There is a common, almost universal, false teaching in christianity that man decides to be saved\u2014to be born again. So, revivals and crusades, with fiery preaching and interminable invitations, or \u201caltar calls,\u201d litter the churchian landscape, promising an immediate guarantee into heaven because of man’s ability to \u201cswitch on\u201d the Holy Spirit inside him by declaring his decision to \u201caccept Christ\u201d or \u201cturn his life over to the Lord,\u201d or myriad other christianese euphemisms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If man has that kind of instant righteousness by saying a prayer, or really, really, really wanting to be saved, then Messiah Yahoshua lied in Luke 8:13, and James was just speaking of a pleasant personality trait. But, James said that by allowing patience (endurance) to complete her work, one will be \u201cperfect and complete, lacking nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What does that mean\u2014to be perfect and complete, lacking nothing? Apart from the Holy Spirit, man is imperfect in the Father’s eyes, and lacks the righteousness necessary to be His child, so he is not complete. At creation, Elohim said, “Let US make man in OUR image,” so man is the union of soul (Father), body (Son), and spirit (Holy Spirit); however, because of Adam’s sin, man is born with a dead spirit, which makes him incomplete in the Father’s eyes (this is the “first death,” and the eternal lake of fire is the “second death”). <\/p>\n\n\n\n
To be completed, or perfected, the spirit in man must be resurrected to newness of life, and that happens ONLY by the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Unless and until that happens, a person is just a soul and a body, which means such a person has only a flesh nature, and all flesh will perish. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Only by receiving the Holy Spirit is man clothed in Yahoshua’s righteousness, and, with Yahoshua’s righteousness covering him, man does not lack anything that is necessary regarding adoption. That gift alone assures him eternal life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So, why is patience necessary to receive that, if man has the power to impute it to himself by his own decision?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The false notion that one can make a decision or pray a prayer that makes him an adopted child of the Most High God is absurd on its face. Man does not have that power or authority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It is not merely the mental assent that Yahoshua is Yah’s salvation, but also confessing Him before others, regardless of relational consequences, for He said that if you deny Him before men, He will deny you before His Father.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
THAT is the patience that James speaks of\u2014the \u201cworks\u201d of demonstrating that your belief is genuine, and not just a mental agreement for personal gain. What a man believes, THAT he will do. If one truly believes in Messiah Yahoshua, and will take the risk of standing for Him in front of others (whatever the personal\/relational cost), that is the belief that will then be rewarded with the covenant (“ketubah,” or covenant of marriage), which is the eternal seal of the Holy Spirit upon Messiah’s bride (whose name is Yisra-el). Man’s belief without the Holy Spirit is not completed, or made perfect, because his spirit is not alive until the Holy Spirit is given to him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The immediate \u201clight switch Holy Spirit\u201d of christianity is the ludicrous belief that it is the child who decides to be adopted by the parent, and that the child’s own declaration of being adopted suffices as the legal decree of adoption. Salvation (justification) is an eternal judicial decree of adoption by the King\u2014man does not have the power to declare it, nor can man ever alter it or cancel it once the decree has been sealed by the King.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Belief in Messiah Yahoshua is the necessary first step to be saved. But, that faith will be tried and tested before one is made \u201cperfect and complete, lacking nothing,\u201d which is to be given the Holy Spirit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If all you have is the \u201csalvation\u201d that christianity teaches\u2014that you were saved by your decision or your prayer\u2014then, you don’t have true salvation; you have a counterfeit of it that is peddled by christianity, which is a counterfeit of the true faith. Without the direct, personal confirmation of the Holy Spirit, one will have no \u201cevidence\u201d (the \u201cwitness\u201d or \u201crecord\u201d of 1 John 5:10) to provide at his judgment that he was ever truly adopted by the Father.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For more information: Is Salvation Hard to Receive?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There is a common, almost universal, false teaching in christianity that man decides to be saved\u2014to be born again. So, revivals and crusades, with fiery preaching and interminable invitations, or \u201caltar calls,\u201d litter the churchian landscape, promising an immediate guarantee into heaven because of man’s ability to \u201cswitch on\u201d the Holy Spirit inside him by … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14,10,9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=965"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2834,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965\/revisions\/2834"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wottblog.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}