from Arnold's blog...

Jesus is the Great I AM ...

Because of grace in Christ I am...


I am the salt of the earth. (Mt 5:13)
I am the light of the world. (Mt 5:14)
I am a child of God. (Jn 1:12)
I am part of the vine, a channel of Christ's life. (Jn 15:1,5)
I am Christ's friend. (Jn 15:15)
I am Chosen and Appointed by Christ to bear his fruit. (Jn 15:16)
I am a slave of righteousness. (Mt 5:13, Rom 6:18)
I am enslaved to God. (Rom 6:22)
I am a son of God; God is spiritually my Father. (Rom 8:14-15; Gal 3:26; Gal 4:6)
I am a joint heir with Christ, sharing his inheritance with him. (Rom 8:17)
I am a temple and a dwelling place of God. His spirit and his life dwells in me. (1 Cor 3:16; 6:19)
I am united to the Lord and am one spirit with him. (1 Cor 6:17)
I am a member of Christ's body. (1 Cor 12:27; Eph 5:30)
I am a new creation. (2 Cor 5:18-19)
I am reconciled to God and am a minister of reconciliation. (2 Cor 5:18-19)
I am a son of God and one in Christ. (Gal 3:26,28)
I am an heir of God since I am a son of God. (Gal 4:6-7)
I am a saint. (Eph 1:1; 1 Cor 1:2; Col 1:2)
I am God's workmanship. (Eph 2:10)
I am a fellow citizen with the rest of God's family. (Eph 2:19)
I am a prisoner of Christ. (Eph 3:1; 4:1)
I am righteous and holy. (Eph 4:24)
I am a citizen of heaven, seated in heaven right now. (Phil 3:20;Eph 2:6)
I am hidden with Christ in God. (Col 3:3)
I am the expression of the life of Christ because he is my life. (Col 3:4)
I am chosen of God, holy and dearly loved. (Col 3:12;1 Thess 1:4)
I am a son of light and not of darkness. (1 Thes 5:5)
I am a holy partaker of a heavenly calling. (Heb 3:1)
I am a partaker of Christ; I share in his life (Heb 3:14)
I am one of God's living stones, being built up in Christ as a spiritual house. (1 Pet 2:9-10)
I am a member of a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession. (1 Pet 2:9-10)
I am an alien and stranger to this world in which I temporarily live. (1 Pet 2:11)
I am an enemy of the devil. (1 Pet 5:8)
I am a child of God and I will resemble Christ when He returns. (1 Jn 3:1-2)
I am born of Christ and the evil one, the devil, cannot touch me. (1 Jn 5:18)

Me *julie* at  # 4:15 AM

Conclusions

There are some conclusions that I have been able to draw for myself that has been very good. Lately, I have been challenged in various ways in my walk and faith in God. Challenged to think past what I have been comfortable with and see ways God might want me to grow. There have been some that I have realized that I had been holding myself back and needed to grow some.

But there are other's that I have looked at and have decided that my original belief or thought process was where I want to stay and that has been good too.

The first one was in the Creation Account. To be honest, that one is really staying in the group where I put the End Times. Since I wasn't there, I am not ready to state whether He took 6 days 10,000 years ago, or 6 million years to create the world, but I can say without a doubt that I believe that God did create the world without the help of Evolution. Now I know that things evolve and adapt.. but they do not Evolve. That may seem like a small conclusion, but in the group of young adults that I have been with lately, it is a huge conclusion to stand firm in.
Plus the added sidebar of realizing those who believe that God used the same ages that scientist have found naturally, as in millions of years, are strong walking Christians that hold to the Truth in the Bible as much as those who hold to the literal interpretation of the 6 days.

Another conclusion is with the canons of the Bible. The initial draw into the study was by some that were questioning whether or not all of the books that were chosen were the correct ones for the Bible. To be honest, I still am not sure why the question really comes up. If someone wants to say that there should have been more of the ancient books put into the Bible, then there are a couple of Bibles that they can read. They can read the Catholic version that has at least 7 more books included in the Apocrypha. If they still want more, then they can pick up a Ethiopian Orthodox Bible which has all of the books that the Protestant and Catholic Bibles contain and adds several more. All of these canons are based off of the original Jewish choices for the OT and then the writings of the disciples and apostles.

I have also come to a conclusion about the closing of the canon. The reason that I found for it was that the writings of the NT that were accepted were the writings of disciples, apostles, and others who had a personal encounter with Jesus himself, which is why they accept the writings of Paul. I don't have any problem believing that God directed those who were examining the books to choose those particular books to be included and other's not. But for those who feel that there should or should not be certain books involved, may be also with the belief that the Bible is a compellation of man writing about God, rather than God directly influencing men to write His words. And if they believe that then most likely they are going to pick and choose which books in the Bible that they are going to use and live by anyway. If that is the case then they can pick and choose what ever books, other than in the Bible, that they want to read and live by. It shouldn't matter to them that the books that they like and get inspiration to live by are't in the basic Protestant or even the Catholic Bibles because they have already chosen not to accept everything written in the Bible as straight from God.

Now there might be those that say they do believe that the original Protestant Bible is the inspired Word of God, but why stop there? Why not allow other inspired works be in the canon? And my question would be Why? What added benefit would there be to say that the works of 'such and such' a man or woman are inspired from God and should be in the Canon? Would it give more validity to those writings? Would they add to the person's faith in God? If so, than what is stopping that book from affecting and changing the person's life even if it's not a canonical book? There are some books that I looked at such as Susanna. It was a nice story, but there was nothing in it that I saw added to the message of the Bible that I couldn't get from some other book. I don't need it to be in the basic canon. I can read it for whatever reason whenever I want but that doesn't mean it has to be in the canon. I just don't see the need. For those that would want others in and question the Truth in the Bible, then most likely they are going to question many things about God and it wouldn't matter if Susanna was in or out or any other book. They will question no matter what. If their questioning brings them closer to God then fine.. But if their questioning pulls them away and into more humanistic thought processes, then it won't matter what books are in or out in the end.

So, in a basic conclusion, I am perfectly content with keeping my Protestant Bible and saying that it is the inspired Word of God. If I want to read some of the other books that aren't in the Bible and want to glean from them, then I will. But I will hold them to the Truth I have already found in the Bible.

Me *julie* at  # 8:12 AM

Just to keep everyone up todate with life....



Morgan has an 18th birthday coming up in two weeks!!!




Me *julie* at  # 6:30 PM

Sometimes I think I should change my blog's name to Grace...

I had an awesome talk today with my sister. It wasn't a real long talk... just a short MSN chat online while she was at work and I was avoiding having to fold clothes. I'm the youngest of 6 and she is 7 years older than me but we tend to be the closest of all the siblings. Which has nothing to do with this post, but I thought I'd throw that in anyway. She met Morgan after work the other day and they had a good chat about all kinds of stuff. One of the subjects that came up was just on how God has been working in our family this last year in regards to values and standards and grace. She has a college age son that is starting to do activities that she has tried to steer him away from while growing up. Mostly, because she engaged in some of them and now she feels they didn't add anything positive to her walk with God. So, now back to my talk with her. She brought up this conversation and teasingly talked about the 'changed' attitude of ours and how she was having a hard time 'letting go' of her son in his activities.
As I talked to her about the situation with her son, it hit me again on some of the attitudes that have changed with me. I told her that even though my standards and morals are still at the same place they always have been, my acceptance of others who have standards different than mine has grown. By leaps and bounds in a lot of areas. I guess I am learning what Grace really is. I have learned how to look past the outward actions, either good or bad, and see the person under them. I think in a lot of ways, I have allowed God to be bigger. I have learned more on how to say to God, "Those are YOUR kids, you deal with them if you want them to change!" I have stopped taking on the role of the Holy Spirit.
A lot of times I have heard the verse, "Man looks on the outside, but God looks on the heart." but this last year I really learned more of what that means.
Me *julie* at  # 7:29 PM

I am so like all over the place!
I never looked me up before! I am rocking!
Me *julie* at  # 11:03 AM

Is Lying Ever Justified?

I started this thread on a forum and it generated a wide variety of thoughts. There were thoughts ranging from Never Lie, ever.. even to spare a loved one or self from torture or death, to it's just a use of the language and neither good or bad but it depends on how you use it. It was a great thought provoking thread.
The more I think about this the more areas I find that I would withhold information in. Maybe you would call it lying, and maybe it is..I don't know. For instance, I refuse to tell the 'honest truth' to my 6 year old when she asks where babies come from. If someone that has been cruel to me or gossips about me, comes and asks how I am or what is happening in my life lately, I am not going to 'honestly' reveal any hardships to that person.
Another thought that came to me was in business. We had a friend that was in the construction business too and he felt that it was best to be completely 'honest' in all business negotiations, meaning if he had no clue on what he was doing, he would be 'honest' and say it to them. He lost many jobs because they didn't trust that he could do the job when it wasn't his ability that was the problem, just his lack of knowledge in that certain area. This is more in line with concealing information rather than putting it in the area of 'lying'.
I think I would always stand for honesty as the best... just not sure as to what extent it all means. It's one of those issues that seems easy on the outside to make resolutions about ..but sticky when I start breaking it down into specifics.
Me *julie* at  # 5:19 PM