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Author
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Topic: presenting our instruments for righteousness
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Leo
Community Member
Member # 7969
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posted
Great post Eden.
Leo:
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Trust in God and Him only:
Posts: 10 | From: Alto, Texas | Registered: Dec 2009
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MentorsRiddle
Advanced Member
Member # 2108
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posted
quote:
it is also about all the little stuff
So true, Eden.
Just yesterday I did something for someone that would help her greatly.
After I completed what I did for her, I thought about telling her – but the voice of God came to me reminding me of what Jesus said about doing your tithes.
I am going to paraphrase:
“Do not tithe before men to be glorified by men. But when you tithe do it in secret and the Lord shall reward you openly.”
So, I didn’t tell her what I did for her.
Then when I got home later that day, I received a check in the mail for 22 dollars from a company that decided to give some money back to people who do business with them.
Now someone can write that off as coincidence, but before I opened the envelope I remembered that verse I wrote above and felt God speaking to me when I picked it up.
Think about my supprise when I opened it up.
So, it is about the little stuff.
God just gave me a reminder about how he keeps his promises.
AMEN!
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With you I rise,
In you I sleep,
kneeling down I kiss your feet,
Grace abounds upon me now,
I once was lost
but now I'm found.
The gift of God dwells within,
To this love I now give in.
Posts: 1337 | From: Arkansas | Registered: Sep 2003
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Eden
unregistered
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posted
Hi, botham, first of all let me thank you for dividing your text up into much more legible paragraphs, makes a huge difference.
You wrote quote:
Your observations entail, in my opinion, the ultimate quest. I wonder if the body and soul are neutral though. I think we are born in sin with a body beset with wiring and hormones that tend to evil.
You are right, the soul and body are NOT neutral. After Adam and Eve inflated their soul at the expense of their spirit, they had to operate their body from their own soul level, and because they neglected their spirit they were without any input from God.
And this tended the soul to look to the earth instead of to God, and to choose sensual things that it came in through the ears and eyes, thus also inflating the sensual body activities.
And over time both the soul and the body accumulated habits that became practically self-stimulating; without worshipping and thinking and fellowshipping in the inner man with God, body activities which otherwise would have had a holy or normal use, became over-use for lack of other things to do (i.e., God).
So that now these habits are like ancient ruts that the cattle follow home to the corral, acquiring a power of their own, for, "what else can we go do"?, and hence, addictions, so that now the body can practically "prompt" the soul to "hey, let's go do this some more", and the soul, not knowing what else to do, goes "yeah, why not" (while scratching his head ![[Confused]](confused.gif) ).
It is only when we are reconciled to God through salvation and we are allowed to hear the Counsel from the Spirit of God again, that the Holy Spirit and the flesh, i.e., the soul and the body, begin to do battle again for restoring the proper hierarchy, God's Spirit, man's spirit, soul, and body:
Galatians 5:17
For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that you cannot do the things that you would.
So when God says:
Psalm 32:8
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go: I will guide you with My eye.
that is acquired BY FAITH just as our salvation was acquired by faith. We read what God and Jesus had done for us, we believed it, and we were saved.
Likewise we also have to believe that when God says:
Psalm 32:8
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go: I will guide you with My eye.
that God meant it and we can trust that God will do it, IF we stop doing our own thinking and making our own plans. And the only way that I know of how to do that is to say, "God, I ask You to guide my steps today and to instruct me and teach me in the way that I should go, from moment to moment" and then start living my day and expect that God will lead me to the best places for everything I do during the day.
For example, I needed some new floor mats for my car. So I went to a store and there were some single mats for $9 each, or $18 for 2 mats. But there was only one double set, but it had no price on it and a small non-important piece was missing. The cashier said it was $14 but I could get a 30% discount and in my head I figured that would make it about $10, so I said, sure, sounds great. When she was finished figuring, she said that will be $7. I thought, Okay, thank You, Lord, I'll take that.
Because when God instructs us, it is not at all just about "heavy spiritual things like I need you to go to Africa to be a missionary", but if I'm going trust God to do my thinking FOR me, then it is also about all the little stuf, like floor mats. ![[1zhelp]](graemlins/1zhelp.gif)
love, Eden
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MentorsRiddle
Advanced Member
Member # 2108
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posted
Great Post Eden!
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With you I rise,
In you I sleep,
kneeling down I kiss your feet,
Grace abounds upon me now,
I once was lost
but now I'm found.
The gift of God dwells within,
To this love I now give in.
Posts: 1337 | From: Arkansas | Registered: Sep 2003
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botham
Advanced Member
Member # 7935
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posted
Thanks Eden for your thoughtful comments. You are correct in that we need to submit our soul entirely to God who is completely trustworthy. So far there has been only One who has done it completely in my opinion, Jesus Christ.
It is such a hurdle to people, at least this one, to turn our will completlly over to God. The paradox of liberty through complete submission is indeed foreign to the soul reared in a culture that demands us to be independent and individualistic. And so many people have been let down miserably by dismal parenting, making it difficult to worship God as a Father.
On spiritual analysis our free will is really, as you know Eden, the prison of bondage. We are never truly free to esperience wisdom and meaningful existence as in God's ways until we realize the absolute trustworthiness of The Holy Spirt. The sooner I quit trying to be good and just let God have His way with my life, the sooner I begin to see and esperience true liberty.
Your observations entail, in my opinion, the ultimate quest. I wonder if the body and soul are neutral though. I think we are born in sin with a body beset with wiring and hormones that tend to evil. That which I ought to do I do not. That which I do I ought not to do etc. A young man who sees a picture of a naked woman will respond to this visual cue with hormones surging and so forth.
But I take your point. Once we know Jesus Christ and trust the Holy Spirit with our whole life, now and forever, it follows that it is best to let Go and let God. This is the highest calling for it is the way that God can use our lives for His Glory. Thanks, God bless, Botham
Posts: 103 | From: canada | Registered: Nov 2009
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Brother Paul
Advanced Member
Member # 7959
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posted
Thanks Eden...
In Christ
Brother Paul
Posts: 235 | From: Cambridge, MA | Registered: Dec 2009
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Luc A C
Community Member
Member # 7921
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posted
Eden thank you so very much.
Luc,
God bless
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Let use not interpret the Bible in a way that it would suit the way we want to live, but let use interpret the Bible in a way God wants us to live.
Posts: 15 | From: Ontario, Canada | Registered: Nov 2009
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Eden
unregistered
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posted
Romans 6:13
Neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those who are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
When I was reading this yesterday, I saw something that I had not seen before.
As a descendant from Adam and Eve, I, the soul, was presenting the instruments of my body to run my own life, with my own mind, and the result was sin, as everyone else did too.
But once we are saved, we receive the Holy
Spirit, and then Jesus, as the Head of the Body, can wirelessly relay His Counsel to us from heaven, as to what we should do and say next in any given moment.
Now look again at that verse again:
Romans 6:13
Neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those who are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.
It is just here that many Christians begin to furiously try to make their instruments righteous, in the hope that they can then present righteous instruments to God.
However, sinful man cannot create righteous instruments of his body. Only One Person has ever lived a righteous life, and that is the ascended Lord Jesus Christ.
Now note therefore that in Romans 6:13 God is NOT asking us to make our instruments righteous and then present them to Him; because that is a LOSING BATTLE. But what God IS asking us to do is that we present the instruments of our body to Him.
Now, the instruments of our body are NEUTRAL, they are neither sinful nor righteous; it is was we DO with the instruments of our body that creates sin or righteousness.
The mistake that many Christians make when they read Romans 6:13 is that they begin to try very hard to make their instruments righteous, but that is not what God is asking.
The Lord Jesus is merely asking that we present our instruments TO HIM so that He, as the Head of the Body, can guide our every step with His divine decisions for our moment-to-moment life, because HE ALONE is righteous and HE ALONE knows how to live a righteous life.
That is, once I say to God, "Okay, You can see everything and I can only see things in part, Lord please, YOU guide my steps from moment to moment", then God will do so (provided that we are saved first, of course):
Psalm 32:8
I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you shall go: I will guide you with My eye.
Psalm 48:14
For this God is our God forever and ever: He will be our guide even unto death.
Adam's sin was that Adam thought that he could run his own body from his soul level, without the input of the spirit, and God allowed Adam to do so and God withdrew His counsel of the Spirit, and today we see what a mess Adam has made of it by trying to run his life from the soul level alone.
When the Bible talks about "ceasing from our own works", it means that we need to cease from "making our own plans" and we need to cease from "generating our own thoughts" because our thoughts are "very inferior" to what the Lord Jesus who can see on our behalf from heaven:
Proverbs 3:5
Trust in the LORD with all your heart; and lean not on your own understanding.
Hebrews 4:10
For he who is entered into his rest, he also has ceased from his own works, as God did from His.
The Bible teaches that God and the Lord Jesus want us to stop making our own plans and to start trusting that the Lord Jesus can give us much better decisions and better counsel than we could ever make ourselves.
So, let's look at our verse again:
Romans 6:13
Neither yield your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves to God, as those who are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.
When God says, "Present your instruments of righteousness to Me", God is NOT saying that we should first make our instruments righteous and then present them to Him, because that is IMPOSSIBLE.
Even in our saved condition, we cannot be righteous. Only Jesus can be righteous. So we should never try to make our instruments righteous first because THAT IS IMPOSSIBLE.
But we CAN present the instruments of our body to God and say, "Okay, YOU are righteous and everything that You counsel me to do and say WILL be righteous and perfect" because YOU ARE MADE righteousness and wisdom FOR me:
1 Corinthians 1:30
But of Him are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made to us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.
And as a result, I actually begin to "look righteous", not because I have generated any righteousness of my own, but simply because the Lord Jesus is telling me righteous stuff to do and say every moment of my life and that in turn "makes me look righteous" eventhough, I have to admit, it all came from Jesus. Therefore Paul says:
Galatians 2:20
I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ lives in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God ...
That is, we ourselves can never acquire ANY righteous of our own, it is always only Jesus's righteousness that shows forth through us, IF we yield the instruments of our body for Him to guide us by.
Do you see the difference? Multitudes of Christians are trying furiously to present "righteous instruements to God" but that can never work. That is wrong reasoning.
It only works when we present the instruments of our body to Him, just as they are, neutral instruments, and then the counsel of Jesus IS the very RIGHTEOUSNESS and IS the WISDOM that we were looking for.
And that is exactly also what Jesus, as the Son of man, did:
John 5:19
Then Jesus said to them, Truly, I say to you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he sees the Father do: for whatsover things He does, these also does the Son likewise.
And finally, that is also the only way that we can "finish our course":
2 Timothy 4:7
I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.
Millions of Christians are not even ON God's course because they are still "on their own course", still doing their own thinking and their own planning, TRYING to make themselves good and righteous.
But once they realize the futility of trying, and instead present their instruments for the Lord Jesus to guide and direct us, then they finally enter on their course.
And then they can prove:
Romans 12:2
... what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
And then we can also say with Paul:
2 Timothy 4:7
I have fought a good fight, I have finished MY course ...
Are you on God's course already, or are you still on your own course? Are you still trying to make your instruments righteous and then present them to God? Rather, present your instruments to God and Jesus from heaven will counsel righteous things TO you; only then will you actually end up looking righteous.
love, Eden
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