Pastor Joel Osteen speaks out on Mormonism
Pastor Joel Osteen responded (Here) to questions about Mormonism and if it should be called a "Christian" religion.It's a shame. How can a pastor of a church that hosts approximately 47,000 people each week use the excuse that he doesn't "know enough about the religion's beliefs to comment?"
Statements like these promote Universalism, and they defiantly are not in line with scripture.
Read John 14:6 and then take a minute to think about what Joel-O said…You have to understand that if person doesn’t have a correct view of Jesus, then they don’t have His promises either! Jesus is NOT a “spiritual” brother of the devil, Jesus was not “created” by God, and God the Father was NOT created either.
Read John 14:6 and then take a minute to think about what Joel-O said…You have to understand that if person doesn’t have a correct view of Jesus, then they don’t have His promises either! Jesus is NOT a “spiritual” brother of the devil, Jesus was not “created” by God, and God the Father was NOT created either.
Why are we losing sight of what is important. The Bible says that it is appointed for a man to die, once, and then judgement. The TRUTH is that we will not be judged according to our works, but according the Law of God (aka the 10 Commandments).
If “Christians” don’t have the salvation of the Jesus Christ of the Bible, then they will not be saved from the Lake of Fire! You can call a Mormon whatever you’d like…Call them a Catholic, call them a Protestant, call them a Baptist, but the bottom line is that unless they truly accept who Jesus is according to the inspired word of God, then they are not Born Again!
What a shame, loving these people to hell. Whose conscience will that be on?
What a shame, loving these people to hell. Whose conscience will that be on?
What are your thoughts?
Jason
posted by Jason W. Allen @ 5:23 PM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
According to the Bible, what is required for a person to be saved?
Wow, what an outstanding question. One that is very hard to sum up in a few sentences but I will do my best. I encourage you to read the Gospel of John when you get a chance as well.
Jesus tells us in scripture (John 3:3-8) that unless we are "born again" we will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. So the question obviously is what does it mean to be born again?
Before we can fully understand Jesus, we must first understand God. The Bible tells us that God has revealed his standard for mankind through the 10 commandments. After looking at the 10 commandments it is easy for anyone to see that they are not capable of living up to those standards. So, God being just, has an obligation to punish us for our "sins" so that justice can be served. The wages of our sin is death (hell) but the Bible also revealed that God loved us, and he wants to give us a chance to be “saved”. So he gave us the opportunity to be set free from our punishment. Our fine has been paid through Jesus Christ, his life on earth, death on the cross, and resurrection from the dead. We have been “graciously” given another chance to making things "right".
God sent his only Son (Jesus) to earth to pay the price for our sins. God’s perfection demands justice for wrongs (sins) that are committed against him. Jesus lived a life of perfection on earth and then died on the cross to set the world free from sin (see John 3:16).
What we must do is repent, or turn away from our sins, and have faith in the fact that Jesus Christ is who he claimed to be in the scriptures (the way the truth and the life – John 14:6). And we must also understand that no one comes to the father (God) except through him (Jesus). We are saved by the grace of God, through our faith (Eph. 2:8-10).
The important thing to keep in mind in all of this is that if we do not have a correct understanding of who the Bible says Jesus is, then we cannot have "faith" in Jesus either. Read the scriptures; get to know who God is, who Jesus is, and why we are all in such desperate need of a "Savior".
Please feel free to email us at any time with more questions. We have a lot of great resources that we can point you to, that will help you develop a firm understanding of what it means to be "saved".
Thank you for your response, and may God open your eyes to the truth.
Jason
Also: Join us on our show every Tuesday night at 6:00 (CST) we'd love to answer questions that you may have on the Internet Radio show as well.
So for a person to be saved they would have to:
1. Fully understand God
2. Fully understand Jesus
3. Repent
4. Be born again
Am I missing anything?
How long should it take before I fully understand God and Jesus?
What does it mean to repent?
How can I know if I've repented?
What does it mean to be born again?
I thank you again for your questions. I feel like I’m on the hot-seat here, because I want to make sure that my words are and not misunderstood, but I will try to use as much scripture as I can so you will know these are not my thoughts on the subject, but instead scripture based which is always a good place to start.
I encourage you to listen to our show tomorrow night at 6:00PM (CST) if you get a chance. Your questions have prompted us to dedicate the entire second half of our show to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we’d love to take your call or questions on the air if you are up for it.
With that said, please see my response to your questions below. We will pray that God continues to open your eyes to his truth.
So for a person to be saved they would have to:
1. Fully understand God
2. Fully understand Jesus
• As humans, I don’t believe it is possible to “fully” know who God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are. We should strive for this, but it is by no means a precursor for our salvation.
• What I was attempting to explain in my response was our need to have a Biblical understanding of who God is. Many people today are creating their own versions of God to fit the desires of their hearts. But the Bible tells us that our hearts are wicked and deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9). Why would we want to trust our hearts to tell us who God is? We need to see what God has revealed about himself, which is why we need a Biblical understanding of God.
3. What does it mean to repent?
• True repentance comes from an understanding of our “sin” nature and its effect on our relationship with God. With repentance comes a new hatred for the things that God hates (sin) and a new love for the things that God loves. It is a turning away from one sinful lifestyle and a sorrow for the disrespect we have shown to God (our creator) by our selfish-sinful actions.
• Please also see John MacArthur’s explanation.
4. What does it mean to be born again?
I can’t say it better than John Piper did in his recent sermon series on the subject, so I won’t even try. Here is a very good series to wrestle with on the idea of being “born again”
Am I missing anything?
• Salvation is not a 7-step program. In fact, the Bible is very clear on the fact that salvation is a work of the Holy Spirit not of our own doing. We are saved by grace through faith. We are all born blind to our sin nature, and it takes the work of the Holy Spirit (the 3rd part of the trinity) to understand who we are and why we are in need of salvation.
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