Former location of "The Kingdom of the Heavens" blog, written by an incurable fool who is trying to become a holy fool!
What does it look like to live at peace with others? If I depend on God to give me all good things, I will not expect them from other people. And, when nothing was said, I should not assume anything.
If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. This is one of the most important principles of Scriture, because God is love.
Si es posible, y en cuanto dependa de ustedes, vivan en paz con todos. Esto es uno de los principios más importantes de las Escrituras, porque Dios es amor.
God created the first human, male and female, as a being like himself with whom he could share his life and his creation. But the disobedience of the first humans introduced shame, which drove them away from God and hindered them from agreeing with God about their sin and returning to him. This is always the effect of shame, which comes from us, not from God.
Complex unity, Confession and Repentance, Conversation with God, Desire to have our own way, Forgetting God, Free will, God is Love, God's Existence and Nature, God's purpose for us, Guilt versus Shame, Knowing good and evil, Language and Speech, Male and female, Marriage, Marriage, Marriage and Reproduction, Meaning of Unity, Repentance, Replacing Relationship with Morality, Sin, To be in his image, To bear fruit, To fill and govern the Earth, Trinity, Unity, What is sin?
The modern emphasis on first identifying my “gift” so that I may then “help” God develop it gets the matter exactly backwards. The important thing isn’t identifying my gift, it is offering my body as a living sacrifice so that the Spirit may exercise any gift He chooses through me. Then any gift I am observed to be actually exercising can be identified as my gift, and its exercise will be genuine and have God’s power.
A God who Speaks, Desire to have our own way, Disrespecting poor believers, Divisions in the Church, God Speaks to Us, God's purpose for us, Historical Background, In the Church, Meaning of Unity, Other Gifts of the Holy Spirit, Personal Background, Personality cults, Prophecy, Through others, Through teachers, Through the church, To be his ambassadors, To bear fruit, To live in unity
Addresses the subject of the roles of the people said in Ephesians 4 to be “given” to the Church by Christ and the qualifications and roles of church officers mentioned in the New Testament–overseers, officially recognized elders, and church servants (deacons). Also discusses the role of elders–older people in the church–even when not formally recognized as leaders, with application to me, the author of this presentation.
Confession of sin is expression of our full agreement with God about the evil within us that produces acts of disobedience. It is NOT the recitation of a detailed list of wrong acts, which we admit we did but for which we deflect responsibility to God or others. True confession is the beginning of reconciliation and restoration.
“Heresy” cannot be determined by calling anything that goes in a different direction that specific leaders a heresy, because leaders are sometimes wrong. Peter is an example, though he repented when rebuked for his divisiveness in Antioch.
Though more detailed than previous indexes, this post is also an index to points later distorted that the New Testament–supplemented by other early writers–shows the earliest Church understood about God’s person. Further links will be added as new articles are written.
Church History, Islamic History and Secular History Interaction, Eternity, God is Love, God's Existence and Nature, God's Other Attributes, God's rationality, God's sovereignty, Immanence, Index, Meaning of Unity, Omnipresence, The Invisible God's Self-Existence, Topic Index, Transcendence, Trinity, Unity
This is an outline of the first part of my attempt to link early errors of organized Christianity to the state of the modern world–specifically, in this part, by explaining some of the foundations of the earliest Christianity from which later errors diverged. Links will be added as future posts are written.
A God who Speaks, Adoption, Background Information, Church History, Islamic History and Secular History Interaction, Complex unity, Eternity Present, Free will, God Speaks to Us, God was never our enemy, God's Existence and Nature, God's purpose for us, God's sovereignty, His Children, His Friends, Historical Background, In the Church, Index, Meaning of Unity, Other Gifts of the Holy Spirit, Peril of Seeking Numbers, Peril of Seeking Power, Peril of Seeking Respectability, Prophecy, Purpose of the Church, Reconciliation, Regeneration, Restoration of God's Image, Salvation, Show us the Way of Truth, Sin, Sins versus sin, The Invisible God's Self-Existence, The universal Church and local churches, Through others, Through the church, To be his ambassadors, To be in his image, Topic Index, Trinity, What is God's Word, What is sin?