EG - "Peter I love ya bro but this stuff has to stop.
But if you can not stop with your false accusations and lies about what I am saying, then please. stop responding to me at all.. "

A few simple observations. You are not my keeper or boss or guardian. I am not lying, but you continually accuse me of it.

Correction peter.

I keep PROVING IT.

No, I am not your keeper. But we are allowed to confront people who have sinned. Or is that not allowed Peter

If you put up a position, expect people to express it in their own words and how they disagree.

People do not get to say that someone else believes somethign they do not. They do not get to take a persons words, and twist them, to make them appear to be saying something they are not saying,

In a court of law. that is called slander. defamation of character, and I can go on and on.

If you cannot handle this then why are you here. It is very agressive suggesting I am lying when I am obviously just reflecting your position. If you do not like how I represent it, then use your own words, it is not difficult.

How can you say you are reflecting my position when you are not even coming close to saying what my position is? It is one thing to say you disagree, and this is what you think is truth, That is your view and my view, and discussing.

You do not go to someonel. slander their position, then call them names, and refuse to admit your sin. Thats not christlike, let alone a moral place to be..

It is a simple, and the word is simple proposition. Can you walk in righteousness, today, without sin?

Can you, Are you sinless? Can you walk in righteousness the rest of your life peter? Can you be sinless? (lets use MY CONTEXT, not peters context. Your arguing MY point, not your point Peter.. if you are going to argue MY point, you have to use MY context. or you will never make a point at all. just slander someone elses opinion.

It appears to me you believe no. If it is yes, then just say it. I have no problem with that, but you seem to.

Ok lets all be honest here, And anyone is free to help me out.

Yesterday, and maybe even the day before, Did I not say, Using PETERS context. Yes, we can walk in righteousness?? And now here is Peter saying I have never said it.

Maybe you just want things on your terms only. It certainly comes across that way.

Dude if your going to argue against what another person says, and tell everyone they are wrong, YOU ARE FORCED TO USE THEIR CONTEXT!

Otherwise, YOUR TWISTING WHAT THEY SAID, AND Bearing FALSE WITNESS.

Again, if your not going to admit you have lied. and al you want to do is protect your own pride, then please, stop responding to me..

 

[Ariel82]

Most of the fruits of the spirit are things that we do towards other people. Is that not work?

No more than eating and sleeping is work...

 

[Ariel82]

I love you EG but am tempted to put you on my ignore list for the day.

 

[Stunnedbygrace]

"Total inability"

The sub text to saying I know there is sin in my life but I most focus on God is not Gods way.
Gods way is repent, confess, desire forgiveness and walk in righteousness.

We know we will arrive at the goal set before us, but we are commited to stay in relationship with God and walk on.

If you abandon these steps, you abandon the walk and accept defeat. This is why I oppose this theology and believe it causes people to not enter and walk in the Kingdom.

I maybe should read all the rest of the posts since I left last night before I post, but God gave me some understanding this morning and I really want to share it. I am just not very good at keeping it short when I try to convey something like this. So...not sure how many will read it, but it's mostly being shared for those of us really IN the ongoing conversation - peter, EG, G77, angela - those of us truly seeking to understand and bear with one another in this ongoing matter.

An old saint, gone from us now, once said, if a person is one or two steps ahead of us spiritually, we will greatly admire them and seek to attain to that which they have attained. But if they are many more steps ahead, we will think them quite evil. (Don't remember his name and that is my paraphrase).

I have come to see thatt hese are words of wisdom and truth and so I never go the route of thinking that someone is terribly evil just because I don't understand them. In fact, I keep it always in the back of my mind that the greatest likelihood is that they are more advanced than me in humility and other virtues and so they have been given more understanding.

But there is also something else that I have learned. It is that many different men will explain the same spiritual matter with greatly differing words. Quick example - what I would phrase as: God has put me on a fast, in spiri,t and I cannot sense Him - other men have variously described as: I need a breakthrough, or all my light is suddenly gone, or I am very thirsty right now, or I need a word from the Lord, or I'm in a dark night of the senses. They/me are describing the same thing and I must try to keep my experience in mind while talking to them, knowing what they are talking about because I have experienced it too, or what they say, what they are trying to share, just doesn't connect with me. I have to keep in mind the EXPERIENCE to understand why they are phrasing it the way they are.

So there is the possibility of either or both (a combination) of these two things - that they may be more advanced and that they may be describing something I have known, and I describe, with very different words.

I will continue in another post in case I am kicked offline and might lose all my typing.

 

[PeterJens]

It is that many different men will explain the same spiritual matter with greatly differing words.

Amen. It is why I persist. It is also why some concepts work as a hierarchy. You are intelligent so have big thoughts or big thoughts mean you are intelligent.

Language can play tricks. I can start with a good statement, then exclude is meaning 99% with the next.
This is dishonest because it would be honest to put the 99% statement first and then the exception after.

It is why when using language like "sin" matters. If 99% of all human activity is sin, the idea of being righteous is absurd.
If 90% of human activity is neutral and 10% sinful, things are different.

So people can be using the same word but in their minds creating a totally different model and then denying it.

The bible is saying people are basically not that bad, but go off the rails because they do not know God.
It is why the world works even though God is not openly acknowledged and people live their whole lives in denial of a need for God. In a real sense we are arguing about the fruit of sin and what sin is in the mix of life.

It is also why the 99% of human activity is sinful is wrong and heresy. It can become that an individual is so corrupted 99% of all they think and do is connected to sinful activity, but these individuals are normally insane and in prison or soon dead.

 

[Stunnedbygrace]

The only way I can think to continue is to just be honest with you all about all that I have been thinkingt he last few days. But I have to start with my OWN death to prideof life in order to do that.

I went through a repeating cycle for many years of trying hard to be good and do what would please God, then failure, then depression. When I would come out of the depression (which was great apathy and sluggishness), I would determine to try again and the cycle would repeat. Each time, the depression was worse than the one before and lasted longer.

My way out of this cycle was to be shown (by Gods grace) what was going on and how He saw it. My attempts to be good and my depressions were a pouting arrogance and pride of life. I was so stuck in this cycle that I never would have stopped but for His grace. In fact, I think suicide may have eventually become more than just a pouting thought at some point if He did not end it.

There are two types of children. When being taught to ride a bike, the one will be fearful and say, don't take your hand away and they will be both exuberant and disappointed when they see that they were doing it alone but that the parent did not keep their promise. The other child, full of pride of life, will push the parents hand away and insist they can do it and needs to crash and burn and bleed and cry to learn the humility to listen to the parents instructions before they take off the next time.

I am NOT the first child. I am the second child. And my pride of life was SO great that I kept getting on the bike and not listening for many years, over and over again.

But just because I am the second child and not the first, does not mean that I will not eventually grow in humility. It just means I need longer and need more cut lips to break me of my pride of life to more humility.

Peter and I, in my opinion, are more like the first child. But when we learn the lesson and learn to humble ourselves to others so we can hear them instead of telling them they are doing it all wrong, when we finally begin to die to our insistence that the other child will NEVER get anywhere and has no hope, we can never, ever be dragged too far back to pride again. Because the final train wreck God allows is too painful for us to ever forget.

This is not to say that the first type of child is very humble. They might have more success in humility in the beginning...it seems so to me anyway, but they become prideful later, thinking, just as the second child does, that they HAVE no pride of life, when they are refusing to humble themselves to the other and bear offenses every bit as much as the first child. BOTH children are looking down on the other. BOTH can't hear the other. And the more they both scream about how humble they are, the more apparent it becomes that they aren't. So you see, they are really not any different. Both are needing to humble themselves to the other even while both are insisting: he hit me first, he started it, it's only fair he apologize, etc.
And it all keeps continuing because NEITHER has been humbled and broken of pride of life yet. If they were broken by the Lord, they would be the one humbling themselves, making themselves lower, bearing the others offensiveness with love, not demanding apologies. They would BE the one pouring out their pride of life for the good of the other.

Ah, but each thinks that to humble themself to the other would be to HARM the other, because it would just let them continue in their pride of arrogance. They CAN'T humble themselves to the other as Jesus commands because to do so would bring about disastrous result. You see, to BEAR the others offenses in humility and quietness would have ill effect on their soul. So they can NOT bear the offenses quietly but need to point them out. So they have only very good intentions in disobeying and refusing to walk in the spirit and put themselves lower than the other to listen and really hear.

If Jesus could not bear the offense of being called a liar or a heretic or insane, with humility and refusal to give an angry defense or demands for apologies, we would be in very big trouble. If we say we follow Him, and we cannot bear offenses like these as He did, we are lyingt o ourselves and others. we are both deceiving AND deceived.

 

[Willie-T]

To readers, A few days ago I asked EG to tell me openly what crime I had commited against him.
It was how you interpret walking in righteousness. He said no-one could walk in righteousness in Gods law, the hyper legalist version, and I said you could in the apostles version. Now this was just what had been said, so it was neither a slander or a lie.

So I gave up trying to talk about this, because I have no sin to repent of, only offence people take but cannot express and I do not know what it actually is. To me it becomes just a slander against me, which I should get upset about, but Jesus says I should not, so I do not.

I am not defending myself , I am just repeating again, the actual situation and not this imagined mentally ill version.
I do know mental illness, and turning something into a serious problem is a classic sign of it. So now you know where I stand.

I apologize that I cannot repent of something I have not done, or sins that do not exist, but that is the reality.
If a christian wants to go further than this, they have some unusual problems that I am not qualified to deal with.

I think you are totally missing the most important thing grace people are saying.

You don't have to "repent" (whatever you have determined in your mind THAT misused term means) for a doggone thing. You are ALREADY covered, and have been, from the day you said "Yes" to Christ's invitation to become His. You are even covered for sins you don't think are sins, as well as sins you might totally miss, and have no idea you committed.

Somewhere, you seem to have gotten the idea that we are saying you have to wail, and moan, and beat yourself up for being the mistake-prone person we all are. I have to tell you, it is you, yourself, who has come up with this idea that your continued and daily "repentance" for every thing awry in your life somehow brings you back into God's love (that you have convinced yourself you fall out of with each transgression) makes you righteous.

No wonder you want nothing to do with believing we sin, even if we follow the commandments. You seem to think you have to do the "hang-dog" routine to cover every possible sin. So, OF COURSE, you don't want to think there are any more sins than those you already "take care of" by your dutiful keeping of commandments.

I would feel the same way if I thought "living right" by adhering to certain Laws was paying for my sins.

This is the very FREEDOM IN CHRIST that we try our best to explain to you.