This is a huge debate in the modern church is what is meant by James. Christianity is truly a heart mindset. God is after people's hearts. He wants the motives to be right. He isn't seeking perfection, but genuine hearts searching for Him.

My interpretation of James: A true believer will produce fruit. That is biblical with the comparison of good fig tree and bad fig tree. If you are not producing good fruit, then you should be evaluating your heart and asking God to examine your heart. The other side of that coin then is to completely give up searching for God and essentially faking holiness by only doing works. This is also wrong because that would just be going back to trying to be saved by the Law. Therefore we should fix our eyes on Jesus and if we are truly seeking after him then our works will match our hearts and we will growth in faith and earthly holiness.

I think I mis spoak when I said if you are trusting in God that you desire not to sin. There is a conflict against sin. Your spiritual side desires not to sin, but your physical desires to lust an get angry is still there. Sin is relevant. It is empty, unfulfilling, and only leads us away from a closer relationship with the God of the universe. Look through the New Testament and you will see the Disciples, Paul and the people who he teaches all have to be told over and over again to not sin. So no convincing people not to sin is not the same as convincing people to breathe. People know sin is wrong, but we earnestly desire it for different reasons. Telling people not to sin is like letting a dead man to get up by himself. We are dead to our sins and earnestly desire them...the only way we can turn from our sins is if God raises us from the dead(spiritually and in this analogy).
I hope I did not mislead you to think Christians don't desire to sin; We just have a large conviction when we do. The conviction grows as our relationship with God grows and it wains as we ignore it and choose the sin.

...that particular Scripture is talking about Abraham's justification .

Unforgivable Sin

Since ya'll have debated this a little since I have posted I want to speak on it. People tend to read that verse without looking at why Jesus is telling it in the first place.

Mat12:
22 Then they brought him a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute, and Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk and see. 23 All the people were astonished and said, “Could this be the Son of David?”

24 But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, “It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons.”

25 Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand. 26 If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then can his kingdom stand? 27 And if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your people drive them out? So then, they will be your judges. 28 But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.

29 “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can plunder his house.

30 “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. 31 And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.

So here Jesus is using the power of the Holy Spirit inside of him to cast out a demon. The Pharisees see this and yell " You are casting out demons by the power of Satan." They just called the Holy Spirit Satan. Jesus turns to them and begins to scold them that he can't cast them out by Satan because if so Satan's kingdom wouldn't stand. He then warns the Pharisees " every sin can be forgiven, but to blaspheme the Holy Spirit won't be forgiven." By equating the Holy Spirit to Satan, they essentially called God the devil and rejected God. There can be atleast 2 beliefs that can come from this: 1) That he is saying that if you reject the Holy Spirit, then you can't be saved (basically the gospel message), 2) If you blaspheme God or Jesus, then you are fine, but if you blaspheme the Holy Spirit then you can never be saved. I lean to the side of #1.

I want to point out that it is written hear that even slander can be forgiven. You can insult God, you can hate God, you can want to punch him in the face. Honestly, most people have felt like this from time to time. God wants you to be honest with him...there is no reason not to since he knows your thoughts. So a prayer life that involves pointing up at the sky with every insult in the world...it can be forgiven. Only blaspheming the Holy Spirit can be unforgivable.

Yes it does show that the people of the Old Testament were saved by Faith producing works.

Keep the questions coming!!! I am trying my best to answer them all. If you feel like I missed your or my explanation doesn't really make sense then pm me or post here and I will try to clarify. =)

...which has no application for those of us saved by grace other than for general knowledge ( as Paul tells is ) . When you grasp this you might want to reconsider your previous opinion on the " unforgivable " sin of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit .

I disagree that this has no application to us and that it should be dismissed as general knowledge. I also don't feel like I need to reconsider the unforgivable sin part. I don't think the 1st dismisses the second. If you would care to explain why you think I should, then I am all ears. Btw...I won't be home for 2 days so responses probably will not happen. I will bump it up when I get back.

...I will explain by way of question for you to consider though what I am getting at may not come to you for years or perhaps never .

Are you a part of God's plan and promises to Israel known as the Kingdom or are you a part of the Body of Christ that Paul details in Romans through Philemon ?



...this is meant as food for thought , don't feel obligated to answer .

This post was edited by WidowMaKer_MK on Jun 27 2014 07:00am

Both. We are part of God's original plan of a people group that reflects his glory as well as the Body of Christ. Can we take God's promises to Israel as our own? I believe in some ways yes...Both the israels of old and the Church of now are God's chosen people.