If "Any Man" Thirst

[JonShaff]

So, you do Theology by majority vote?

LOL

No, sir. I believe the Passage of Christ our Lord raising His Beloved Friend from the dead is a Picture of what Christ will do for all His beloved Friends at His coming. He will Raise the Dead to Life.

If one says that this is a picture of regeneration and then continues to use the analogy of a dead man to explain regeneration, i'd say they have a faulty premise in their Theology

 

[Pastor_Bob]

Really? Go up to a dead man in a casket and tell him he is ugly. See how he responds. Offer to take him out to lunch. See how he responds. Offer him something to drink. See how he responds.

Jesus was clearly speaking to spiritually dead (thirsty) people. Spiritually alive people would not need to drink from the water of life after the very first taste (John 4:14, John 6:35). So, your reasoning is very circular. In essence, "I don't believe that man can choose to come to Christ, therefore; this passage must mean something different."

Saying "all I see here is circular reasoning" seems to indicate your desperation.

There it is...

Col 2:13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;

Amen! All this happened the very moment I placed my faith and trust in Him!

 

[InTheLight]

Really? Go up to a dead man in a casket and tell him he is ugly. See how he responds. Offer to take him out to lunch. See how he responds. Offer him something to drink. See how he responds.

Saying "all I see here is circular reasoning" seems to indicate your desperation.

Col 2:13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;

The problem with Calvinist theology claiming "dead men can't see", "dead men can't thirst", "dead men can't _________", is that the whole thing is question begging. The "dead men" examples rely on the a priori conclusion that unregenerated people are dead and can't do anything. But Paul says that while the Jews won't listen the Gentiles will (Acts 28:28). So here we have a verse saying that God's chosen people are "dead" and can't hear, but the unregenerate "dead" Gentiles can hear. Hmmm...

 

[HankD]

Was Lazarus spiritually dead as well as physically dead?

That indeed is the question.

HankD

 

[thatbrian]

John 7:37 In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.

Thirst is something that originates within each man. Jesus didn't say, "All those in whom I have placed a thirst, let him come to Me and drink."

"...for what is the use of food to a hungry man if he cannot get at it? Of what avail is the river of the water of life if one cannot drink?" All of Grace: An Earnest Word with Those Who Are Seeking Salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ - Charles Spurgeon

John 6:35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

Revelation 22:17 And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.

Why don't all men thirst?

The only reason so do is that they have been regenerated, aka, born again. Like a new baby doesn't need instruction regarding feeding from its mother's breast, new Christians hunger and thirst for Christ. Prior to regeneration, no man desires God or things of God.

 

[thatbrian]

LOL

No, sir. I believe the Passage of Christ our Lord raising His Beloved Friend from the dead is a Picture of what Christ will do for all His beloved Friends at His coming. He will Raise the Dead to Life.

If one says that this is a picture of regeneration and then continues to use the analogy of a dead man to explain regeneration, i'd say they have a faulty premise in their Theology

Jesus didn't have a traveling sideshow. His miracles revealed spiritual truth. They weren't spectacles. His miracles were not disconnected from spiritual realities. There is no other way to understand the story, but to see that Jesus calls His elect, by His word, and they are made alive.

 

[JonShaff]

Why don't all men thirst?

The only reason so do is that they have been regenerated, aka, born again. Like a new baby doesn't need instruction regarding feeding from its mother's breast, new Christians hunger and thirst for Christ. Prior to regeneration, no man desires God or things of God.

Context is Key...

the Woman at the Well follows John 7:37

She was an unregenerate woman satisfying her thirst with men. Christ offered His Living Waters and quenched her heart's thirst.

You are correct, that the unregenerate man does not thirst for God, however, when the Preacher (Christ Himself) says, "Come, Taste and See that the Lord is Good," one can prove the Word of the Lord to be True

Also, (edit)

Christ didn't say, "If anyone's thirsts for God..." notice he didn't qualify it...He just says if anyone thirsts...

 

[JonShaff]

Jesus didn't have a traveling sideshow. His miracles revealed spiritual truth. They weren't spectacles. His miracles were not disconnected from spiritual realities. There is no other way to understand the story, but to see that Jesus calls His elect, by His word, and they are made alive.

Was this miracle done to reveal Regeneration? or the Resurrection from the Dead at Christ's Coming?

 

[thatbrian]

Context is Key...

the Woman at the Well follows John 7:37

She was an unregenerate woman satisfying her thirst with men. Christ offered His Living Waters and quenched her heart's thirst.

You are correct, that the unregenerate man does not thirst for God, however, when the Preacher (Christ Himself) says, "Come, Taste and See that the Lord is Good," one can prove the Word of the Lord to be True

By speaking the words, "If any man thirst. . ." He, through His word, and by the Spirit, does His work.

 

[JonShaff]

By speaking the words, "If any man thirst. . ." He, through His word, and by the Spirit, does His work.

I also added that Christ didn't qualify His statement...He just said, "If anyone thirsts....come to me..." He did not say, if anyone thirsts for God...

And certainly, Christ's follow up statement about "anyone believing on Him" must have to do with the imperative of "Come to Me". If you are thirsty, come to Christ--Believing He is the one who would satisfy your soul. And then John 8 Gives us a fine picture of this.

 

[agedman]

Folks, did or does Jesus call any one a friend of those who were lost?

Did he not have Lazarus as a friend?

So when His friend died physically, what estate was that friend (Lazarus) placed, hell or Abrahams bosom?

Remember the parable of the rich man, desiring to return? Was there any allowance for any person of that estate of torment to again walk the earth?

What man from that place of torment was ever raised or seen to walk upon earth yet both in the OT and NT the redeemed dead are seen to be raised to walk among the living.

Some might point to the child that was raised by the prophet, yet do not Baptist claim that a child is "safe" until accountability?

Some might even point to the dead soldier who sprang from the prophet's grave. Yet, there is no indication that the man was not redeemed or lost, just that he was killed in battle.

There is nothing in the passages presented in the OP that refutes the thinking of those who embrace the Particular thinking.

 

[InTheLight]

Jesus didn't have a traveling sideshow. His miracles revealed spiritual truth. They weren't spectacles. His miracles were not disconnected from spiritual realities. There is no other way to understand the story, but to see that Jesus calls His elect, by His word, and they are made alive.

Wrong. The "spiritual truth" revealed is that Jesus is the resurrection and the life, not that unregenerate people are dead corpses!

Jesus heard about Lazarus being sick yet he stayed where he was for two additional days and then decided to go to Bethany. Why? Because he wanted to use Lazarus as an example of the resurrection. Jesus deliberately tarried so that Lazarus could die. In fact, Jesus told his disciples that Lazarus was asleep, they didn't understand he meant that Lazarus was DEAD. Even Jesus' disciples didn't grasp the alleged, "dead in sins" analogy.

So, if as you claim, that Lazarus is an analogy for people being spiritually dead why did Jesus not teach that very lesson? Why would he couch his words to his disciples to make them think that Lazarus was only sleeping? If your analogy holds, why would Thomas say, "let us go there and die also?", i.e. Let us all go there and be dead in our sins?

11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.”
13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead,
15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) "said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

40 Jesus says, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
Note there is no "allow me to give you a new heart, to figuratively "make alive" your "dead in sin body", and then you can see the glory of God. No, it was, "believe and you will see the glory of God."

The lesson of Lazarus is not that people are "dead in sin", the lesson is that Jesus holds the literal power over death through the resurrection!

 

[JonShaff]

Jesus didn't have a traveling sideshow. His miracles revealed spiritual truth. They weren't spectacles. His miracles were not disconnected from spiritual realities. There is no other way to understand the story, but to see that Jesus calls His elect, by His word, and they are made alive.

Here you go, @TCassidy, @thatbrian seems to think Lazarus was raised from the dead to show Regeneration.

 

[JonShaff]

Wrong. The "spiritual truth" revealed is that Jesus is the resurrection and the life, not that unregenerate people are dead corpses!

Jesus heard about Lazarus being sick yet he stayed where he was for two additional days and then decided to go to Bethany. Why? Because he wanted to use Lazarus as an example of the resurrection. Jesus deliberately tarried so that Lazarus could die. In fact, Jesus told his disciples that Lazarus was asleep, they didn't understand he meant that Lazarus was DEAD. Even Jesus' disciples didn't grasp the alleged, "dead in sins" analogy.

So, if as you claim, that Lazarus is an analogy for people being spiritually dead why did Jesus not teach that very lesson? Why would he couch his words to his disciples to make them think that Lazarus was only sleeping? If your analogy holds, why would Thomas say, "let us go there and die also?", i.e. Let us all go there and be dead in our sins?

11 After he had said this, he went on to tell them, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”
12 His disciples replied, “Lord, if he sleeps, he will get better.”
13 Jesus had been speaking of his death, but his disciples thought he meant natural sleep.
14 So then he told them plainly, “Lazarus is dead,
15 and for your sake I am glad I was not there, so that you may believe. But let us go to him.”
16 Then Thomas (also known as Didymus) "said to the rest of the disciples, “Let us also go, that we may die with him.”

40 Jesus says, “Did I not tell you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
Note there is no "allow me to give you a new heart, to figuratively "make alive" your "dead in sin body", and then you can see the glory of God. No, it was, "believe and you will see the glory of God."

The lesson of Lazarus is not that people are "dead in sin", the lesson is that Jesus holds the literal power over death through the resurrection!

Well said.

Edit, very well said

 

[thatbrian]

I also added that Christ didn't qualify His statement...He just said, "If anyone thirsts....come to me..." He did not say, if anyone thirsts for God...

And certainly, Christ's follow up statement about "anyone believing on Him" must have to do with the imperative of "Come to Me". If you are thirsty, come to Christ--Believing He is the one who would satisfy your soul. And then John 8 Gives us a fine picture of this.

Well. . . Okay. I'm pretty sure we would agree that He didn't mean physical thirst, so we are left with spiritual thirst, of some kind. He spoke in the Beatitudes of thirst for righteousness. I would again argue that unregenerate men don't thirst for righteousness.

If not for righteousness, what other non-physical thing could He have been referring to?

 

[JonShaff]

Well. . . Okay. I'm pretty sure we would agree that He didn't mean physical thirst, so we are left with spiritual thirst, of some kind. He spoke in the Beatitudes of thirst for righteousness. I would again argue that unregenerate men don't thirst for righteousness.

If not for righteousness, what other non-physical thing could He have been referring to?

Once again, In John 7, Christ did not qualify His statement. He just said, "If anyone thirsts, come to HIM."

In the Beatitudes, Christ qualifies His statements of those who are blessed, as they hunger and thirst, "For Righteousness."

Context is key...(as always) ....John 8 tells us what Christ meant concerning the Thirsty Soul.

 

[Pastor_Bob]

Folks, did or does Jesus call any one a friend of those who were lost?

Yes.
Matthew 26:50 And Jesus said unto him [Judas], Friend, wherefore art thou come? Then came they, and laid hands on Jesus, and took him.

 

[TCassidy]

That indeed is the question.

No for me. I see the context saying he was already a believer and friend of Jesus, so he had spiritual hearing even though the body was dead.

 

[Jerome]

Folks, did or does Jesus call any one a friend of those who were lost?

Scripture says of the rich young ruler, Jesus loved him.

Mark 10:20-22 And he answered and said unto him, Master, all these have I observed from my youth. Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me. And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions.

 

[TCassidy]

dead (thirsty) people

Dead people are not thirsty. They are dead.

"I don't believe that man can choose to come to Christ, therefore; this passage must mean something different."

I believe the bible when it clearly and plainly says in 1 Cor 2:14 "Now the natural man does not receive the things of God’s Spirit, for they are foolishness to him, and he can’t know them, because they are spiritually discerned."

That's God's word. We either accept it and believe it or we deny it and disbelieve it.

Amen! All this happened the very moment I placed my faith and trust in Him!

Amen. He regenerated your sin sick soul and at that very moment he gave you faith to believe, repent, and obey, just as it says.

"And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;"

You were dead, then He made you alive.