A NOT SO FINE TOOTH COMB ---- GOING OVER SOME OF POSTS IN THIS THREAD...
FROM POST BY MUD...
« Reply #25 on: May 18, 2007, 01:09:48 PM .... I think the argument is made that Christ is referring to Christians when he uses the terms "brother" and "when they repent" because of the whole counsel of the bible. We are told later by Paul that Christians are to hold accountable other Christians but that we are not to judge the world. Elsewhere Christ tells us to bless, not curse, those who spitefully use us. We are told to turn the other cheek to our enemies, not rebuke them. If they thirst we are to give them a drink of water.
It seems clear to me that Christians have an obligation to forgive unconditionally, as Portia put it, those who they do not know to be Christians. Likewise they have an obligation to correct and exhort to righteousness those Christians who have sinned against them.
As His followers Christians are to do their best not to bring shame or disrepute to Christ. A non Christian's sin brings no disrepute to Christ, but a Christian's does. That is why we are to forgive the former and correct the latter.
YES IN THAT PASSAGE THE CONTEXT THE REFERENCE IS AS TO FELLOW CHRISTIANS....BUT SOME ASPECTS I THINK CAN BE STRETCHED TO A WIDER CONTEST AS I SUGGESTED THAT WHEN A NON CHRISTIAN COMMITS A CERTAIN KIND OF SIN THAT THE APPROBRIATE ACTION CAN BE REBUKE.... JESUS CERTAINLY POINTED OUT OTHERS HYPOCRISY IN WHAT I THINK WAS A KIND OF REBUKE....AND PERHAPS A LARGER PART OF WHY CRUCIFICTION OF JESUS WAS SOUGHT BY LEADERS AND ELDERS OF THE JEWS..... PERHAPS A FURTHER STUDY OF THE GREEK WORD TRANSLATED AS REBUKE IN LUKE MIGHT HELP AT SOME...THE POINT... there seems to be maybe an assumption made that non christians are not aware of their choice of evil and tnus should be automatically forgiven.... which i am not so sure is correct....surely tho as jesus said tis true if the case truely be..forgive them for they know not what they do.... but that to me is not the nature a type of sin jesus speaks of in luke 12... where that kind of sin has the consequences of being caste among unbelievers and the body being torn asunder...and i do not think believers there refers just to christians rather non believers in the golden rule....that allows self justification for knowing one is doing evil to another and thinks one can get away with it successfully for self aggrandizement ....something narcissists and pyschopaths seem to be into....but on different levels...
Michael, on another post, you mentioned reincarnation. How does that fit into Chrisitanity? Someone else mentioned they don't believe in Heaven. How can you believe in Jesus and God and not believe in heaven? I want to understand.
HI CAMPER,
i am not sure where above u ask about reincarnation and heaven if you are wondering if along with the believe in reincarnation
that that does away with a believe in heaven...
for me it does not but what i see biblically is that besides the kingdom of heaven there is a kingdom of god...
and a hell.... but as to hell i do not think the greek in the new testament supports that hell is a place of eternal damnation
but still it still can be hell and not the best place between incarnations...but it can serve to get the souls attention
about the consequences of their sin and the type of sin that gets damnation is to know evil and do evil...
[or as luke 12 puts it ..to be caste among the unbelievers ....]....
in luke 12 there are 3 modes of sin and of course being without sin...which gets one into the kingdom of god...
the kingdom of heaven is the messianic kingdom in between lifetimes ....
in terms of there being no eternal punishment... see tentmaker.org ...
in terms of reincarnation what might serve well is the edgar cayce material...
tho the material is not flawless...to me it is one of the best sources of modern times on many spiritual matters..
biblically of note might be the old testament book of zecheriah and pay close attention to the hight priest then a joshua...
not the joshua who brought the them into the promised land..
yet again the same joshua in terms of the later high priest joshua of the time of the rebuildingof the temple in zechariah
is a reincarnation of the joshua who brought god's chosen people into the promised land...
pays special attent to i think chapters 2 or 3 on joshua
and chapter 5 or 6 on joshua in zechariah...
where to me a deeper reading informs one that said joshua
would come for his last incarnation born of woman as the messiah....aka revelation 1st chapter FIRST BEGOTTEN OF THE DEAD
also in hebrews where some say the bible teaches no reincarnaton
such as where it says...it is appointed unto man once to die and then comes judgment...
that context i think is quite clearly not talking about physical death except in the sense of dying to the flesh and sin
by being convicted of the old sin nature of the adamic line and accepting the holy spirit...
also in hebrew where it says that jesus came only once...
the greek word also has the meaning not of just one time
but one final and last time....
also in matthew 11 or 12 where jesus says to his disciples if they are willing to accept it
that john the baptist was elijah...
i take as reincarnation...
SO REINCARNATION IS HOW I SEE ENVIRONMENT AND HERIDTARY ELEMENT DOVETAILING TOGETHER...
THERE REMAINS THE QUESTION OF IF REINCARNATION IS TRUE
WHY DOES THE BIBLE NOT MAKE IT CLEARER....
UNFORTUNATELY PRESENTLY I AM NOT AT LIBERTY TO DIVULGE THE SPECIFICS...
JUST KIDDING.... MAYBE LATER SOME THOUGHTS ON THAT
