Why can I fogive but God cannot?

[Bob May]

When Jesus was crucified, all of humanity, because of sin, sins, offenses, and the flesh (characterized by its uncircumcision) was crucified together with Him.

When He died, We, all together, died.

When He became a corpse, we (plural) became a corpse.

And, in Him, we were made alive together.

Joel

Joh 5:24 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life. Joh 5:25 Verily, verily, I say unto you, The hour is coming, and now is, when COLOR="Red"]the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live. [/COLOR]

Who is it that shall hear??? The Dead,..US.

We did not become a corpse, we were corpses. It is only when we hear that we become alive. It is only when we hear that we become aware of the truth that we were already dead. That is because we, humanity believed the lie. That We Did Not Die when we ate of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The promise came through Isaac. One who was "as good as dead." His mother and father were beyond the age for having children and he was almost sacrificed.
Isaac is hearing.
Ge 21:3 And Abraham called the name of his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac.
Ge 21:4 And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac being eight days old, as God had commanded him.
Ge 21:5 And Abraham was an hundred years old, when his son Isaac was born unto him.
Ge 21:6 And Sarah said, God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.

Ro 5:12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:

The emphasis of the saving work of Christ is primarily for all of humanity as a collective unity, not as individuals.
Joel

The emphasis may be on humanity as a whole or it may not. But it applies to all who will hear.


When we perform the ceremony of water baptism we acknowlege that we have been dead and have come to life. It is a ceremony. Not the experience. The experience is an awareness, a belief that we did not have previous to having it. We were dead for our entire lives until that awareness/belief came to us.

We, however, believe it individually.
Joel

There is no other way to believe.

[Richard Amiel McGough]

When we perform the ceremony of water baptism we acknowlege that we have been dead and have come to life. It is a ceremony. Not the experience. The experience is an awareness, a belief that we did not have previous to having it. We were dead for our entire lives until that awareness/belief came to us.

Oh my ... that has profound implications. The Gospel is nothing but a story told with words. Words do nothing but cause changes in our awareness/belief - i.e. consciousness. I was thinking of starting a thread on this idea yesterday, but here you have introduced the theme for me. Thanks!

It has always seemed to me that Christians think an "event" or "experience" happens when they come to believe the Gospel. They talk as if God has "done" something. But now it looks more like the "event" is nothing more than a change in perception, belief, and awareness. A change of consciousness.

Hummm .... very interesting ....

[Bob May]

Take a sheet, and go into a lighted room, and cover yourself with it. You have just demonstrated the death the Adam and Eve brought into the world, pictured by the uncircumcision of the flesh.

Now, remove that sheet, and you have just demonstrated the coming to life that Yeshua brought, the forgiveness of our trespasses, pictured by the circumcision of the flesh.

This is taught in the scripture I shared as well as in the Colossians passage shared by another here, where Paul uses parallelism to define for us death and life.

Ron

Hi Ron,
Ge 17:9 And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep my covenant therefore, thou, and thy seed after thee in their generations.
Ge 17:10 This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised.
Ge 17:11 And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you.

If you look at the "generations" from Abraham to Jesus, There are some very important changes in awareness symbolised by the lives and awarenesses of those listed in the geneology.

Abraham, belief in the unseen, Belief in the promise of dwelling in a land he knew not.
Isaac, Hearing, coming back to life from the dead.
Jacob/Israel, catching a glimse of that "land" in which we are promised we will dwell.
Joseph, being taught by God through visions, dreams and interpretation of dreams. Recieving the inheritance symbolised by the coat of many colors.
Manassah and Ephraim, wisdom and understanding.
David, realizing God does not hold our sins against us.
Babylon, watching as language, on the one hand opens up to you. And closes down to others. The dividing of the word along the line between soul and Spirit.
Christ, "I and the father are one."

These changes in awareness are the peeling away of the flesh in us. These are the "Tokens" of the true Circumcision.

2co 1:20 For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us.
2co 1:21 Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God;
2co 1:22 Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts.

So, we have tokens in the Old Testament and the "earnest of the Spirit" in the new. These changes are a promise of a contract (Covenant) being fulfilled. Like "earnest money" when buying a house.

We are told, "Thou shalt keep my covenant,..."
We do that by watching it happen to us and believing the "tokens" as they appear.
We are watching the layers of "flesh" being peeled away by God.

Bob

[gregoryfl]

Amen Bob,

Life is then an unveiling of that focus on the flesh, the veil which separated the outer court from the holy place, which was introduced by Adam and Eve, that death they experienced on the very day they ate of that fruit. It is a seeing once again of what always was, a coming into a new awarness, yet not really new, only new to us in our current experience. For just as the holy place existed, albeight not seen because of the curtain, in Messiah that veil has been torn in two, and we grow in greater awareness of those things hidden for so long, that life that always has been the light of all men, revealed out of the darkness of the heart, once foreskinned, covering that from which is the source of life, but now circumcised.

I say as Paul did, oh the depth of the wisdom and knowledge of God!

Ron