When I see people calling evil "good" and good "evil" I like to offer God's Truth to them hoping they will see their error, repent of it, and be reconciled to God. Here is my post to 80VETTE which is a question for you also:
80VETTE wrote to me "You have shown me that you are one of the proud, self-righteous, confrontational, holier-than-thou "Christians" that turn so many seekers away from Jesus Christ. You make evangelism just that much more difficult for those of us with a heartfelt and tender love for the lost."
"heartfelt and tender love for the lost" ?
Is it loving to teach the lost to follow their fleshly desires which will lead them straight to Hell? Or is it more loving to warn them to deny their fleshly desires, forsaking them in exchange for an infinitely better desire named Jesus who gave His naked flesh for the eternal pleasure of His sheep?
Luke 14:33
So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple.
Is giving up our fleshly desires asking too much in exchange for all we receive in Christ?
1 Corinthians 9
27 But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when I have preached to others, I myself should become disqualified.
You come across to me (and I am sure many of the other responders) as a modern day pharasee.
John 1:14 reads (NIV) The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
Mark 12:29-31 (NIV) reads "The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
Your methods here do not show love or grace and, honestly, push people away from the truth of Christs redemptive power than toward it.
You indicate you love us, Steve; yet it is hard to read the love behind your dire warnings. You seem like the street preacher I have heard in downtown Denver, shouting warnings of doom and destruction for sinners at the top of his voice; I actually agree with much of what he says, but like everybody who hears him I turn my head and cover my ears when he passes by. Perhaps he does this out of a genuine love--yet his words might come from Osama bin Laden's mouth.
Jesus of Nazareth did not so. He listened, and when needed He broke the ice in surprising ways, like asking a Samaritan woman from "the wrong side of the tracks" for a drink. (John 4) And, as I've mentioned before, He was also careless about His own clothes. (How do you both wear and use a towel? John 13:1-11)
I am being spoken against for speaking God's Truth to people whose flesh wants no part of it. Jesus, Stephen, and probably most, if not all, of the prophets who brought God's Truth were hated and killed for it. Many of you probably feel okay speaking against me since you feel the support of your group in what you believe. However the crowds who killed Jesus, Stephen, and the rest of the prophets probably also felt reassured in being part of the crowd and believing that what the crowd believed and did was right. But where are they now?
Matthew 5
11"Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. 12Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
The fleshly desire to be naked may not always be sexual lust, but it is still the lust of the flesh operating. Just try giving it up completely and see how easy it is. Will your flesh resist and war against your spirit? If it is not lust and not an idol in your life, then there will be no problem at all in giving it up and not looking back. If you want Christ, then you must give it up. You can't serve Christ and the flesh. Christ demands all of our hearts, not just a part of them. We can't have divided hearts. Either Jesus is on the throne or the flesh is. Either He rules or the flesh does. Give your heart over to Him completely or give it over to your fleshly desire (lust) to be naked, but you cannot do both.
Luke 16
13"No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other.
I would have replied earlier, but I have been very busy with school lately and as tiring as this argument has sounded, it has not motivated me to really be vocal until now.
First of all, nudity is not sinful, period. End of story. Nudity can be used for different purposes which may be sinful, joyful, shameful, erotic, and glory-filled amongst many others. You have to look at the context in which the nudity is occuring to determine whether or not it is sinful, joyful, erotic, or shameful. I agree that if someone KNOWS that another has a problem with lusting after others while clothed (which IS more often the case) or naked, then it is a sinful thing to be nude around them. However, the members of this board take every precaution to make sure that we do not make a fellow Christian stumble by tempting him/her with our nudity or talk thereof.
Second of all, we are commanded to glorify the Lord in all that we do. That means that we should glorify the Lord when we are frustrated, when we are happy, when we are sad, while we are getting a divorce, while we are dealing with death (yes, even then), and at ALL times. Christians are not made to be uberhappy all the time - we still feel emotions, and in the same sense, Christians are not made to only serve in one aspect of Christianity all the time. Each of us has talents that were given to us by God (we usually are pretty good at what that talent is and enjoy doing it) and we are to use them to spread the Word. For the members of this board, our lives of service to God include naturism, amongst many other things. Not only do our lives of service to God include naturism, but naturism provokes the use of our talents and glorification of God, therefore, we enjoy being nude, fellowshipping with other Christians, and using our talents for the work of the Lord.
Lastly, in your post you state:
"Just try giving [nudity] up completely and see how easy it is. Will your flesh resist and war against your spirit? If it is not lust and not an idol in your life, then there will be no problem at all in giving it up and not looking back. If you want Christ, then you must give it up. You can't serve Christ and the flesh. Christ demands all of our hearts, not just a part of them."
1) We already have Christ if we have accepted Him as our Savior and been baptized into His death. You cannot take that away by saying that something that we have studied, prayed about, and found to be profitable in our Christian lives is wrong. 2) Your "lust test" seems to me suspiciously like a practice that was used during the Salem Witch Trials. If someone was suspected of being a witch, they were taken to the river and thrown into the water (if I remember right, they also had some sort of weight tied around their body). If they floated, they were a witch. If they did not, then they were innocent - but unfortunately not alive anymore. Christ wants us to be happy children of His. We have found something that brings us happiness while giving us a way to use our talents and glorify the Lord at the same time.
We have separated nudity from sin in our lives (we all have sin in our lives, even you) and believe that it is possible for others to do as well. Just because we have been able to do this does not mean that it is right for everyone, and we do not say that it is. However, for those that are open to having a soft heart, being humbled, and enjoying the creation of the Lord, we are glad to invite you in and study, pray, and fellowship with you.
Inspired by the Holy Spirit you have said it most appropriately.
September 6 2006, 4:28 PM
Quoting scripture is great, but the fact of the matter is God is alive right now and directing each of us.
Findings are these:
God has never said in Bible -- or anywhere else nudity is wrong of itself..There are many things we owe each other, among which is to safeguard our souls. If you know that one gets drunk around certain drinks, then you must do all you can to prevent them from falling..
Thus nudity may create problems for some..
What do you do here? Pray for guidance..Perhaps they get a problem witrh people in shorts. I had a member of the family like this...their problem was that they were psychologically so restricted that the appearance of bare legs was their must outlet of frustration..
It may well be that we a given the talent to be nude to administer Christ to the nudist. Corey Ten Booom, the Dutch martyr of WW 2, was placed in a cell no one would go near as it was full of lice.. what an opportunity to minister Christ to those there without any interference..There is the story of Our Lord's Juggler who could only use his one talent -- juggling -- for the glory of the Lord....instead of bourying it (see parable of the talents).
I am a daily visitor to church and The Lord has had ample time to lead me..if he did not want me sharing this with the world, he would have guided me otherwise. As a Maronite (Antioch, Turkey origin) Catholic I see the talents he has given us to be used for the community. I am afraid that many have been led the wrong way into fear of sin -- why give the enemy any mention. Look at life as a garden where God has given us all sorts of gifts to use and enjoy for the world --both people and creatures as well. Take up your talent and use it.. You would make a person who gave you a beautiful gift -- eternal life through baptism -- veryt un-happy if you did not use the gift He gave you.
Each person in the nude is showing a beauty that is hiddeen behind the walls of clothes.. Look at it this way. God's creation reflects his unlimited grace. This coming from a Catholic who is not supposed to be bible based!
To the non-nudist out there, I say Be very careful judging us the nudists of the Lord...A story to illustrate this is in order. The deck of cards was a country song many years ago.. A soldier was accused of gamgling with a deck of cards.. He told his accuser that every card had some religious meaning. The song the days of Christmas has the same connotations -- meanings. The enemy wants God's followewrs to be divided to keep us from doing the Lord's work for each of us. In short the nudist is clothed in the grace of God that only a few can see -- others are clothed in cloth. Regardeless God sees us as we are. Lets all join hands and work for a better world.. Joe Tibiletti / Don Castle...
I didn't mean to leave you out of my "Thanks" post further down the thread, Joe and Don. Thank you for your further post under mine and it's good to have a new couple of friends around here. I hope you are having a good time so far...it isn't always quite as...argumentative, maybe? as it has been lately. Steve Baird made for a little bit of an interruption in the normal flow of things. I suppose it's always good to review the reasonings that you have for doing something, but after a while it does get old and I think we were all feeling that. Anyway, I hope that you have a good time while you're here and enjoy the fellowship of all of us fellow clowns...er, naturists.
I just wanted to thank Kevin, Terry, and Bornnude for your comments. They mean a lot to me and it is nice to know that I have the ability to put down words in a way that effectively means something to someone. I do hope that Steve Baird was able to read the post before he was blocked, but if he wasn't able to, I hope the Lord will speak to his heart and soften it. I doubt that he was able to read it, however, because I probably would've gotten a little more personal of a backlash than Gwin got since I personally posted to try to "teach him" a little something. If he thinks a woman shouldn't ever teach a man, then he's got another thing comin'...how'd he make it through 27 years of marriage without getting trained???
If I'm not mistaken, a person who has been blocked from posting can still access the site to read others' posts, but simply cannot make any of their own.
In that case, Steve should have been able to read your post, and yeah, it probably upset him...
Personally, I think he needed a few coals heeped on top of his head, but that's just me...
I've found that there is someone for everyone in this world. Guys like that always find the mousy, demure, submissive women who will never speak up. They have been trained throughout life to be obediant by their parents and church. Usually, through fear and guilt. Maybe that's where we have the advantage. We don't have shame because we love ourselves since our God loves us. When I was in radio, I talked on the phone to a young woman who's parents believed that a woman should not go to college. That was a man's domain. They were to take over the family business...a grocery store. On one hand, don't get an education, on the other, be a modern woman and run a business. Religious beliefs tailored to fit whatever situation you like.
Anyway, I'm sure Steve found just the right woman who will bend to his particular skewed sense of Christianity and she's perfectly happy with it. All I know is that I love my wife very much, but if I tried to force her to bend to my will, I'd be beaten in my sleep (LOL).
This works both ways, Steve. You have spoken against us and insulted us, either without taking the time to read our statements or in the face of our statements. Do you think it's easy having to defend ourselves against constant attacks from those who know the Bible no better than we do? Do you think that we would continue in our beliefs and practices if we didn't believe they were both innocent and right? May the Lord convict me of sin if I ever sin by being naked. (So far He hasn't, and I've been an active nudist for three years.)
I hope you are having a good time so far...it isn't always quite as...argumentative, maybe? as it has been lately. Steve Baird made for a little bit of an interruption in the normal flow of things. I suppose it's always good to review the reasonings that you have for doing something, but after a while it does get old and I think we were all feeling that. Anyway, I hope that you have a good time while you're here and enjoy the fellowship of all of us fellow clowns...er, naturists. 
Of course, we can't ask his wife...