Honest Self-Criticism

@sonship said
@Kevin-Eleven
Kevin,
For your sake I address this question of Divegeester.

@sonship said
@Kevin-Eleven
Kevin,
For your sake I address this question of Divegeester.

Sonship, here is the question, by me not Kevin Eleven, which I’ve now put to you 3 times...

How do you reconcile 2 Corinthians 5:17 (and all the other scripture about new birth) into your BRAND NEW DOCTRINE that a person can be a follower of Jesus besides Satan?

@FMF

What I don't get is why a follower of Christ would be a willing follower of "Satan".

@fmf said
I get why a Christian might "sin". I get why a Christian might be weak. I get why a Christian might be tempted by the "flesh". And so on.

What I don't get is why a follower of Christ would be a willing follower of "Satan".

@sonship said
@FMF
I think part of the reason for this is that people on this Forum think of following Satan something like worshipping Satan. Say a Satanist with much occult paraphernalia is "following Satan". Anton Levy and his "First Church of Satan" has its members "following r passions and turn aside after Satan. It doesn't mean they went off to be occult Satan worshippers.

@divegeester

Go back and read The Normal Christian Life again.
Better still read "The Experience of Life" by Witness Lee.

Particularly read the chapters on Dealing With the Flesh.

God''s salvation is working from the kernel of a person's being moving OUT.
The battle is that the Devil is on the outermost part trying to move INWARD.
And countering him in the Christian is the Lord Jesus in the nucleus of the center of his being working OUT.

The two clash.
The battle is between the new nature and the old.

In the same letter that you site Second Corinthians we have Paul speaking of the treasure in earthen vessel. The excellency of the power being with the inward treasure while the outward part is being consumed.

"But we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us." (4:7)

"Therefore we do not lose heart; but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day." (v.16)

This is a renewing process in which something INNER is godly and something OUTER is still related to the old creation.

Eventually regeneration and transformation will give rise to transfiguration in the physical body. Satan is kicked out of that realm by Christ working to save man from the inside out.

" . . . we eagerly await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, Who will TRANSFIGURE the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of His glory, according to the operation by which He is able even to subject all things to Himself." (Phil. 3:21)

@sonship said
I think part of the reason for this is that people on this Forum think of following Satan something like worshipping Satan. Say a Satanist with much occult paraphernalia is "following Satan". Anton Levy and his "First Church of Satan" has its members "following Satan".
.

@sonship said
@divegeester
Go back and read The Normal Christian Life again.
Better still read "The Experience of Life" by Witness Lee.

@fmf said
No. Thanks for the red herring. I am not talking about Anton Levy's First Church of Satan, or Satanism, or worshipping Satan, or the occult. You already know I'm not. You're being evasive.

So the question remains: I get that Christians might "sin". What I don't get is why a follower of Christ would be a willing follower of "Satan".

@FMF

You are just going to find me explaining the same thing in different words.
You are going to get repetition.

I assume that you cannot grasp what is being said.
That is possible, that you just cannot understand what the New Testament is showing about the progressive process of sanctification.

Peter was the leading disciple of Jesus. Peter received the revelation that Jesus was the Christ the Son of the living God. Soon after Peter made this confession Jesus called him Satan. Peter had followed his natural opinion about something. He said that Jesus should not go to the cross to die.

"And Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, God be merciful to You Lord! This shall by no means happen to You!

But He [Jesus] turned to him and said to Peter, Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me, for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men." (Matt.16:22-23)

How did Peter, so clear that Jesus was God's Son, plunge into the depths to be called Satan? Satan came out of his opinion. Satan came out of Peter's setting his mind on the things of men and failing to set his mind on God's will.

Jesus turned to Peter His leading disciple. But He spoke to Satan. He addressed Satan. "But He turned and said to Peter, Get behind Me Satan . . . "

Peter lapsed into setting his mind on his opinion WILLFULLY. And in doing so WILLFULLY he was following Satan, expressing Satan's thought, furthering Satan's schemes for Jesus to pity Himself.

In the following verses to this Jesus speaks of DENYING THE SELF.

" . . . for you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of men. Then Jesus said to His disciples,

If anyone wants to come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wants to save his soul-life shall lose it; but whoever loses his soul-life for My sake shall find it."" (vs.23b-25)

Satan is hiding out in the self. To willfully follow the self dominated by the fallen flesh can be to follow Satan willfully. Such is the parasitic attachment of Satan to the fallen Adamic man.

A Christian in whom the Lord Jesus as the Holy Spirit indwells his spirit STILL HAS the flesh, the old man. And he can still express his Satan influenced opinion. This amounts to following Satan in that he is following his fallen self.

@sonship said
You are just going to find me explaining the same thing in different words.

Peter was enlightened to see Jesus was the Son of God.
Jesus said His Father in heaven gave to Peter this revelation.

A very short time latter Peter, setting his mind on human opinion, setting his mind on himself and following the opinion of the self expressed Satan.

"But He [Jesus] turned and said to Peter, Get behind Me Satan!"

Jesus recognized the subtlety of what was going on.
Satan was utilizing Christ's closest disciple to cause Jesus to have self pity rather than accept the Father's will that He go to Jerusalem to die.

We can express the subtle Satan by setting our minds on the things of man as opposed to the will of God. This can be willfully following Satan.

If some here cannot understand this it is perhaps because:

1.) They just cannot understand it.

2.) They cannot accept it because it would expose them.

I don't know which could be the reason. But it could be either. The problem is not on my side. Some of us realize how deeply Satan has embedded his activity in the fallen Adamic man, his unbridled thoughts, his opinions especially when he contradicts the intended will of God.

There IS salvation from this attachment. THAT is the most important thing.

@FMF

The problem is not on my side. Don't even try to dismiss what I explain as waffle.

It is clear enough. Maybe you are unable because of lack of spiritual experience to UNDERSTAND what the New Testament is showing there.

You should not assume that just because you are a smart and intelligent guy you can readily grasp some spiritual things. Possibly you just cannot understand it.

But Peter, choosing to follow the self, was suddenly willfully following Satan. If you can't see it Jesus was able to see it. And it was recorded for our enlightenment.

We have to deny the self and take up another Person and follow Him - Jesus the Son of God.

It is clear enough if you are opened to realizing your need for Christ as salvation.