It's definitely possible, Paul was worried about that himself. There will be many in the last days who will think they're going to make it, but who haven't experienced the change God wants to see in their hearts. It's a sad state of affairs, because you're right, those people fall thru the cracks because they're "in church". They never grow, they never become purified, and not many people think to help or encourage them.
I understand what you mean as well, it does seem a bit unfair, but if the older son(who represents God's people, more specifically the Israelites) was really obedient to the father(God), the older brother would also have been celebrating that the younger son was returned from the clutches of death. In this parable, the older son did not understand the father's will, doubted the younger sons motives, and did not exhibit a loving attitude toward either the father or the younger brother. He went so far as to resent the father's joy at seeing his younger son alive.
The younger son did have a realization that showed his motives for returning, and an attitude of humble repentance. He realized that the father whom he had rebelled against was really a fair and loving man who took care of every one in his home, and when the son came back, he was humble and requested to be taken back as a servant, not the position he had once held as heir.
That is the same state we are in when we return to God, having a realization that God is not an oppressive tyrant, but a loving Father, and that we have done Him wrong, misrepresented His character, disobeyed His safeguards, squandered His talents, and not only that, but by doing so, we hurt His other children. We no longer deserve to be called His sons or daughters.
Christ displayed the attitudes that the older son should have displayed, going so far as to die for his earthly siblings, giving us shares in His inheritance, a promise to live forever together with Him.
"Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God"
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends."
Just to clarify a couple things, the mark of the beast is only indirectly related to the Sabbath. Anyone who takes any of God's commandments and willingly supplants them with traditions of men will be "marked". Basically, if you willingly supplant any part of God's government, you cannot be trusted to live in that government. If someone makes the commandment about adultery of no effect by man-made legal processes, they would receive the mark of the beast, especially if they should have known better. The mark of the beast is submission to any way of "life"(probably should be called a way of death) apart from God's way. So that goes for every commandment. The 4th commandment is the glaringly obvious one which would be violated in the last days if the Catholic system is the anti-christ, because they do claim that they changed the holiness of the day from Saturday to Sunday as a sign of the power of their church, which is blasphemous.
Stephen Keenan, A Doctrinal Catechism 3rd ed., p. 174.
"Question: Have you any other way of proving that the Church has power to institute festivals of precept?
"Answer: Had she not such power, she could not have done that in which all modern religionists agree with her-she could not have substituted the observance of Sunday, the first day of the week, for the observance of Saturday, the seventh day, a change for which there is no Scriptural authority."
Concerning the historical Kingdom of Tyre, it's not altogether unreasonable to believe that Tyre was directly ruled or influenced by Satan at some point. God was the direct ruler of Israel, perhaps Satan decided to impersonate that model. It's really the only logical explanation. The verses in Ezekiel condemn both the "king" of Tyre, who is given properties that humans do not possess(perfection, immortality, used to be in heaven), and also a "prince" of Tyre, who is directly referred to as a man. It sounds very much like the government which Satan will set up in the last days, with a "man" giving power to the "beast", etc. A "prince" giving power to the "king".
Well, Richard, on the contrary, it seems like all Trent is doing is responding to the scriptures you're providing, and also submitting many of his own. I've seen every single thing you've posted on this thread multiple times in other threads, most of which I have responded to already, but you continue you post the same misinformation over and over. I think that sheds some light on the way you conduct yourself. You might try engaging Trent on the issue instead of trying to discredit him with canned responses. We could all learn from some friendly discussion, but it's hard to discuss anything with pasted articles.
You can read my response to your last post that you already submitted word for word on another thread:
* The combination of love (that is often expressed as something nice) and longsuffering? (Why would something nice be associated with pain?)
There is pain in the world as a side effect of love. Being free to really love someone enables the opposite effect of being really free to hate something. God tried to give us an environment of love, trust, and freedom. We messed it up. Because God loves us, He's trying to get our trust back instead of simply erasing us. That includes letting us live and see the results of our choices. But make no mistake, God loves us and is actively pursuing us. He subjected Himself to human suffering, even unto death on the cross. He has not remained distant, He personally knows your pain, and justice will be done.
* How does one obtain a transformed/renewed mind or what is a renewed mind at all?
I believe a renewed mind is one that is "Self-aware". You hear about the quest for computers to become self-aware, it might surprise you that most humans are slaves to their bodies like a computer is a slave to it's circuitry. In order to be "born again" and have a renewed mind, we must crucify the flesh and it's lusts. We do that by seeing what Christ has done for us. If we look at Christ, understand who He was, and understand what a glorious sacrifice our Creator made for us in giving His Son and taking our punishment on Himself...it can only make us reflect on just how terrible we really are. We can't even love the ones we love, we continually hurt them, how can we love everyone like God does? If we can see that we are terrible people, and that God is offering us a return to a better way, it usually inspires us to be freed from sin and stop causing pain to everyone. We see the fruit of sin for what it is, it might be a temporary pride or pleasure at the expense of others, but the end of sin is always fear, vanity, and death. We see the fruit of what God wants for us, life, love, joy, peace, filled to overflowing. If we choose to deny the flesh and choose life from God, then we have started on the path of self-awareness, we've been born again, we have a new heart, we've been renewed, we've been saved from the clutches of sin by the sacrifice of Christ.
Trent, Richard doesn't like to play fair, you'll notice he uses quite a few logical fallacies to discredit you first, without really addressing the evidence you bring forward, and that's not counting his "copy and paste" tactics. It's better to just treat him like a computer throwing up random challenges for you to meet with biblical evidence for other people to read. You probably shouldn't even try to report him if he gets unreasonable, the best method is to just answer his attempts to discredit you and watch him become more desperate and unreasonable. Show your fruits, and let him show his. Don't waste your life on him though, you'll probably never get the last word. Most people here already know to just pass over the huge articles he repeatedly posts EVERYWHERE, and if they don't, they'll learn quickly.
"One last thing that I would like to share: If some of you should think that I am attacking fellow Christians by identifying the little horn power, please keep in mind that the prophecy is aimed at a system and not individuals! There are sincere, devout Christians in ALL churches, including the Catholic faith. Daniel 7 is simply a message of judgment and correction upon a large religious institution which compromised with paganism, like so many other churches that arose after her.
Other prophecies point out the faults of Protestant and Jewish faiths. God has true people in all religions. His true people, no matter their faith, will always humbly accept the correction of the Lord and will not shut their ears and hearts against Him by self defensiveness. We should be very thankful that God's Word speaks with impartial honesty on every subject."
Thanks for writing this disclaimer, many forget to have one!
I don't think guys and girls are too far off when it comes to this, just try to be yourself and show that you're interested in getting to know someone. Ask questions, try to be unique, etc. I know when I was looking for someone, it was exhausting to always be the one sending the first message and coming up with new ways to try to get someone's attention. If you send the first message, you already have bonus points!
No one is trying to take your pearls, it'd just be nice if you weren't so disparaging about someone's new pearls. Can I ask you where you got your pearls from?
And if I haven't said it before, I understand how you feel, I have managed to hang onto my "pearls" AND find a "virtuous" woman as well, so I know just how far from normal that is these days, but, you're taking that concept and casting shame on everyone who hasn't lived up to that standard, even if those people are repentant Christians who are living virtuous lives. If you have any sin that you've repented from, you ought to be understanding and merciful. Maybe you haven't committed fornication or adultery, but your sin deserves death just like mine does, just like everybody else.
"O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God, through Jesus Christ our Lord."
And in reality, like the woman who washed Jesus' feet, whoever is forgiven much, loves much. I know a "virtuous" man who married a woman with a slightly sordid history. He accepted that she was repentant and changed into Christ's likeness, and the love and loyalty that she responds with is enviable. One might say that she is the more virtuous wife.
"I will not send my soul to Hell so that someone can "feel good about themselves"."
I'm not telling you to marry a harlot, I gave that example to contradict your statement that God would never tell someone to marry an un-virtuous person. I'm trying to show you that there are all kinds of extenuating circumstances, therefore you should not be so quick to judge. If you marry a repentant/virtuous woman who is not a virgin you are not going to hell, and it's pretty offensive to imply that. You have every right not to marry a person who is no longer a virgin, but you should not treat those people as "broken" if God has healed them. If you lied once, should I treat you as a liar after you've turned from your lying and God has forgiven you? If I did, I'm sure you would rightly throw "the Book" at me. A Christian should be known by their fruits and not by their past. The idea that someone who was not virtuous can never be virtuous again is flatly against Christianity and everything it teaches.
