Featured Question For My Reformed Brothers And Sistes, Will God Take Care Of Us?

Yeah that actually is amazing, seems like when seems go well, joyful days, money, everything going fine, we feel like it's a reward, then conversely these times, it DOES make me ask once in awhile, when I get real low "Wait, are you sure you've saved, look at all you friends, they have everything they need, surely God can't love me in this state, what if I'm a phony", "No I know my time with the Lord, I see Him stopping me from sin, loving and understanding His word", back and forth it goes. I have a thing I use, John Bunyon used it in "Doubting Castle", he just said "My righteousness is in Heaven", boom that's it, we have up times, down times, BUT OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS LIVES IN HEAVEN, and nothing can alter Him.

I don't know how Arminians survive in that state, knowing that yes, indeed maybe I did some sin and lost my salvation, that would drive me insane. I've heard others say this, but if I could lose my salvation I would lose it. I've been a Christian along time, long enough to know there remains in me so much sin I don't have a chance, on my own, to make it to Heaven, not worthy, I have to have HIS Righteousness.

Hope your well, got excited last night when out of the blue was offered some money, I mean it's been BAD.

 

I agree, this has been MUCH MORE than I can handle! And yeah, imagine, I don't think we can, the suffering Jesus went through, not just in the Passion but all His life, being that pure, seeing God haters everywhere, knowing He's going to die for generations of such people, take their punishment, the greatest blend of sorry/joy every experienced on earth

 

Excellent, thanks, read every word slowly, "But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy', going to be studying that line tonight, "just as"

 

Always wondered about "Be Holy AS YOUR FATHER is Holy", and "without Holiness no one will see the Lord", found good piece from MaClaren;

I. The Pattern of Holiness.

‘As He that hath called you is holy.’ God’s holiness is the very attribute which seems to separate Him most from the creatures; for its deepest meaning is His majestic and Divine elevation above all that is creatural. But here, of course, the idea conveyed by the word is not that, if I may so say, metaphysical one, but the purely moral one. The holiness of God which is capable of imitation by us is His separation from all impurity. There is a side of His holiness which separates Him from all the creatures, to which we can only look up, or bow with our faces in the dust; but there is a side of His holiness which, wonderful as it is, and high above all our present attainment as it is, yet is not higher than the possibilities which His indwelling Spirit puts within our reach, nor beyond the bounds of the duty that presses upon us all. ‘As He which hath called you is holy.’ Absolute and utter purity is His holiness, and that is the pattern for us.

Religion is imitation. The truest form of worship is to copy. All through heathenism you find that principle working. ‘They that make them are like unto them.’ Why are heathen nations so besotted and sunken and obstinate in their foulnesses? Because their gods are their examples, and they, first of all, make the gods after the pattern of their own evil imaginations, and then the evil imaginations, deified, react upon the maker and make him tenfold more a child of hell than themselves. Worship is imitation, and there is no religion which does not necessarily involve the copying of the example or the pattern of that Being before whom we bow. For religion is but love and reverence in the superlative degree, and the natural operation of love is to copy, and the natural operation of reverence is the same. So that the old Mosaic law, ‘Be ye holy as I am holy,’ went to the very heart of religion. And the New Testament form of it, as Paul puts it in a very bold word, ‘Be ye imitators of God, as beloved children,’ sets its seal on the same thought that we are religious in the proportion in which we are consciously copying and aspiring after God.

But then, says somebody or other, ‘it is not possible.’ Well, if it were not possible, try it all the same. For in this world it is aim and not attainment that makes the noble life; and it is better to shoot at the stars, even though your arrow never reaches them, than to fire it along the low levels of ordinary life. I do not see that however the unattainableness of the model may be demonstrated, that has anything to do with the duty of imitation. Because, though absolute conformity running throughout the whole of a life is not possible here on earth, we know that in each individual instance in which we came short of conformity the fault was ours, and it might have been otherwise. Instead of bewildering ourselves with questions about ‘unattainable’ or ‘attainable,’ suppose we asked, at each failure, ‘Why did I not copy God then; was it because I could not, or because I would not?’ The answer would come plain enough to knock all that sophisticated nonsense out of our heads, and to make us feel that the law which puts an unattainable ideal before the Christian as his duty is an intensely practical one, and may be reduced to practice at each step in his career. Imitation of the Father, and to be perfect, ‘as our Father in heaven is perfect,’ is the elementary and the ultimate commandment of all Christian morality. ‘Be ye holy as He that hath called you is holy.’

Then let me remind you that the unattainableness is by no means so demonstrable as some people seem to think. A very tiny circle may have the same centre as one that reaches beyond the suburbs of the universe, and holds all stars and systems within its great round. And the tiniest circle will have the same geometrical laws applied to it as the greatest. The difference between finite and infinite has nothing to do with the possibility of our becoming like God, if we believe that ‘in the image of God created He him’; and that men who have been not only made by original creation in the Divine image, but have been born again by the incorruptible seed of the Word into a kindred life with His, and derived from Him, can surely grow like what they have got, and unfold into actually possessed and achieved resemblance to their Father the kindred life that is poured into their veins.

So every way it is better indefinitely to approximate to that great likeness, though with many flaws and failures, than to say it cannot be reached, and so I will content myself down here, in my sins and my meannesses. No! dear brethren, ‘we are saved by hope,’ and one prime condition of growth in nobleness is to believe it possible that, by His blessing we may be like Him here on earth in the measure of our perception of His beauty and reception of His grace.

 

By the way, way off topic, but you mentioned Pilgrims Progress, of all things there is a CARTOON version that is excellent, it really is.

 

Wow how great to see this, no notice or anything, thanks! Yes indeed please pray for me.

Its funny you said "would have committed a crime...", I got so low, the temptation came through my head "Just go to a drug house and rob them", I mean not really think that, don't know but yeah the brain is funny, shows us how sinful we are.

Things are so much better, if anything just my attitude, I listened to a sermon by Spurgeon last night about prayer, MAN he almost sounded like a "name it and claim it" cult, but he was very specific, so there was no confusion, he talked about this is my Father, just keep praying, lean on Him, don't pray of anything else, so for like two hours last night, awake and asleep prayed the same thing, what's interesting about that is the focusing on God, that He REALLY IS THERE, REALLY IS LISTENING, and just pleading a case. Today work was awesome, no fear, I have hope, could be temporary but I don't think so.

Thanks, and can always use prayer, please

 

Thank you very much. Just add in Mike when you pray

 

I don't understand your question, we are to help ALL, rich or poor, Religious or Atheist, we are to even submit to authorities to glorify God, for He put them there. There is a EXCELLENT, seen it 5 times at least, movie on Daniel on YouTube, it shows well how we are to submit to Authority, pagan authority, any authority over us that God has set up, yet when the edict "No one shall pray to anyone but me", resist

 

First, not trying to be rude, but where did you get that assumption? Scripture is clear, out of a group of rebels, before the world was created, God, for His glory sake, choose some for Salvation, other rebels He left in their sins, so clearly only the elect are saved. Unlike Arminianism Reformed Theology humbles the Christian, for we know there was NOTHING IN US that led to our salvation, while Arminians are left to wonder why they choose Christ and there neighbors didn't, are they smarter? Better? Just by chance at some crusade. No every atom in the Universe is in the exact place where God wants it.

Even Arminian scholars admit God has at least two wills, His revealed will, and His secret will. The cross is a great example, on the one hand we are told in Isaiah "It PLEASED the Lord to bruise Him", this is God's secret will revealed, His revealed will, clearly is that He abhors murder, especially of His Son. In Acts 4 we find out that every step, from the Jews actions, the Romans, Pilate, Judas, all Pre-determined by God, and we see this all through scripture, God ordaining a think He hates. God incited David to take a census, then judged him for it, on and on if you just read and study it.

 

Hey brother, get this, my company sold $37,500.00 yesterday! Everything has changed, why? My attitude, when I first learned of God's sovereignty, this will make you sick, I'd look at my sins and think "Well nothing to stop God from bringing me down", and I'm SO NEGATIVE, God is in the sky, over me with a book, make a mistake, sin, He frowns, totally opposite of what scripture teaches. But it was a sermon of Spurgeons that turned me around, using Jacob wrestling with God as overriding topic, we are to be that way, NEVER STOP PRAYING, BELIEVE IT WILL HAPPEN, serious Spurgeon sounded close, if you didn't know to the name it and claim it's, much different of course, but it HONORS GOD FOR US TO COME TO HIM EXPECTING REWARD, IT HONORS HIM FOR US TO EXPECT GOOD THINGS, HIS FATHERLY FAVOR, I only expected bad things for my sins, crazy huh?

I can tell it's over, my nightmare gone, I won't let anything get me down, I'm living in FAITHFUL EXPECTANCY, "He who trusts in Him will not be put to shame", I know it doesn't necessarily apply but that's my attitude, if something goes wrong "Father, why", but it takes prayer like I've never done, one night was two hours, not works, but a true desire to talk to my Father, all I want is money to live a normal life on, put God first in everything, experience His presence ALL THE TIME like when first saved, do my ministry, wife and more kids.

I'm so happy I feel like I'm floating on clouds