Quote:
Originally Posted by A little brother
That was probably insufficient (otherwise, Jesus would have already came back long ago). We all know what problems happened to the early church. Many the epistles from Paul, John and others in the NT were to address the problems they saw.
This is a suitable time to go back to your original post:
If I understand it correctly, your view is that faith (and examining true faith) is insufficient and we should put emphasis on gaining Christ. Are faith and gaining Christ different things? Or just that the "recovery" defines them differently so as to elevate its own position against "poor poor Christianity"? Based on what facts can you say the LC saints are gaining Christ while believers in general Christianity are not?
I am not rejecting the idea of gaining Christ, but I am afraid you have missed the point by separating it from faith. I think the answer can be as simple as examining what faith (emunah) means in original Hebrew thinking.
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The topic Christ or faith the Savior does not mean "Christ versus faith", rather - are we merely stopping at our faith saving our spirit eternally or are going onward to gaining Christ for full salvation?
My post #19 answers most of your questions I think. Gaining Christ is more or less synonymous with denial of the self, and similar concepts may be known in Christianity as "process of sanctification". However I think this process is not usually associated with gaining Christ but of becoming a better person.
Phil 3:9 says:
and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith.
The righteousness Paul is speaking about here is not the righteousness of justification, but the righteousness of sanctification. This should be obvious, because why would Paul write about his present or future righteousness if he was writing about justification by faith which occurred in the past? The meaning of righteousness here must not mean justified from sin, but having the right standing before God in our conduct and living.
To be clear, Lee called this kind of righteousness "subjective righteousness" and I think of it as sanctification as it relates to our condition. "objective righteousness" would be justification by faith which is irrespective of our condition.