Unless they are talking about two different things. Jesus tells us to pray “Your kingdom come, your will be done. On earth as it is in heaven.” So there are two places being talked about. There is the kingdom of God in heaven and the kingdom of God on earth. The earth is for giving us birth. But the earth is a place of considerable limitations, where things are perishable. Heaven is for the imperishable. But the earth is not as it should be – not as God meant it to be. So Jesus told us to pray that the will of God would not only done in heaven but also on the earth. And you can also say that even heaven is not as it should be, because there are so many spiritually dead. So Revelation speaks of a new heaven and a new earth, because much will be changed when many of the spiritually dead are brought back to life.
I don’t see how what you linked has anything to do with an alternative to cessationism. The alternative to cessationism is that nothing has changed. It means the miracles of the Bible are no different than the miracles we see today, because miracle are not and never were some kind of magical violation of the laws of nature.
As we should be, to the extent of being wary, but we have to be sure that it isn’t just our cave-brains unconsciously recognizing a face in the wall or something like that. If someone thinks they are oppressed or being haunted, why not teach them to go through a list of possible causes?
Have you considered getting them to talk with an actual exorcist? I know a couple of people that have dealt with the demonic, and they’re quite methodical about their approach to it. They dispelled the Hollywood notions in my mind and reminded me that God is still ultimately in control.
This is definitely where we need to step back and say, “Wait a second.” Last time I checked, watching Billy and Mandy didn’t make me a vessel for Satan, even though the show quoted Aleister Crowley and has a character named after a Mesopotamian god.
I’m willing to suggest that it could potentially happen, but it might depend on the person subjected to the material, and to what extent the material is actually demonic.
You seem to be doing good so far. The evil one only has as much power as we give him.
Your right, I didn’t understand. I see the connection now.
Klax
(The only thing that matters is faith expressed in love.)
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I’d actually welcome a no-holds barred malign supernatural manifestation witnessed by billions, tested exhaustively by science, as that would be indirect evidence for the benign. But not necessarily…
If you are going to believe in a force for good it makes sense to believe in an (equal?) opposite force for evil. The world demonstrates the ying/yang principle extensively. But, just as God tends to leave you alone if you ignore Him, likewise Evil (demons) tend to do the same. Evil only becomes dangerous when you mess with it.
There is much in this world that we do not fully understand or even perceive. True, the bible tends to over emphasise the power and influence of demons, attributing them to things we now understand differently, but.
If you are not a cessationist, like me, and believe in the power of the Holy Spirit, it would be foolish to dismiss the opposition power as fallacy. However, confronting it would qualify as “messing with it” so unless you are certain, perhaps the best advice is the one from War Games “don’t play”.
You are rather limiting it though. And I am guessing that if you do not believe that the Holy Spirit works through people any more then you would not expect demons to either. IMHO that is an error.
Besides I can vouch for the Holy Spirit still being manifest in humans. I have witnessed it in both the 1st and 2nd hand, as I have also put elsewhere. IOW I think you are being naive at best and foolish at worse to believe as you do.
Well create a separate thread to my cessationism thread and counter my arguments and we can go from there. Just make sure you read through it all because I’m not big on repeating stuff already answered and I’m even less keen on wasting my time to correct someone who seems to not even know what I believe. If you scroll up a bit you’ll find the now closed thread on why I’m a cessationist. If you want to, read it and make your own thread separate from this one and if it’s actually countering my positions I’ll worry about doing the same.
To be honest I walked away from that thread even more confident in my stances. So far in my life after every discussion I’ve ever had for a decade on this subject at the end I have been left even more certain cessationism is the best interpretation of those issues. So much so I don’t even pretend in my mind that there is a possibility of it being wrong.
Is there a conflict? It depends on your interpretation.
I believe that Jesus is returning and he will establish a kingdom on Earth. What Isaiah wrote may be symbolic language but it may also be a description of life in that kingdom. Or both.
What about the adversary (Satan)? He is still alive and acting. Yet, those who are children of God do not need to fear him because Satan cannot rob them from God. When God puts limits to what the evil is allowed to do, Satan cannot cross the line. If Satan scares someone, the answer is to look at Jesus and listen how he says ‘do not fear’.
The scary movies are just scary movies. Imaginary stories. If they make someone feel afraid, why should that person watch those movies?
I guess for me I fall in a weird middle ground where I think demonic possession did exist but ended in the first century and everything since then is jut either mental illness, hyperbolic campfire tales or out right lies or maybe someone being deceived by the “victim”.
I just knew from various conversations in here that some believed in it and some believed it’s a mental disorder as your mentioned. So was curious how did everyone respond in general to those kinds of questions. I’ve never read Heissler or whatever his name is but I know someone by a name similar to that has some kind of book out on this subject that comes highly recommended and I’ve heard it on The Bible Project a few times. I’m also not 100% certain on my stance of Satan being a cosmic being vs a metaphor for what we call sin. Until recently I never considered Satan as a literary device and so I’ve never studied any work on it from that angle.
