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"No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.

1 John 3-24 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.

More on Love and Hatred
11 For this is the message you heard from the beginning: We should love one another. 12 Do not be like Cain, who belonged to the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. 13 Do not be surprised, my brothers and sisters,[b] if the world hates you. 14 We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. 15 Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him.

16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

19 This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: 20 If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. 21 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22 and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him. 23 And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. 24 The one who keeps God’s commands lives in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.
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Thinkerbell · 41-45, F
@SW-User

Yes, and the fact is that David and Paul [i]did[/i] sin, so I don't understand how in 1 John, John can say, "Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child...". Did David and Paul stop being God's children while they were engaging in a particular sin, but were re-instated after they stopped that sin?
Carazaa · F
@Thinkerbell They were Gods children because they stopped sinning ! A christian wants to be pleasing to God. Our life is a test and we grow and mature if we have the Holy Spirit, not if we don't have the Holy Spirit in our hearts.
Thinkerbell · 41-45, F
@Carazaa

But Paul was converted on the road to Damascus in approximately 36 AD, and he wrote to the Romans in approximately 57 AD that he was still sinning about 21 years later.

So was he still not a child of God at that point?
My feeling is that he was a child of God for the whole 21 years, just as my children don't stop being my children when they misbehave.
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Thinkerbell · 41-45, F
@SW-User

[quote]"Well if your children don't stop being your children, why would God's children stop being His because they misbehave?"[/quote]

Exactly.
So why does John say in 1 John, "Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child..." ?
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Thinkerbell · 41-45, F
@SW-User

Well, then I think John should have made that clear.

And btw, didn't the father of the prodigal son go running out to meet his son when the the father saw the son yet at a great distance? He had no way of knowing at that point that the son was truly repentant, or just back to hit the old man up for some more money.
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