There are many referances to Jesus saying if certain things he said were not followed one couldn’t be saved. The Holy Spirit seems to be telling different things to different people if it were truly the Holy spirit we would all come to the same conclusion.
What truth is one to surrender to? There are so many different people who see truth in a different way. All believe what they do and believe to be truth.
I think what we think is the Holy Spirit is just our own minds using what we want to believe; each person has a mind that can think it is the Holy Spirit. There is no way to know what we think or do is from the Holy Spirit( or not).
In the circle of life a destination is a matter of belief.
Jesus was only an example in some ways. He said there would always be the poor. He never had the problems of raising a family, was never in a bad marriage, had perfect parents, when he needed money for taxes he had Simon go to a fish and get what was needed,he never knew old age, what a woman goes through in childbirth,never experianced the death of a child.
As to not worrying if all people were saved, when it came to Judas he said it would have been better if he had not been born, but if it wasn’t for Judus betraying him people would not have been saved by him.
To me a good teacher spends her time with the people who need the help more,so rather than teach the people who(if he were God) would know the others needed more understanding and he would have tried to help those peole who needed it, not talk in parables so they wouln’t understand,at one point he had stated that the message was for the Jews only, then one of his followers said even the dogs ate crumbs from the masters table.
If one knows for certain what a situation is that would bring them death for all eternity they would choose what was best for themselves (unless their mind wasn’t right). No one would hold ones hand to the fire when they knew for sure it would burn them.
We have a mind and should be able to use it to tell what is wrong or right, but one doesn’t always know the difference. The people like Pat Robenson think the Spirit guides them but that is another story.
I don’t read Jesus references to being saved as the traditional reward and punsihment view. He also said , “The truth will set you free” and “The kingdom of Heaven is within” I see Jesus use of saved as “saved” from ourselves. Saved from the illusions that we are primarily seperate physical beings.
“To thine own self be true” I don’t see the Holy Spirit as a seperate entity that God sent to help us. It lives within us all, connects us all, and will guide us if we learn to listen. We are influenced by our culture, our personalities, our enviorment etc. The Holy Spirit is filtered through our individuality. These are the things that create the illusions of different truths for different people. Ultimately as those illusions drop away we will all come to the same place.
That is certainly part of it. People follow what they percieve to be the truth. They will continue to do so until their perception changes and their understanding of the truth is clearer. There is a way to tell the difference between what we think and the guidence of the spirit although we will fool ourselves from time to time. It’s called the still small voice, or our inner voice. We guage our actions by love, compassion and kindness.
I’m not sure what you mean.
It’s 2000 years later. So far he’s right about the poor. I guess you’re right about the other details, although I don’t think his earthly parents were perfect. He didn’t experience everything and those things are hard to deal with. I think the example he set was being in communion with God through the Holy Spirit. If we can listen to that inner voice it guides us away from a lot of the ills that plague society and helps us help others more effectivly.
Judas chose to do what he did. We must live with the consequences of our choices. I think it was Jesus life that saved people , not his death. Had he lived he might have gone on teaching.
Remember when Jesus was criticized for hanging out with the wrong people. He said “They’re the ones that need me” A teacher can only teach those who are willing to learn. You don’t teach advanced calculus to a 2nd grader. You teach him what he is capable or understanding and give him more when he is ready. Jesus said something like this to his disciples. The parables weren’t to confuse people. It’s like the stories we tell our children that have a moral or lesson in them.
To be clear, I don’t think the Bible is 100% accurate in it’s representation of Jesus, what he said and did, so I don’t feel the need to examine or defend every passage. He obviously taught people to break down the social barriers and treat all people as God’s children. In the story you mentioned that womans faith was rewarded not rejected. It was the woman herself who made the dog reference not one of his followers.
Traditionally and in the experience of those who have had conversion experiences of one sort or another, the Holy Spirit is God Himself working within us. A large part of the reason for the paradoxical Doctrine of the Trinity is that the Holy Spirit is God pushing us to spiritually move towards God, a distinct Person from the Father who is “God” in the sense of Ultimate Reality, Supreme Spirit, etc. To say that “it is God playing a particular role” is both an accurate analogy and the heresy of Modalism.
I think the last few paragraphs of cosmodan’s post just above are farily accurate. But I think what you have to realize about the Gospels is that they are not objective biography, nor were they intended to be; they were attempts to portray Jesus, as He was known to the authors or their sources, written for catechetical purposes, the instruction of new Christians.
Accordingly, we have four different portraits: the wonder-working Son of God who does not want to be publicly revealed as Messiah; the awaited Messiah who would fulfill prophecies in His own way; the compassionate, gentle figure who expects moral behavior of all but is only harsh to judgmental hypocrites secure in their own opinions of what God wants; and the transcendent Word who is at the same time intensely human. Each gives a facet of who Jesus was; none give the full picture.
Jesus gave us a simple reliable guide to tell if we or others are being moved by the spirit of God. What are the acts you see yourself or another doing. Are they acts of love, compassion, brotherhood, kindness, forgivness? When Pat Robinson, or Jerry , Fawell , or Jimmy Swaggart, make references to killing others in the name of the Lord it isn’t hard to tell how wrong they are or that regardless of the words they use, they are not following the spirit. Since I don’t really believe in the whole reward punishment thing or death for all eternity, I can’t respond to your other comment.
I see no different in the example of Jesus, than Buddah, Buddah’s golden rule was 500 years before Jesus time. Even the Good Samaritan did more.
I guess because I do not believe Jesus was any more God than any one else I may look at Him differently.
I have never read where He did anything difficult most of what he did was not done in a way most men could do it, Like curing the sick etc. According to the writers he just worked miracles. He surely didn’t do anything like the men of his time or ours. (Of course he was a carpenter,but I am referring to his being an example)
Christians I know speak of his death to save us. I see his death as not a death, and if one of my children told me" I am going to suffer awhile, die, and be back in about 36 hours" I would say, Do you want me to fix breakfast for you when you return"? This too if you note was a contradiction, as the scriptures said he would be in the earth 3 days and 3 nights. Friday unil Sunday sun rise as some claim he was in the grave is not 3 days and 3 nights.
The more I have studied what Jesus taught and did, the less I could see anythig special in him that I do not see every day in regular humans.
I conclude it is a matter of faith and what helps a person; for me it does nothing,but I will concede that those who do believe it,it seems to help them. Even though sometimes some use this belief to belittle others who do not agree.
I say, If there is “a” God so be it, if there is God either way I do not have any concerns.
We don’t really disagree too much. I don’t hold the traditional Christian view of Jesus. I think we are all able to commune with God in the same way Jesus did. I think that’s what he was trying to teach. I believe he was the son of God but no more than you or I. I think he was teaching that too. He said we could do what he did and greater if we only had faith. My own beliefs are still evolving but for now, I don’t believe his death and resurection has the significance the traditional Christian view gives it.
There’s a series by Wayne Dyer called “The Power of Intention” that yoou might find interesting if you’re not familiar with it. He talks about a spiritual balance in the whole, like positive and negative. A spiritual being like Jesus or Buddha raises the spiritual level of everyone. That seems to be the significance of those rare occurances.
I’ve always found it significant that even with the distortion of centuries we can see that Jesus and Buddha while hundreds of years apart, taught essentially the same thing about our relationship with each other and the world.
Even though I use the terms I don’t nessecarily see God and the Holy Spirit as seperate entities from us that we interact with. It’s just language. I see it more as a mysterious oneness that is very hard to explain.
I can see where you are coming from; My belief is that we are all a part of a greater whole, and I think Jesus(or who ever quoted him) was stating that too, when he called "God " Our father, “My father and yours”; and quoted the psalmist, We humans tend to think of God as being seperate from us, I think we are a part of a greater whole some call God.
Right. The more I study the less I am willing to let symantics create walls bewteen me and others. In my studies and in communication I have found that beneath the framework of our words we often have less differences than we thought. I use the terms God and Holy Spirit in conversation but I try not to limit the concept. It’s part of the great unknown we are trying to grasp. Someone here on the SDMB used the term “myterium tremendum” I thought that was pretty good.