Quote:
Originally Posted by Evangelical
Calling on the name of the Lord to determine whether someone is in the spirit has sound biblical basis:
1 Cor 12:3 Therefore I want you to know that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit.
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It is true that no one can say "Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit." But are you sure you know what he meant when he said "say"? Did he mean, no one can speak the words except by the Holy Spirit? Or did he mean that no one can make the honest claim that Jesus is their Lord except where there is the actual indwelling of the Holy Spirit? We are used to the idea that people say things that are not true, yet here we somehow believe that no one is capable of saying those three words unless they are telling the truth and the Hoy Spirit is in them.
I suggest that this is an error in understanding. Paul was not saying there is a sure-fire way to prove that Jesus is someone's Lord by getting them to say three words. I cannot accept such a trite understanding of the passage. By it there has been evidence of serious unrighteousness undertaken by those who stopped periodically to say three words. If you are right, then the activities that were being undertaken could never have happened because the Spirit could not have been involved. Therefore they were not, at the time, under the Lordship of Jesus. Yet they said the words.
Out of the same fountain cannot come filth and purity.
And, like ground, where it suits the MOTAs, oversimplify beyond credulity.