The Man of Faith
For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. Romans 7:15 NASB
I do not understand – Paul is not describing his spiritual state before his “conversion.” That’s what Augustine thought and as a result the Christian Church embraced another round of Platonic dualism, reformed into an anti-Jewish evangelism. Paul did not convert. He accepted Yeshua as the Jewish Messiah. Conversion was unnecessary! What Paul does in Romans 7 is create a “straw man,” the man who recognizes the inner conflict of faith and who longs for resolution. What Paul writes about in Romans 7 is the battle between the yetzer ha’ra and the yetzer ha’tov, not between the Law of the Jews and the Grace of the Christians. What this means is that Paul puts into words what everyone who has ever battled with the temptation to sin has ever felt—unexplainable inner turmoil.
“The man of faith is always at war with himself.”[1] Why? Because he “desires to create, to master the earth, to dominate,” and he recognizes an opposite desire “to submit to divinity, to ask why, to know always that he is incomplete—that there is another above.”[2] When he fulfills the desire to have the world the way he wants it, he stands in opposition to the equally compelling desire to submit to the world the way God wants it. And yet he finds himself doing what he knows cannot satisfy eternally. He stands outside himself and asks, “Why do I constantly do those things that I know will eventually cause me distress and dissatisfaction? Why don’t I just do what I know is right?” He is himself the battleground of the ethical equation and he cannot escape by taking a moral vacation.
“The man of faith is always at war with himself.” Perhaps you will need to read that again. Faith is being at war with yourself. Faith does not bring peace, harmony, ease, comfort, prosperity or the good will of others. Faith produces conflict, both external and internal. Faith is a fight! I must fight myself since I was trained so long and so well to manage life to my own ends; and I must fight my environment, given over to the influences of Babylon. A man of faith without a fight is dead. Believing God and acting according to His instructions will bring you perfect peace—in the grave. But until then, we will continue the lives of Abraham, Jacob, David and the prophets.
We have learned that prayer is a battle, a place of combat with the One who loves us through and through. It is a battle because it requires us to have the courage to be real, completely open, engaged, sometimes even enraged. But prayer is a battle in the realm of willing parties. The battle of the yetzer ha’ra is not so cooperative. Ou ginosko, writes Paul. “I do not understand.” I don’t understand myself when all of this combat is raging around me. I don’t understand how I got here, why I am in the midst of all this or why it should be this way. But it is. To pretend otherwise is to deny what it means to be alive. To pray is to fight. To love is to fight. To live is to fight.
“Being human is about craving. It is at its essence, a state of thirst.”[3] That craving leads in only one of two directions. Either way is a fight. The path is up to you.
Welcome to the world.
Topical Index: battle, not understand, ou ginosko, Romans 7:15, conversion, fight
[1] Aviya Kushner, The Grammar of God, p. 100.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Aviya Kushner, The Grammar of God, p. 162.
It has taken me a long time to understand that the archtype, as it were, of the hero on this planet is always a warrior. A fighter. Who and what and why we fight determine which side we are on, but a hero is one who makes a decision to turn around and engage.
We fight to survive, for we are born looking our eminent demise in the face, but our paradigm – our belief system – determines how we direct the fight. If I believe that it is ‘all up to me’, I am going to fight for myself. If I believe (faith) that it is ‘all up to Him’, then I also have to believe Him when He says that vengeance is HIS, and He will fight for me. Then the fight turns around and I battle with myself to stay in that faith.
To let go and let God is the decision to face the enemy head on, for Ephesians tells me that there is no armor for my back side, but the correct action for me to take is to look that enemy in the face, and pray. The God of my salvation will never tie my hands, but I must tie them myself, submit to my cross, and get out of the way, for Him to enact His perfect will. I am never going to be able to work myself out of the hole that my sin dug, for the tool that fixes my problem (His will) is not the same tool – the only tool I possess – that caused it (my will). Salvation itself teaches me that I cannot do it myself, for I am the biggest part of my problem. I need saving from myself. I have truly met the enemy, and it is truly me.
It seems to me that you’re overlooking a very important step in Paul’s analysis of his spiritual state. While I totally agree with you that the conflict of Romans is not over law vs grace, and there is no “conversion” to speak of, there is, however, a remedy to the conflict – Chapter 8, vs 2: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.” Paul spent the better part of chapter 6 explaining that concept. YOU have died. A dead man can’t be in conflict. Yes, there is the matter of “reckoning” this, and “working it out,” and “renewing the mind,” which are admittedly ambiguous concepts, but, based on everything else Paul says, it seems to me that this conflict in chapter 7 was with his “still alive” flesh. “Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! …the law of of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death.”
I think you misread Paul in chapter 7. This is a typical “straw man” argument found in Greek literature, not a reflection of Paul’s own experience, something that would have been incompatible with his declaration before Felix. You have interpreted Paul as Augustine did, a Christian version, not a Jewish one. Furthermore, chapter 8:2 is not a solution unless you realize that Paul uses nomos in a way that cannot be understood as Torah. He does this often with at least 8 different meanings of the term. I have noted this previously and cited a book about it on my recommended reading list.
Do the Jewish people today also “accept Yeshua as their Messiah?” If not, – why not? I would love to dialogue with anyone concerning this very topic.
This is Paul’s passionate plea:
“Dear brothers and sisters, the longing of my heart and my prayer to God is for the people of Israel to be saved.” (Romans 10.1)
Is there a [Jewish/Kosher?] Gospel?
Who, exactly, is included or excluded by “whosoever will”?
Why was meant by the Messiah in His conversation with Nicodemus: “You must be born from Above?”
What is this “second birth” all about?
Paul’s pointed query- “Who shall deliver me..?” revealed itself. – Who is our Deliverer?
“the Jews require a sign?” Here’s one (of how many?)
~ For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the LORD.
And this shall be a SIGN unto you; You shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
“Why was meant by the Messiah in His conversation with Nicodemus: “You must be born from Above?”
What is this “second birth” all about?”
Dying to self through Yeshua’s death, raised to newness of life through his resurrection. That is the second birth.
Do you think Yeshua actually communicated this to Nicodemus who would probably have NO idea of this anachronistic concept?
The prophets spoke of circumcision of the heart, and replacing the heart of stone with a heart of flesh. Would not this be the same concept?
Yes. And it does seem Nicodemus was confused or taken aback by this “entering a second time into his mother’s womb..” Would you agree, that we also, need to be “born from Above..” that this “second birth” is necessary for both Jew and Gentile?
It would seem that eternal life begins in the here and now, at the second birth, when we’re translated into the kingdom of God. John says the one who has been born of God will no longer continue in a pattern of sin. That would indicate a definitive victory over the yetzer hara. And, yes, it is for all God’s children. Jew and Gentile alike.
I think what I have seen in scripture is eternal life is the PROMISE in the world to come.
That world has NOT yet come upon the earth.
John 12:25
Luke 18:30
Romans 2:7
Eph. 1:13
Romans 5:21 and I see the word “UNTO” in these verses ..
We were created to be part of a much, infinitely (through association) much, larger whole. Everything about our creation is geared to Belong, from what activates our chemical responses to stimulates our mind to satisfies our heart. We were designed to obtain our life from without ourselves, through love. Our very breath is a down payment on the principle that nothing lives unto itself, for the One Who holds tomorrow also holds our every breath. When the selfish, ignorant heart of man tries to strike out ‘on his own’, he immediately starts to drown. We fight for that spiritual Air that we cannot live without, but we tilt at windmills when we do not recognize what, exactly, we live on. Nope, not “bread alone”, but every Word, and that mysterious Ruach, too, that comes down from that Father of lights.
We twist and turn on the hooks of our own devising and guessing (missing the mark), but He waits until we turn around. “Repent” is where the last gasp of that selfish heart fades away, and we take the first Breath that re-connects us to what we were made to live in. Like fish out of our native element, flung onto the shore of our devastation, we flop and fight, until we can hear the still small Voice behind us that says “turn around”. Torah is an ocean of freedom, and we were made to live and breathe and have our being nowhere else but through that holy Character – which Torah reveals to us – expressed through us; born into His likeness, and growing up into His likeness – that Body from beyond us – like that Breath from beyond. “Emmanuel” also means God THROUGH us. Definitely NOT something I can ‘do myself’!
“The man of faith, according to the Rav, is lonely, because he is always caught between these two opposites” (p. 94)
It is a battle, but one worth fighting.
Are you sure about this conclusion?
Skip, do you think Paul would agree with the later developments in rabbinic thought that say an individual can master the yetzer ha’ra themselves?
An excellent question. Even if I agree, I think perhaps the struggle is so intense that it requires us to act like “mad men” in the world – totally opposed to the life of this realm. I think Moses suggests we can do it, but I wonder if I am able.
My conclusion or Rav’s?
Funny coincidence/connection with today’s “Today’s Word”: Just read this paragraph below on chabad.org as i was researching proper pronunciation of the “Modeh Ani” (first Jewish prayer before getting out of bed)
A new day, new battles. Actually, one battle that assumes different forms: I Want vs. I Should. The day’s first battlefield is your bed, and the first shot is fired when the alarm clock rings. I Want reaches out to hit the snooze button; I Should is ready to jump out of bed and take on another day.
That’s why the first instruction in the Code of Jewish Law is: “Be strong as a lion when you wake up in the morning to serve your Creator.” Because if you win this battle, the rest are lamb chops.
I am bothered by the idea that we must “master” the yetzer ha’ra – as if it is a defective part of us that must be beaten into submission so the yetzer ha’tov can reign.
I think what we are looking to do is “temper” the yetzer ha’ra by the yetzer ha’tov. Tempering provides a counterbalance, a moderating effect – not a replacement. Tempering weakens the original substance as heat, cold or another substance are added in to modify it; but in the end, the product is stronger than it was before the tempering. It’s not that the metal, glass, clay or food is “mastered”; it CHANGES by the “mixing in” of something else. It is the mixing-in of the yetzer ha’tov that is the variable – but it is a variable that brings out the best of both.
Very interesting observation, Suzanne.
Agreed Suzanne, I think it comes from the (mis) understanding the yetzer ha’ra is equivalent to the “sinful nature”. Perhaps it would help if we would suggest that the yetzer ha’tov can be, and often is, susceptible to corruption. Other thatn that, it’s a gift to us that I wonder how long we would survive without. 🙂
Very interesting perspective and observation! Definitely something for me to ponder. I’ve been fascinated by the yetzer ha’ra and yetzer ha’tov since first hearing about it. Never thought about it this way but it definitely helps bring more light (and understanding) to what I’ve been thinking! Thanks Suzanne!
The heart of man is deceitfully wicked and incurably sick. That’s why we need a new heart. We can’t just “temper” it. Light and darkness don’t mix.
Aurora, that’s right. That’s where that DYING comes in. Otherwise, why would we need to be re-born from above? Isaiah records a promise of a new heart. I have clung to that verse many times, as I would reach the bottom of mine and see nothing but disfunction in every direction. I need His life in me!
The yetzer ha’ra is not the sin nature of man. Christian thinking imposes that idea on the text. I suggest you read some of Skip’s earlier posts about the origin of the “sin nature” idea and spend some time studying the books suggested on the reading list. Exploring other ideas is what enables us to reconsider long-held beliefs.
Good point, Suzanne. We were created with it, obviously, but pronounced “very good” when we were. There is a very big difference between ‘corruptible’ and ‘corrupted’. To call the yetzer hara ‘bad’ is to accuse the Creator of making us defective. If I have no potential for goodness, then I don’t have to try. Cheap way out.
But I also don’t think that we can get there by our own bootstraps, either. It seems clear that I can choose my way into corruption (I can be corrupted), but Someone else is going to have to reverse that death. I can sin by myself, but to be free to obey, now that is going to have to take some deliverance from sin first. It’s not enough to choose life: Somebody is going to have to absorb my “dead in sin” status and share some of their Life with me. Then I can obey. The yetzer tov is the return to the capacity to do right, but when I get there, I don’t think that loving (obeying) is something I then do ‘on my own’. I have to be linked with heaven and that love Source before I can choose to participate in that love.
How exactly does one become “dead in sin”? Is being “dead in sin” the result of our actions? Or were we born that way? The two are very different ideas. If you say “born that way”, then you are equating “dead in sin” with original sin. If sin is the result of disobedience, then it is the result of choice. Torah has a prescribed action for us to take when we become aware of sin: repent, restore and sin no more. I don’t read anything in Torah that places restrictions on my ability to obey – other than my willfulness to disobey. Do we have free will? Then of necessity we must have equal capacity for right and wrong choices. You state that we can choose wrongly, but that we cannot rightly choose unless God enables us. That isn’t a Jewish idea; it goes back to Calvin, Luther, Plato and probably Dionysius. It is not likely that first century Jews who followed Yeshua would have held the idea that man is so inherently sinful he can’t conceive of making Torah observant choices without divine help. So Rav Sha’ul – good Jewish boy that he was — must have meant something other than not having a choice to be in sin when he said “dead in sin”. Maybe it’s time to explore that.
This is important, and I think, with you, that we could camp out here on this fuzzy frontier a while, too. “Dead in sin”. What is it? What exactly is it?
I know the decades I thought it was ‘up to me’ to achieve righteousness, I consciously, conscientiously, tried with every thought to not sin – I agreed with all those Commands – and to love. The more I tried, the more it didn’t work. Love wasn’t working for me! I chose and chose, but the more I chose, the worse it got. This is rather hard to describe, but the years I thought I had to love ‘on my own’, love just got me in trouble. I loved in all the wrong ways and it finally landed me in Alanon, hopelessly addicted to an addict, and helplessly watching as the people I loved, who desperately needed my love, were not benefiting from my love. At all. Those years I tried, I learned things, though. I learned that you can choose and choose to ‘do right’, and DO IT, but all it ever did for me is set me up as a sucker for the unrighteous to cream. The more I tried to love, and be honest, and want the best for others; the more I knew what was ‘right’ and tried to do it, the bigger a fool, and the more exposed to the sin in others, I seemed to get. Love wasn’t working! I didn’t understand! You know, you can choose a fine dinner, and choose it with all your might, but you still won’t get it, or it still won’t do you any good, if you cannot pay for it, or you cannot digest it. I was performing my level best, and dying. It almost killed me.
When I finally made my peace with God, I quit all that spinning of wheels. I repented for all ‘my’ motivations for obeying, too. I quit trying to love on my own steam. Slowly, slowly, I am starting to get up off that floor. This is like learning to walk all over again. Doing righteousness in His timing, for His reasons, with His power, in His Way. Learning to make His choices, too. Listening for His Voice to say “this is the Way”. I realized something huge. I don’t know how to love! I don’t know how to implement the Commands! They are so simple, but HOW do I do them; how do I choose how to live because of them? I thought I knew. I am not so sure, any more. HOW do I choose to Love Him, myself and others in each moment? Its not actively bowing to idols or lying that gets me; its the stuff I am supposed to be doing that I haven’t a clue. Love according to what I think looks quite different than love according to how He thinks. I cannot read His Mind, and I do not know His will. I have to ask, and listen, and THEN obey.
About that power we are supposed to be walking in; that power where love is an invincible force, and the runway is cleared for me to do right: these days, if I get my relationship with Him right, first, and get the asking and listening right, then whatever I choose to do, its like its blessed, or something. It works! These days, love is working! I cannot even begin to tell you how big a difference love (obedience) by my own power, vs. love by His power is.
Dead is where you are not free to move. Dead is where you are getting shoved around by life; where your best efforts keep landing you in a ditch. Not your worst efforts; your best. Dead is where you can choose and choose, and agree with those right choices, all day long, but the fruit still never materializes. Love is power, but it is power from beyond us, and we have to be free from our sins (fractures) – this is what free MEANS – before the actions of relationship ( righteousness) actually are going to work. Like, duh. I have to repent (return to His will, instead of my own) before I am free to obey. But even then, free will still does not mean I should run ‘on my own’ (choices). Free will to me, these days, just means that I should run to Him and let His Will (His choices) run through me.
Life never was up to us. We never could love by legislation; not even our own legislation. I still cannot ‘do right’, just because I say so. It takes REAL power (not my power: not even the power of choice) to love! Otherwise, I am just a “sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal” and I will stand before that throne with all the other goats and list all those good deeds, and hear Him say “I know you not”. My choices should all be about choosing Him to choose through me. His Will be done. This is what it means. There is His Life. In me. There is He: Him living THROUGH me. Then, like Skip says, “let Him do whatever He wants to”.
Thanks for your caring, and for the conversation, Suzanne.
Laurita — I’ll be completely honest with you: I’m just not going to read an 800 plus word treatise given as a response. If you are really interested in the exchange of ideas, condense your thoughts to about 200 words. Then maybe we can sharpen each other’s iron.
Ok, dead is when I obey my way; alive is when I let Him have His. In me. The Golden Calf experience is where I heard, and agreed, but then, the instant I was left – seemingly alone – I assumed I had been abandoned. Then I did it my way: you know, love. Obedience. Obedience is not where I read, think I understand, or even hear from a Mountain, what to do: obedience (love) is what I choose to let Him do, through me. Sin cuts me off from life, for I live on love: love is life for us. I can choose to relate (obey) while I am still fractured all day long, but still that won’t mean that I am actually relating. There is a missing step. That step is repentance. Turning around is where I GIVE OVER ‘my way’ and let Him have His, IN ME. I am not fractured because I didn’t try; I am fractured (dead circuit) because I tried it my way. That is a Golden Calf experience. The Children still were trying to worship and obey, like they had agreed, but they were trying it their way. They died. Death (sin) is where you lose your freedom to choose. Life is where you understand that our free will is something we were given so that we would have something to give back. “Not my will, but Thine”. It is actually His Will that gets the loving (obedience) done.
There IS a missing step: that is the idea that doing it my way is ever obedience. If you are “doing it your way”, you are by default being disobedient. It is only in lining up with the instruction that you are obedient to it. So yes, you are dead in sin when you disobey. As for love: do you love me? Obey my commandments. It is His will that we obey, but it’s not His WILL that gets the obedience done.
But what is obedience? Right actions? That’s a start, and a must, but is it a guarantee? Are the 10 something for me to apply, or are they a template for me to agree to have done through me? Do I white knuckle an attempt to not compare myself with others (covetousness) or do I need a new foundation entirely, where I don’t HAVE to compare because I have this great, mysterious love and understanding for those around me? My heart is not a good enough foundation for love. I need His heart to do it with.
Here is the crux of Laurita’s response (that you didn’t read): “I repented for all ‘my’ motivations for obeying, too. I quit trying to love on my own steam. Slowly, slowly, I am starting to get up off that floor. This is like learning to walk all over again. Doing righteousness in His timing, for His reasons, with His power, in His Way. Learning to make His choices, too. Listening for His Voice to say “this is the Way”.”
It really doesn’t matter what you or anyone else believes of thinks of ‘original sin’, the fact of the matter is that ‘sin’ follows family lines, now there is no ‘gene’ for adultery, or rape, or thievery, but there IS a decided generational flow, and i care not one whit the religion or the denomination (or lack thereof) of the person or persons who first articulated it.
I am a birth mom. My son connected w/me when i was in the throes of laying down my will and learning to walk in HIS will (as Laurita explained, and you did not read, so you don’t know what i’m talking about).
The number of ‘sins’ that my son was walking in that fell away as *I* repented for them, not he, is to great to list out. *I* acknowledged the family line, *I* acknowledged our error and our rebellion *I* stood accountable and my son, w/out ANY KNOWLEDGE was describing things, as time passed, how he had INDIVIDUALLY AND WITHOUT ANY PROMPTING was seeing things differently and choosing a more godly lifestyle.
Maybe it just HAPPENED to coincide w/my gutted repentance response, maybe.
and MAYBE he was born w/a familial, personal, ha satan overseer who was doing its level best (and successfully, too) to guide him into the very destruction that my act of releasing him was my best attempt at keeping him SAFE FROM!
Nehemiha speaks of finding the Scrolls and all the people standing in the temple for HOURS repenting of their and their generational sins….and at the cross when Pilat questioned them as to whether or not they REALLY wanted that other sinner to be released over a man who did no wrong their response was “his BLOOD be on OUR HANDS”…and so it was, the temple was destroyed w/in 40 years (one generation) and the people dispersed.
I’m not really interested in BECOMING something i DO NOT believe, OR being shamed into silence because i don’t believe it, jewish or not.
I’m interested in Truth. As YHVH reveals it to me.
Understanding my jewish roots, taking advantage of Skips ability to research and using his findings to bolster what i already believe is my walking out my free will. and i do NOT allow ANYONE to infringe on that.
I didn’t do a word count. I could care less if it is over 800.
PS: i from a jewish bloodline, both sides, 3rd generation on one, 4th on the other.
I follow Skip from this perspective, but i am not interested in being ‘Jewish’. I am interested in walking in obedience, not from ’10 commandments’ perspective, but from a heart response.
I don’t get caught up in the minutia, i find it marginally interesting, but it’s not my life’s heartbeat or intent.
I find Nehemiah Gordon’s stuff every bit as intense and invigorating as Skips, and from what i gather there are people on here who find him circumspect. I could care less.
Hi Laurita,
It seems if I stand in the paradigm of Christianity, your statements fall in line. However, attempting to understand your words in light of a Jewish mentality, i.e. the world Yeshua and his contemporaries lived and thought in, I read your explanations as somewhat of a mystical Christianity, a version steeped and clothed not in biblical thoughts but in Christian traditions and doctrine. Examples: “absorb my “dead in sin”,” “share some of their Life with me,” “the yetzer tov is the return to the capacity to do right,” and ” I don’t think that loving (obeying) is something I then do ‘on my own’.”
Maybe I’m reading your words wrong, but, they exude thoughts placed on top of biblical statements from an eisegetical perspective as opposed to a Jewish exegetical approach. I mean I don’t know where anyone or anything would “absorb” my “dead in sin,” I don’t know where or how sin is absorbed. And share “some” of their Life (capital “L” as opposed to little “L”?), is my capacity to do right ever taken away such that I need the yetzer hate to return. I understand it as exercising our own choice – “Choose this day life or death”, and if I don’t obey from my own volition, then what’s the point? If someone else is doing it, why is it even an issue?
Just some thoughts.
yetzer hatov, not yetzer hate. Pardon my ignorant spell correction, please.
Dear Michael,
For me, choosing to love is still not actually loving. I choose it: He has to do it. The Torah shows me what to choose. To set my heart on. But He still has to perform His good pleasure in me. I cannot make love. And if my actions are not from love, they don’t count. Even all the right ones. I can choose and act til the cows come home, but there is this mysterious hand off between where my will ends and His begins. I don’t think we could bisect that frontier successfully in any religious or spiritual operating room, though, because I may be a vector of life, but I am not an origin. I don’t understand it either! But that doesn’t mean I don’t need it. I can choose His Will, but only He can do it. I will that He do His good Will. In me. As a good temple should. Don’t ask me how, I just know that when it gets ‘done right’ in my life, it sure wasn’t me! Halleluah!
What about the parable of the two sons? One chose to after saying no. So, he didn’t obey? It would seem he didn’t want to obey, yet decided to choose to do so. Choosing dictates action in the Jewish world wanting to or not. Action is the obedience. True, the heart attitude to want to out of love is the goal. The action, with or without a “heart” to do it IS still obeying, isn’t it? Yes, it may be with a childish, or more specific, immature and less than perfect manner, but obedience, none the less. A mature person will move to maturity, naturally. The end game is obedience without, necessarily, a reason other than YHVH’s imperative, which contains life in it.
We can’t “bless” food either. YHVH blesses it, we enjoy it and give thanks, not bless the food ourselves, yet we are always asking, “Who wants to bless the food?” Those words express something that we cannot do, yet we communicate it as such.
As with my own children, I look for compliance to my imperatives and adjust to their specific understanding of the imperative. I teach and lead. But THEY are still the one doing it, not me, even though I am charging them with obedience. Isn’t it the same with YHVH and us? Of course, NOTHING can be done with out his creative acts and maintenance and sustaining everything. That’s a given. Our putting energy in to obedience is still a thing, a something originating from our own will. Again, if not, then what is the point?
Robots are robots. YHVH instructs. I, me, myself, Michael obeys with compliant action in an every growing and YHVH-like expression. The more I act like him the closer to looking like him I become.
I know we are saying the same thing from different angles! As long as there is this understanding that action is a dual exercise: we choose to love; He does the loving. Yes, I still have to show up with a willing heart and hand, too, but I am insane if I think I was the one that actually accomplished the love. I am nothing without Him.
I guess we are saying the same thing, hopefully.
I am responding to a premise of growing up and being taught from a paradigm that instructs me to “let go and let God,” that I am ‘saved’ no matter what after a verbal confession alone, complete with an irrevokable ticket to someplace called heaven. The baseline motives revolved around the basic concept of it being all of “God, nothing of me,” “once saved always saved.” The teaching and framework begat something different and separate from real life and biblical words somehow. This teaching led me and the vast others to own an attitude of no worries, really. I will just pray, petition “God” and wait for him to miraculously do something “through” me. I could then say “God” did it, not me. Somehow, miraculously, “God” made this or that happen and animated me beyond my volition in some mystical, magical “Godly” way. After all, I can do ALL things through Christ Jesus!
In actuality, it played out that I just got lazy, made up my own ideas and followed them AND justified them by quoting various scriptures. Yes, I did it. I do it. Again, if its not actually me that does the obedience, and I am just an animation of Yeshua’s action and his person, again, what’s the point? What is the impetus for me to do anything if I don’t have a claim in it? Yes, I do it for him, by him, in him and through him, however, it is I choosing and taking action myself on his claims, his examples and the power given me by my creator and energizer. Same reason I can’t bless food. YHVH blesses it. I can’t change it. YHVH made me . . . and it was good. He gave me passion, choice to live or die by his Torah. I choose based on his instructions. Otherwise, what is the need of all these words in scripture inciting us to righteousness, being made for good works if he is the one going to do it all? Works are what I DO and offer to him out of a growing love. I am saved by the grace he chooses to bestow upon me and others. However,chesed is obligatory. I give it as it was and is given to me from YHVH. I am to love BECAUSE he has loved me and by so doing act in his NAME, his character and his being. I then reflect him. My actions that mimic YHVH IS love, patterned after him, in his NAME, in his character, example and life.
Is that similar to what you are saying?
Skip and others. I appreciate and value your reflection on Romans 7 in likening faith to an ongoing fight. Earlier today, I received an email from an anthology source looking for essays on serenity and severity. As a student of Hebrew roots, the terms depicting evil inclination versus the good inclination are seemingly synomynous with serenity and severity. The anthology directive asks if these are symbiotic or separate states, one conquering the other. My understanding of main-line Christian theology suggests as you eloquently described that they are separate. Christian theology seems to go a step further and say I cannot by my own reason or strength come to Christ unless the Spirit draw me. This thinking has in some distorted manner occasioned my indulgence in same-jender attraction. The pattern dissipates thankfully when I am faced with the ultimate question, who are you living for? This is an ongoing battle just like over-eating or losing one’s temper may be the battle others reading face. I would appreciate prayer to endure this tendancy. Fight the good fight was encouraged by Paul. Lord, teach us just what the good fight is about. Thanks!
BP Wade…your “tone” is way out of line…Suzanne’s point is that Skip asked everyone, very nicely, to stop blogging on his blog.
Sandy,
My ‘tone’ reflects suzanne’s, which i found to be way out of line as well.
As for Laurita’s ‘blogging’, IF her response to the initial blog was longer, perhaps a reminder would be in line, however, Laurita was responding to a personal interaction and she was doing so in Laurita fashion (trust me, i interact w/her often, she is meticulous in her articulation).
Personal responses are not ‘blogging’.
Thank you for offering me a way to clarify myself.
First, I am sorry for my big learning curve, Suzanne, and thank you for trying to help me.
Thank you, Barbara, for being my friend. I love you, too.
I am praying for all of us, but most particularly for us three. I think we could all be very good friends, and I know I am hamstrung (dead) in the places where I need the understanding you two have for me. But I also know we can never get there by ourselves. I am praying that we are given that love from above to touch us and give us what we need the most. Each other.
Love, Laurita
Actually what *I* need the most is a nice glass of wine.
But it is morning. I will settle for coffee. 😉
There is more to the man of faith that meets the eye.
Faith is trusting in YHWH, and walking out under His direction/s, both in the general, broad sense and, in the minutest ways, as in the tone of our voice, our facial expressions, mannerisms, attitudes, agendas and such, which are subject to yetzer ha’ra. Those inclinations are within our control if we will be slow to speak but quick to hear, having the will to choose not to be defensive, oppressive nor aggressive.
That is, if we desire to be matured, restored, re-born, regenerated, in our spirits to love as YHWH would have us love, in truth and in spirit; to be respected as to respect, honored to honor, and loved to love. A tall order, but facing the reality of the chaos, around mankind, in so many aspects these days, are we willing to put up a fight to put the yetzer ha’ra to submission?
It is more complex than simply sinning no more. Have we been caught in situations or circumstances beyond our guard, at a most vulnerable moment of our lives?
All that begins with us standing before YHWH.
Ester, you are a precious person to me.
yetzer hatov, not yetzer hate. Pardon my ignorant spell correction, please.
Hi Skip and others, I will be as brief as possible. I know right from wrong and asked prayer for that discernment to remain alive and active. The comments on the power to sin or not sin, obey or not obey baffle me. Given the big picture in our world today, e.g., terrorism and shootings, maybe to ruminate over our own foibles is a form of idolatry, putting ourselves as top dog on Spiritual examination. Laurita made sense to me, and those who advised I read more about the founding of original sin, your advisements are well taken. The fight to trust and obey continues according to Skip; I thank you profusely for that piece of mentoring…
Reply to Michael: yep!