Ishee...
Matthew 16
27 For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and then he shall reward every man according to his works.
Luke 13
23 Then said one unto him, Lord, are there few that be saved? And he said unto them,
24 Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.
25 When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:
26 Then shall ye begin to say, We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and thou hast taught in our streets.
27 But he shall say, I tell you, I know you not whence ye are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity.
28 There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets, in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves thrust out.
29 And they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God.
30 And, behold, there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last.
So, at Luke 13:24 it does say strive, and I think this reasoning could grow into a debate of semantics as far as what does it mean to strive to be perfect vs. just being perfect. I never looked at the word strive and thought there weren't two roads before I. There surely is a high and a low. As even Iyasus was tempted He showed I and I that there is a Right path to take in such instance, but He did have to first overcome temptation.
For One to have faith that they will be perfect is a righteous thing, but it simply is not as easy as said and done. I do have to say that for my own part, I am not a puppet on a string with faith that the master will guide. I feel sure in the fact that the Master Builder has passed His tools on to I and showed I how to use them, yet He is not going to use them for I, see it? It is up to I and I to use the tools given to us; and in order to do that there must be serious effort put in (and by effort I mean that Ones have to strive). In life Ones come through many trials and there is no One here who has passed through yet.
I fully agree with what Ark I said in regards to "grace" meaning "divine inspiration". And perhaps this is my own twist on it but I see I Self as having been "divinely inspired" by His and Her "grace" or "girmawi" to save I Self in the presence of His example, that Qedemawi and Qedemawit should see I walking with them.
I see so many faithful but they still stumble in lack of effort, but I don't see that as their lack of faith.
Give Thanks...
Selam
|
|