How are we to be like God?

[AdHoc]

If you can only use one word to describe a characteristic of God that we should follow as an example what word would you use?

And why do you choose that word?

[myth-one.com]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

[Checkpoint]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

Ezekiel is talking about what is an essential part of the good news.

About, not our future body, but the entry of God's Spirit into our spirit, in this body and in this life.

It is an essential experience, without which no one will have a body fitted for eternity.

[myth-one.com]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

Ezekiel is talking about what is an essential part of the good news.

About, not our future body, but the entry of God's Spirit into our spirit, in this body and in this life.

It is an essential experience, without which no one will have a body fitted for eternity.

No human body will ever be fit for eternity.

That is why we must be born again into an eternal spiritual body.

That is what Jesus states in the Bible.

[Checkpoint]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

Ezekiel is talking about what is an essential part of the good news.

About, not our future body, but the entry of God's Spirit into our spirit, in this body and in this life.

It is an essential experience, without which no one will have a body fitted for eternity.

No human body will ever be fit for eternity.

That is why we must be born again into an eternal spiritual body.

That is what Jesus states in the Bible.

We are not just a body, but body, soul, and spirit.

I did not say a "human body"(by which you appear to mean a "mortal body").

To be "born again"into eternity, we must first be "begotten again" while still living this mortal life in this mortal body.

No human will ever be "born again" if they have not first been "begotten again", just as no human will ever be born into this mortal life without first having been begotten.

[brianbbs67]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

Does God's spirit not count? Chapters 36-37 talk of nothing but God putting His spirit in us.

[myth-one.com]

We are not just a body, but body, soul, and spirit.

Like the other animals?:

For that which befalleth the sons of men befalleth beasts; even one thing befalleth them: as the one dieth, so dieth the other; yea, they have all one breath; so that a man hath no preeminence above a beast: for all is vanity. All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. (Ecclesiastes 3:19-20)

Man fears the unknown. Mankind's most obvious fear is death. Death is the one thing we cannot try out on a test basis. You are either dead or alive. Furthermore, you cannot discuss death with someone who has experienced it.

We see decaying dead animals and know that our bodies end up likewise. The part we do not understand is our personalities, our thinking processes, our emotions, our non-physical processes. These are the processes which many believe separates us from the other animals. We even give it a name, calling it our "soul," and assigning to each soul eternal life. Thus, we fight out fear of death by denying it.

From The Random House College Dictionary, the noun soul is defined as follows:

1. The principle of life, feeling, thought, and action in man, regarded as a distinct entity separate from the body; the spiritual part of man as distinct from the physical part.
2. The spiritual part of man regarded in its moral aspect, or as capable of surviving death and subject to happiness or misery in a life to come.

So not only did Satan lie to mankind when he stated, "Ye shall not surely die," mankind still believes the lie and has a word defining that part of man which lives forever!

In the Old Testament, the scriptures inspired by God used the Hebrew word "nephesh" when referring to both man and other animals.

Translators decided to translate this one word into multiple words, thus distinguishing between man and animals by assigning immortality to man as an immortal soul or spirit.

They knew or sensed that man is born as an immortal spirit living within a physical body. Satan sanctioned their false belief through his lie that, "Ye shall not surely die."

This is the mechanism by which Satan sealed the scriptures from man's understanding.

That is, If man has an immortal soul, then death does not apply to man.

Thus death must be interpreted to be something other than death! This contradicts the Bible, which states that the unsaved die, perish, and are lost and gone for eternity. That is the end, or death, of them.

If we all live forever, we must live somewhere. So believers go to heaven eternally while nonbelievers are tormented eternally in the lake of fire.

Thus Christianity is destroyed until shortly before the Second Coming, when the scriptures will be unsealed and mankind will learn the truth:

And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. (John 8:32)

===============================================

To be "born again"into eternity, we must first be "begotten again" while still living this mortal life in this mortal body.

No human will ever be "born again" if they have not first been "begotten again", just as no human will ever be born into this mortal life without first having been begotten.

begotten: brought into existence

born: existing as a result of birth.

Jesus said we must be born of water (flesh) and the Spirit.

You're saying we must be:

1. begotten of flesh
2. born of flesh
3. begotten of the Spirit
4. and born again of the Spirit

So Jesus left out some steps?

[myth-one.com]

* born again of the Holy Spirit, because of His quickening (making alive) of our spirit (again, Ezekiel gives us a great picture of this in chapter 36 of his prophecy ["I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances" vv.26-27])

This is good and true. Especially the last sentence.

Nowhere in Ezekiel is anyone said to be born again of the Spirit.

Does God's spirit not count? Chapters 36-37 talk of nothing but God putting His spirit in us.

Count towards what?

It doesn't count as our being born again of the Spirit.

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 84 by myth-one.com]

Checkpoint wrote:

To be "born again"into eternity, we must first be "begotten again" while still living this mortal life in this mortal body.

No human will ever be "born again" if they have not first been "begotten again", just as no human will ever be born into this mortal life without first having been begotten.

begotten: brought into existence

born: existing as a result of birth.

Jesus said we must be born of water (flesh) and the Spirit.

You're saying we must be:
begotten of flesh
born of flesh
begotten of the Spirit
and born again of the Spirit

So Jesus left out some steps?

Unknown, but unlikely.

You did, until now.

You put them in this time, as I pointed them out in my post.

Do you now accept those steps as being an integral part of a process that will ultimately result in being born of the Spirit, fully fitted to live forever with the Lord?

[myth-one.com]

[Replying to post 84 by myth-one.com]

Checkpoint wrote:

To be "born again"into eternity, we must first be "begotten again" while still living this mortal life in this mortal body.

No human will ever be "born again" if they have not first been "begotten again", just as no human will ever be born into this mortal life without first having been begotten.

begotten: brought into existence

born: existing as a result of birth.

Jesus said we must be born of water (flesh) and the Spirit.

You're saying we must be:

1. begotten of flesh
2. born of flesh
3. begotten of the Spirit
4. and born again of the Spirit

So Jesus left out some steps?

Unknown, but unlikely.

You did, until now.

You put them in this time, as I pointed them out in my post.

Do you now accept those steps as being an integral part of a process that will ultimately result in being born of the Spirit, fully fitted to live forever with the Lord?

Of course not! I never did accept those four steps.

That is what I understood as your claims.

One would have to scratch two of those events out to equal what Jesus said was necessary to enter the Kingdom of God.

To enter the Kingdom of God, Jesus said we must be:

1. [strike]begotten of flesh[/strike]
2. born of flesh
3. [strike]begotten of the Spirit[/strike]
4. and born again of the Spirit

[Checkpoint]

[Replying to post 84 by myth-one.com]

Checkpoint wrote:

To be "born again"into eternity, we must first be "begotten again" while still living this mortal life in this mortal body.

No human will ever be "born again" if they have not first been "begotten again", just as no human will ever be born into this mortal life without first having been begotten.

begotten: brought into existence

born: existing as a result of birth.

Jesus said we must be born of water (flesh) and the Spirit.

You're saying we must be:

1. begotten of flesh
2. born of flesh
3. begotten of the Spirit
4. and born again of the Spirit

So Jesus left out some steps?

Unknown, but unlikely.

You did, until now.

You put them in this time, as I pointed them out in my post.

Do you now accept those steps as being an integral part of a process that will ultimately result in being born of the Spirit, fully fitted to live forever with the Lord?

Of course not! I never did accept those four steps.

That is what I understood as your claims.

One would have to scratch two of those events out to equal what Jesus said was necessary to enter the Kingdom of God.

To enter the Kingdom of God, Jesus said we must be:

1. [strike]begotten of flesh[/strike]
2. born of flesh
3. [strike]begotten of the Spirit[/strike]
4. and born again of the Spirit

What happens to anyone who is not born of the Spirit? They perish.

Is John 3 the only time Jesus talked about what was essential to avoid that and thus become able to enter the kingdom with eternal life?