Sunday, August 30, 2009

Can you be declared righteous by God without actually being righteous? Why or why not?
Posted by at

2 comments:

  1. Pat ManleySeptember 3, 2009 at 7:42 AM

    The question was raised, "If God declares that someone is righteous, and so they are, what motivates them to avoid sin?" I said that it is the pain one feels upon sinning.

    It was contended that the motivation is to do what is right for the community, and that God's commandments are for the community's good.

    It seems to me that the Holy Spirit within me causes me to feel some kind of pain (or sadness, unrest, something of the sort) whenever I sin. I do not always (or even most of the time) stop at the edge of temptation and consider the cost to the Christian community of my sin. I agree that the commandments are for the good of the community, but I also believe that they are for the good of the individual Christian first, since our Father knows how selfish we are.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousSeptember 6, 2009 at 8:20 AM

    Pat, one of the constant attacks on the Doctrine of Justification by imputed righteousness is it would create a license to sin. The motivation not to sin is a fruit of believing the truth of the Gospel. There is not one more thing needed as motivation that pure gratitude on what God does in His children. The problem we have is when people think we must approach the Law of God by ourselves. The commandments can never motivate a person without approaching them through Christ. The purpose of Law/Commandments was never to motivate us, but to reveal how sinful we are and point us to Christ. Grace is what motivates a person.


    Joe Kinney

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)