Do you pisteuo? …Blogged Bible Study
Not so much a verse or part of the story I want to dissect, but one particular word. This has to be the most powerful word in the bible. It means everything. By doing this we show that we know that Christ is True, because we are persuaded by the Word, give Christ the credit for our Salvation, and place full confidence in God with our daily life.
This word when used in conjunction with Jesus Christ being the receiver has the power to change your life forever. Don’t do this and your life will be in torment forever.
To see the middle part of this post, and to figure out the word. Place your cursor after the “J” below and click and drag to the “M”, like you are selecting text to copy. The Verses and word will be revealed.
Joh 3:12 “If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how shall you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
Joh 3:15 that whoever believes may in Him have eternal life.
Joh 3:16 “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.
Joh 3:18 “He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
Joh 3:36 “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”
Greek word Pisteou definition from here. (Bold wording added)
- to think to be true(Christ),, to be persuaded of(The Word), to credit(Christ for your Salvation), place confidence in (The Father God our daily provider)
- of the thing believed (Jesus Christ)
- to credit, have confidence (Christ for you Salvation)
- in a moral or religious reference
- used in the NT of the conviction and trust to which a man is impelled by a certain inner and higher prerogative and law of soul (We can not obtain with out the Prodding of the Holy Spirit)
- to trust in Jesus or God as able to aid either in obtaining or in doing something: saving faith 1bc) mere acknowledgment of some fact or event: intellectual faith (The essence of our Faith)
- of the thing believed (Jesus Christ)
- to entrust a thing to one, i.e. his fidelity (You believe, is Jesus Lord of your Life?)
- to be intrusted with a thing (Through your belief trust him with your Life.)
For those having trouble with the middle part of the post I will reveal the text later today.
To see the rest of the entries for this weeks Blogged Bible Study go here http://cpk3.wordpress.com/calendar/
To be persuaded and place confidence in…I LOVE IT!!
Often we only think of believe as an intellectual assent. I love the way the Greek opens up the understanding of placing our confidence in the object of our belief.
Thanks, Carl. Love the “hidden message.”
Michelle- That is the hardest part for an non believer. They have to place confidence in something they can not comprehend, and can not comprehend until you believe. Even then we do not completely understand, but that is where faith comes in.
Carl…
Right on…every word of scripture needs attention! I think so often we gloss over passages without considering the weight behind each word.
John had to be aware of the difficult time the world, particularly the Jesus’ fellow Jews, would have BELIEVING in Jesus–but what a simple way to salvation…just believing.
I did think 3:36 was interesting: Belief=Salvation; Disobedience=Wrath of God
John 3:18 and John 3:36 seems to be saying that the state of unbelief everyone is in prior to believing in Christ might mean that we are in a state of having ‘already been condemned’, the ‘obedience’ spoken of in v. 36 being ‘believing’ in Christ. If before we actually believe, we are in a state of ‘unbelief’, and therefore objects of God’s wrath, are we in effect ‘born on death row’? Just a question.
Wow Carl thank you for this. This word is facinating to me. My understanding of this word, if I am reading correctly is “I have faith in”, which puts Jesus as the object in which to place that trust. I am so thankful that this is the focal point…He is the focal point. Without that, we are incapable of even the trust we have in Him. All things are through and by Him…I can so rest in that.
This is pretty cool how you did the drag thing…gonna share your secrets?????
Love you brother!!!
clever!!!
for me it is the so important to believe..and actually know what that means..
Jesus is always the object..nothing is about me, and everything is about HIM..whew! I am feeling the relief from that..very freeing…to know HIM is to trust HIM, and to trust HIM is to love HIM.
Nate- I love doing word studies… Brings so much more meaning to the bible. Mainly cause we have present meaning to words on our minds when we read. Digging into the Hebrew and Greek tells us what the word meant from it’s origin.
Dan- It is hard to believe in something you know nothing about.There will come a time when every knee shall bow. So I have to think that every person will be given the chance accept Christ some how.
Deb – The background of my blog is white… I just set the color of the text to white..
Darla – Him Him Him… Is that all you think about? FYI- I think I know the answer..
So even though we are completely ‘without excuse’ (Romans 1) and ‘objects of God’s wrath” (Eph 2), we all get a chance to accept or reject, believe or not believe, before we die, no matter how we meet our fate?
Dan love your pic!
Dan–
Rev 1:7 Look, he is coming with the clouds,
and every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him;
and all the peoples of the earth will mourn because of him. So shall it be! Amen
Once a person believes they are no longer of this earth, not conformed any longer to this world. Romans 12:2 The ones that remain in unbelief are still of the earth, and will mourn at the sight of Christ, because they will understand their choice of unbelief.
Rev 21:7-8 He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur. This is the second death.”
Hard to figure me. . .unless the deer in the headlights look give me away……lol
Dan- Might I remind you of a previous conversation we had…
John6:44 “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.
Rev 1:7 – The 2nd coming of Christ as Judge of all the earth, Romans 12 – believers’ transformation, Rev 21 – the New Heaven and New Earth. they go to answering my last question how? You have me totally stumped…..
So since everyone has a chance to accept or reject before they kick the bucket (just saw that movie), it follows that everyone will be drawn to a decision making point in his/her life. That’s what I hear you say?
Yes..However God in his Foreknowledge knows each persons choice. The will of God will draw a person who hears the Gospel to believe or not.
Where I struggle is with those who do not hear the Gospel.
I lean to them being raised to live durning the 7 year tribulation, and have the chance to chose then.
Your first point is exactly what I believed once upon a time, in a land far, far away. . .:)
Assuming that definition of foreknowledge is accurate, no matter how you slice this pizza, man is sovereign – or, God in His sovereignty, gave up a tiny bit of His sovereignty in this particular matter, and by default is no longer a God who is sovereign over all of His creation, which seems to contradict what Scripture tells us about God, many times, in many places.
And to even get there, I we have to also assume that the decision one makes is not his/her own doing, because “it is not of works”.
Now granted, if I drive up to the house in a brand new Hummer and my wife asks me “What did you do?”, I would reply, so she wouldn’t think I rented the thing, “I bought a used Hummer!” and not just say I ‘decided’ to buy it. However, the decision was still ‘my work’, even though it was a mental exercise.
Thank you for telling me exactly what you meant! I have been known to jump to unwarranted conclusions.
And by the way, so we don’t assume anyuthing here, you might want to do a study of the biblical definition/use of ‘foreknowledge’.
Man does not have foreknowledge… Never said man does.
All in all I do not believe this is something that we as humans will ever completely comprehend.
I can see how God allows us to use our free will to move us towards his will. I also see that God being omniscient knows where, when and who will choose him.
To answer your ultimate question. There is nothing we as humans can do to save our selves, the choice we think we make, can not even be made without Christ. With out Christ we wouldn’t even have the choice we think we have.
I’m not sure I understand that. You seem to agree that our choice, or decision, is something we do, but we can’t nake the choice without Christ? I’m sorry, but I don’t follow. Is our choice not as much a ‘free will’ choice as we like to think?
I will answer the same way when you went down this road with me on the Identity at the Door Post…
God’s plan is for us to believe in his Son, God’ will, will persue us until the end of time and into the lowest of lows until we can do nothing but look up to Him.
That is where Rev 1:7 comes in… Every eye will see him coming from the clouds. Every eye, but at that point it will be to late, cause those who chose not to believe will mourn there life without Christ.
Some are destined to chose Christ, some are destined to go on unbelieving.
I will also ad.
Eph 1:4-6 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5 he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
God choose us but only Christ can stand the gap between us and God. Without Christ there is no way to make it to God. His out stretched arms on the cross make the bridge.
Is this the same word used by Christ when he asked the lepers (or maybe they were blind men) if they believed he could heal them?
TT,
Kind of.
Luke 17:19 And He said to him, “Stand up and go; your [pistis] has made you well.” (ESV)
Pistis is the noun of the pist root. He only said it to the one who returned, the samaritan.
Jason is correct…
pisteuo is the verb the action of believing.
http://biblestudytools.net/Lexicons/Greek/grk.cgi?number=4100&version=nas
From the Noun Pistis
http://biblestudytools.net/Lexicons/Greek/grk.cgi?number=4102&version=nas
[...] is that word again… Pisteou used with the below meaning. to trust in Jesus or God as able to aid either in obtaining or in [...]
I got nothing…which is something. « Faith the Continuation said this on August 13, 2008 at 6:15 am