I've not heard from the slip disc friend. Our timezones tak ngam. He lives in Australia and don't always come online.

But now another prayer request urgently needed.

My friend is working with a good Christian boss. But they've not been doing well. They do systems security.

Despite his best efforts it's like everything is against him. Either this is a bad way, or Satan is blocking him.

If can give a moment of prayer, will help a lot. Their deadline is the end of December. Otherwise got to jual everything.

... sweep the dust off our feet ...

Good morning! Hope you've been having a great morning.
welf
Anyway, a note about the "greek" for Salvation: Yes according to a  concordance (I used this one http://www.biblestudytools.com/lexicons/gr...as/soteria.html ), salvation *could* mean welfare or prosperity, but it's an error in hermeunetics to say that just because the greek word can mean a range of definitions, therefore the verse is talking about all those things.

Now, according to my textbook on hermeneutics:

"Both the original language word (Hebrew or Greek) and the English word used to translate it will have a semantic range. There will be some overlap, between the semantic ranges of the two words: That's what makes translation possible. But the ranges will not be identical. We must remember that they are different words and will almost always have different (but overlapping) ranges of meaning"

-Duvall and Daniel Hays, Grasping God's word p 140
The example given was this: in Matt 25:14 Jesus in his parable says "Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them" (NIV)

"Entrusted" here is translated from the Greek word paradidomi and the greek word has a broad range of meaning:
(a)to hand over something to someone
(b)To betray
©to commend or commit)
(d)to pass on traditional instruction
(e)to grant someone the opportunity to do something;to allow or permit.

Now here's the tricky part; Just because the greek word "paradidomi" is used, can we then interpret the parable to say that to "entrust" in the NIV also means to "betray"? No we can't. So how then should we conclude what the real meaning of the word "paradidomi" means in this context? Well, context! In this case, the context of the passage doesn't allow "to betray" as a definition of the greek word.

Hope that helped.
Let me then talk about your theology of healing: you say that disease and sickness are not a part of God's will, but will you agree that God has control over it so it's more appropriate to say that God "allowed" someone to be have cancer?

Then let's bring it to the practical aspect of things: So you believe that every Christian has the holy spirit, so what if a Christian has cancer (any many Christians do die of cancer)? If you say that Jesus died so that they may be healed from their cancer, why do so many Christians die of cancer?

...
So what about Christians who died from cancer? My Answer is this. God has ordain that it is that's person time to go. All the days of our live is written in God's Book. (Psalm 139:16 )
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... He just want to uphold the Truth in our Christian faith. ..

No Bro, I believe many Christians missed it here.

Faith is not something to be "produced" by will power of our mind. It should come naturally.

How does it come? Answer: When we hear God's word.

What is the message of that word?

It will come naturally when we know that our Abba in Heaven loves us. Demonstrated by all he did.

This is not a simple meaning. God loves us. Different people have different ideas about it.

I'll tell you why many Christians lack faith.

It's because They don't really believe God loves them.
There still this fear, that God has not forgiven them completely.

When that binds them in fear, Faith cannot operate.

...
To be honest, what you wrote in this post is just laughable. Really.
...

The other way round.

I believe Peter trusted Jesus because He knew somehow Jesus love him, that made him dare to come on the water.

Not about you loving God.

But about you knowing God loves you.

Like knowing how far & how much your Wife or your Dad loves you, to that extend is your trust and faith in that person.

You know that the person who loves you will not harm you but will do things for the best interest of your life.
For example, every dad will try his best to give the best education money can buy for his son/daughter. He will try to send him to the best school possible, why?
Because the father loves his son and want the best for him.

Same thing with God, he will give you the best.

But Like I said, not every Christian can believe this. They don't think God is that good.
That is why Faith cannot operate when you doubt God's love. Faith is not suppose to be conjured like trying to "produce"
It should come naturally. And it will come naturally when you really know God loves you.

That kind of "natural" Faith will cause God to move mountains for you.

...
Also, note the problem in saying that "God blessed Abraham, therefore God can bless me equally too", you can't do that without examining the context of those blessings. Abraham was God's chosen patriach to carry out his great plan of salvation, God promised Abraham countless offsprings, are you going to say that God promises that ALL of us will have countless children as well? God gave Moses the power to perform wonders like splitting the red sea, does it mean that we as Christians can part oceans as well?
..

Not about you loving God.

But about you knowing God loves you.

Like knowing how far & how much your Wife or your Dad loves you, to that extend is your trust and faith in that person.

You know that the person who loves you will not harm you but will do things for the best interest of your life.
For example, every dad will try his best to give the best education money can buy for his son/daughter. He will try to send him to the best school possible, why?
Because the father loves his son and want the best for him.

Same thing with God, he will give you the best.

But Like I said, not every Christian can believe this. They don't think God is that good.
That is why Faith cannot operate when you doubt God's love. Faith is not suppose to be conjured like trying to "produce"
It should come naturally. And it will come naturally when you really know God loves you.

That kind of "natural" Faith will cause God to move mountains for you.
Can I share my testimony with you dee? I have experience this so many times.
If there are problems so big, I just come to God in my quiet time and get absorb in his love.
Every morning, when I wake up, I just thank him for loving me. And I sense his love.
And when I'm outside I practice God's presence, knowing He watch over my life with love.

All those fear, day by day slowly fade away. Every fear and nervousness, gone.

Somehow everything in my life works together. Whatever problem, God provided for me and answers me.

You should try it. Practice God's love for you. Don't worry about your love for God. It will come naturally too when you focus on God's love for you first.

Don't know why someone in my company always 'attack' me and seem like wanted me to leave the company or my position so badly.

...
Nick Vujicic and etc.

No, UW ):, I don't think I'm misunderstanding you here. Yes you claimed that we live in a fallen world, and I wholeheartedly agree. But the claim that you're making is that Jesus died not just for our sins, but so that we can be healed. Here's a breakdown of it

(1)Jesus died so that we may be physically healed and have protection in life <<< Your belief that I disagree with
(2)Jesus died for Nick Vujicic <<< we both accept this premise
(3)Nick Vujicic did not grow his limb back.
(4)Therefore, either (1) or (2) is false.

The logic here is pretty simple: Either (1) Jesus died so that we may be physically healed is false or (2) Jesus died for Nick Vujicic is false. You have to choose.

The reason why I'm re-emphasizing Christ's atoning work on the cross here is because you need to see the difference between what I believe the gospel to be and what you believe the gospel to be:

My belief: (a)Jesus Christ came to die on the cross for the sins of sinful men
Your belief: (b)Jesus Christ came to die on the cross for the sins of sinful men AND that they will be physically healed in this life.

Note how there is nothing about (i)Whether Christians can be blessed or healed by God if God desires them to be healed.
Man I'm starving. Time for din dins
...

All this guilt ridden and shameful emotion overcame me when I went to church last weekend.

All these years when I thought that God didn't love me, but in fact, he actually love all of us. He paid for all of our sins, even though we are not worthy. But the pastor said that not all will repent and go to heaven. We must earn it.

He was there to cheer me up when I was sad.

He raised my hope when I lost hope.

He showed me the path when I was lost.

He opened my eyes when I was blinded by sins.

Now I hope that He will use me for a greater purpose.

Now I want to set a different priority in my life to a more God centric and maybe one day do God's work.

I hope I can serve God by using my talents.

...
I had roast pork.
...

Uh, I, er had bad experience with churches like this too. No offense.

All this guilt ridden and shameful emotion overcame me when I went to church last weekend.

All these years when I thought that God didn't love me, but in fact, he actually love all of us. He paid for all of our sins, even though we are not worthy. But the pastor said that not all will repent and go to heaven. We must earn it.

He was there to cheer me up when I was sad.

He raised my hope when I lost hope.

He showed me the path when I was lost.

He opened my eyes when I was blinded by sins.

Now I hope that He will use me for a greater purpose.

Now I want to set a different priority in my life to a more God centric and maybe one day do God's work.

I hope I can serve God by using my talents.

I need the Lord help to help me get a job. Had send out resume but no reply, I don't know what to do or where to search. now I'm at my wits ends 

Short answer: It's a sin just like any other sin.

Long answer: As a uni student, I must admit that this is one sin that turns off uni students the most. People my age would reason that God is unfair for not letting us express our love to someone we love or that "marriage is just a paper" or that christianity sexually oppresses people.

I can confess that the church has far too long been trying to avoid the topic by making sex a taboo topic; but in reality, the bible talks about sex as if it's a gift from God, and it is! Except like all the gifts of God, the abuse of it (i.e. orgies, pornography etc.) is what the sin is. So the issue isn't sex being evil, but pre-marital sex being wrong.

But then you have the other problem of us living in a sexualized culture: the pressure from the media + our hormones makes remaining pure in thought extremely hard. I used to think that women didn't struggle with sexual temptation but only men; I was wrong.

But if anyone tries to imply that you're a bigger sinner than them for being involved in such things before (just speaking hypothetically here), I bet you that if you had a tape recording of their thoughts in the past few weeks, you'll see that they're not that big of a difference than you are. There are those who have fought temptation and conquered it, but these are the people who can empathize with you best and would care for you the most because they know just how hard it is to fight sin. Only someone who has fought temptation and overcome it would admit to it being hard to overcome. Hence, the best place to go to seek the most loving advice is to another person in the church of the same gender that is older and wiser than you are: 1 to 1 sessions will help.

Of course, that's where finding a good church is important: many of the churches I've been to tend to sweep issues like these under the carpet: because to us asians it seems like a terrible topic to talk about. But this is dangerous because the power of sin is in it's secrecy. A church who thinks that sexual temptation is not an issue, who gossips about people who DO fall into such sin without loving them by trying to help is a unhealthy church.