1) If our own righteousness is "as filthy rags" and we are expected to "Let Go And Let God", does that imply that we are abdicating our personal responsibility by allowing God to fix things?
The bumper sticker quip "Let God and Let God" as I understand it has to do with learning not to be ruled by anxiety but trust in Jesus. I can be eaten alive by anxiety or I can trust Jesus to move and operate on my behalf. The latter is a better way to live, I have found. And that goes for moral areas as well.
Now a word about this "operating" Jesus. This operation is often within the believer's being. As Paul told the Christians:
"It is God Who operates in you both the willing and the working for His good pleasure."
Receiving Christ is a matter of receiving a new life compounded into your original natural life. Now you the believe and Christ are mingled together in a harmonius blending. The believer is not use to this for he has learned to live only from his self. Now having received another divine and mystical Holy Spirit with in them, they must through patience and time learn to live in an "organic union" with Christ. Such a living obliterates anxiety.
The Apostle writes again:
"The Lord is near. In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thenksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses every [man's] understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus." (Phil. 4:5b-7)
The peace of God, which is a very inward peace radiating from the kernel of the Christian's being, will guard and garrison his thoughts against anxiety. A holy calm and the sense of one standing on a solid and reliable rock keeps one in peace as His life operates to move and direct your way.
Some people coined the phrase "Let Go and Let God" probably because of this kind of experience.
2) If we believe that Satan is alive and well on planet Earth, does that serve as a cop out? In other words, if we say that the world is in a mess due to Original Sin and figure that nothing will ever really improve until Jesus comes back, is that an abdication of our responsibility as members of the human race?
The victory of Christ over the Devil is sure. The Christian is to apply that victory in her life by joining her inner being to the Spirit of Christ. It is an appplicable victory like the use of a blank check on which we may write the amount of money that we need.
We believers access the victory that Christ has obtained and allow it to flow firstly through our own being.
Say I have a terrible problem with lust. I turn to Jesus and receive Him. I still have this lust problem. But I learn to declare:
"Lord Jesus, your word says that I was crucified with you. Your word says that You have overcome the world. Your word says that I am more than a conquerer through Christ Jesus. Lord Jesus, I thank you for these thruths. I stand upon these truths. I don't believe my problems. I believe You and Your word. I don't believe my failures. I believe in You and Your victory. Praise you Lord Jesus my victorious Savior."
This proclaming faith releases Grace into the inner being. And the praiser and thanker APPLIES the trememdous victory of Christ over the world, the flesh, and the Devil. This is
"Not I But Christ" in action.
The defeat of Satan by Jesus Christ then becomes an appicable reality that the Christian accesses through turning his whole being toward the living Lord Jesus.
We have found that not only does the individual Christian benefit from this standing in faith. But an entre congregation may enter into spiritual victory by corporately and collectively making such a stand.
This kind of standing will one day bring the Lord Jesus Christ physically back to the earth. While people are laughing and denigrating, as you spoke, the growing armies of Chrisians standing on the promises of God is encreasing to a critical mass under their noses.
Don't expect to be informed by Mass Media hype on this.
And we will bring the Lord Jesus back one day as He responds to enough of His saints believing not their circumstances, not their problems, not what they see but what the word of God says.
3) Does God expect us to be mature, rational thinking beings or does He expect us to be unquestioning obedient servants?
Why don't you read more of the Bible.
Did Abraham never question? What about Jacob? Do you think Joseph never questioned God while he was 18 years in prison. What about the patriarch Job? Did Moses never question? Did David never question? Did Jonah or Ezekiel never question? Did John the Baptist never question? Did Zacharius never question? Did Mary, Nathaniel, John, James, Phillip, or Peter never question?
Why don't you embark on a little adventure and read through the Gospel of Matthew and John and see how many times you can locate the disciples of Jesus asking questions?
Take some time each day and read for yourself apart from the laughter of the crowd. See how the followers of Jesus and of God questioned the One Whom they were following.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
Edited by jaywill, : No reason given.
™ Version 4.2
