TRUE SPIRIT CONVERSION
People in churchs everywhere continue to think and say "just pray this simple prayer", or, "repeat this verse", And you will be born again.
Jesus said you must be born again in order to see the kingdom of God. Because natural unchanged humanity can not preceive or understand the things of God, heavenly things, spiritual truth, or Godly realities.
He also said, marvel not that I said, ye must be born again. We know that wind is real. We see the effects of wind but we do not see the wind itself, or the place it began at or where it will end up; Those things we do not know about wind, but we know it is real. That's the same way it is for someone to receive the born again Spirit of God, as it says in Luke 17:20 "The kingdom of God cometh not with observation" There are things though that we can do to be sure we get born again, or born of the Spirit, or born of above; which are different ways of describing what born again means. Born again is NOT a denominational doctrine ! It is a Jesus thing.
It's like what Jesus told Peter "My Father in heaven revealed this to you"
If we get people to expect they are born again, when they are not, we could give them the confidence to go to hell, without actually getting the Spirit of the Lord. This is a most serious matter to understand.
According to Luke 17:20, You can not inspect by human eyes the new birth process; Even though there are things that can happen to give evidence. The most common being a witness within; He sends His Spirit into us crying Abba Father, the Spirit of adoption.
There are spiritual principles which can get you in line with Gods word and way, to bring about the revelation from Father in the Spirit, to cause in you the born again reality.
A seed must first go into the ground and die. That means Repentance; God grants us repentance when we come to Him the way He says. Jesus described that way; When you seek with All your heart then you'll find.
Repentance is Not your works of doing good; We are not saved by our ability to do good. Repentance is when you come to a place in your mind and heart, that being right with God means more to you than anything; That you become desirious and willing to let God have rule in your life. You will not be expected to be perfect in your abilities to obey, but your attitude of giving Him consent to do His work on you and in you, like as if you were clay in a potters hand; That is repentance. It's like saying I was my own teacher before, now I want God to teach me. That's repentance; that isnt hard, but it is essential.
Next, or also, You will need to believe. A humbled repentant heart can receive from God, the revelation of Jesus, which will enable you to believe with true bible type believing.
The word "believe" is translated from a greek word meaning: "commit to trust, to rely to depend". It's an act of the heart in the Spirit. Believing is the most precious Grace from God, and is not valid without repentance.
Jesus didnt lead people in sinners prayers or give altar calls. Jesus taught people the things that bring faith, the principles that enable you to hear from God to have faith to get saved. Faith comes by hearing and that means hearing from God.
God is seeking them who will worship Him in Spirit and in truth.
If you asked Jesus into your life, Did you meerly invite Him in like a dinner guest who is not in charge of your life? Or, Did you invite Him in as a King to rule in your life; to guide and instruct and teach and empower you?
It has been well said; If He is not Lord of all of your life, then He is not Lord at all in your life.
That does not mean you will be without failures and weakness, and that you will never experience any sin anymore, but it does mean, that in your heart, you are Changed by the Spirit within you, and that you are not comfortable about sin or doing wrong, that you must continue to pursue holiness, as it is your new nature.
REFINEMENT
Just as Jesus broke down all the law of Moses and of the Prophets down to two things; To love God with all your mind heart soul and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself:
Even so; I break down this understanding of the depths of salvation;
All who call on the name of the Lord shall be saved ;and;
Whosoever will, come and drink of the river of life freely.
Those last 2 verses help you believe with faith in how Easy it can be to be saved; The information before, is to ensure you do not get a watered down luke warm idea of what coming to him or calling on his name means: Amen !!!
Salvation is Not about our ability to perform, but our willingness to open to the Lord, to give him consent to deal with us as his children. It's about our making ourself available to him
Salvation works in stages. First, God works on us to keep us alive to be able to respond to him, along with sending us messages and chances and hope to come to the place where we can believe from the heart on Jesus. Secondly, we appropriate salvation into our own life by simply saying yes to Jesus, before knowing or understanding much or anything about what yes to Jesus means; That's what Jesus meant by saying "the violent take it by force"; You just go for it and deal with the details latter. Thirdly, God began this work on you, and he will be faithful to complete this work throughout the rest of your life. He doesnt want you to enter heaven in an embrio stage; please give the Lord time and space in your life to bring you to full age maturity in your salvation. It will not only benifit you in eternity, it will become a great joy for you now, in seeing God use you to draw others closer to him.
Above all that!
No matter how fine a line I can draw to express how soon you may or may not be saved yet or not; This one thing I do; I do not hold much confidence on my days before being totally sold out to live for Jesus . Even though God was at work all my life getting me to the place where I became dedicated to follow, I mark the date when I said yes to follow Jesus as a committed dedicated serious decision as the time of my salvation, because that was the turning point of when my life was changed for good. That was the time when I became mature in attitude towards God; When I really learned what wholehearted meant by faith, not knowing how it was going to work. You see, earlier I mentioned " just go for it, and deal with the details latter" But Jesus said to count the cost, like being sure you have enough money to finish building a house before digging the foundation; Counting the cost doesnt mean waiting till you feel sure you can serve God; confidence in natural human reasoning will not generate a God inspired conversion in anyones life; What it means is, you come to the end of yourself, it means you stand humbled before God in need of His help, that you, by faith, permit God to enter your life , even though you will never come to a place of holiness manifested without any error, you will find that his life in you is what makes the difference. It is written about christians in the bible: That now, at the present state of being a christian, now we are Gods children, his sons, and it is still not obvious or clear what we are; It doesnt always seem that way, but we know that when Jesus shows up in the cloud for rapture, every one who hopes in Jesus will become just like the resurrected body of Jesus; while at this time, we still see our weakness. Listen to what the Spirit of the Lord is trying to say to your spirit, not what religious people have overloaded you with guilt and condemnation and doubts about. After 25 years of being totally dedicated to follow, I know that we are still only able to cling to the fact that we are saved by grace, it is a free gift in the Spirit. We just keep going with God, and going back to him, never denying him. His on fire love in us is not ever our ability; his joy in us is our availablity to him.
Jesus gave us a wonderful example. Two men came into the house of the Lord to pray. One man stood boasting how he gave faithfully of his money and did so many good things, and said he thanked God he was not like that sinner in the room, the other man praying. The other man wouldnt even look up towards heaven, but in conviction was beating his fists against his chest, saying, Lord have mercy on me, a sinner. Jesus said that man who exalted himself was rejected by God, even though the world would have praised him, for he appeared righteous to people, and that the man who people would reject and condemn, the sinner, he went home justifed by God, for everyone who exalts their own self is brought low by God and everyone who humbles themself before God is accepted by God.
Other places in the bible it says that God rejects the proud but gives grace to the humble; and, to be clothed in humility. And, that when knowledge from God comes to you, if you reject it, God must reject you. And ; By humility and the fear of the Lord are richs honor and life.
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The bible tells us that, the Holy Ghost teacheth, and, the Anointing teacheth. These are true Spiritual means of learning; If you want to be sure you hold to real truth, and not mans versions, seek to excell in this way of learning. Comparing spiritual with spiritual.
