What Counts For Spiritual Abuse?

[_Tobin]

Anyway, what you cited is a good example. We are already in Satan's power. What you should draw from your promises to the Lord (and what you should take seriously) is to free ourselves from him, we should obey and follow the Lord as best we know how and as God gives us the light to see and understand the gospel.

Tobin, I rebuke thee. Stop pretending to know the gospel which you obviously have not partaken of. Maybe you got a witness of an angel or something but you have not finished your course neither have you come unto Christ with full purpose of heart that he might heal you. Don't tell me you have. You cannot teach what you do not know.
You abuse yourself to think you know so much. Man, I am here to tell ya.

Now don't go thinking I must hate you. I am getting my dander up lately though so watch it.

That's nice Nightlion. However, my salvation is between me and God (not you) and I call it as I see it. If you don't like it, well - take it up with the Lord. If it gets your dander up to teach that one must follow the Lord to free oneself from Satan and his power (and influence), then you have bigger problems than me.

Oh, and by the way - I still believe evolution is true. Get over it. And I know that if evolution is true, that auto-magically means that your belief in God falls apart. But maybe you should examine those beliefs in that case.

[_jo1952]

Hello Nightlion!

I would like to make some comments and ask questions which may, at first blush, appear to have nothing to do with your OP. However, if you would please bear with me, I will be able to make the connection.

In general, what are your feelings about the Apostle Peter? We can first look at Jesus' conversations with Peter:

Matthew 16:15-19 (KJV)

15 He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?

16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.

17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

Matthew 16:21-24 (KJV) (emphasis mine)

21 From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.

22 Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee.

23 But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.

24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

Not only did Peter inadvertently savour the things of men (thus, Peter did not deny himself and his passionate love for Jesus) and serve Satan in that moment, we will be able to see that Peter was not able to embrace this lesson, even though the Master Himself personally taught the lesson. Was Peter not prepared sufficiently by Jesus? Did Jesus err in teaching this lesson to Peter, thus spiritually abusing Peter?

Matthew 26:33-35 (KJV)

33 Peter answered and said unto him, Though all men shall be offended because of thee, yet will I never be offended.

34 Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, That this night, before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice.

35 Peter said unto him, Though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny thee. Likewise also said all the disciples.

I am sure that Peter was quite upset when Jesus told him that he would deny Jesus three times before morning. This would have been on Peter's mind; perhaps it is why Peter smote one of the High Priest's servants and cut off his ear. Wasn't Peter trying to again show his devotion to Jesus; in fact, trying to prove his love (and most likely smarting by the thought that his beloved Jesus could even suggest that Peter could ever deny Him)? AND wasn't this about the very same issue which caused Jesus to call Peter "Satan"? So, what did Jesus do? Jesus rebuked Peter and then healed the ear of the servant. What Jesus did NOT do was take away Peter's Apostleship or the power and authority which Jesus had given him---even though Peter keeps screwing up.

We know, of course, that Peter DOES wind up denying Jesus three times. When Peter realizes what he has done, he wept bitterly.

How could an Apostle, called by God, be so slow to learn the lessons Jesus was teaching Him? Again, I will ask, was Peter being spiritually abused?

We can also look at a startling action of Peter's which occurred after Christ's ascension in the story of Ananias and his wife, Sapphira. Remarkably, Peter is rebuking them for lying to the Holy Spirit, while he himself, in his passionate devotion to God, causes the deaths of both husband and wife. The reason I claim that it was Peter who caused their deaths is because God will not take away a person's free will. If the Holy Spirit had acted upon His own power and authority, or if He acted upon Father's orders, then He would have been taking away Ananias' and Sapphira's free will. However, by Peter using his own free will to use the power and authority which Jesus gave him via the Holy Spirit, it would be man (NOT God) who took away the couple's free will.

We also find later that Paul argues with Peter over choices Peter makes.

Now, with all of this information about Peter, and the evidences that Peter's best intentions caused him to make mistakes and wind up serving Satan instead of God on several occasions, what value do you give to Peter's Apostolic teachings? I would offer that if you were to apply the same standard to Peter, which you apply to even one other individual, that you would have to throw out anything Peter taught because Peter obviously was not able to partake of the Gospel even though he had been chosen by God to be an Apostle. In fact, I will use your own words:

Tobin, I rebuke thee. Stop pretending to know the gospel which you obviously have not partaken of.

Meanwhile, I do want to tell you that I admire your passion. However, in your passion I believe you are easily persuaded by the adversary and inadvertently serve him.....just as Peter's passion during his early years as an Apostle caused him to so easily be influenced and persuaded by the adversary to make serious mistakes. From one moment to the next he would first be serving God; and in the next he would be serving Satan. We ALL do this. That is why our progression in being able to have All Truth revealed to us takes such a long time; it doesn't happen instantly.

As Peter matured in the Gospel and understood more and more of what he had been taught, you can see his evolvement from his original hotheadedness, into a very wise and prudent Apostle, as seen in his Epistles. During this spiritual evolution of spiritual growth, he was able to eventually tame his earthly passions and more easily and readily remain in God's camp. We can see through the example of Peter (and certainly God used incredible and awesome wisdom in choosing Peter in the first place) that what we perceive to be as our own good intentions which are motivated by our love for God, can have the unintended consequences of serving Satan instead.

I believe this same evolution of spiritual understanding and growth is also taking place in you in your personal journey. However, you are still in the same earlier phases of Peter's growth which we were purposely given as examples to teach all of us.

Blessings to you, Nightlion!

jo

[_Nightlion]

Tobin, I rebuke thee. Stop pretending to know the gospel which you obviously have not partaken of. Maybe you got a witness of an angel or something but you have not finished your course neither have you come unto Christ with full purpose of heart that he might heal you. Don't tell me you have. You cannot teach what you do not know.
You abuse yourself to think you know so much. Man, I am here to tell ya.

Now don't go thinking I must hate you. I am getting my dander up lately though so watch it.

That's nice Nightlion. However, my salvation is between me and God (not you) and I call it as I see it. If you don't like it, well - take it up with the Lord. If it gets your dander up to teach that one must follow the Lord to free oneself from Satan and his power (and influence), then you have bigger problems than me.

Oh, and by the way - I still believe evolution is true. Get over it. And I know that if evolution is true, that auto-magically means that your belief in God falls apart. But maybe you should examine those beliefs in that case.

I am not going tit for tat with you Tobin because you have neither tit nor tat to begin with. You summary above of the gospel is so extremely inadequate manifesting NO real experience nor gospel accomplishment. Since you are over the bar in your own mind little hope is there for your reconciliation with the REAL gospel. Hence you merit a stern rebuke to sober up you mind if at all possible. Take heed to what you think you know. I have already pleaded with you to read scripture. And I renew that to you.

There is not enough actual evolution in all creation to come between me and my God. Stupid of you to think so.
Think for a second why you attach affectionate "belief" to your dear evolution. Why do you venerate it? Are you a Yeastite, a Microbialist? Is that what you really worship? lol Just teasin'

[_Nightlion]

Hello Nightlion!

I would like to make some comments and ask questions which may, at first blush, appear to have nothing to do with your OP. However, if you would please bear with me, I will be able to make the connection.

In general, what are your feelings about the Apostle Peter?
I believe this same evolution of spiritual understanding and growth is also taking place in you in your personal journey. However, you are still in the same earlier phases of Peter's growth which we were purposely given as examples to teach all of us.

Blessings to you, Nightlion!

jo

Ah, jo, ya just don't know, do ya? lol

Warning: This is a correction. I am not scolding you or putting you down neither do I have any desire to rebuke you.

First off let's get a visual aid in here shall we. I saw on The Apocalrock of late what seemed like Jesus having something to do with this other fella. I have mused over it for more than a week. Today, on my way to work I thought upon it again and asked the Lord who it was and it was put into my mind that it was.......no kidding.......wait for it.........Peter! How about that. Now here you go whipping me using Peter for a waling stick.

I see Jesus on the left looking somber at Peter who is aghast at having denied Christ thrice. Almost like in the movies.

Even though Peter knew of God that Jesus was the Christ he was not yet accountable before God because so long as Christ was in the world Jesus was the light of the world and the power of the Holy Ghost COULD not come upon any.* So Peter waffled back and forth as a result of this reality. Jesus spent 40 days among the Jews who believed on him and told them AFTER he was gone to WAIT for the promise of the Father which is the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost.

After Pentecost the Holy Ghost began to fall upon many. Peter became a fearless witness and apostle of the Lord. The matter of the two saints who held back part of the money in their consecration was certainly NOT on account of Peter's passions or his lack of anything.

Here is the entire event:

Acts 5
1 But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession,
2 And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles’ feet.
3 But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land?
4 Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God.
5 And Ananias hearing these words fell down, and agave up the ghost: and great fear came on all them that heard these things.
6 And the young men arose, wound him up, and carried him out, and buried him.
7 And it was about the space of three hours after, when his wife, not knowing what was done, came in.
8 And Peter answered unto her, Tell me whether ye sold the land for so much? And she said, Yea, for so much.
9 Then Peter said unto her, How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? behold, the feet of them which have buried thy husband are at the door, and shall carry thee out.
10 Then fell she down straightway at his feet, and yielded up the ghost: and the young men came in, and found her dead, and, carrying her forth, buried her by her husband.
11 And great fear came upon all the church, and upon as many as heard these things.

Ananias simply fell down dead when Peter discerned that he lied to God. How culpable was Ananias. If he was allowed to participate in the united order of that day by consecrations he would've necessity had to have been a true saint, one who verily had been visited of the promise of the Father and truly wrought upon and cleansed by the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost. Only this sort are ever allowed, by competent administrators, to consecrate unto building up the Zion of our God and of his Christ.

Peter did nothing but discern the lie. Ananias fell down and dies of his own accord. When his wife came into the play and Peter inquires as to whether or not she is implicit with her husband she affirms his suspicions. Peter does NOT curse her he simply foretells and accurate prediction that God is about to take her as well.

No learning curve here for Peter. No hasty, rash, or passionate judgment. He was cool and calm as a Summer's morn but manifesting to all the Church the seriousness of the laws of their consecrations. Zion must be built up by holy hands and the Lord will not suffer that it be polluted. Same in our day. Oh if only there were a number who were truly subject to Christ and worked the works of God to attain the hope in Christ by the power of the Father in the regeneration of being conceived the children of Christ in the baptism of fire and of the Holy
Ghost. It may be of some interest to most that all three, The Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are one together in the conception of their children. The same as they were together in the beginning when they will of the Father spoke through the Lamb of God and the power of the Holy Ghost brought forth the organization of intelligence when God first became our Very Eternal Father. Even all three of them together are the Very Eternal Father not just of man but of all things. So much glory, honor and praise be ascribed unto the Most High God.

Anyways, you see now, don't you that it is you who are acting rash in deliberate ignorance of sublime realities.
Anybody who pretends to know anything about true religion who forfeits, forgoes, omits, skates, evades, or simply does not appreciate the core gospel of being visited of the power of the Holy Ghost as the prime axis that rivets ones feet upon the Rock of Christ will be judged a fool and all their words and teachings suspect in the hopes of their eventual redemption.

I am edified. Hope you might be as well. Have a good evening.
James
*This is most of why Christ was crucified. The power of the Holy Ghost was held in abeyance in the wisdom of God for all that Christ did, all the truth he spoke, and his very presence should have been witnessed of by the power of the Holy Ghost and every heart would have been penetrated. It was a needful thing and odd were the consequences to say the least. Only the demons testified. Great! There are some rather interesting details of this phenomena. Like the fact that John need be born of the Spirit from his mother's womb. Ere long Christ would have been in the world before John was a year old. How then could he have become a prophet? The two prophets at the temple were already prophets before Christ was born and they testified of him when a baby.

The time of the life of Christ was a meridian. A separation of sorts when things were tweaked differently for a short season. This gave the powers of darkness their in that the die be cast and that Christ be crucified.

ETA Perhaps with this wisdom the Jews can find place to forgive themselves and not carry darkness upon their backs any longer.

[_Tobin]

I am not going tit for tat with you Tobin because you have neither tit nor tat to begin with. You summary above of the gospel is so extremely inadequate manifesting NO real experience nor gospel accomplishment. Since you are over the bar in your own mind little hope is there for your reconciliation with the REAL gospel. Hence you merit a stern rebuke to sober up you mind if at all possible. Take heed to what you think you know. I have already pleaded with you to read scripture. And I renew that to you.

There is not enough actual evolution in all creation to come between me and my God. Stupid of you to think so.
Think for a second why you attach affectionate "belief" to your dear evolution. Why do you venerate it? Are you a Yeastite, a Microbialist? Is that what you really worship? lol Just teasin'

Thank you for the baseless assertions. I'm happy to be corrected if you can come up with a cogent argument even pointing out my mistaken views here.

[_Chap]

ETA Perhaps with this wisdom the Jews can find place to forgive themselves and not carry darkness upon their backs any longer.

ETA ... no, that would take the thread Telestial. And it's only poor old Nightlion anyhow. Who cares?

[_Nightlion]

I am not going tit for tat with you Tobin because you have neither tit nor tat to begin with. You summary above of the gospel is so extremely inadequate manifesting NO real experience nor gospel accomplishment. Since you are over the bar in your own mind little hope is there for your reconciliation with the REAL gospel. Hence you merit a stern rebuke to sober up you mind if at all possible. Take heed to what you think you know. I have already pleaded with you to read scripture. And I renew that to you.

There is not enough actual evolution in all creation to come between me and my God. Stupid of you to think so.
Think for a second why you attach affectionate "belief" to your dear evolution. Why do you venerate it? Are you a Yeastite, a Microbialist? Is that what you really worship? lol Just teasin'

Thank you for the baseless assertions. I'm happy to be corrected if you can come up with a cogent argument even pointing out my mistaken views here.

Tobin, you stepped from beliefs to views, and I think that is progress already.

let's take just a second and think what would the reality be with God as the actual creator of all creatures.
He would be able to manipulate DNA at will. That sort of capacity would not need to rely upon breeding subtle changes. He could clone out his new creation from the nearest compatible species. And there ya go. One male, one female, ole!

And on the other hand since there are according to people who take the pains to count such things over 200 different species of ants on a single tree in the Amazon Jungle. The evolution that accounts for that is not a source of life as much as it is a fact of life. Stuff like that you may be able to rewind the evolution to a certain point and that would be it. You could not go back further. Would be a wonder wall when discovered by science some day. The wall of absolute creation where all the government funded species counters count back and run up against absolute creation. It'll be cool.

I have not capitulated to evolution in any wise to be the source of any life except that ancillary to what is created of God within limits he allows. I mean they are all ants. Right?

[_Nightlion]

ETA Perhaps with this wisdom the Jews can find place to forgive themselves and not carry darkness upon their backs any longer.

ETA ... no, that would take the thread Telestial. And it's only poor old Nightlion anyhow. Who cares?

Why oh why, after I have mightily rode on eagle's wings above the high places of the earth and brought forth a little light of wisdom's effulgence some mean handler has to pre-condition the peanut gallery with ho hums? Hmmm? I take it as a backhanded compliment by the way. Thank you.

And I am not gonna try and figure out what you mean by going telestial.

[_Tobin]

Tobin, you stepped from beliefs to views, and I think that is progress already.

let's take just a second and think what would the reality be with God as the actual creator of all creatures.
He would be able to manipulate DNA at will. That sort of capacity would not need to rely upon breeding subtle changes. He could clone out his new creation from the nearest compatible species. And there ya go. One male, one female, ole!

And on the other hand since there are according to people who take the pains to count such things over 200 different species of ants on a single tree in the Amazon Jungle. The evolution that accounts for that is not a source of life as much as it is a fact of life. Stuff like that you may be able to rewind the evolution to a certain point and that would be it. You could not go back further. Would be a wonder wall when discovered by science some day. The wall of absolute creation where all the government funded species counters count back and run up against absolute creation. It'll be cool.

I have not capitulated to evolution in any wise to be the source of any life except that ancillary to what is created of God within limits he allows. I mean they are all ants. Right?

I don't know why you attach significance to whether or not I express my beliefs as views or not, but if that stops you from making baseless attacks - great!

And I don't believe God created life or anything out of nothing. I believe God must work in the framework of the universe's natural laws. And I believe evolution is a natural law and that there is good support and evidence about how life evolved on this planet. I really don't see why you have such a difficulty with evolution if God had a hand in our evolution. I feel no need to dispute the truth, scientific or otherwise, in order to believe in God. In fact, I believe if one can not accept the truth about the universe and how it really is - and it challenges your beliefs about it, then your beliefs need to change.

[_Nightlion]

Tobin, you stepped from beliefs to views, and I think that is progress already.

let's take just a second and think what would the reality be with God as the actual creator of all creatures.
He would be able to manipulate DNA at will. That sort of capacity would not need to rely upon breeding subtle changes. He could clone out his new creation from the nearest compatible species. And there ya go. One male, one female, ole!

And on the other hand since there are according to people who take the pains to count such things over 200 different species of ants on a single tree in the Amazon Jungle. The evolution that accounts for that is not a source of life as much as it is a fact of life. Stuff like that you may be able to rewind the evolution to a certain point and that would be it. You could not go back further. Would be a wonder wall when discovered by science some day. The wall of absolute creation where all the government funded species counters count back and run up against absolute creation. It'll be cool.

I have not capitulated to evolution in any wise to be the source of any life except that ancillary to what is created of God within limits he allows. I mean they are all ants. Right?

I don't know why you attach significance to whether or not I express my beliefs as views or not, but if that stops you from making baseless attacks - great!

And I don't believe God created life or anything out of nothing. I believe God must work in the framework of the universe's natural laws. And I believe evolution is a natural law and that there is good support and evidence about how life evolved on this planet. I really don't see why you have such a difficulty with evolution if God had a hand in our evolution. I feel no need to dispute the truth, scientific or otherwise, in order to believe in God. In fact, I believe if one can not accept the truth about the universe and how it really is - and it challenges your beliefs about it, then your beliefs need to change.

I am not stick in the mud. I have changed my beliefs major over the years. I am not going to pretend to comprehend creation and dictate to God that the physical fall-out of species variations is relevant to how he had to do anything. And this planet is not the Proto-planet. Billions have already come and gone with the inhabitants thereof. We need to include all data to even approach having a working model. If the seed of life, all animal and plant life go back to infinity there is no origin of the species. Certainly not for this world. Supposing such an arrogance is absurd.