| Spiritual Non-Fiction posted February 22, 2017 |
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Is salvation a gift or a reward?
Don't Trust Fairy Tales
by Deniz22
For you, what is the most memorable thing from Walt Disney's story of Pinocchio?
Most people will mention the little wooden puppet's nose growing out of normal proportion whenever he lied.
Ever since the movie was released in 1940, the growth of Pinocchio's proboscis, fueled by personal prevarications, has been routinely employed in political satire cartoons from all segments of the political spectrum.
Small wonder we almost immediately and universally remember it first when we think of Pinocchio!
However, I would suggest the greatest wonder of the story of Pinocchio, is not his nose as integrity indicator, but that he became a real, live boy!
This was his goal and it was dependent on him becoming a good, moral person...um...puppet.
He achieved this and was then rewarded with a transformation from wood to flesh. This wonder is usually forgotten, obscured by the sensation of his telescoping nose.
Many seem to believe Christianity teaches a kind of Pinocchio theology. It's generally believed people are motivated by promises of immortality to be good.
Truth be told, most think they have a head start on being good, only needing a little sprucing up here and there.
So the reward of Heaven is anticipated, which is only fair in their mind, since they feel they have met the required obligation of being a good person.
Christianity is far away and beautifully different than such a concept however.
God gives life, not to wooden people, but to dead people with hearts of stone.
This spiritual state of deadness is alienation from the life of God.
The symptom of this condition is sin, as in going against the revealed will of God.
This sickness is terminal and all such afflicted are hopeless, except Christ saves them.
The good news for sinners is Christ died to pay the penalty for all sin!
Now He can give this eternal, spiritual life, not at the END of earthly life, but at some point, DURING the life experience...if in fact, it is received at all.
When life is received, real spiritual life wherein all can increasingly know God, it is by simply believing His promise, and not by keeping a promise we made to God.
What Pinocchio had to strive for was the REWARD of physical life.
What God has provided...life, true life, is a GIFT, ours by simply believing the living Word of God.
What seems so right to men, as in the Pinocchio story, about EARNING life, is seen in the scriptures as the GIFT of God, to the glory of God.
Believe today and receive eternal life immediately!
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. (John 3:16 NKJV)
For you, what is the most memorable thing from Walt Disney's story of Pinocchio?
Most people will mention the little wooden puppet's nose growing out of normal proportion whenever he lied.
Ever since the movie was released in 1940, the growth of Pinocchio's proboscis, fueled by personal prevarications, has been routinely employed in political satire cartoons from all segments of the political spectrum.
Small wonder we almost immediately and universally remember it first when we think of Pinocchio!
However, I would suggest the greatest wonder of the story of Pinocchio, is not his nose as integrity indicator, but that he became a real, live boy!
This was his goal and it was dependent on him becoming a good, moral person...um...puppet.
He achieved this and was then rewarded with a transformation from wood to flesh. This wonder is usually forgotten, obscured by the sensation of his telescoping nose.
Many seem to believe Christianity teaches a kind of Pinocchio theology. It's generally believed people are motivated by promises of immortality to be good.
Truth be told, most think they have a head start on being good, only needing a little sprucing up here and there.
So the reward of Heaven is anticipated, which is only fair in their mind, since they feel they have met the required obligation of being a good person.
Christianity is far away and beautifully different than such a concept however.
God gives life, not to wooden people, but to dead people with hearts of stone.
This spiritual state of deadness is alienation from the life of God.
The symptom of this condition is sin, as in going against the revealed will of God.
This sickness is terminal and all such afflicted are hopeless, except Christ saves them.
The good news for sinners is Christ died to pay the penalty for all sin!
Now He can give this eternal, spiritual life, not at the END of earthly life, but at some point, DURING the life experience...if in fact, it is received at all.
When life is received, real spiritual life wherein all can increasingly know God, it is by simply believing His promise, and not by keeping a promise we made to God.
What Pinocchio had to strive for was the REWARD of physical life.
What God has provided...life, true life, is a GIFT, ours by simply believing the living Word of God.
What seems so right to men, as in the Pinocchio story, about EARNING life, is seen in the scriptures as the GIFT of God, to the glory of God.
Believe today and receive eternal life immediately!
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. (John 3:16 NKJV)
Most people will mention the little wooden puppet's nose growing out of normal proportion whenever he lied.
Ever since the movie was released in 1940, the growth of Pinocchio's proboscis, fueled by personal prevarications, has been routinely employed in political satire cartoons from all segments of the political spectrum.
Small wonder we almost immediately and universally remember it first when we think of Pinocchio!
However, I would suggest the greatest wonder of the story of Pinocchio, is not his nose as integrity indicator, but that he became a real, live boy!
This was his goal and it was dependent on him becoming a good, moral person...um...puppet.
He achieved this and was then rewarded with a transformation from wood to flesh. This wonder is usually forgotten, obscured by the sensation of his telescoping nose.
Many seem to believe Christianity teaches a kind of Pinocchio theology. It's generally believed people are motivated by promises of immortality to be good.
Truth be told, most think they have a head start on being good, only needing a little sprucing up here and there.
So the reward of Heaven is anticipated, which is only fair in their mind, since they feel they have met the required obligation of being a good person.
Christianity is far away and beautifully different than such a concept however.
God gives life, not to wooden people, but to dead people with hearts of stone.
This spiritual state of deadness is alienation from the life of God.
The symptom of this condition is sin, as in going against the revealed will of God.
This sickness is terminal and all such afflicted are hopeless, except Christ saves them.
The good news for sinners is Christ died to pay the penalty for all sin!
Now He can give this eternal, spiritual life, not at the END of earthly life, but at some point, DURING the life experience...if in fact, it is received at all.
When life is received, real spiritual life wherein all can increasingly know God, it is by simply believing His promise, and not by keeping a promise we made to God.
What Pinocchio had to strive for was the REWARD of physical life.
What God has provided...life, true life, is a GIFT, ours by simply believing the living Word of God.
What seems so right to men, as in the Pinocchio story, about EARNING life, is seen in the scriptures as the GIFT of God, to the glory of God.
Believe today and receive eternal life immediately!
16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. (John 3:16 NKJV)
 Recognized |
18 He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.
21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God. John 3:16-21
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and 2 member cents. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed.
21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God. John 3:16-21
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