Featured John 3:16, The Meaning of "kosmos"

I have, once many years ago, personally used an NWT to present the gospel using what is called the "Romans Road."
Romans 3:10.
Romans 3:23.
Romans 5:12.
Romans 6:23.
Romans 5:8.
Romans 10:9.
Romans 10:13.
Revelation 3:20.

 

Off topic non response.

“kosmos” does not just refer to humankind, Van, but includes all mankind. It includes all creation, the order of creation, the moral foundations of creation...

By inference that includes humankind.

 

Smokescreed non-stop

 

Really?

I give definition to a Greek word used, and that is smokescreen?

Typical of Van nonresponses?

 

Smokescreed #17.

 

Please give the NT use for it meaning "all creation."
Please give tbe NT use for it meaning "the order of creation."
Please give the NT use for it meaning "the moral foundations of creation."
And in each of thoses cases please show why it cannot mean in said context to refer to mankind.

 

First, I present that it DOES mean humankind.

Second, I present that the Greek allows for more than just humankind.

I don’t have to give NT uses, because I merely referred to the available definitions.

Perhaps you should give cause why it cannot be held to a larger more fuller perception.

 

I do not need to prove a negative.
It is my understanding, that κοσμος is believed to have a broader meaning than "mankind" in the New Testament. My looking at it in as used in the New Testament, I see no case where it cannot mean, as used the New Testament refer to "mankind." I am asking you give a few examples where mankind should not narrowly be understood.

 

I am not about to do your research.

The word is used nearly 200 times in the NT, and not always is it used exclusively as humankind.

For example John 1, Matthew 16, Acts 17, and on throughout the NT to Revelation 17.

Therefore, there are given occasions where “mankind should not be narrowly understood.”

 

I would like to focus on what you define as the "real issue." I am going to assume for this post that you are speaking of whether God sent his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, to the world so that all who believe in him might not perish but have eternal life and that God, by doing that, demonstrated how much he loved the world. I was very sincere when I said in one of my post that, after considering that, I concluded that act of God was some serious love. This is the subject of the op.

"can of their own innate ability, .....believe"

We humans are unique among God's earthly creatures. We are made in his image. We are trinitarian. We have intelligence, reason, and will. Cattle and horses don't have that. We can actually believe John 3:16 without being converted to Christ. I am guessing that you did believe that before you were converted. If you are truly converted it is a good bet that you DID believe that before you were converted. It takes intelligence to believe that. I am not going to bother telling my neighbors dog about Jn 3:16 because he cannot understand it.Telling him would be a waste of time. He cannot know and he cannot believe it. You, OTOH, must know it to believe it.

Now, that paragraph was about intelligence. All the evidence I have ever gathered while speaking to Calvinists assures me they have intelligence. This paragraph will be about reason. God who created all of us writes his Bible as if he thinks we have reasoning ability. The fact is he even called on people before they were converted to reason with him. Take a look.

"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." Isa 1:18

God is asking unconverted men to reason with him.

When men who know there is a God because of their intelligence but come to a place in their life when they can also know he is their only help, this reasoning will drive them to him; Look here;


Ex 3:7 And the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows;

You can know Jn 3:16 and believe there is a God who sent his son to save you, and you can reason that you are a sinner who needs to be saved just like he says, and still not be born again.

You must will to believe that God will save you when you believe from the heart. There are external circumstances and conditions that keep men from acting on his knowledge and reason. Jesus deals with it in this conversation with Nicodemus in Jn 3. He said men will not believe because they love darkness more than light. He did not say they did not believe because they did not have a will. He actually said they would not believe because they have a will. Jesus certainly implied repentance in these statements, which is an act of the will of man.The born again man is not associated with sin. He is associated with the sinless man, Jesus. I am going to quote this because you need to see it;

17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.


18 He that believeth on him is not condemned: (This believer must have heard) but he that believeth not is condemned already (this unbeliever must have heard), because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (this is the REASON given by God that the unbeliever is condemned and it does not agree with Calvinists)
19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.

Doing and coming is an act of the will based on information you have received and is the fruit of one's reasoning.

I am not claiming any certain Calvinist is a lost man but I am saying Calvinism is another gospel and any saved people who embrace it is already saved and confused by it.

God has sent preachers and his Bible into the world to influence sinners.


1 Cor 1:21 For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.

Rom 10: 13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.
14 How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?
15 And how shall they preach, except they be sent? as it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!
17 So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

So, the answer is yes, men can believe God. They must believe God and be saved.

Rom 6:17
But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you.

 

Metanoia means simply to change one’s mind. For the Jew to change their mind about the Messiahship of Yeshua. For the Gentiles it is to change their minds about idolatry. For those in the parable of the mustard seed they are to change their minds within the monstrosity of the church age of Christendom they must change their minds about church state salvation, about their belief in church salvation to individual salvation by grace alone thru faith alone in the substitutionary death, burial and resurrection of Christ alone plus nothing.

In the context of salvation repentance is a synonym for faith and by your lack of scholarship you make repentance a false addition to the gospel, you are anathema, your gospel is of a different kind.


Joy unspeakable full of glory

 

You are wrong about that. John the Baptist called on Israel to repent before he called on them to believe Jesus is the Messiah.Paul said in Acts 20that he preached repentance towards God abd faith in Jesus Christ. One is dependent on the other and is two sides of the same coin, but it is two sides. Agedman is right about that.

Sins are actions of the body. They are deeds that are generated from the heart. Change the heart and the deeds it produces will change and through Christ will be forgiveness.

James 1:13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: 14 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. 15 Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. 16 Do not err, my beloved brethren.

12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

 

If you die today, what will you tell God is your reason that you should go to heaven?


Joy unspeakable full of glory

 

Good question. I would not have to tell him because I am born again and am his son by birth whom he knows but I understand your question. I was born again at age 14 when I put my trust in the Lord Jesus Christ as my saviour from sin, believing the testimony of God in his Bible who promised me eternal life through him. Almost all I knew about God at that time came through the preacher that I heard regularly because I was fortunate to grow up in a family who took me to a Baptist church every Sunday for all my life. Since those days I have confirmed through my own study that the preacher was telling me the truth when he said whosoever will come to God through Christ may come and have eternal life. Thank you mom and dad for exposing me to the gospel of Christ when I was young.

What about you?

 

I have ordered your answers for entrance into heaven.

MY ANSWER: it is by the blood of Christ alone.


Joy unspeakable full of glory

 

How is that an answer? What does an answer like that have anything to do with you? I am confused.

 

I know this wasn't addressed to me... but I'm going to answer anyway...

What would be my reason? What would I say to God about whether I should be granted Heaven???

Simple... I'd tell Him He shouldn't let me in. The only hope I have is that Jesus died the death I owed God for my sin; that He lived the perfect life that I could never live; and that He was raised from the dead to secure my salvation.

The Archangel

 

You barely made it


Joy unspeakable full of glory

 

Yes you’ve become an utter embarrassment to yourself.
Just kidding


Joy unspeakable full of glory

 

If Jesus is my substitute in life, death, and resurrection, there’s no barely about it. The mystery, however, is why He would substitute Himself for me.

The Archangel


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