nasa1
13th April 2008, 02:09 PM
Last night my friend decided to ask me all sorts of questions. You see in his salvation experience, he recieved an absolute knowing that he would go to heaven when he died. That's nice, but not all of us have that. Anyway, my friend says that in the "cults" that they do not have total assurance that they are heaven bound at death. And he thinks that maybe I'm not really saved because I do not have this total assurance.
Now I told my friend that he is judging the validity of other people's salvation by whether or not theirs matches his - having an absolute assurance of going to heaven when he dies. I gave him this example: not too long ago the Pope stated that everyone not in Catholicism may be in danger of being lost to Christ. Now, why would he think like that? Could it be that like my friend, he is judging other people's salvation experience against his own? His experience is one of being Catholic. That is the context in how he came to know the Lord. Wonderful. http://www.theooze.com/forums/images/smilies/1.gif But why do people have to be so close-minded as to think that if someone else's salvation experience does not match their own, then those other people perhaps are lost?
If I grew up as a Mormon, and knew the Lord and the scriptures in that context, I would probably think that everyone who was not a Mormon was lost. If I grew up as a 7th Day Adventist, I probably would think that everyone who did not know the Lord in the way that I did - by Adventist teachings - was in danger of not having a real relationship with the Lord. All of this close-minded judging just makes the congregation of the Lord, His Body, live in disunity.
Now I know that there are some of us that do not cling to these judgemental attitudes. It is my prayer that there will be more and more of us. And where do we come from? I know that I used to be quite fundamental in my beliefs. We need God to soften our hard hearts. I think of the disciples who wanted to incinerate a Samaritan village because it would not prepare to recieve Jesus. That is how many of us are today. Are you surprised when you read about all the atrocities of the so called Church during the Dark Ages? Why should we be? If the disciples wanted to burn people who didn't want to receive Jesus, no wonder others throughout Christian history have had the same desire - unfortunately they didn't have Jesus right there with them to rebuke and stop their insanity.
I want Jesus and His cross to be our foundation. If it is, then we can accept each other. We have to remember that Jesus died for each one of us and that no one is better than anyone else. We need to drop all these creeds and these denominational titles and just accept each other because Jesus died for us all. We all drove the nails into the cross of Christ. No more blaming Jewish people. No more looking at the "Church" as the only benefactors of grace. I pray that we can truly accept one another not by our creeds but rather because Jesus died for us and that makes all of equally important and loved by God.
nasa
Now I told my friend that he is judging the validity of other people's salvation by whether or not theirs matches his - having an absolute assurance of going to heaven when he dies. I gave him this example: not too long ago the Pope stated that everyone not in Catholicism may be in danger of being lost to Christ. Now, why would he think like that? Could it be that like my friend, he is judging other people's salvation experience against his own? His experience is one of being Catholic. That is the context in how he came to know the Lord. Wonderful. http://www.theooze.com/forums/images/smilies/1.gif But why do people have to be so close-minded as to think that if someone else's salvation experience does not match their own, then those other people perhaps are lost?
If I grew up as a Mormon, and knew the Lord and the scriptures in that context, I would probably think that everyone who was not a Mormon was lost. If I grew up as a 7th Day Adventist, I probably would think that everyone who did not know the Lord in the way that I did - by Adventist teachings - was in danger of not having a real relationship with the Lord. All of this close-minded judging just makes the congregation of the Lord, His Body, live in disunity.
Now I know that there are some of us that do not cling to these judgemental attitudes. It is my prayer that there will be more and more of us. And where do we come from? I know that I used to be quite fundamental in my beliefs. We need God to soften our hard hearts. I think of the disciples who wanted to incinerate a Samaritan village because it would not prepare to recieve Jesus. That is how many of us are today. Are you surprised when you read about all the atrocities of the so called Church during the Dark Ages? Why should we be? If the disciples wanted to burn people who didn't want to receive Jesus, no wonder others throughout Christian history have had the same desire - unfortunately they didn't have Jesus right there with them to rebuke and stop their insanity.
I want Jesus and His cross to be our foundation. If it is, then we can accept each other. We have to remember that Jesus died for each one of us and that no one is better than anyone else. We need to drop all these creeds and these denominational titles and just accept each other because Jesus died for us all. We all drove the nails into the cross of Christ. No more blaming Jewish people. No more looking at the "Church" as the only benefactors of grace. I pray that we can truly accept one another not by our creeds but rather because Jesus died for us and that makes all of equally important and loved by God.
nasa