The Atonement: What did it REALLY Accomplish?

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PaulThomson

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We are instructed not to add anything to the scriptures, or take away anything from the scriptures

My bible says "saved", not "being saved".
Actually, the Received Text in Greek does say "being saved". It is a present participle. Your English Bible's translation is misleading you.
 
Mar 23, 2016
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You deny the efficaciousness of Christs death, that's against Christ. You limit Christs death in its quality and effectiveness, thats against Christ.
sigh ... move on, brightfame52.

you know what you did ... everyone who reads this thread knows what you did. you conflated Romans 4:25 with Romans 7:4 and I called you out on your manipulation of Scripture.

That does not mean I deny Scripture ... it just means you are careless in your handling of Scripture and people need to take care when reading your "commentary".


2 Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
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Jesus said to the Church here Jn 15:8

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples.
Jesus spoke those words to His disciples just before His crucifixion.




brightfame52 said:
Our fruitfulness
In reading through John 15, we learn that as we abide in the Vine (the Lord Jesus Christ), He produces fruit ... we, as branches, hold out the fruit He produces to all we meet. :cool:
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Mar 23, 2016
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By belief is that all scriptures must harmonize, if we are to understand the truth of Christs doctrine.

In Isaiah 48:16, in order to keep this verse in context, Isaiah is not speaking to the natural man, but is speaking to Jacob and Israel his called (verse 12),
so you want me to believe that all of the Israelites were believers? ... there were no unbelievers among the descendants of Jacob? I suppose you believe that gentiles were the only unbelievers at the time Isaiah was written???
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Mar 23, 2016
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You do realize, I hope, that Luke 11 is directed to his disciples.
:rolleyes: ... so you do want me to believe Jesus is teaching people who already believe that they are to ask God to give them something they already have.

Luke 11:13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
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brightfame52

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Nov 21, 2020
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sigh ... move on, brightfame52.

you know what you did ... everyone who reads this thread knows what you did. you conflated Romans 4:25 with Romans 7:4 and I called you out on your manipulation of Scripture.

That does not mean I deny Scripture ... it just means you are careless in your handling of Scripture and people need to take care when reading your "commentary".


2 Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
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You deny the efficaciousness of Christs death, that's against Christ.
 

brightfame52

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Nov 21, 2020
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Jesus spoke those words to His disciples just before His crucifixion.





In reading through John 15, we learn that as we abide in the Vine (the Lord Jesus Christ), He produces fruit ... we, as branches, hold out the fruit He produces to all we meet. :cool:
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You still dont see the truth.
 

PaulThomson

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Oct 29, 2023
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Respectfully, I disagree with your interpretation of the scriptures.

Once a person is born, with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, (Eph 2:1-5) they are "babes in Christ", They are in Christ and Christ in them. Once a person is born again, they have God's promise of an eternal inheritance (Eph 1:11).

Although we have been born again of the Spirit, we still carry the baggage of our fleshly nature, and do, at times, yield ourselves to the temptations of the world (Rom 7)which separates us from our fellowship with God, temporary, until we repent. We do not lose the promise of our eternal inheritance, just our fellowship with God temporary until we repent.

The babe in Christ's mind is focused on spiritual things, but he does understand the doctrine of Christ (Isaiah 28:9).

The natural man that has not been born again, with the indwelling of the Holy Spirit cannot receive the things of the Spirit. Not the spiritual things that the mature born again christian can receive, nor the spiritual things that the babe in Christ, that are not mature, can receive.

The natural man, as described in 1 Cor 2:14, will not repent of breaking a spiritual law of God that he cannot understand.
Babes in Christ are not being indwelt by the Holy spirit (Romans 8:4-14. They are not walking according to the Spirit. They are walking according to the flesh. They have the Spirit, (Rom. 8:4-14) but he is merely a guest; not a welcome participant in the household.'s economy.

A carnal Christian is immature, a baby, cand annot accept meat but needs milk, i.e. the simpler doctrines of the scripture. They have not yet learned to discern good from evil and to choose the good. Paul calls a Christian who is unpacking and wearing his fleshly baggage carnal. You need to figure that into your soteriology.

True. But neither the psuchikos (soulish/natural) man nor the pneumatikos (spiritual) man can repent of breaking a spiritual law of God that he cannot understand. But the natural man can still acknowledge that he lies and lusts and covets in certain known areas, realise he has been behaving as one who has been distrusting and rebelling against God, understand that Jesus Christ was the Almighty Holy Son of God subjecting himself to His Father abandoning Him to the hateful attacks of men and demons to the point of a shameful death on a cross, to demonstrate the infinite extent of God's love for His rebellious wicked creatures.

And this revelation of God's love in the cross, by itself, can move the natural man's heart to call upon and trust this Almighty Holy God and this Christ for mercy. Especially when, as in Paul's preaching, the message of the cross is accompanied with the despised King healing and delivering these enemies despite their history of rebellion against Him.. Maybe the reason we don't see more healing and deliverance when the bible is preached is because we are too focussed on trying to convince others to accept our eloquent dogma on the process of how salvation works, rather than persuading our audience of their need to trust God by describing is love, mercy long-suffering and patience displayed in the cross.And maybe God is not interested in authenticating with miracles our flawed soteriological pronouncements. Maybe.


WE are obedient slaves to whatever we are obeying, according to Jesus. If you are going to insist a slave has no free will to choose against his master's will to choose salvation, then the Christian who chooses to sin is also a free-will-less slave of sin. That is not losing "just our fellowship with God temporary until we repent". How can a sinning Christian be a slave of sin and choose to repent, when according to you, a non-Christian can't be a slave of sin and chose to repent? God is no respecter of persons.
 

ForestGreenCook

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Jul 8, 2018
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Actually, the Received Text in Greek does say "being saved". It is a present participle. Your English Bible's translation is misleading you.
Saved, according to Strong's concordance, means delivered. Very few of the salvation scriptures are referencing eternal deliverance. Most of the salvation scriptures are referencing a deliverance, as they sojourn here on earth for those who are already born again, by their obedience in following God's instruction of how they should live their lives here on earth. These deliverance's are because of their good works.

There is an eternal deliverance not by our works, and there is a deliverance by the good works of those who are born again, as they sojourn here on earth.

Bu not distinguishing the difference in the salvation (deliverance) scriptures tends to support eternal salvation is given because of our good works.
 

ForestGreenCook

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A carnal Christian is immature, a baby, cand annot accept meat but needs milk, i.e. the simpler doctrines of the scripture. They have not yet learned to discern good from evil and to choose the good. Paul calls a Christian who is unpacking and wearing his fleshly baggage carnal. You need to figure that into your soteriology.
The born again christian has a warfare inside him, his spiritual nature warring against his fleshly nature (Rom 7:23). The scriptures teach us that we, as a born again christian, do at times, yield ourselves to the temptations of the world (becoming carnal) and lose our fellowship with God, not the promise of our eternal inheritance, temporary, until we repent (1 John 1:6-10).
 

ForestGreenCook

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True. But neither the psuchikos (soulish/natural) man nor the pneumatikos (spiritual) man can repent of breaking a spiritual law of God that he cannot understand. But the natural man can still acknowledge that he lies and lusts and covets in certain known areas, realise he has been behaving as one who has been distrusting and rebelling against God, understand that Jesus Christ was the Almighty Holy Son of God subjecting himself to His Father abandoning Him to the hateful attacks of men and demons to the point of a shameful death on a cross, to demonstrate the infinite extent of God's love for His rebellious wicked creatures.
The natural man, according to Eph 2:1, was yet "spiritually" dead in sins when he was quickened, having no understanding of a spiritual God having a son, and was consenting to him being crucified.
 

ForestGreenCook

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WE are obedient slaves to whatever we are obeying, according to Jesus. If you are going to insist a slave has no free will to choose against his master's will to choose salvation, then the Christian who chooses to sin is also a free-will-less slave of sin. That is not losing "just our fellowship with God temporary until we repent". How can a sinning Christian be a slave of sin and choose to repent, when according to you, a non-Christian can't be a slave of sin and chose to repent? God is no respecter of persons.
The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
 

ForestGreenCook

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:rolleyes: ... so you do want me to believe Jesus is teaching people who already believe that they are to ask God to give them something they already have.

Luke 11:13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
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I believe that Jesus is talking about his disciples. The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them.
 

ForestGreenCook

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:rolleyes: ... so you do want me to believe Jesus is teaching people who already believe that they are to ask God to give them something they already have.

Luke 11:13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
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David said in Psalms 51:10-11, Create in me a clean heart, O God,and renew a right spirit within me. Take not the Holy Spirit from me.
 

Kroogz

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Dec 5, 2023
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The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
What's the context? Paul was explaining that human wisdom and intellect could never figure out the MYSTERY of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. No amount of pondering, reasoning or debating from the human mind/natural man would ever figure out Gods mystery plan of His Gospel. It had to be REVEALED. God had to wait until "it was finished" to reveal it to mankind. Why?

1 Cor 2:8~…which none of the rulers of this age knew; for had they known, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.

The natural man could not muster up enough intellectual prowess to see this mystery. So when "it was finished" the Spirit REVEALED the MYSTERY.
1 Cor 2:10~~ these are the things God has revealed to us by his Spirit.The Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God.

Now the mystery is revealed. So ALL can see.
 

PaulThomson

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1 Cor 2:14 indicates that the natural man, before he has been born of the Spirit, will not, and indeed, cannot know, or ask anything about spiritual things.
It does not say the natural man "cannot know or ask anything about spiritual things" in 1 Cor. 2:14.

This is the biblical process of conversion according to scripture. The natural man is soulish (psuchikos) and is living from His soul/mind (PsuchE) which has been programmed by his culture, his instincts and the demonic powers with all kinds of false ideas about reality and God. The objects of this man's faith are man-conceived ideas, man made technologies, flesh and blood persons, demon-sourced gnosis and powers. He cannot access the spiritual inheritance God has available through the Holy Spirit for His children to enjoy,m unless he is first born of the spirit through choosing to make the Father and Jesus Christ the objects of his faith.
How can God convert the soulish/natural man's confidence in the above idols to confidence in Jesus and God without violating thr man's free-desire/ free-will by merely unlaterally replacing that man's chosen desires/will with an imposed love for Him? We love God because He first loved us. God uses the testimony of His sacrificial love for the rebellious creatures whom He allowed to slaughter Him on the cross and to whom He afterwards still offers mercy, to dispel the lies of the devil that God is like fallen kings and acquires submission and loyalty by issuing threats and imposing punishment. In the cross we see that God wins allegiance not by using His almighty power to force submission. He uses foolish-to-the world divine power and wisdom of self-sacrificial love to reveal His true nature, which does not look anything like the kind of gods that Satan, demons and fallen men envision to be in their own broken images.

This revelation of the true nature of God draws men's attention away from their idols and onto this gracious, merciful and loving Saviour King in whom they begin to put trust. They hear and learn about the things of Jesus, the Holy Spirit bearing witness to the truth heard, ideally with signs following, and when they trust this message, and believe it, they receive the risen Christ. They are reckoned righteous by faith and are born again of the Holy Spirit. They receive a new spirit, which includes a new conscience that replaces the one that was perverted by the flesh, the world and the devil: perverted by appeasing their fleshly instincts when God through their conscience had been telling them to go against their instincts; and perverted by appeasing their cultural and philosophical expectations, when God through their conscience had been telling them to go against their philosophy's and culture's norms; and perverted by appeasing the demonic temptations to lording-over-others-power, when God through their conscience had been telling them to go against their lust for power over others. Into this new spirit, the Holy Spirit comes. They are no longer natural/soulish (psuchikos), because they now have the Holy Spirit. They have become babes in Christ to whom the Holy Spirit begins to open scripture showing them all the things in them concerning Christ and the inheritance of those in Him, and they start to learn from Him to discern good from evil and to choose the good.

As they submit to the Holy Spirit's guidance through their conscience and the Word, they mature and are capable of understanding more and more of the things of the Spirit, the things that the Holy Spirit brings with Him and He has for God's children to enjoy; the things that the natural/soulish man cannot receive because they are in the Holy Spirit, whom they do not have. If he co-operates with the Holy Spirit, the Christian's soul's false thoughts are gradually replaced with God's revealed truths taught him by the Holy Spirit. And so he becomes more and more Christ-like in thoughts, words and actions. The saint who has not been through this process of divesting themselves of the false thinking they inherited and absorbed before conversion remains largely controlled by those fallen attitudes and habits, i.e. is fleshly (sarkikos), and behaves badly.

The disciples did not need to have the Holy Spirit in them to understand who Jesus was and to trust in Him as the Messiah, saviour and Lord. They received the Holy Spirit AFTER confessing their faith in His risen lordship, not before. See John 20: 19-23 -

19 On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” 20 After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.

21 Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” 22 And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”
 
Mar 23, 2016
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I believe that Jesus is talking about his disciples.
so? ... apparently under your dogma you believe Jesus taught people who already believe that they are to ask God to give them something they already have.




ForestGreenCook said:
The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them.
ripping 1 Corinthians 2:14 from the context in which the Author of Scripture has placed it is improper interpretation of Scripture.

Clearly in 1 Corinthians 2 Paul speaks of believers who are carnal and who had placed their faith in man's wisdom:

1 Corinthians 2:

2 For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

3 And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling.

4 And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power:

5 That your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.


Because the believers in Corinth followed men (1 Cor 1:11-13; 1 Cor 3:1-4), they were carnal and with some of them Paul was unable to go beyond Jesus Christ and Him crucified (which is basically the Gospel) ... hopefully Paul was also able to teach the resurrection and ascension!!!


However, there were some in the church at Corinth who were more mature and here is what Paul has to say about them:

1 Corinthians 2:

6 Howbeit we speak wisdom among them that are perfect: yet not the wisdom of this world, nor of the princes of this world, that come to nought:

7 But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory:


the word "perfect" in vs 6 is translated from the Greek word téleios which means mature (consummated) from going through the necessary stages to reach the end-goal, i.e. developed into a consummating completion by fulfilling the necessary process (spiritual journey) - HELPS Word-studies.

So we see here that Paul was able to speak of deeper spiritual matters with the believers who were more mature in the Lord Jesus Christ.


Paul then goes on to speak of the deeper spiritual matters ...

1 Corinthians 2:

9 But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

10 But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

11 For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.

12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.


vs 10 - God reveals these deeper truths concerning the hidden wisdom (vs 7), as well as other things which God reveals.


Then God tells us:

1 Corinthians 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

What are the "things" God is talking about which are spiritually discerned? Is it the Gospel which Paul was able to discuss with the immature, carnal believers in the church? ... or is it the deeper, spiritual things of God which Paul and the more mature believers in the church were able to discuss apart from the carnal folks?


1 Cor 2:14 rests in a context which indicates the reference is to the deeper things ... the hidden wisdom of God ... the mystery ... the things which eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor that which has entered into the heart of man ... things which God reveals in His gracious lovingkindness to those who love Him.

However, I know that you, brightfame52, and a few others insist that 1 Cor 2:14 refers to the basics of the gospel ... you have to because you do not believe that God allows mankind to reject Him (suppress the truth in unrighteousness as shown in Romans 1:18).
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Mar 23, 2016
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David said in Psalms 51:10-11, Create in me a clean heart, O God,and renew a right spirit within me
Prior to Day of Pentecost, believers were not indwelt with Holy Spirit as they were after Day of Pentecost and continuing to our day and time.

That's why Jesus told His disciples in John 16:7 that He had to go away ... so He could send the Holy Spirit in a much more dynamic and permanent manner than in the past. And in John 14:7, Jesus told His disciples ... I will pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he may abide with you for ever

From gotquestions.org:

The Old Testament relates occasions in which the Spirit left someone, such as King Saul (1 Samuel 16:14) or Samson (Judges 16:20). However, in those days the Holy Spirit worked differently than He does since the time Jesus rose from the dead. In the Old Testament, the Spirit is never said to “indwell” anyone; rather, He “came upon” people for a time to accomplish specific purposes (Judges 3:10; 1 Chronicles 12:18). The Holy Spirit inspired the prophets to proclaim truth to the people (Ezekiel 11:1–2). He instructed the leaders of Israel (1 Samuel 16:13). He inspired the writing of Scripture (2 Peter 1:21). But He did not indwell those people as He now does with believers in Christ.
Before Christ’s finished work and ascension, the Holy Spirit came and went, but He no longer works that way. He does not come and go in the lives of believers today.




ForestGreenCook said:
Take not the Holy Spirit from me.
hmmm ... do you believe God takes away the Holy Spirit from the born again believer?
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PaulThomson

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Oct 29, 2023
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I believe that Jesus is talking about his disciples. The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them.
Were the disciples born again before Jesus died and rose again? John 20:20-23 says the apostles received the Holy Spirit only after the saw the risen Lord and believed He is the risen Lord.

And yet Peter recognised Him as the "the Christ, the Son of the Living God" before he received the Holy Spirit. Even demons could recognise Jesus as the Son of God, and later as the risen Son of God, without having the Holy Spirit. So, obviously, anyone can believe tht Jesus is Messiah, Lord and risen without yet having the Holy Spirit. Your gnostic sect is bewitching you.