Born Agains:- What do you beileve?

by LouBelle 24 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  LouBelle

  There was a post on here about been being a Born Again Christian. I must admit I don't know all the ins & outs of being one, but I did pop into a church and did a stint for 3 months before I left as their doctrine become clearer to me - I couldn't stay.

  I'm not sure if these beliefs are held all around the earth by BAs so clarification would be welcome:

  1. Paying tithe: I was told by the leaders of the church that this is a mandate from God/the bible and it plays a key roll in doing the will of the lord.

  2. Once saved...always saved & a constant laying your sins at the foot of the cross.

  3. The belief in the rapture

  4. That the tribulation is a literal time of events and that all those things in the book of revelation will come to pass...literally.

  5. That christ will then literally come back to earth and set up his kingdom in Jerusalem.

  I'm not too sure what happens there after....All of the above is what I picked up from that stint at the church - there were other things that didn't sit well with me - one being the talking in absolute gibberish & when I asked for a translation of this - none could be given.

  Lou - on her spiritual journey within.
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  Junction-Guy

  I agree with all of the above points except once saved/always saved, as I am a Free Will Baptist. There are alot of different denominations within born again christianity and no 2 are exactly alike. As for the gibberish, well some speak in tongues, but not all.
• 

  gaiagirl

  I'd say that anyone who was once a JW and has left the organization and begun a life outside has been born again. The five points which you mention are dogmas, and every church, and possibly every individual, will have their own take on each one of those points.

  My take would be something like:

  1) Give what you can, and only if you are SURE the money is being used for good cause. A certain percentage mandated by the church does not allow for peoples individual circumstances. It's like WTBTS mandating a certain number of hours service each month.

  2) Once saved, always saved? So if a person becomes saved, then begins a life of crime, they are still saved? Sorry, this belief is a logical fallacy.

  3) There will NEVER be a rapture. This is the born-again equivalent of the WTBTS carrot-on-a-stick "new system of things", a false hope to encourage people to obey the dictates of the church. Paul, Peter, and other first century Christians MAY have actually believed it would happen to them, however we KNOW that it did not, that they died just like the unbelievers of their time.

  4) The tribulation was written about AFTER the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, expressing the hopes, by early Christians who still considered themselves as Jews, only with a Messiah, that they were STILL Gods chosen people. There will NEVER be a tribulation brought upon the Earth by a God who is defined as "Love". Blaming earthly problems on God is failing to take responsibility. Humans create problems, and are capable of solving them.

  5) Christ is dead, just like Moses, Buddah, Mohammed, Ghandi, and other noteworthy men. He is recorded as saying (although this may have been added by a later writer) he would return WHILE those first Christians were still alive. We know this did not happen. Another carrot-on-a-stick.
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  Deputy Dog

  LouBelle I disagree with most of the points. But being "born again" isn't about being in line with every point of doctrine. There is freedom in Christ. What all true Christians have in common is we Worship Christ as God. We believe He alone has done the work to secure and maintain or relationship with God. The term or phrase "born again" is found only in a few times in the bible. My suggestion would be to look there. The first is John chapter 3. Another is 1 Peter Chapter 1

  Paying tithe: I was told by the leaders of the church that this is a mandate from God/the bible and it plays a key roll in doing the will of the lord.

  What a load of dung! I would challenge anyone to show me tithing in the New Testament. In fact, anyone who tries to put that load of crap on me, I would ask them why don't they sell all that they have and give the money to the poor. Being "born again is NOT about what you do (like paying tithes, or speaking in tongues). It is about faith (which is given to you from God) in what Christ has done for you.
• 

  XJW4EVR

  1. Paying tithe: I was told by the leaders of the church that this is a mandate from God/the bible and it plays a key roll in doing the will of the lord.

  There is NO mandate for the tithe to the Christian church. You should run from any Pastor that tells you this! The only mandate was to give according to two factors: your means, and the amount of gratitude you have for your salvation.

  2. Once saved...always saved

  If you mean, "once saved always saved no matter what you do" then there is a problem. The Bible does not teach that. It does teach that if you are trull saved then your salvation is eternal. After all did not Jesus promise His followers eternal life?

  & a constant laying your sins at the foot of the cross.

  I am not sure what this means. However, John tells believers that they are to confess their sins. As long as Christians are still in their mortal bodies they will be subject to temptation and sin. Being subject to these often means we fall into sin, and if we confess these sins to God, He is merciful to forgive us.

  Now I would like to point out that there are sins consistent with the Christian life and sins inconsistent with the Christian life. Stealing would be inconsistent with Christian life, and a professed believer caught in this habitually would be subject to church discipline, up to and including excommunication.

  3. The belief in the rapture

  Usually this term refers to a pre-tribulation catching-up to heaven of believers alive at this time. This is NOT an essential for salvation. In fact, it is something that is recent in Christian history, namely around the 1830s. Historically, the rapture has refered to the resurrection of believers and non-believers.

  5. That christ will then literally come back to earth and set up his kingdom in Jerusalem.

  Sounds like you were in a dispensational church. Dispensationalism is on of two major theologies inevangelicalism. Wikipedia has a fairly accurate description of dispensationalism. From there you can link to Covenant theology, which is the other major theological school.
• 

  XJW4EVR

  1) Give what you can, and only if you are SURE the money is being used for good cause.

  I wish I could use this line of logic when I pay taxes, lol. Seriously, I do not think that anyone can be SURE of this. I believe that a believer should perform due diligence before he/she gives anything. Beyond that, the Pastor and staff will be held accountable by a Higher Authority.

  2) Once saved, always saved? So if a person becomes saved, then begins a life of crime, they are still saved? Sorry, this belief is a logical fallacy.

  This is not only a logical fallacy, but is completely unbiblical, too. The New Testament is full of warnings to its readers about both doctrinal and moral apostasy. In fact, most of the men that Paul invested his life into, fell away. What the Bible does teach is perserverance of the saints. This belief is that while a true believer may fall into sin, he/she will never permanently remain in that condition. If a professed believer does this then they were never trully a Christian, as John states in 1 John.

  3) There will NEVER be a rapture. This is the born-again equivalent of the WTBTS carrot-on-a-stick "new system of things", a false hope to encourage people to obey the dictates of the church. Paul, Peter, and other first century Christians MAY have actually believed it would happen to them, however we KNOW that it did not, that they died just like the unbelievers of their time.

  That's a big catagorical denial. Perhaps you are not aware of the fact that the rapture was, up till the 1800s, the final resurrection of the dead for judgement.

  4) The tribulation was written about AFTER the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, expressing the hopes, by early Christians who still considered themselves as Jews, only with a Messiah, that they were STILL Gods chosen people. There will NEVER be a tribulation brought upon the Earth by a God who is defined as "Love". Blaming earthly problems on God is failing to take responsibility. Humans create problems, and are capable of solving them.

  What evidence do you have to back up for your first statement?

  Your second statement does not follow, because God is not just "LOVE". He is just and righteous also.

  No one is "failing to take responsibility" as you say. Perhaps the tribulation is a time period in which man gets himself in such a mess that he is unable to extricate himself from it, and God is forced to step in and make things right? This is not necessarily what I believe will happen, but I just wanted to posit a different point of view.

  5) Christ is dead, just like Moses, Buddah, Mohammed, Ghandi, and other noteworthy men. He is recorded as saying (although this may have been added by a later writer) he would return WHILE those first Christians were still alive. We know this did not happen. Another carrot-on-a-stick.

  Where's the body?

  Proof for your assertion of additions to the text please?

  Christ gave prophecies that indicated that His coming would NOT be during the lifetime of His disciples.

  More half-truths and baseless assertions.
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  Deputy Dog

  XJW

  Historically, the rapture has refered to the resurrection of believers and non-believers.

  I'm not pretrib, but, Never heard of the "rapture" including nonbelievers before. Can you give me a source.
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  Deputy Dog

  XJW

  If you mean, "once saved always saved no matter what you do" then there is a problem.

  What's the problem?

  Rom 8:31

  What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? 32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things? 33 Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies; 34 who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. 35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 Just as it is written, "FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE BEING PUT TO DEATH ALL DAY LONG; WE WERE CONSIDERED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED." 37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

  I thought that Jesus died, so that nothing, including sin, could separate us from the love of God.

  Keep in mind, I'm not saying; I want to sin more, that grace may abound.
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  XJW4EVR

  1 Corinthians 3:10-15 & Matthew 25:31-33. This is off the top of my head. I do not have access to my notes at this time so a fuller explanation will have to wait. However the fifth point of the Apostles' Creed states:

  He ascended into heaven
  and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty,
  whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.

  Personally, I think that the pre-tribulation rapture is nothing more than giving believer's a false sense of security about not being persecuted for their faith.
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  XJW4EVR

  DD,

  I think your last statement answers the question. As I mentioned before, the Bible does not teach sinless perfectionism. In fact it teaches the opposite. Just look at the various first century church epistles. Paul was angry with the Corinthian church for allowing a sin that even the Gentiles did not permit to happen in their midst.

  Salvation is three-fold in its affect on humanity. First, we are saved from the penalty of sin. Next, we are saved from the power of sin. Lastly, we will be saved from the presencse of sin. The first was at regeneration, ie. the born again experience. The second is ongoing through the Holy Spirit's progressive sanctification of the believer. The last will happen at glorification.

  Chapter 17 of the Westminster Confession puts it,

  I. They, whom God has accepted in His Beloved, effectually called, and sanctified by His Spirit, can neither totally nor finally fall away from the state of grace, but shall certainly persevere therein to the end, and be eternally saved.

  II. This perseverance of the saints depends not upon their own free will, but upon the immutability of the decree of election, flowing from the free and unchangeable love of God the Father; upon the efficacy of the merit and intercession of Jesus Christ, the abiding of the Spirit, and of the seed of God within them, and the nature of the covenant of grace: from all which arises also the certainty and infallibility thereof.

  III. Nevertheless, they may, through the temptations of Satan and of the world, the prevalency of corruption remaining in them, and the neglect of the means of their preservation, fall into grievous sins; and, for a time, continue therein: whereby they incur God's displeasure, and grieve His Holy Spirit, come to be deprived of some measure of their graces and comforts, have their hearts hardened, and their consciences wounded; hurt and scandalize others, and bring temporal judgments upon themselves.