Wootah wrote:
Being washed in the blood means accepting Jesus's sacrifice for your sins. Jesus died for all sins.
That's what I thought it meant.
Believing, accepting that Jesus died for one's sins.
Wootah wrote:
If you do not forgive others then God will not forgive you does not mean that if you forgive others then God will forgive you.
On the contary,
Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.
Wootah wrote:
Essentially a Christian believes that deep down no mattter what we profess, no one forgives. We both know that forgiveness has levels. I have forgiven people and years later realised there is more to forgive.
So even if i granted the simplistic understanding of if you forgive you are forgiven i doubt anyone has done it.
Actually i don't think one can forgive until one realises that they are guilty as well. How can i forgive another person for lying unless i know how easily i can lie? At the very least it makes it easier. Once i know how tempting and susceptible i am to sin it makes it a lot easier to understand those that sin against me. And of course i realise how guilty i am.
Yes, no one forgives perfectly. Yet Jesus says we
must in order to recieve forgiveness from the Father. Hopefully, implicit in Jesus command, is that it is sufficient that we be
willling to forgive, as God gives us the grace to do so. We all need God's help for this.
But my main point, is that Jesus does not seem (in the LORD's prayer anyway) to be making an exception for the "bloodwashed" those who believe the "right things" about Jesus impending crucifixion and resurrection. They too, must be willing to forgive others in order to recieve God's forgiveness.
Jesus did not teach complex, Pauline substitutionary blood-atonement
theology in the Sermon on the Mount, just simple repentance and the necessity of forgiving others. Why do you think that is?