Soomee

It is the actual death to sin. I believe that Paul is talking about Jesus' physical death that brought about our spiritual death to sin. We are made up of spirit, soul(mind) and body (a kind of "tri-entities"). When we are born again we are united with Christ esentially in our spirit. The old spirit is dead (the old man is dead) and our sinful nature is shattered. Now our spirit is made completely new (resurrected) and my old sin-loving nature is buried with Christ. My spirit is a new man (holy) now connected with the spirit of Christ. But my soul and body are not yet come to that state. Once we allow the spirit to work in us the soul and body will gradually change to "christ-likeness" by the power of the Holy Spirit. This is the process of sanctification (becoming like Christ). It is not a theological mumbo-jumbo. It is the faith matter and a believer can feel and live in that reality. That is my experience and I enjoy living in that experience of reality. I do not have to have a complete explanation in my mind to have faith in something. I feel in my spirit and then obey God's call. For example, I do not understand how my digestive system exactly works. Because I do not unerstand, I do not go on without eating. I eat and it digests. I like to use the same argument here. I feel this reality in my spirit and I believe and enjoy His spiritual leading. As a consequence my eternal life (to be with Jesus) is secured. If I keep argueing in my mind and keep on unbelieving this reality then who is the loser? ME!!!!

I was baptized (sprinkled water) as an infant and led a very ordinary worldly life. Then I was converted to the real dedicated life a few years ago. Then I chose to have an immersion baptism as an adult after a couple of years after I became a committed spirit led christian. My decision to get baptized was merely an act of obedience and declaration of my "new life" to my relatives and friends (to the world). In physical sense the act of baptism did not bring me to that "new life". I had that even before. After I made that decision to take Jesus serious in my life and I believe I started that "union with Christ" Physically the baptism symbolises our death and burial to "myself" and was raised to be "in Christ". In theory the physically dead body should not respond to the desires of this world.

When we repent and accept Christ as our Lord and Saviour. The english word "repent" does not exactly explain and give the true meaning of it. In my own language it is translated as "about turn of mind". This one explains exactly what it means. A 180 degrees turn and I have nothing to do with my old ways of life. I now walk in "newness". When we say "Lord & Saviour" we have to really mean it. "LORD" means He is our master now. We only have to take commands from Him. We have already dead to our "old master" hence we are not under the Old master's authority. If the old master tell us to go back to our sin we say "No" to it. Roman 6:14 says that "Sin must not be your master, for you do not live under law but under God's Grace". Oh what a previlege we have under the Lordship of Jesus. I wonder why so many people choose to live under bondage when we have this wonderful good news.

The human race is ultimately connected to Adam. The proof that we are racially connected to Adam because we all die (physical death). I think we all are wired in a way that we will give in to temptation exactly same way that Adam gave in and sinned. We are identified with Adam in "sin" and "condemnation". We need some external power to overcome sin's power dragging us down. As an example one could visualise the Newton's Law of gravity pulling things down. If an object is falling an external thing like a hand has to reach out and catch it so that it will not fall further. Similarly when we fall under the pressure of temptation we need the Spirit of Christ intervene and hold us up and give us victory over sin's power. Christ went to cross for our sins and then he had been raised from the grave to walk with newness of life. Unlike Adam, Jesus came from above and lived as a human (the same limitations that we have) and showed us that we also can have a victorious life when we are born again and use the previledge that we have via the Holy Spirit. So we are called upon to set our hearts on things above. The born again believers are identified with Christ in his death, burial and resurrection.

I got this from our Bible study recently. Thought it would be useful for others as well. What is justification by faith? Justification is the legal act where God declares the sinner to be innocent of his or her sins. It is not that the sinner is now sinless, but that he is "declared" sinless. This declaration of righteousness is being justified before God. This justification is based on the shed blood of Jesus, "...having now been justified by His blood..." (Rom. 5:9) where Jesus was crucified, died, was buried, and rose again (1 Cor. 15:1-4). God imputes (reckons to our account) the righteousness of Christ. At the same time our sins were imputed to Christ when he was on the cross. That is why it says in 1 Pet. 2:24, "and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed." Also, 2 Cor. 5:21 says, "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." Additionally, we are justified by faith (Rom. 5:1) apart from works of the Law (Rom. 3:28). To be saved means that God has delivered us (saved us) from His righteous wrathful judgment due us because of our sins against Him. It means that we will not be judged for our sins and be sentenced to eternal damnation. To be saved means that we are justified before God.

We need to have a gift of discernment as there are quite a lot of deceptions going on in this area in the name of Jesus. When people seek their own honour or try to draw attention to themselves then we can easily discern the true one from falsehood. When prophets are humble and point the people towards Christ then they are genuine. They display the attitude of

Yes, Jesus is using humour to reach the hearts of the listeners easily. The main point is

Unbelievers do not have a Father as we Christians have. That means they are fatherless (orphans). If we take a small orphan boy and another boy who has parents, then there is a huge difference between these two boys. The orphan boy has to worry and fret about every physical and material need. Whereas the other boy will have an anxious-free mind knowing that he has a loving father & mother who put his needs above their needs and provide without failing. Therefore we Christians who have a loving heavenly Father should have a completely different outlook towards our life. We are the citizens of a heavenly calling (Kingdom of God). But the unbelievers are only the citizens of the kingdom of earth. They belonged to this world and hence there primary concern and worry is related to the earthly things. On the other hand we have peace and joy that is beyond description. Jesus is making that point very clearly here.

1) No thanks or recognition to God for providing & no thoughts for the needs of others. It is not that God does not want us to enjoy life. God provides so that we can bless others (need to have the attitude of sharing). His selfishness that Jesus did not like (There are 6

1. The Father

1) None of us can claim that we are

He is our Father

Yes, God knows our needs. If the prayer is to tell him what He needs to consider or do then we do not have to pray at all as he knows all our present and future needs. I consider prayer as an avenue of communication with God (not only we speak, he also talk to us in the form of putting some thoughts in our minds). God instructs us to have that sort of fellowship. Prayer also a kind of affirmation we provide to God to show that we are willingly partnering with Him on things that He is planning to do. It also allows us to elevate ourselves into the spiritual realms in which God operates.

(i) Prayer is also giving an offering to God. So the principles apply to our

These questions are really making me to examine myself as they really challenge me. I find it quite hard to obey blindly. 2a & Am I giving straight away when some one approaches me and ask for something? It depends. If I am meeting that person for the first time I tend to ask some quick questions to find out whether that person is genuine. I migrated to Australia from a poor South Asian country. The welfare system in Australia is very good. I was on Government welfare as soon as we migrated (until I got a job) and we not only lived comfortably, we also managed to save some money to meet any surprises in life. So I know that if someone approaches me on the street for money, I really need to use the God given wisdom to establish whether the need is genuine. Once we were standing outside the church and a lady approached us for money as the people consider the Christians are easy targets. It is very difficult and there is no cook book solution for giving. If we are not wise in giving then the money that will bless the really needy ones will go into the hands of drug addict, for example. I believe that we have some responsibility too in giving and we cannot just say we blindly give and do not care how the money is spent by the receiver. It is quite difficult to set one rule. What we need to do is to be open to God

a) The world teaches us that we need to be a man-pleaser. But according to God, our primary focus should be "what would God think of us". In this context I always remember Isa 2:22 "Stop trusting in man, who has but a breath in his nostril. Of what account is he?" or another translation put it as "Put no more confidence in mortals. What are they worth?". If we adopt this as our motto in life then our sole concern will be to "perform for the audience of one". seeking Pride - the desire to get a good name amoung others. c) The worldly organisations circulate a list where you write your name and your pledge (how much you are giving for the charity). This way the people are forced to give (in a suttle way) a substantial amount because everyone will know how much you are giving. I see the same practice infiltrates into the church too. This is totally wrong.

Q5. (Matthew 19:9) Does a person who has remarried after a divorce that wasn't caused by marital unfaithfulness, live in a perpetual state of adultery? Should that person divorce or separate in order to get back into God's will? How can he or she get back into God's will, or is that no longer possible? 1st time trial msg: According to Jesus' teaching on this subject, it is adultery. But as 1 John 1:9 says it is like any other sin and the God of love is there to forgive all if it is confessed sincerely and asked forgiveness. It boils down to ones own personal walk with God. It is quite hard for the leaders to take a particular stand in this matter when someone who had gone through this kind of unfortunate circumstances wants to aspire leadership. Those who do not have a clear understanding about this issue will be in a total confusion if the church allow such people to go as leaders. I am wondering what can they preach to others. May God grant wisdom to all church goers on this matter.