Posted on 10/02/2001 2:30:40 PM PDT by malakhi
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The Neverending Story (The Christian Chronicles) -- Thread 153
The question is based on (once again) an incorrect understanding of the Protestant belief of Sola Scriptura. The gospel is the "good news" of what Jesus Christ accomplished for us while here in the body (His life, death and resurrection). The Bible is a way of communicating the truth of His works to all generations. It is not itself the gospel, but it contains the truth of the gospel in written form.
You attack with no backing at all, very weak, show me.
BigMack
Are you going to give us all the answers, or are you going to work on the challange Big Mack posted for you?
There silence is LOUD. They could be at the spin factory www.Rome
BigMack
"I never ask God to give himself to me, I beg him to purify, to empty me. If I am empty, God of his very nature is obliged to give himself to me to fill me.
How to be pure? By steadfast longing for the one good God… God being in himself pure good can dwell nowhere except in the pure soul. He overflows into her. Whole, he flows into her.Where the creature ends, there God begins to be. God asks only that you get out of his way, insofar as you are a creature, and let him be God in you. The least creaturely idea that ever entered your mind is as big as God. Why? because it will keep God out of you entirely. The moment you get one of your own ideas, God fades out. It is when the idea is gone that God gets in.
God desires urgently that you, the creature get out of his way - as if his own blessedness depended on it. Ah, beloved people, why don't you let God be God in you? What are you afraid of?
I ain't goina put up with false teaching no more, its time to call a spade a spade.
But you can bet your.......... I'll Be Back!
BigMack
Well, the Apostles weren't Apostles back in those days.
They are called "apostles" in Mark 6:30, three chapters prior to my citation.
They were merely disciples and had no authority over the Church, an authority which Jesus gave them later.
Going back further, in Mark Chapter 3, Jesus appoints the twelve, and gives them authority to cast out demons. The parallel passage in Luke has the apostles being given
authority over all devils, and to cure diseases. And he sent them forth to preach the Kingdom of God and to heal the sick...And going forth, they went about from village to village, preaching the gospel and working cures everywhere. (Luke 9:1-6)
So perhaps they had no authority over the church at this point, but they certainly had some authority.
There were similar people back in the early days of the Church. They were called "wanderers," and they went around on their own, preaching Christ. In order to get some sort of handle on these guys, the Church set up some regulations on how members were to deal with them
So it seems that there were followers of Jesus who were operating outside the confines of the church, even in apostolic times. Do you know of any mention of these people in the writings of the church fathers?
If you guys are serious, I think that those lists are too long to handle in one chunk. Pick three points off each list which you think are the most damaging to the other side's position, and let the other side provide a detailed response.
So, who asked you? This from the fellow who posted a bandwidth-wasting vanity rant entitled A Proposal to focus Free Republic... You were roundly thrashed by most everyone on that thread, remember? Give it up. If you don't like the way Jim runs the board, go elsewhere.
'Course, your welcome to attempt to answer them all in one shot, if you want to.
Jesus is now speaking in Latin? I thought it was Aramaic.
Where is the locus of permanence in Christianity? You must answer that it is an institution. Others will say the acts of God throughout history (heilgeshicte), others say in the experiences (good Charismatics apply here) and good Baptists (and some bad ones) will say Doctrine (and thunder their fist on the pulpit). I say (with Barth) that permanence in Christianity is in a way of life.
But how do we know what that "way of life" is? Through the teaching of Scripture, primarily. The center of Christ's prophecies and teachings center around this "reign of God" that has broken into "this present evil age." The leaven that leavens the whole loaf. The mustard seed that moves mountains.
All that to say that hyper sola Scriptura would require a statement within Scripture in support of itself. But sola Scriptura is a principle that places Scripture at the fore of the life of faith. It is a sound principle because Scripture is God's self-revelation to us. It is in the Scripture that God has chosen to show us who He is, what He has done, what He will do, His plan for humanity.
The Scripture has claims in it that it is inspired. (e.g. - 2 Peter 1:20-21). Here Peter is affirming that the prophecies of the OT was moved along by the Spirit of God. The impetus was the Holy Spirit. Our favorite passage is another example. 2 Tim. 3:16. The idea conveyed here is that the sacred writings (which Paul assumes Timothy knows) are breathed by God. Peter uses the OT authoritatively in his preaching in Acts 1. God spoke through the mouth of David. This idea is repeated in Ats 3:18,21 and 4:25. The message equates "it is written in Scripture" with "God said it."
This fits well with the messages of the OT prophets. Time and again they say, "Thus says the Lord..." Micah wrote, "But they shall site every man under his vine and under his fig tree, and none shall make them afraid; for the mouth of the Lord of Hosts has spoken." Isaiah affirms, "For the Lord spoke thus to me....saying..." Jeremiah says, "These are the words which the Lord spoke concerning Israel and Judah." Amos says, "Hear this word that the Lord has spoken against you, O people of Israel." And we not mention, except in passing, the obvious authority which Jesus ascribes to the OT.
Furthermore, Scripture is viewed as permanent. John 10:35 - "Scripture cannot be broken." Especially interesting is the comparison Jesus makes in Mt. 24. For two things were considered sacred to the Jew, the temple and the Scripture. Jesus says that the Temple will completely destroyed (not one stone left upon another) but emphasizes the unchanging and everlasting nature of Scripture.
So the Scripture is God-breathed. It is God's revelation of Himself to us. If we are Christians, then we desire to be like Christ. And our best and by far most comprehensive source for information about Christ is the Bible. So it seems natural that our theology should primarily flow from a God-breathed source (the self-revelation of God supplied for that very purpose) which tells us the most about the God-Man who we desire to emulate.
Note that this does not eliminate other sources for theology - tradition, general revelation, philosophy, etc. But they must be viewed through the lens of the glasses God has given us to see Him.
I posted a couple of threads back how Tom Clancy addresses this (rather tangentially) in his latest book The Bear and the Dragon (or vicey versa). He has Jesuits gathering information (surveillance) for the Vatican in China. And though it is a fictional work, Clancy is not given to wild flights of fancy in regards to such things. He might have been in this case, to be fair.
I disagree with this. The two most sacred things to the Jew are the Scriptures and the Covenant. The Temple is simply a place where God designated sacrifice to occur. Jews existed before the first temple, in the time between the two temples, and after the destruction of the second temple.
Good post, though. Yours?
That's right, Jesus doesn't want us to understand. It's all a big mystery and let's keep our fingers crossed and hope we don't go to hell. Oh, wait, is someone coming with the secret decoder ring? Call me and ask for Blue Boy.
Good point and thanks for the correction. I think the point stands in the main (it might even be emphasized by your point). Christ emphasized the passing nature of the place of worship (reiterated in John, "in spirit and truth") and the everlasting nature of the revelation.
I am borrowing heavily from the book "Christian Theology" by Millard Erickson. You should know I'm not that smart...
Red herring. You know how frustrated you get when Proddies claim you're worshipping Mary? Kinda how we feel when you distort sola scriptura as you do by asking a "have you stopped beating your wife" question. The premise of the question is false. We do not teach that Christian faith should be based exclusively on a book. Only that the book (the Bible) is all that's necessary for the regula fidei.
It is not necessary to know the author nor the color of his last bowel movement to declare a book authoritative or inspired.
This is merely a slight variation of question 1. Red herring.
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