Featured Regeneration w/o Living Water?

Steaver...you are confusing yourself with this text...it has been answered already....only you do not get it. Everyone else does:wavey:

 

That's not what Jesus told Peter after Peter told him, 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.'(Matt. 16:16) It wasn't Peter's knowledge that showed him who Jesus was, but rather, 'Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.'(Matt. 16:17)

Peter walked and communed with Jesus everyday, but it wasn't knowledge that revealed Jesus to him as the prophesied Messiah, but came from God Almighty...


Look at how the passage unfolds in John 4....Jesus comes to the well for a drink. She asks Him why, because the Jews and Samaritans don't commune with eachother. She then tells Him the well is deep and He has nothing to draw with. He then tells her that that water will still cause a person to thirst later, but the water He has will never cause thirst again, and even be within her a well of water springing up into everlasting life. She then asks Him for that water and He tells her to bring her husband. After she tells Him she has no husband, He then tells her of her previous five, and person she has now isn't her husband. Pay careful attention here...she then says she perceives that He is a Prophet...Jesus at work revealling Himself to her through the working of the Spirit. He then tells her at the end that He was the prophesied Messiah. She then leaves her waterpot behind and tells the Samaritans about Jesus, and many believe upon her testimony...again, the Spirit at work in the lives of sinners...and then He stays for two days and many believe through His words...again, the Spirit working in the lives of sinners...


She lacked knowledge, Jesus gave it to her, and she believed. But Jesus also told the Pharisees, Saducees, Chief Priests, other Jews who He was, and they didn't believe. The Spirit never worked in their lives to bring them to the Truth, the Truth being Jesus Christ...

 

Did you actually read that post??

Next time, before you post something that makes you look bad, please read a little more carefully.....

 

Quick general kibbitz: It sounds like we have been spending too much time at 312 Azusa St.

1. Jesus was slain before the foundation of the world--circa the same time the names were written in the Lamb's Book of Life. OT saints were converted the same was as NT saints: by grace through faith. Eph. 2: 8-10.

2. The Spirit, The Holy, given at Pentecost to the first church to lead, guide and direct as well as convict the world of sin, righteousness and judgment to come is still doing all of the above--in those churches which still have a candlestick. (some never had a candlestick) See letters to the Seven Churches of Asia, Book of Revelation.

3. When a person is converted, The Spirit of God, from the pneuma referenced in the Garden of Eden, when God breathed into the first man Adam and this lump of clay became a living soul, is made alive, quickened; having been dead(separated) in trespasses and sin. Sorry about the run-on sentence.

4. There is a difference in the manifestations. There is a difference in the doctrines as well. False doctrines come from churches with no Holy Spirit--there may be born again members.

Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

Bro. James

 

Until the Holy Spirit quickens and enables spiritual dead sinners as all of us once were here to be able to hear and respond to the Gospel message, it is just the same as us preaching in a cementary!

 

I have the feeling that in your zeal for proving me wrong, you scan my posts and never really read them in-depth whatsoever...


This mythical free will you harp about is just that, a myth.


Regeneration is being born again, born from above. It's akin to being naturally born. What did you do to help your mommy when she birthed you?

 

Oh man, Bro. Willis...I had really hoped you wouldn't jump on the "mythical free will" bandwagon...

Question: Is "being born again" the same as being saved?

 

Free will doesn't exist. Free means w/o restrictions. If one's will is free, then they could come to Jesus at any time. Jesus said, "no man can come unto Me UNLESS My Father which sent Me draws him". That shows that one's will must first be sensitized by the Spirit. Drawing by the Spirit precludes anything that sinner does positively towards God.

Nope. Being born again leads to salvation....

 

Brother Willis, good morning.

If you do not mind, let me add a few points of clarification regarding free will.

As Monergists we do not believe in a self autonomous free will the way Synergists do. Synergist free will teaches that mans will can operate independent of God. This is what allows the sinner to accept or reject the offer of salvation. This type of free will must reject original sin and that man is completely fallen in his sinful nature.

Monergists that the will of sinful man is held in bondage to his sinful nature. The presence of bondage means that mans will is not free. Regeneration, which proceeds justification, releases the will of man from bondage. Once the will of man has been released, he is able to freely believe in God. Man will has been liberated to do what God original created Adam to do.

So, Monergists believe in free will. We just do not believe in the self autonomous free will that Synergists believe in.

 

As you'll see I note below, perhaps I should offer up my interpretation of Free Will. See, I don't believe man can come to God whenever he so chooses. I believe there must be the drawing power of God, as you so quoted. However, I believe God can draw someone and that person is then free to accept or reject God. That is my interpretation of Free Will. As a "however" to the however, however (see what I did there?), I also see people in the Bible seeking God and I see God honoring that. That tells me there is a bit of mobility allowed to man in the flesh. The Ethiopian is a good example. He obviously had some impetus to read the scriptures. We could argue where that impetus came from until we are blue in the face. But he admitted that he could not fully understand what they meant without guidance.

As to your statement that drawing by the Spirit precludes anything that sinner does positively towards God...consider Deuteronomy 30:11. We have Moses speaking to Israel and telling them that the commandment of God is not far off or hidden, that it is not out of reach. He even goes so far as to say that he was laying before them "life and good, and death and evil." If man was unable to do anything "positive" toward God, then why bother telling them that the commandment was not far off, and that it was "life or death?"

Thank you. I've heard it put both ways, so I wanted to confirm the terms you were dealing in. That said, it leads me to a next question:
Can someone be "born again" and not be saved?

 

He is now doing the quickening and enabling though, isn't he?