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To: LearsFool
Here, this is the sort of thing I was talking about:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/3196479/posts

They're Christian gay marriage supporters. They HAVE the Bible. They AGREE that in it is the Word of God. They've had their personal encounter with Jesus, whom they ACCEPT as Lord and Savior. That's good enough for them.

Bringing them to the Gospel won't help them. They think they're already there.

"But their interpretation isn't right, and I can provie it, because...." OK, complete that sentence.

131 posted on 08/24/2014 8:23:49 AM PDT by Mrs. Don-o (Most of us know more from being old, than from being told.)
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To: Mrs. Don-o
Now I urge you, brethren, note those who cause divisions and offenses, contrary to the doctrine which you learned, and avoid them. For those who are such do not serve our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly, and by smooth words and flattering speech deceive the hearts of the simple.

How ought we to deal with the simple, the naive, the untaught and gullible who fall for these lies?

And a servant of the Lord must not quarrel but be gentle to all, able to teach, patient, in humility correcting those who are in opposition, if God perhaps will grant them repentance, so that they may know the truth, and that they may come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil, having been taken captive by him to do his will.

We are to teach them the truth, and leave the rest to God.

Or do you perhaps have something better to offer them? A more powerful antidote to the poison they've swallowed?

Their delusion is that Jesus is right and the Church is wrong.

Well Jesus IS right. And churches sometimes ARE wrong. Churches are not infallible, Jesus is.

If you and the Pope and the eminent preacher you mentioned want to claim that sodomy is wrong because your CHURCHES say so, I'll oppose you. And afterward, I'll attempt to heal, with the words of Christ, the wounds you've inflicted on the young and simple.

Jesus never mentioned homosexuality. Cool. The Church not only mentions it but opposes it. Uncool.

Maybe if your church stopped claiming, "It's wrong because WE say it's wrong," and started teaching what Jesus said about it, that would straighten things out all around. If, as you say, these young people are willing and wanting to follow Him, stop asking them to follow your church instead.

I can't blame them for rejecting traditions of men. I reject them myself! Why? Because of what my Master taught me:

Then came to Jesus scribes and Pharisees, which were of Jerusalem, saying, Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? for they wash not their hands when they eat bread.

But he answered and said unto them, Why do ye also transgress the commandment of God by your tradition?...Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect by your tradition.

Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying, This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.


The Jewish leaders had traditions too. Jesus rebuked them for imposing their traditions as if they were on equal standing with God's commands. You know this. How many times did Jesus say, "You have heard it said...But I say unto you..."? He pointed them back to the commandments of God.

In Colossians Paul dealt with new traditions - which some claimed were necessary to make one fully pleasing to God, a sort-of "super-Christian" - by pointing his readers back to Christ, just as Christ had dealt with the same bogus "super-Jew" traditions by pointing back to the commandments of God.

Why is this not enough for you? Is it because I've done a poor and/or incomplete job of addressing from the Scriptures all their questions and objections in this discussion? Do my inadequacies in knowledge and communication mean the Bible is inadequate? Do they force me or you to come up with better ways to rescue the young and ignorant from the devil's henchmen?

What is it that's lacking in the Scriptures that drives you to look elsewhere for answers? Tell me, please! Because if it's something worth having, and God hasn't given it to us in his revealed Word, I want it to. But if it's something you just haven't found yet, I want to help you find it if there's any way I can! :-)
134 posted on 08/24/2014 11:50:30 AM PDT by LearsFool ("Thou shouldst not have been old, till thou hadst been wise.")
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