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dohzman
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Joined: 2004/10/13
Posts: 2132


 Re:

I don't take lightly Nee's writting though, because where there's great suffering, there's also deep insight. I guess I approach alot of these great saints works like Mary the mother of Jesus who stored all these things in her heart and pondered them. :-)


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D.Miller

 2005/10/11 19:52Profile
coops
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Joined: 2004/6/28
Posts: 141


 Re: Nee vs Tozer

Quote:
by man based, more of a almost assuming the recieving of



Nee says that we have already recieved the Holy Spirit. We just have to realise it to be filled. I can see the Chineese influence (in regard to their religion) in his peaceful way of putting it. Tozer charges on asking for it and gets it - but that contradicts Nee's interpretation. Then again, Jesus is supposed to be the Prince of Peace, so travailing in prayer over recieveing the Spirit... is that right?!

I know at some stage one of you is going to ask "what is your interpretation?" and this is what I'm trying to figure out, because I want to be able to answer this question. :-(

The hint I'm getting from the past few posts is this: Someone is probably wrong and its probably Nee.

It baffles me how two 'men of God' who were both 'mighty in prayer' and had really gotten a hold of 'dying to self' can hear two contradicting things from God?

P.S to the most recent post: yeah Nee has had some real eye openers for me (I hope he was right in those) and is great, I would definately not discount him, but test everyones words :-)


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Coops

 2005/10/11 20:01Profile
dohzman
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Joined: 2004/10/13
Posts: 2132


 Re:

I think it's approach, Tozer believed in taking hold of the horns of the altar and taking by force , as it were , the things of heaven. I really believe it's a matter of ones faith, or inward conviction.
Reguardless one thing is certain, If one seeks God with all thier heart THEY WILL FIND HIM ! In that the Lord has always been consistant. So I don't know if the approach is as important as the intent of the heart in its bent to love, glorify, and embrace Jesus Christ.


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D.Miller

 2005/10/11 20:08Profile
letsgetbusy
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Joined: 2004/9/28
Posts: 957
Cleveland, Georgia

 Re: Nee vs. Tozer

Interesting subject. This is my two cents.

I don't know if their theology contradicted concerning being filled with the Holy Ghost, but it seems from these excerpts that they are both in agreement that being filled with the Spirit is not guaranteed after a particular program (be it 10 steps or through a meeting). Just like salvation is not guaranteed to one who goes through a certain motion (whether it be going to an altar or reading off the sinner's prayer).

Dying to self is something that I believe is a daily walk. It is a new subject to me, but I think that while someone cannot lose a genuine salvation, they can get to a point after being filled where God is no longer working through them in a mighty way. For example: they fall into drunkeness, etc (many Old Testament verses speak of the Spirit moving upon men and then leaving them). However I think one can be filled again, just as Duncan Campbell testified (keep your lamps trimmed, etc).

It would seem to me at salvation, the old man in us is given a death sentence. However, the world has not been crucified to us at this point. I think those who remain at this point are thorny ground hearers. No showing fruit, but rather being choked out by the cares of this world. I believe we should seek to be crucified with Christ at this point, but in truth we are crucifying our worldly ways. Much like we should still seek Christ even though we have met Him. So we should also seek to be filled even though we already are.

So once the world is crucified to us, those rooms that are vacated by the old man are then filled with the Spirit. We speak of receiving fire from heaven, or having the Spirit poured on us, and while this is true, we must already have the Spirit in us to receieve the outpouring.

So I would not want to say that Nee is wrong, since I don't know that context he was writing in, but all Christians are not Spirit-filled, but must have a death sentence put on the old man of the flesh (fruits of repentance) to truly be converted. I would have to agree that all true Christians have crucified the flesh (Rom 6:6, Gal 5:24), and have met with Spirit of Christ, but should still seek their flesh to be crucified, and to meet with Christ again, though he lives inside the converted person.

I like the way Corrie Ten Boom put it, that though Jesus is the way to salvation, He is also the way to the fulness. Just as repentance is a necessity to salvation and the fulness. Just as dying to self is the way to salvation and the fulness. It does seem that each step with the Lord is just a more intimate committal to the same doctrines we first learned to be converted, namely, turn from your ways, and look to Christ.


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Hal Bachman

 2005/10/11 20:54Profile
philologos
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Joined: 2003/7/18
Posts: 6566
Reading, UK

 Re:

Quote:
In the late 1950s, A. W. Tozer wrote about what he called "the error of textualism," which has its counter-part in today's "wordism." This is what he said: "The error of textualism is not doctrinal. It is far more subtle than that and much more difficult to discover, but its effects are just as deadly. Not its theological beliefs are at fault, but its assumptions.

"It assumes, for instance, that if we have the word for a thing we have the thing itself. If it is in the Bible, it is in us. If we have the doctrine, we have the experience. If something was true of Paul it is of necessity true of us because we accept Paul's epistles as divinely inspired.

"The Bible tells us how to be saved, but textualism goes on to make it tell us that we are saved, something which in the very nature of things it cannot do. Assurance of individual salvation is thus no more than a logical conclusion drawn from doctrinal premises, and the resultant experience wholly mental." (Man: The Dwelling Place of God, A. W. Tozer, page 18, copyright 1966 Christian Publications, Inc., Harrisburg, PA.)The emphasis of Watchman Nee in 'The Normal Christian Life' is that of Brethren writers generally; it distinguishes between standing and state. Our official 'standing' is where we are technically, in Christ. But our experience or 'state' needs to catch up with our 'standing'. Our 'reckoning' is a reckoning based upon our 'standing'. His famous trio walking along the wall illustrates this. As I remember it the three wall-walkers were Fact, Faith and Feeling. They were walking along the top of the wall but everytime that Faith looked backwards to 'Feeling' the whole trio fell off the wall. However, when Faith looked forward to Fact, then Feeling came along quite safely. The key difference here, as I see it, would be as to what 'Fact' Faith actually has its eyes upon. For Watchman Nee the 'Fact' would be the Biblical truth as recorded in the scripture. But this becomes very close to what Tozer would call 'textualism' where because we have the 'word' we think we have the 'thing'.

The Watchman Nee position seems to say that what is needed for the vast majority is the 'realisation' that these things are already true and this realisation is achieved by 'reckoning' it to be true. In some ways Tozer's position is much more pragmatic. He is asking the question 'is it true for you'? ie in Watchman Nee's Brethren terminology, Tozer is saying your 'state' is the reality rather than a 'logical conclusion drawn from doctrinal premises'.


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Ron Bailey

 2005/10/12 6:12Profile
dohzman
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Joined: 2004/10/13
Posts: 2132


 Re:

Looking at the early church----Jewish believers in Christ verses Gentile believers in Christ---- Would it be right to say that the Jewish believers approach to messiah and the covenant promises was almost like an assuming the ..... what ever? as compared to the gentile believers who really needed taught inorder to take hold of ...whatever?

I agree with your statement above and have always sided with Tozer, but I'm going to play devils advocate here for a minute...Is there a place in christianity where certain truths or provisions should be assumed as true in reguards to the normal christian life?


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D.Miller

 2005/10/12 10:48Profile
rookie
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Joined: 2003/6/3
Posts: 4821
Savannah TN

 Re:

Brother dohzman wrote:

Quote:
.Faith can be closely associated with conscience but isn't nessarily dependent upon the condition of the conscience as much as the response .



Does this mean that faith is of man according to your comments here?

Also, what does "agency of faith" mean?

In Galatians 3:5 Paul points to the source of where faith begins and then grows. There is nothing in carnal man that can know God. Paul writes that "by the hearing of faith?" this becomes the substance of what is hoped for. God speaks thoughout the Holy Scriptures. This is the means by which man is known by God. There is no other way.

In Christ
Jeff


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Jeff Marshalek

 2005/10/12 11:03Profile
rookie
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Joined: 2003/6/3
Posts: 4821
Savannah TN

 Re:

Brother Coops quoted Nee

Quote:
Nee calls it "reckoning" (looking back at the FACTS)



This is where Nee talks with stammering lips. His understanding relies on facts. The facts truly come from the Holy Scripture but to realize how the facts become true to oneself one must be led forward by the Holy Spirit. Paul wrote,

Phil. 3:12 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. 13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, 14 I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

A walk with Christ is always forward, one who understands this precept never has to rely on the reckoning the past.

In Christ
Jeff


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Jeff Marshalek

 2005/10/12 11:11Profile
coops
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Joined: 2004/6/28
Posts: 141


 Re: Nee vs Tozer - Reckoning vs Pragmatism

Thankyou all for your discussion so far, this is great. There is an overwhealming support for Tozer's viewpoints here, but may I also play the devil's advocate?

[b]philologos....[/b]

Quote:
The Watchman Nee position seems to say that what is needed for the vast majority is the 'realisation' that these things are already true and this realisation is achieved by 'reckoning' it to be true. In some ways Tozer's position is much more pragmatic. He is asking the question 'is it true for you'? ie in Watchman Nee's Brethren terminology, Tozer is saying your 'state' is the reality rather than a 'logical conclusion drawn from doctrinal premises'.

Would it be fair to say that Nee is still correct in this: that we HAVE died in Christ when He died, and the seed of Adam (the sinful flesh) was buried then and there, and that we, as Christians, have our part in Jesus' blood, so that we are now born by the spirit children of God and pardoned by that blood for our sinful nature, our new live to be lived out in the spirit? I guess that is the foundation of knowing who you are in Christ, that you are forgiven, and the manner in which to live.

Its interesting, Riedhead preached against pragmatism (10 Shekels), and said in essence the same as Nee: when Christ died, we died with Him, and now we must live not according to the old dead nature, but according to the Spirirt.

Is it ok to say that Tozer questions "Is it true for you?" whereas the real question is "Do you know it is true?" Because when you know it is true you will live it.

[b]rookie[/b]
Quote:
A walk with Christ is always forward, one who understands this precept never has to rely on the reckoning the past.

How then do you interpret this: “Even so reckon ye also yourselves to be dead unto sin” (Romans 6:11)
I though that we would look (with faith) back at the facts as a foundation for our future? I thought even Tozer would agree with this one?


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Coops

 2005/10/12 18:13Profile
philologos
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Joined: 2003/7/18
Posts: 6566
Reading, UK

 Re:

Quote:
Would it be fair to say that Nee is still correct in this: that we HAVE died in Christ when He died, and the seed of Adam (the sinful flesh) was buried then and there, and that we, as Christians, have our part in Jesus' blood, so that we are now born by the spirit children of God and pardoned by that blood for our sinful nature, our new live to be lived out in the spirit? I guess that is the foundation of knowing who you are in Christ, that you are forgiven, and the manner in which to live.

Rom. 6:6 (KJVS) Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. Paul is writing to people who 'know' something, This word for 'know' means perceiving; they have 'seen' it in their understanding. They do not need to be persuaded; they know. To such, Paul can say 'reckon yourselves...:

We may know the doctrine of justification by faith without being justified by faith ourselves, and we can 'reckon' ourselves to be dead...' but unless we are dead, it is a mental exercise only.

Quote:
Its interesting, Riedhead preached against pragmatism (10 Shekels), and said in essence the same as Nee: when Christ died, we died with Him, and now we must live not according to the old dead nature, but according to the Spirirt.

Reidhead is talking about a different kind of pragmatism which is designed to make life easier.


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Ron Bailey

 2005/10/12 18:36Profile





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