BB,
While I read the passages you do mostly the same, I note that one passage does not a strong proof make. Less strong-appearing actions by a self-proclaimed believer is not evidence of no real salvation.
In fact, while all encouragement to such people (most of us) to do more than rest in their grace-given salvation is typically needed, I think that spending time trying to figure out how most alleged followers are not really believers is contrary to the very mindset that we are called to have concerning others. (Something about loving God and our neighbor)
In fact, I think that the kind of instruction that is found in the older traditions of evangelicalism, and even other, older groups that is more focused on me/us and how we live
our lives is much more important than dissecting what might be wrong with the lives of others. I am not dismissing efforts in the gospel to the unsaved, but pointing to the fact that we all need the gospel everyday and we too often are concerned with how to be rid of it for ourselves by having taken the magic pill that gets us beyond sin forever.
Fact is that we will all struggle with sin until we die. The only magic pill to eliminate sin is death. Real, stop breathing and pumping blood death. And while I am not charged to just turn inward and contemplate my own condition, I must always be considering it because it is never cured.
When Paul said what he did in Galatians . . .
Quote:
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Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.
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. . . he seems to have repeated, in a sense, the past tense comment about being crucified similar to 2:20. But the thing he says to do now is to "keep in step with the Spirit." Much like he said in Romans 8 where he says to walk according to the Spirit.
Making some harsh thing out of it because of the metaphorical use of crucifixion does not appear to be called for when the current action is something very different from crucifixion. I do agree that we need to be sober and willful about our sins. Any of us who think we did OK yesterday and have no sin are simply delusional.
Since Paul is speaking to ones that he obviously thinks are having trouble, if "taking the cross" is the important thing, then Paul would not have said "I have been crucified" and "have crucified the flesh." He was not declaring the Galatians did not belong to Christ. He was giving them the underpinning for their call to action of keeping in step with the Spirit. If our crucifixion is past tense, then it must be an eternal truth. But the way that it is lived out is not given in the same terms — crucifixion — but in the terms of positive action and will to keep in step with the Spirit.
Paul did not say to crucify anything. He said it was. Why? Because the source of our strength is found in One who was crucified and overcame the resulting death. All of that is found in the Spirit that we are advised to walk according to and keep in step with.
Our Christian life (which should be our whole life) is neither a search for euphoric experiences nor an effort in crucifixion or other ascetic living. Rather, it is in a constant and diligent walk with and according to the Spirit. That is what the Bible says when you back away from dissecting the fortune cookies that were created by printers. The Bible is not a long series of fortune cookies, nor a collection of precious promises. It is a narrative that must be taken in large parts, not in microscopic snippets. The broad narrative looks more like righteous living, love for all those around us, care for the needy, and all with a view to the God that we rely on for our strength to do it. In minutia, we only find doctrines and other things to write books about, fight over, and assent to in our minds. "Yep, I believe that one that way. Put a check mark in the right column!"
Checkmarks in the right column get us nothing. Becoming the bearers of God's image in our lives gets us everything.