5
Dec
1999
Decision Making
Submitted by theshovel
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PDF versionI know I seem to be dragging this out, but all of us have a closet full of misconceptions based on the world’s rules that need to be reconsidered. Many of us are, right at this moment, suffering from the frustration of trying to find the door INTO the room we are ALREADY in. You might be tempted to do a study on “Doors and How to Recognize Them”, but it won’t help you to solve your problem. Why not? Because your problem has NOTHING TO DO with the thing you are trying to figure out.
So it is with decision-making. You are already “in the room”, so to speak. Let me put it another way: if you are in Christ, you are smack dab in the center of God’s will. I will repeat this: IF YOU ARE IN CHRIST YOU ARE IN THE CENTER OF GOD’S WILL. And isn’t that the thing we are trying to achieve? Isn’t that part of the fear we have as we try to find “the peace of Christ” that will help us make our decisions? Aren’t we afraid that we might “fall out” of the will of God? What if this is the very thing that has been keeping us from enjoying the reality of being in the center of God’s will?
You wanna know what I think? I think that this fear of NOT being in the will of God is one of the Deceiver’s main tricks to cause us to question the finished work of Christ! How so? Simple … the gospel tells us that through Christ, God has placed us in Him and He in us. But our “Christian Decision-Making Principles” tell us that we have to jump through a series of hoops in order to find and remain in the will of God. Don’t you see it? Are we REALLY in the will of God through Christ … or are we in the will of God through following a set of rules, or principles, or guidelines, or feelings?
If I still held on to the latter belief, then I would make sure that I separated the DOCTRINE of “Discovering God’s Will” from the DOCTRINE of “Being IN Christ”. That way no one would confuse the two. We would then realize that “being in Christ” had nothing to do with “decision-making”. And then we could realize that “being in Christ” had no real effect on the everyday stuff of our lives as we are faced with one decision after another! Whew! Wouldn’t that make life easier and less confusing? But heck, that’s the way most “Christian” churches teach it already.
Here’s a novel idea: Decision-Making & Being Alive and Free in Christ (part 3 of the Shoveletter series, The Will of God)
Next time …. :)
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Re: Decision Making
Re: Decision Making
Posted: December 6, 1999 by Becki
« « « If you are in Christ, you are smack dab in the center of God's will. » » »
I remember the first time I really grabbed a hold of this. It changed my life.
\o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/ \o/
I was so excited to see you addressing it in your shoveletter. I look forward to hearing about the lives it changes and the people it sets free.
Love you bro,
Posted: December 6, 1999 by Bruce
Jim,
I love it!
WE ARE His Will in the earth! Because Christ is in us...we are bringing Heaven to earth! We are the Ark of His Presence! We are the "clouds" that are raining the Living Water upon the earth (which is a dry and desert place) and we are causing it to BLOOM like a rose!
We know the book of Jude says that false prophets are like "clouds without rain". This is because they do not have the "living water" flowing out of them...NO LIFE! We however realize that CHRIST IN US...the LIVING WATER...is what causes everywhere we place our feet to BLOOM like a rose.
Indeed...How lovely on the mountains are the feet of them that bring this GOOD NEWS of a FINISHED WORK!
WE are HIS WORKMANSHIP! HE,the ALPHA, began it all...and HE, the Omega, finished it all...and will continue His work in man till HE is ALL IN ALL.
This way the focus stays on HIM...and HE gets all the GLORY & credit due to HIM.
Keep it up...I LIKE IT...I LIKE IT!
:)Bruce
Posted: December 6, 1999 by Heather
Jim - to some degree i think you are wrong. I don't think that being regenerated means that every thing i do say or think from this point on is smack dab in the middle of God's will. Why then would we need the Spirit to lead us? We wouldn't! Why then would we need the scriptures to instruct us? We wouldn't! I'm sorry if this is not as easy as we all want it to be or thought it would be, but being in Christ does not mean that we become passive beings that automatically can do no wrong - or automatically do what is right. While our righteousness is a gift, imputed to us by virtue of being in Christ, there still has to be an active participation on our end to perform "what is His good, pleasing and perfect will." It's not something we even automatically know, but that must be discovered as we are obeying (active) the command to be transformed by the renewing of our minds.
You're saying this all occurs as a mystical sort of occurence, or perhaps an imputedness, but i think you are wrong. I think God wills in us and works in us to will and to do according to his good pleasure, but that is still something that he performs by working in our WILL. We are required to engage our WILL with our beings and our environment in order to see this come to pass.
Posted: December 6, 1999 by Sherri
Excellent dude!! Love it!! Keep it up!! (I know you will ... chuckle chuckle)
I love you more ............... :)
Wifus
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