I'm sorry. I thought Jesus life lived out for us was the standard by which we'll be judged, and our salvation is based on our acceptance of Him, not on whether we did 17 good things and only one bad - or do we have to do 18 good things to earn heaven? I thought obedience was the evidence of our relationship, not the cause. Or does Jesus only walk with the righteous? I thought He came to save sinners. I thought the ten commandments were a mirror, not a ticket to heaven.

Hi Zyph and others,

You are right... Jesus was the example.. follow Him and you'll be right on the mark. He kept the commandments, so should we, out of love. Doing what Jesus asks is not grievous, it is a Joy if you love Him. It is not legalism to follow God out of love, when He asks you to do something. His yoke is easy and burden light.

"Not by works lest any should boast"

Cheers
Dedreic

Obedience is not something we do out of love for Jesus. He doesn't set us free and then we go on and obey the law by ourself.

Philippians 2
13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Jesus saves us and then, out of love for us, He empowers us to live without sin and to mature in the fruits of the Spirit. It's all of Jesus.

zyph,

It's true in a sense that Jesus' perfect life is the standard; but what is the measuring stick by which that perfect life is shown to be perfect? It's the law of God, certainly. That's the overarching standard by which all human behavior is measured, Christ's included. Sure He kept it perfectly, and so His life is the standard of human behavior we should endeavor to imitate; the 99.9999th percentile, so to speak. Sin-weakened humans can do this through His power only; anything else is impossible. "All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags"; Isaiah 64:6. But James clearly says that the Ten Commandments are the standard by which all will be judged; James 2:10-12.

Jesus lived a life and did no sin; but without the Law, nobody would even be able to know this. "By the law is the knowledge of sin" (Romans 3:20). The only real concrete definition of sin given in the Bible is that it is "the transgression of the law" (1 John 3:4); so the law can be the only standard by which to judge sin, by its very nature, and the very definition of what sin is.

Obedience to the Ten Commandments isn't a ticket to heaven, certainly not; only complete acceptance of and faith in Christ is. But disobedience to the Ten Commandments can surely be a ticket to hell:

"For if we sin [transgress the law] wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries." -- Hebrews 10:26,27.

"Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them." -- Romans 1:29-32.

"But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death." -- Revelation 21:8.

Dedreic and Mike: right on.

As the Lord said, "Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in Me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without Me ye can do nothing." -- John 15:4,5.

"The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law." -- Galatians 5:22,23.

Avalee: thanks for the kind words.

If obedience can't get you into heaven, how can disobedience keep you out? It doesn't compute. You can't have it both ways. Obedience either qualifies, and therefore earns you points, or it is an irresistible symptom of the acceptance of Christ's sacrifice moment by moment. You can't sin in the presence of God, when He is posessing you. Sinning is merely an evidence of your status or growth, and is not the causative factor. Eve had already started to trust herself instead of God before she actively sinned.

We need to get this very clear. Works are not the focus. Jesus is. Try to seek Him instead of seeking works, and you will have all the works you need. It is a subtle deception to continually focus on works as a causative factor.

For a thought.

When The Spirit leads a faithful believer who lives by the Spirit, what happens?

He will have the fruit of the Spirit; love that seeks no self in it. Now, he is able to love his fellow men. Now he did keep the law of God although the deeds are not done based on his own desire but the Spirit desire.

So, is there any use of the law (10 Cs) for him? None!

Even there is no law, he will not break any law as if there is a law, but he will live according to the principle of heaven with loving his fellow men.

In a faith relationship with God through a lie by the Spirit, there is no place for our own desire in obedience to the law, because this is done by the Spirit, it is the desire of the Spirit.

All what we can wish and do is based on our self-love nature and that is against the Spirit desire. We must “emptying our self”, we must die in order Christ might live in us and lead our life. “I is no longer “I” that live but Christ that lives in me”.

The only thing we can wish that is in accordance with what the Spirit desire is to deny our self, to deny the flesh, because the Spirit of Christ wants to release us from the power of sin, from the desire of the flesh. “Where the Spirit is, there is freedom.”

But how could the Spirit release us from the power of sin if we want to keep and obey the law, as keeping the law empowers sin in us to become stronger and exceeding sinful?

Galatians 5:18 “But if you live by the Spirit, you are not under the law.”
Clear and unmistakable! If you are led by the Spirit, you are not under any obligation to keep the law, you are not under the law authority, you are not under it judgment and at last you are not under it condemnation.

In His love

James S.

James,

What you're proposing is a curious mix of truth and error. For example, you wrote:

quote:
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People may keep and obey the whole Ten perfectly but without love.

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That's just not possible. No human being can keep the Ten Commandments without the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit; and one of the fruits of the Spirit is love. So if a person is keeping the Commandments, that person will have the Spirit living in him/her, and so will have the fruit of love. No two ways about it. Keeping the Ten Commandments perfectly but without love is just a complete contradiction in terms.

Unquote.

John.

Read Philippians 3:6, if Paul before his conversion could keep the law perfectly, so would many others. But was he happy with this? No! He threw it away and turns his heart to Christ

Philippians 3:5-9 (NIV).
5If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.
7But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.

In His love

James S.

John.

It seems to me that you only know that if you break the law, you commit a sin. So, if you keep it you are righteous.

But do you know that without breaking the law, you already live in sin?

Do you also know that obeying the law makes you a sinner?

What is our comment on the other topic: SIN and sin.

In His love

James S.

Zyph, here's to your last post - Amen! Good works, even Spirit-powered works, cannot earn us a place in heaven. And neither can evil works keep us out of heaven. "All have sinned." Salvation does not depend on works, it depends on Jesus. And like you said, when we have Jesus we'll have all the good works we need. So cool! Thank you Jesus.

The Desire of Ages, page 489, paragraph 5
"The True Witness says, "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock." Rev. 3:20. Every warning, reproof, and entreaty in the word of God or through His messengers is a knock at the door of the heart. It is the voice of Jesus asking for entrance. With every knock unheeded, the disposition to open becomes weaker. The impressions of the Holy Spirit if disregarded today, will not be as strong tomorrow. The heart becomes less impressible, and lapses into a perilous unconsciousness of the shortness of life, and of the great eternity beyond. Our condemnation in the judgment will not result from the fact that we have been in error, but from the fact that we have neglected heaven-sent opportunities for learning what is truth."

[ May 29, 2002, 12:31 PM: Message edited by: Mike Lowe ]