Like self-love is sin? Well, look at Christ's self-denial, self-renouncing love....That's the fulfillment of the law.



This has been proven utterly false. The man of Romans 7 is converted. His problem is that he's failing to keep the spirit of the law (you shall love your neighbor as you love yourself).

For one he is trying, in his own effort, to use his will power to defeat the flesh. To grow he needs to learn to allow the Spirit to take control of his nature. Then growth into the spiritual realm of the law can advance....

I'm not interested in "I think" - I'm interested in the facts. If you have any questions to what Matt 22:39 means then look at the life of Christ. Show me where He was selfish. Show me self-love...I can show you the opposite (not self-hate), but rather self-renouncing love - that love which is not self-seeking.

It's true there will be no stopping point where we can say we have arrived. That is true. But let's read on.

Since you quote Ellen White here as an authority, you will want to read other statements related to the topic:


In all His Godlike deeds, the world's Redeemer declares, "I can of mine own self do nothing." "This commandment have I received of my Father." John 5:30; 10:18. All I do is in fulfillment of the counsel and will of My heavenly Father. The history of the daily earthly life of Jesus is the exact record of the fulfillment of the purposes of God toward man. His life and character were the unfolding or representation of the perfection of the character that man may attain by becoming a partaker of the divine nature, and overcoming the world through daily conflicts.The Faith I Live By (1958), page 114, paragraph 3

All who have truly repented of sin, and by faith claimed the blood of Christ as their atoning sacrifice, have had pardon entered against their names in the books of heaven; as they have become partakers of the righteousness of Christ, and their characters are found to be in harmony with the law of God, their sins will be blotted out, and they themselves will be accounted worthy of eternal life. The Lord declares, by the prophet Isaiah: "I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for Mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins." Isaiah 43:25. Said Jesus: "He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot out his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before My Father, and before His angels." "Whosoever therefore shall confess Me before men, him will I confess also before My Father which is in heaven. But whosoever shall deny Me before men, him will I also deny before My Father which is in heaven." Revelation 3:5; Matthew 10:32, 33. GC 483

This isn't complicated at all....Jesus is God. His nature is agape...after all the Bible says, "God is agape". Agape is not just simply an attribute, agape is who God is....

So Christ's nature is Holy...it is selfless...it is self-renouncing. He lives not for Himself...He lives to serve....He lives for you....That's the deity of Christ....

At the incarnation, Jesus as God, assumed the fallen human race that needed redeeming. God did this by uniting the sinless deity of Christ with our fallen, self-loving, humanity that needed redeeming.

You see having a sinful human nature makes you a sinner in and of itself. IF you say Christ HAD a sinful nature, you make Him a sinner.

Note how EGW ties our fallen nature with sin:

We cannot say, "I am sinless," till this vile body is changed and fashioned like unto His glorious body. But if we constantly seek to follow Jesus, the blessed hope is ours of standing before the throne of God without spot or wrinkle, or any such thing; complete [where? in our performance? No,] in Christ, robed in His righteousness and perfection.-- Signs of the Times,March 23, 1888.

"The character is revealed, not by occasional good deeds and occasional misdeeds, but by the tendency of the habitual words and acts." [EGW]

I see "character" as a mindset, not necessarily performance. Paul brings this out in Romans 6:6

For we know that our old self [our old life from Adam] was crucified with him [Christ] so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.


Now the above is talking about our position "in Christ". Literally "in Christ" our humanity was freed from the power sin because it died. A dead person can't sin....

Now Paul takes this truth and applies to the Christian's mindset:

10 The death he [Christ] died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.

11 In the same way, count [consider] yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

That's mindset....Not performance. Yes, your mindset...your character will lead to performance, but not perfection....

Why?

“But ‘might be fulfilled’ is not to be taken to imply that the faithful fulfil the law’s requirement perfectly. Chapter 7 must not be forgotten. They fulfil it in the sense that they do have a real faith in God (which is the law’s basic demand), in the sense that their lives are definitely turned in the direction of obedience, that they do sincerely desire to obey and are earnestly striving to advance ever nearer to perfection. But, so long as they remain in this present life, their faith is always in some measure mixed with unbelief, their obedience is always imperfect and incomplete. And this means of course that there can never be any question of their being able to make their new obedience a claim of God.” [Quote unavailable for now]

But if we go by Romans 8: 1-17, as well as 1 John 3:9, it becomes obvious that the man of Romans 7 does not have the Holy Spirit in his life. Compare what those verses say as to what happens in a person's life when they have the Holy Spirit. None of those things are in the life of the man of Romans 7. 1 John 3: 9 says plainly that if we are born of God and have His seed in us, we will not continue to practice sin.

The man of Romans 7 cannot stop committing sin. He is practicing evil and cannot stop it. This is not the mark of a man born of the Spirit.

Romans 8: 1-17 makes the same point. The man of Romans 7 is in the flesh, not in the Spirit. He is living according to the flesh.

See especially Romans 8: 4-9 and compare and contrast the two descriptions: first the man of the Spirit of Romans 8, and second, the description of the carnal man in Romans 7: 14-24.

I believe the evidence is that the man of Romans 7 is one whom the Holy Spirit has convicted. He appears to have first accepted Christ in the last verse of Romans 7. He is hungering for salvation, but he does not accept salvation through Christ until Romans 7: 25. It is then that he is justified and receives the Holy Spirit, at which point he begins the life in the Spirit which is described in the remaining verses of Romans 8.

Since you are quoting Ellen White here, what does Ellen White say the robe of Christ's righteousness is? Is it legal justification? Do all have on the robe of Christ's righteousness who have ever claimed to have accepted Christ?

What does it mean to have the robe on?

She says in COL that it is imparted righteousness; changed characters due to the Holy Spirit in our lives. It is not something God puts over sins that people continue to practice. It is not hiding our sins that we love and keep committing.

The New Theology makes the mistake of saying the robe of Christ's righteousness is simply forensic justification and is completely unrelated to a change of character that results from a personal, daily, faith-based relationship with Jesus Christ.

We're pretty much in agreement here on the things you've said, Jack-- oh, I mean Rob.

By the way, do you have Jack S.'s, Christ Speaks To Laodicea? I just found it in my library where I had forgotten I put it a few years ago.

That is true about no one being able to say, "I am sinless," until Christ changes us at the Second Coming.

But let's talk about the robe of Christ's righteousness. New Theology sees it a lot differently than did Ellen White.

Compare the quote above with other, related statements by the same author concerning the robe of Christ's righteousness:

By the king's examination of the guests at the feast is represented a work of judgment. The guests at the gospel feast are those who profess to serve God, those whose names are written in the book of life. But not all who profess to be Christians are true disciples. Before the final reward is given, it must be decided who are fitted to share the inheritance of the righteous. This decision must be made prior to the second coming of Christ in the clouds of heaven; for when He comes, His reward is with Him, "to give every man according as his work shall be." Rev. 22:12. Before His coming, then, the character of every man's work will have been determined, and to every one of Christ's followers the reward will have been apportioned according to his deeds.

It is while men are still dwelling upon the earth that the work of investigative judgment takes place in the courts of heaven. The lives of all His professed followers pass in review before God. All are examined according to the record of the books of heaven, and according to his deeds the destiny of each is forever fixed.

By the wedding garment in the parable is represented the pure, spotless character which Christ's true followers will possess. To the church it is given "that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white," "not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing." Eph. 5:27. The fine linen, says the Scripture, "is the righteousness of saints." Rev. 19:8. It is the righteousness of Christ, His own unblemished character, that through faith is imparted to all who receive Him as their personal Saviour. COL 310


Christ in His humanity wrought out a perfect character, and this character He offers to impart to us. "All our righteousness are as filthy rags." Isa. 64:6. Everything that we of ourselves can do is defiled by sin. But the Son of God "was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin." Sin is defined to be "the transgression of the law." 1 John 3:5, 4. But
Christ was obedient to every requirement of the law. He said of Himself, "I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart." Ps. 40:8. When on earth, He said to His disciples, "I have kept My Father's commandments." John 15:10. By His perfect obedience He has made it possible for every human being to obey God's commandments. When we submit ourselves to Christ, the heart is united with His heart, the will is merged in His will, the mind becomes one with His mind, the thoughts are brought into captivity to Him; we live His life. This is what it means to be clothed with the garment of His righteousness. Then as the Lord looks upon us He sees, not the fig-leaf garment, not the nakedness and deformity of sin, but His own robe of righteousness, which is perfect obedience to the law of Jehovah.

The guests at the marriage feast were inspected by the king. Only those were accepted who had obeyed his requirements and put on the wedding garment. So it is with the guests at the gospel feast. All must pass the scrutiny of the great King, and only those are received who have put on the robe of Christ's righteousness.

Righteousness is right doing, and it is by their deeds that all will be judged. Our characters are revealed by what we do. The works show whether the faith is genuine. COL 311, 312

I have no problem with this statement in that it is understood it is those righteous deeds accomplished in us by Jesus in which we are we are judged. The unrighteous deeds that were part of our experience receieved judgement in punishment in the Person of Christ on the cross, sins continuously cleansed by the blood of Jesus to all who receive Him as their present Savior, and in which He still suffers at present failures requiring moral cleansing.

"For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,
And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come,
If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame." Hebrews 6:4-6 KJV

And I would like to suggest, the underlined above is not talking about the person who finds himself failing his Father miserably, but is rather referring to one who chooses to join the enemy of God's children in opposition to His wishes to save whosoever will come to Him in repentance.

"The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance." 2 Peter 3:9 NKJV
Regards!