Woa, this thread has really hit the sky!!!
I haven't read the messages in that great detail because there's been so many. Though, I've only really looked at the first few messages, I've skimmed the next eighty or so messages.
I'll try and make this simple. Here is the story of humanity and Christianity:
1. God creates Adam and Eve. They are
originally purely good people without fault or blemish. Human nature is purely good.
2. Adam eats the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Because Adam now has knowledge of evil, he is now capable of lying, selfishness, arrogance, hatred, greed, etc. Human nature is
no longer purely good and is now a
mixture of good and evil.
3. Adam and Eve are banished from the Garden of Eden. They spawn a whole race of human beings that are defective and struggle between the extremes of good and evil, light and darkness. Human beings are separated from God and no longer live under His glory and regenerating influence. Injustice and iniquity plague the human race.
4. God sends His Word down, who comes in the form of a human being named Jesus, the Second Adam whose human nature is purely good without fault or blemish.
5. Jesus, Lamb of God offers Himself as the atoning sacrifice, a cleansing ritual that opens a pathway to God's Kingdom, a path that ends in physical death but everlasting life thereafter. The curtain veiling the Holy of Holies in the Temple of Jerusalem is torn open.
From this we can say:
It is no longer necessary to follow rules and laws. What we need now is for the dark side of human nature to be conquered and vanquished. We do this by practicing our faith, hope and love.
We tend to think it's all about forgiveness of sin and legalism, but really that's pointness if human nature is still corrupt!!!! Human nature gives us the ability to sin again and again and again so the only way to achieve holiness is to get rid of it once and for all.
We live by faith, not by conformity to rules, regulations, institutions, dogma, doctrine or ideology. A person who has faith in God believes that God will give him something better than what he or she wants and does not need to sin.
We live by hope that one day evil and wickedness will no longer have any power over us. We will be perfectly immune from evil and corruption because we have God as our Source and we drink the water from the Tree of Life.
We live by love, seeking only the best out of people. In our pursuit to make other people happy we conquer the darkness, death and decay that threatens to destroy us all.
Finally, Christ Himself is the path of holiness. It is a path that leads us to the promise that God offered us all along -- the Promised Land -- God's Kingdom. Faith, hope and love are the things we practice every day to stay in this one and only path to hope and peace.
I said:
For example, the idea that everyone is a worthless sinner - that sin is inherited - and that becoming Christian is a way to free yourself from sin is obviously at the heart of the "works vs faith" discussion - does simply accepting Jesus make someone sinless?
No, we do not become sinless. We are sinners in this life but if we die and have accepted Christ, we are born again in God's Kingdom.
We are instructed to follow Christ's path. Only when we reach our destination will we be free from the evil and darkness that infest this world.
In the end we will be sinless but just not here and now
. The perfection is deferred to another time and place.
I said:
And if someone accepts Jesus but sins (and asks forgiveness) then isn't this worst - a form of "mafia faith", where people can criticise others for committing sin, but if a Christian sins then it's not so much of an issue? Or is that entirely a mis-perception?
A Christian should not criticise others (especially a non-Christian) for sinning because he is no different to everyone else. He is simply a person who follows Christ's path to holiness, hope, peace and happiness. Yes, you could say this is a mis-perception.
/ˈdaɪ
