The Two Thieves and Two Different Crosses

[mfblume]

bump

Originally Posted by mfblume

But what is really a blessing is to see that the false cross is exposed for being a salvation that avoids the death of the cross. Like the knowledge of good and evil in the false tree, the false cross preserves SELF and exalts SELF by avoiding at all costs any such thought of a death of self. But the true message of the cross demands the death of self WITH CHRIST on the cross.

Satan told Eve that she would be as God, and implied she could save herself. But God wanted man to have God's Life within, from the fruit of Life, and that requires self life to be set aside. Salvation by works is the message of the false tree and cross. Since we need to make ourselves as good as we can by acquiring all the necessary knowledge of good and evil so as to avoid the evil and do the good, death of self is the LAST THING we need to experience.

But self must die in order for true salvation to occur, and that salvation is not of works but only through the work God did through the death of the cross, that we find a powerful revelation in Jesus' response to the penitent thief's request to be remembered in the Kingdom. Jesus must have shocked the penitent thief! The thief probably considered any association with the Kingdom to perhaps occur years or eons later at some wonderful great by and by! But this Kingdom is so much based on God's work and not our own, that Jesus let the thief know that as soon as he dies with Christ on that cross, and their souls and spirits left their bodies, that the thief would indeed be in the Kingdom Paradise (Garden) of God THAT DAY!

Without the thief able to do one impressive deed for the Lord, as though works could save, the moment he died with Christ would give him entrance into the Kingdom!

AND SO IT IS TODAY!

[Timmy]

Originally Posted by mfblume

Guys, I really want this thread back on course. Start a new thread about your concerns.

But there already are threads for that! Oh. Wait. OK, I see your point.

[Timmy]

OK, on topic:

Why do you call the tree of the knowledge of good and evil the "false tree"?

[Timmy]

(Happy now? )

[mfblume]

Originally Posted by Timmy

OK, on topic:

Why do you call the tree of the knowledge of good and evil the "false tree"?

lol

Okay.

It is the tree that was not God's will for mankind, and satan wanted man to partake of it. Satan urged the woman to consider it something that would advance her. Life versus knowledge of good and evil are basically the two contrasting elements that span the bible. Knowledge of good and evil is something people consider to acquire in order to avoid the evil and do the good in a sort of "salvation by works" mentality. But even in the GOOD of the false tree, there is death, for it is human goodness which just does not measure up to the degree of righteousness God requires. And, it was disobedience to eat of that tree, hence it would bring forth death. The soul that sinneth must die.

So the deception was that it is a matter of good and evil as depicted in the single forbidden tree, when in reality it is a matter of life and death when one contrasts the two opposing trees.

This is also the reason Jesus said He was the "true" vine. It is all connected.

[NotforSale]

Originally Posted by mfblume

Guys, I really want this thread back on course. Start a new thread about your concerns.