Pouring It Like Salt

Theological Definitions & Explanations for Us Simple Folks

• God=Author, Creator of everything, Designer, (Hebrew:) Yahwey, "Father", God of Abraham, Isaac, & Jacob; Spirit, neither male nor female, begotten not made, The Beginning & the End/(Greek): Alpha & Omega, Good, Perfect, One
• Jesus=Son of virgin Mary & her husband David, born by the Holy Spirit, "God's son", the Word, the Light, The Way, Truth, & the Life, fully-God & fully man (hyper-static-union), perfect, Teacher, Healer, bore the whole world's sin died (crucified) and came back to life on the third day (resurrected), is coming again to judge the living and the dead
• Holy Spirit=God's breath, portrayed as a fire or wind, lives inside Believer's, instructs, guides, reminds us of scripture, is our seal/guarantee of God's promise for heaven, will never leave nor forsake us
• Believer=an individual who has chosen to have faith in who Jesus as in relation to the Holy Trinity and what He did on the cross
• Holy Trinity=Father (God), Son, & Holy Spirit. Three in one. All different in the matter of functions, but same.
• Crucifixion= an ancient Roman tactic for criminals, where a person is stripped and nailed to a wooden cross in a public area left to die
• Resurrection=raising back to life after death. Jesus did this after three days just like He prophesied. This defeated the power of Satan and death. Everyone will receive a resurrection during the End Times.
• Prophesy=a promise, a fore-telling of what is to come. This has to be true 100% of the time. The coming of a Messiah for the Jewish Community was fore-told hundreds of years before Jesus came and Jesus fulfilled everyone of those "qualifications." Jews who believe this Gospel are called "Messianic Jews" because they believe the Messiah has already come (Jesus).
• End Times=end of the world/everything, details found in Isaiah, Daniel, Revelation and other books in the Bible, entails a rapture of God's people (followers of Jesus), seven years of tribulation ("hell" on earth), restoration of everything-a new heaven & earth, God reigns among His people
• Rapture=where at a time only the Father knows, Jesus will come and take His followers in a blink of an eye to heaven
• Jew=a born Hebrew (an ethnicity) or convert into this culture that follows the Judaism religion. God's "chosen people" before Jesus came and "tore the dividing wall" between Jews and Gentiles. Jesus was a Jew, born in Nazareth (Jesus was not Caucasian, with blue eyes and long brown flowing hair)
• Gentiles=everyone not a Jew
• Baptism=a submersion in water that symbolizes this individual has been "barred with Christ & born again". This comes after an individual has accepted Jesus as their personally Lord & Savior (thus, not when they are an infant). This does not save you nor forgives your sins.
• Confession=the telling of your sins. Catholics have "confessionals" where individuals sit in a booth with a divider and you confess to the priest your sins. The priest then tells you are forgiven after you do/say a specific mantra. But only Jesus can forgive sins & only Jesus is needed to access the Father. God knows everything about you already, no need to feel shame.
• Shame=feeling that something is wrong with who you are
• Guilt=feeling bad for what you did
• Prayer=talking with God. Consisting of admiration, confession, requests and praises. There is no wrong way to pray. You talk & you listen. There are no special words to say, but typically began with "Dear God or Father" and "in Jesus name, Amen"
• Amen="Let it be so"/ "it is most certainly true" 
• Devotions=a "quite" time with mediating on God's Word, prayer, or singing songs, basically you separate yourself/set aside a time to just be in God's presence, encouraged to carried out everyday, not a command but our hearts need it
• Salvation Prayer=that initial prayer you say confessing you are a sinner that needs Jesus and you accept who Jesus is/what He has done for you into you "heart". 
• Saint=a doer of God's will, we are all saints as followers of Jesus and it's all because of Jesus 
• Baby Dedication=something some church's do in which the parent/guardian of a newly born baby will stand in front of the congregation and announce the will raise this baby in the Christian faith 
• Denominations=different sects (sections) /branches in the Christian faith, all really break-offs from Catholicism & Protestantisms
• Christian=someone who believes & follows Jesus, is a "little Christ"; this name was given to the early Church by outsiders-before Believers just said they were "followers of the Way"; Catholics are Christians, but not every Christian is Catholic.    
• Christ=not Jesus's last name. Means "anointed one"
• Messiah=leader
• Yahwey=the most holy name of God. "I AM the I AM" said by God Himself to Moses. YHWH is Hebrew and the correct pronunciation is unknown due to not suppose to be spoken
• Church=(capitalized) is the body of believers in Christ Jesus. We are one family.
• church=(lower case) denotes the building we as Believer's attend for weekly services. Note the first church began in the book of Acts in the New Testament
• Scripture=the Word of God in the Holy Bible. The Holy Bible is the complete and only true word of God. It doesn't matter what translation you have; as long as you understand the main points. 
• The Holy Bible=a book of sixty-six books written by different prophets and followers of God with all the words inspired by God's Spirit thus it has the power to change hearts; constructed in the the form we now see it by some old guys years ago at this important conference thing...It is separated in two parts-the Old Testament and the New Testament.
• Testament=means promise. The Old Testament is about the old promise or covenants made with Abraham and Moses. Jews use this. Christians add the story of Jesus found in the letters of the New Testament. The new promise is found in the Gospel.
• The Gospel="The Good News". God sent His son, Jesus, to die for our sins that whoever believes in Him will be forgiven and have eternal life; there is only one Gospel and it comes from the accounts of four different men: Matthew, Mark, Luke, & John
• Forgiven=(in God's view) only in/through Jesus are we viewed as clean, perfect & holy. God made the records straight between us & Him. He remembers our sin no more.
• Sin=missing the mark (an archery term), we all have fallen short of the commandments God set
• Commandments=more commonly known as the Ten Commandments, although there are hundreds of commands in the Old Testament. The Ten Commandments were the first and most sacred rules given from God to His chosen people-the Jews. However, this law is something that is "written on" everyone's heart. Thus, common sense. These laws though were only to show that we could never fill the gap between God and ourselves.
• Holy=set apart for God's use
• Sanctified= made clean
• Justified= made right 
• Redeemed=brought near
• Born Again=this is a spiritual awakening within the individual, a term used for when they accept Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior
• Lord=commander
• Savior=someone who rescues another from something
• Salvation=being rescued from something. Jesus saved us from the power of sin/ourselves
• Satan/The Devil=a fallen angel who is condemned to roam the earth until he is thrown into hell, temptor ,accusor, evil,deceiver, was the most beautiful angel but wanted to be higher than God
• Hell=where a soul of a person goes who has not chosen to believe and follow Jesus Christ, an eternity of torture, a place without God, burning fire, extreme pain and sorrow, a person choices this-God does not sentence you there nor is Satan the ruler of Hell
• Soul/Spirit="heart/mind" of a person, the unseen nature of an individual that lives forever, broken because of sin, made whole when untied with God
• Heaven=a place with God, where God dwells, for those who believe and follow Jesus, Jesus said he was preparing a place for us there, "mansions", "new bodies", & "new names", beautiful, glorious 
• Monotheism=believe in one God; Christianity is a monotheist religion
• Religion=a set of believes that constitute a specific tradition/way of life/culture, full of rules and regulations, is "cold", is man's attempt to make things right with God...Christians believe it is about a relationship not a religion 
• Grace=undeserving, unearned, never-ending, unconditional love given by the Father through Jesus to all of us
• Mercy=not giving you what you deserve, letting go of your punishment; the punishment for our sins was hell but Jesus redeemed us
• Love=(capital) God
• Trust=to lean into
• Worship=most commonly viewed as the service at a church that entails singing and teachings; it is a life-style/an everyday way of giving everything about you to God
• Praise=the songs you sing during worship
• Condemnation=a sentencing. God does not condemn us because He sees us through Jesus, but the Holy Spirit does convict us
• Convict=to make known that something is not right (we've all felt that feeling)
• Hallowed=Holy  
• Communion=a coming together to do a specific activity, in the church we have "Holy Communion" where the tradition goes back to the Jews exodus from Egypt. Jesus, however, in the New Testament said that the unleavened bread and wine were symbolic of his body and blood being broken/poured for all of man kind (talking about his crucifixion)-so we participate in this activity to remember/reflect