Sent: August 17, 2004 12:50
Subject: [TruthTalk] Christians'
authority over nature
God's covenant (via Abraham) is unilateral and,
not bilateral.
jt: God's covenant (via
Abraham) is Jesus and those who come to Him have been drawn by the
Father.
I don't see anything
"unilateral" in all the gospels. Counting the cost is a scriptural
principle. judyt
In a message dated
8/16/2004 12:16:39 PM Pacific Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
writes:
The above is TFT's
"incarnational teaching" Yes Jesus is the sacrifice for all time but
God is a Covenant God and Jesus is given as a Covenant to the people.
Covenant agreements involve the fidelity both parties and we enter the
process of salvation so that we might overcome as He overcame. Yes it is all
His grace, and it is all His power - but we have our part in the process if
we have repented from dead works so that we may serve the Living God.
I'm not satisfied with a "form of godliness" are you?.
What about the fellow in Ro 2:12-16? The text
presents one who is not a hearer of the law -- of any law. But
he instinctively fulfills the law and with that activity, can be saved by
Christ. The text does not present one who has accepted Christ as
his personal savior or held himself obedient to an ethical code of some
sort.
jt: The fellow in
Romans 2:12 is a New Covenant believer a person who has God's law
written upon the tables of his heart by the indwelling Spirit as Per
Jeremiah 31:33. A gentile who was not raised under the Jewish
law. The book of Romans is addressed to: "All that be in Rome beloved
of God, called to be saints" IOW it is to God's people in
Rome.
Scripture everywhere teaches that God cares more for the condition of
the heart than anything. Somewhere in this "inwardness" is the
image of God spoken of in Genesis.
jt: I agree about the
condition of the heart being important to God. However, scripture
also teaches us that the human heart is deceitful above all things and
desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9); this is not the image of God.
Jesus is the image of God. He said "If you have seen Me you have seen the
Father" and it is not until we are conformed to His image (which is the
purpose of salvation) that we return to the image of God spoken of in
Genesis.
Grace and
Peace,
Judy