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John Gavazzoni's Response to The Video Below
Sent by His Friend and Brother
Russell Haynes
First the comments from my friend and brother Russell Haynes:
Now, my response:
He has addressed a key issue: today, if we ask someone how he/she knows they are saved, in all probability they would answer, "because I......etc., etc." ("I received Christ into my heart/I prayed the sinner's prayer/I made my decision for Christ). He's headed in the right direction, and if he goes all the way into all the implications of what he has addressed, he'll face head-on the resistance of the system.
For, "the man in the middle cross," was on that cross not only for the repentant thief, but for the unrepentant one, and for every human being, and that, effectively so, not merely potentially so....."potential" in the sense that the cross and resurrection depend upon our response, rather than our response depending upon the cross and resurrection.
One thing he didn't touch on, and that was that the hope (with certainty) of resurrection had made its way into his heart, in his expectation of joining Jesus after dying with Him. Notice: He believed that Jesus would rise from the dead, and he called Him Lord. The saving word of God had entered his heart that, "if thou shalt confess with thy mouth, 'Jesus is Lord,' and believe in thy heart that God has raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved (made whole.")
That wasn't from Paul a formula for "getting saved," it was an explanation of the effect of the saving word of God, for that statement is preceded by, "the word is nigh thee, even in the mouth, and in thine heart, that if......" The word in our heart and in our mouth is the source of the right confession, that is, the confession expresses the saving operation of the saving Word. The confession doesn't save us, the saving dynamic is in the Word, so that, "out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks." From James: "Begat He us by the Word of Truth." "He sent His Word and healed them."
Jesus hadn't spoken anything to the man that was salvifically instructive. His very presence spoke to the man's heart ("in this day, God has spoken unto us in a Son." The man saw something, heard something, in his heart drew him to look to Christ in all his abject need. In the end, regeneration occurs "when the heart turns to the Lord....." The brazen serpent on a pole...just look, and be healed. "Look unto me and be saved, all ye ends of the earth...." John on the Isle of Patmos: "I heard a voice behind me, and turning I was One like unto the Son of Man......" "....seeing the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."
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