| Author |
Message |
Sheilaaallen
Registered user
Username: Sheilaaallen
Post Number: 14
Registered: 10-2012
| | Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2013 - 9:40 am: |     |
This morning in the devotional My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers I was really struck by something I read and just have to share:
"Paul states here(1 Cor 1:17) that the call of God is to preach the gospel. But remember what Paul means by "the gospel" namely, the reality of redemption in our Lord Jesus Christ. We are inclined to make sanctification the goal of our preaching...We are not commissioned to preach salvation or sanctification-we are commissioned to lift up Jesus Christ. It is an injustice to say that Jesus Christ labored in redemption to make me a saint. Jesus Christ labored in redemption to redeem the whole world and place it perfectly whole and restored before the throne of God. The fact that we can experience redemption illustrates the power of its reality, but that experience is a byproduct and not the goal of redemption." How freeing and burden lifting to think of the reality that when I "touch the underlying foundation of the reality of the gospel of God" I will give up focusing all of my energies on my sanctification and the things I want Him to deliver me from and instead experience Christ's redemption as the amazing gift that it is. Adventists just have it so backwards their emphasis is so on sanctification that they gloss over that fundamental part of Jesus' redemption. How much better of an experience and growth in Christ we can have when we come from that place of experiencing and accepting His redemption. I feel like I have to relearn everything. |
Mjcmcook
Registered user
Username: Mjcmcook
Post Number: 904
Registered: 2-2011
| | Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2013 - 10:12 am: | |
I believe that CHRIST will take anyone as 'deep' as they are willing to go, to "relearn everything."~
~mj~ |
Colleentinker
Registered user
Username: Colleentinker
Post Number: 14262
Registered: 12-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2013 - 10:55 am: | |
I know, Sheila. We do have to relearn everything. Our worldview was upside down, with humans really at the top of the heap and God somewhere limiting Himself in order to serve us and to keep our human free will "sovereign".
Oswald Chambers was helpful to me during the years we transitioned out of Adventism. His devotional was very helpful to me in learning to see reality from a biblical perspective where God is sovereign and the gospel is everything.
You've said a mouthful there...God wants us to experience His redemption as the amazing gift that it is. Our focus is not to be our sanctification; rather, our focus is Jesus. He glorifies Himself in us as we trust Him. He changes us; we don't change ourselves by trying to "access" His power.
We are to trust.
Colleen |
Jrt
Registered user
Username: Jrt
Post Number: 1286
Registered: 10-2008
| | Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2013 - 2:49 pm: | |
I just thought I'd share something that I am learning ... sanctification is Jesus' work as well ..... meaning He does the growing in us in our relationship with Him .... Scripture says, "He Who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it."
I am coming to a different understanding of sanctification than what I learned in Adventism ..... In scripture we are asked to 'put off the old self' (Eph. 4:20-32) meaning coming to God in repentance of how the 'old self' is displayed in our lives (This has nothing to do with salvation, but maturing in Christ - look at the context of this passage). Repentance plays a part of sanctification ..... meaning we come to God repenting from the heart the areas in our life that do not line up to His Word .... Asking Him to forgive us and remove that sin from us and replace it with His Spirit and the fruits of the Spirit .... Sometimes God asks us to humble ourselves and receive the help that He will provide through His children - That help may come in the form of private intercessory prayer and unconditional love towards the person who is growing up in Christ.
"He Who began a good work in us is faithful to complete it." Praise the Lord!
Carolyn |
Mjcmcook
Registered user
Username: Mjcmcook
Post Number: 905
Registered: 2-2011
| | Posted on Saturday, February 02, 2013 - 8:16 pm: | |
'It' is all about CHRIST and what HE does!
HE is the author and finisher of our faith!
This is Good News!
~mj~ |
Asurprise
Registered user
Username: Asurprise
Post Number: 2945
Registered: 7-2007
| | Posted on Sunday, February 03, 2013 - 11:14 am: | |
Sheila; thank-you for that! That's got to be the hardest thing to learn! I still have lots of trouble with that!
I remember quite awhile back my pastor (non-denomination Christian church) was preaching through the book of Galatians. When he came to Galatians 4:9 ("But now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements, to which you desire again to be in bondage?"); he compared the week and beggarly elements which refer to the law that the Galatians were trying to keep, to the idol worship they had turned from. (Also the next two verses after that are significant: "You observe days and months and seasons and years. I am afraid for you, lest I have labored for you in vain." verses 10 and 11)
Here's another quote by Oswald Chambers. (From a letter written by him, at the beginning of chapter 8 The Wider Sphere in the book; "Oswald Chambers: Abandoned to God" by David McCasland.
quoting part of the letter:
"Holiness is not an attainment at all, it is the gift of God, and the pietistic tendency is the introspection which makes me worship my own earnestness and not take the Lord seriously at all. It is a pious fraud that suits the natural man immensely. He makes holy, He sanctifies, He does it all. All I have to do is come as a spiritual pauper, not ashamed to beg, to let go of my right to myself and act on Romans 12:1-2. It is never 'Do, do and you'll be' with the Lord, but 'Be, be, and I will do through you.' It is a case of 'hands up' and letting go, and then entire reliance on Him." |
Asurprise
Registered user
Username: Asurprise
Post Number: 2946
Registered: 7-2007
| | Posted on Sunday, February 03, 2013 - 11:28 am: | |
Ellen White teaches the exact opposite; that sanctification and holiness is a necessary attainment that WE, together with Christ are supposed to be doing in order to be saved! |
Mjcmcook
Registered user
Username: Mjcmcook
Post Number: 907
Registered: 2-2011
| | Posted on Sunday, February 03, 2013 - 2:51 pm: | |
Ellen White always was and continues to be a "fraud", along with her husband, James White~
In so being, a robber of a person's "Peace" which
we are given as a 'gift' from 'Our' FATHER in Heaven! when we accept and Believe in JESUS CHRIST~
~mj~ |
Asurprise
Registered user
Username: Asurprise
Post Number: 2949
Registered: 7-2007
| | Posted on Sunday, February 03, 2013 - 6:54 pm: | |
Worse, she was a robber of people's eternal life because she denied a person complete reliance on Jesus' finished work and caused them to put part of their trust in themselves.
After being brainwashed by her for over 50 years, it's difficult sometimes to realize that Jesus really does/did it all! |
Mjcmcook
Registered user
Username: Mjcmcook
Post Number: 909
Registered: 2-2011
| | Posted on Sunday, February 03, 2013 - 8:14 pm: | |
Asurprise~
I agree~ 'egw' is a "robber" of a person's "eternal security" attested to in Scripture~ when they accept JESUS CHRIST as their personal SAVIOR~
Saved Forever by Grace through Faith in JESUS~
~mj~ |
Gcfrankie
Registered user
Username: Gcfrankie
Post Number: 913
Registered: 1-2007
| | Posted on Monday, February 04, 2013 - 7:23 pm: | |
Something I noticed when I was transitioning out was spiritual peace that slowly came over me which is something I never had as an sda. |
