Look carefully in the mirror ask yourself “Why do you look the way you do?” Do you resemble a parent or a grandparent or even a great grand-parent? Do you have the same colour eyes, hair and skin or face shape? You look that way because your ancestors passed on physical characteristics from generation to generation. In the same way, as head and father of the human race, Adam passed on spiritual characteristic to every human being. Paul told the pagan men of Athens that from one man God created all the nations of the earth. (Acts 17:26a, NIV) That makes you Adam’s descendant! Therefore; everyone is born spiritually dead; sick and poor, it makes no difference what the medical report or parents’ bank balance says. All that is born of man is born …show more content…
First, every man without Jesus Christ is a low of the lowest man. Though they be born of the blood of respected families, families with high regard in the world we live in and though they are of the offspring of royal families, yet if they do not have the blood of Jesus Christ running in your veins, they are hopeless man.
A man without Christ is a hopeless case because all his actions and services at best are but as filthy rags and dead works. Every man, in his unconverted state, is the skivvy and drudge of the devil, a worker of wickedness, still fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, being given over to vile affections.
A man without Christ is not only a man without hope, but a slave. This Christ say, “If the Son shall make you free, then are you free indeed,” intimating that we do not have an interest in Christ to free us from the slavery of sin and Satan, we shall remain slaves
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In John 8:34, Jesus says, Verily I say unto you, whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin, and in 2 Peter 2:19, While they promise them liberty, they themselves are servants of corruption, for of whom a man is overcome, of the same he is brought into bondage. Every man, by nature, is a slave to sin. God made man over all, but man has made himself servant to all and worse, to the enemy of God
No matter how much we try to be good, we can never impress God.
But we are all as the unclean thing, and all our righteousness’s are as a menstruation cloth. And we all fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.
Isaiah
The ideal action we would take as God’s people would be to help those in need, but like the Good Samaritan parable in the Bible, many would not help those in need. It is not always easy to see Christ in the people around us because we are human and we are not perfect. Dorothy explains this statement when she says, “It would be foolish to pretend that it is easy always to remember this” (Room for Christ 2). We need to make room in our hearts for Christ, and also the people that presented to us as Christ.
that “man is conceived in sin and born in corruption and he passeth from the
By giving our lives to him we will be free from the evil in our society. This is where the problem lies within our religion. Because we are all sinners we think that we can do it all on our own. We would rather be with our friends than glorifying our God. Christians in today 's society have become extremely self centered. If it does not help us in any way then we don’t want to do it. Because of our self centeredness we think that we can fix the social problem by ourselves. If we try to convince people that they need God in their lives but we don’t even think we need him; how well is that going to work? Not very well. Kuyper says that as Christians, before we help any of our fellow brothers and sisters in need that we need to make sure that we are doing it for the right reasons. As we serve, we should also find ways to show God 's’ glory through what we are doing instead of what we are
What information from this week’s articles might be helpful as you think through this case?
Begetting and Making are two very separate ideas that can become easily confused. Begetting is the creating of something the same as the creator. Humans beget humans and birds beget birds. Making is the creating of something that is not the same as the creator. God made man; man is not God but is like God in some ways. God sent His begotten Son to earth so that the fallen humans of the world could become sons of God; humans are made into sons of God, not begot into sons of God. When Jesus came to earth, he gave us a perfect example of what a human life should look like. However, human lives are naturally self-centered, the opposite of Christ’s life. This self-centered lifestyle often holds individuals back from living for Christ. Christ died for humans as a whole; in principle, each individual is already saved and just needs to accept that salvation. Some have asked why God didn’t just beget sons of God instead of making them and then having them go through the difficult and agonizing process of becoming more like the one who God
Stop and listen to the words Jesus spoke to the assembled flock on that mountain side so long ago; then ask yourself this question” is my life better or will it be worse if I live by Jesus standards of
If you’re born-again, then they have God living on the inside of you and there is more to you than meets the eye. The Holy Spirit lives with you. Depend upon His wisdom and life to meet your needs through the day. See yourself not as others see you but see yourself as God sees you in the spirit – as an more than a conqueror, healed, etc. If you’re a child of God, you have access to resources that the rest of the world does not. You are the temple of the Holy Spirit and you have power to overcome the world and any obstacle that life may throw at you. The greater one lives in
Human identity can be summed up by looking at it from two perspectives. Who we are in our natural state and who we are in Christ. Mankind in his natural state is driven by his sin nature. Romans 1-8 perfectly lays out who and what we are in our natural state. It also lays out who and what we are in Christ. “For we have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under the power of sin.” (Romans 3:9 NIV) In Romans 1:29-31, Paul gives a long list of wicked behaviors that are still prevalent in today’s society, which lets me know that we, in our natural state, are the same as we always have been. There are no exceptions to the rule, besides that of Christ. “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” (3:23) Paul emphasizes in Romans 1-3 how people have tried to free themselves from their sin nature by depending on the Law to no avail. The Law could not bring about justification (Acts 13:39), produce righteousness (Galatians 2:21), produce life (Galatians 3:21), bring about perfection (Hebrews 7:19) or free the conscience from a knowledge of sin (Hebrews 10:1-4). (Johnson, 1896) The fact is that God’s standards are perfect and we alone can never live up to them by any religious act or moral behavior. The good news is that God knew all of this. He knew that by our strength alone, we could not overcome our own sin nature. He sent us a perfect sacrifice to permanently fulfill the Law. That sacrifice was his only Son, Jesus Christ. “God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.” (Romans 3:25) Through faith in Jesus Christ, the grace of God has been given to us. Now, rather than being bound we are made free. Instead of unrighteousness abounding in ou...
“Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” (Romans 5:12). In order for humanity to fulfill it’s created purpose and be completely satisfied in life, each individual must worship God in every deed, word, and thought. God reveals this purpose over and over again in the first eleven chapters of Genesis in the story of Cain and Able, Noah and the flood, the tower of Babel, and most importantly, the fall. With all of this in mind, one must ask the question, “How can we fulfill our purpose if we are unable to worship God?” That is where Christ comes in. Because of His great love, He came to this earth and died for humanity so that they could be restored to life (Romans 5:8). By accepting Jesus’ free gift of salvation, His blood covers all sin and His righteousness is credited to the sinner (Romans 6:23). The result, then, is that everyone who receives this gift is now free to live their lives for Christ; fulfilling their created purpose. There is, then, only two human identities. Either one has accepted Christ’s gift of salvation and now identifies as a child of God, or he rejects God and chooses death over life. The child of God now lives under the authority of Christ and interprets everything through a different
If you are without christ you are straight garbage and will always be trash to Jesus no matter
From the excerpt from the novel, “Under the Feet of Jesus” by Helena Maria Viramontes, the main character is Estrella, a young Spanish girl with a powerful desire to learn to read. Although she is persistent, her teachers refuse to educate her because they are more concerned of Estrella’s personal hygiene. This leaves Estrella resentful because of the barrier between herself and knowledge. Estrella remains silent until a man named Perfecto Flores teaches her how to read by using his expertise in hardware and tools to represent the alphabet. Viramontes depicts the heartfelt growth of Estrella through her use of tone, figurative language, and detail.
Christianity has its challenges. It places demands on us that set us apart from the rest of our world. The bible calls us a peculiar people, who navigate the challenge of living IN the world, without being OF the world. When we say ‘no’ to temptations that are enjoyed by the masses, we are labeled as self-righteous snobs, religious weirdoes, or worse. But we persevere, and we press toward that invisible line the Apostle Paul drew in the sands of time…for the high calling in Christ Jesus.
“Americans are harder working and more productive than ever, yet the rewards of that productivity flow into the pockets of fewer and fewer people (Ketteler, 2006).” This relates to the previous articles in that the wealth are becoming wealthier, while the poor are becoming poorer, and this is something that goes against everything the common good stands for and the teachings of the church for so many years. As we can see over and over again, people become greedy and selfish and only do what is in their best interest, and this goes against the teachings and the actions of Jesus Christ. Father Ketteler writes that Jesus chose the poverty life, to be close to those who are in need most. “Jesus lived out a preferential option in standing on the side of those most in need, physically and spiritually (Ketteler, 2006).” Father Ketteler finishes with saying that when we love one another, nobody is a burden and everything that is produced is shared equally among all men and women, “civilizations of love abandons a mentality in which the poor as individuals and as peoples are considered a burden, as irksome intruders trying to consume what others have produced (Ketteler,
Before this line, Hughes mentioned how the Beatitudes are important to Jesus and his followers. Hughes stressed the importance of this because the Beatitudes are reputable to devoted Christian worshippers. These teachings of Jesus are notable because they were directed towards the enslaved Israelites. However, a majority of Christians believe that the Beatitudes generally apply to everyone that has or is going through a difficult time in their lives. For example, “blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” - Matthew 5:3 (The Holy Bible). By poor in spirit, Jesus was talking to the Israelites who were physically worn down and even mentally drained. Hughes said that” though the empire has rejected these people as completely worthless, the kingdom of God restores dignity and views them as blessed and highly esteemed” (Hughes 66). As mentioned earlier, many Christians believe that the Beatitude teachings apply to everyone, but there are several that disagree that everyone can get into the kingdom of
William Shakespeare shows the reader that religious hope is easy to come by when life is going well, but in the case of the persona it is even easier to fall away from religion. All that anyone truly has to fall back on is love. Love exists for both the rich and the poor, the powerful and the powerless. It costs nothing, and it breeds hope as well as happiness. To Shakespeare and his persona hope and happiness are worth more than all the jewels and gold a king could have. Gold and jewels are just items, and while they may glitter and shine, they cannot bring a man to Heaven. Whether it is physical, emotional, or religious, only love has the power to bring a man to the gates of Heaven.