Posted on 10/15/2001 6:54:40 AM PDT by malakhi
| Statesmen may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue. - John Adams |
You have an art with twisting words. There is spiritual life and death. And there is physical life and death. There are boundaries set by the Father. In the physical, we may commune with the physical. But we may only see the spiritual at the discretion of the Lord.
You seek to confuse the spiritual life/death with physical life/death to blur the boundaries between the two and ignore the law in the doing. The word of God is clear. No communion with the dead (physical death) as they are now of the spiritual realm.
Moses saw God. It didn't make it any more right when moses saw God than when Jesus appeared in flesh. People saw angels in the OT. Yet the Commandment says (Exodus 20:4) "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth:"
*Nothing in Heaven
*Nothing on earth
*Nothing from the seas
Jesus is in heaven and walked on earth. God the Father is in heaven and has walked on earth. Angels are in heaven and have walked on earth. The dead in Christ are in heaven and have walked on earth. No allowances. No exceptions. No right to break the commandments and tell someone else it's ok to do so. And with that, I rebuke you in the name of Jesus.
Finally all the quotes from the Catholics referring to, "prayers to the saints" have struck a bell, it must comes from their old and close ties to Greek mythology, you know, like they get when they read their apocryphal books.
Remember how the movies depict the Greek god's, sitting up in heaven watching we mortals in a pool of water or a crystal ball, and arguing about what they should do to win a fight, or a girl, or a war?
Well today’s Catholics have gone modern, and they picture all their dead Catholics up in paradise, bunched all together hanging over the rail that keeps them from falling out of heaven, cheering for their favorite worshiper.
Mary has the biggest crowd, but Peter is closing in fast, since it is him who the Catholics must use to legitimatize their apostolic succession theory, so he has them by the short hairs and is going for the #1 position.
Now you have to remember that some of these dead catholics have been up there for over a thousand years, and all they are allowed to do is serve as a prayer answering service, and they are all starting to get an attitude by now, and asking each other, “quoting from Peggy Lee, Is that all there is”?.
Here we are, a whole universe out there to discover and what do you think we’re doing?… That’s right, were stuck here in this relic forsaken place, with nothing to do but listen to all those #%!*@) repetitious memorized prayers, then we have to go stand in line the rest of the day waiting for an audience with Peter or Mary, so we can beg, you heard me, beg, for them to intercede and go directly to the big guy and use their influence to incur his favor so he will help someone who doesn’t mean squat to me.
There is this one guy,.. who must have me mixed up with old St. Blaze over there, and he keeps bugging me about his dumb throat, I'll never under stand why a place with all the gold and diamonds this place has, they can't even afford a simple “PDS”, prayer direction service, some times I have to listen to someone for 15 minutes before I find out he was wanting Ignatius or Anthony, or some other saint, so there goes my whole morning down the tubes, but that's alright, I have nothing better to do with my time, anyway, it's not like I have a life,.. hint, hint.
I remember hearing that Protestant, the apostle Paul saying, the eye hasn't seen ot the ear heard, the things that are prepared for us guys when we get here, but so far,… zilch,… if you call this paradise, I beg to differ, and with all the hours we put in here, and we don't even have a sabbath anymore.
I remember when I couldn't wait for the day of rest, and now that I really need one, they say, Oh we don't need one here anymore, that was just for working humans.
Sure, I remember the fliers that John passed out,"join the saints", "go where no man has gone before", well I fell for that one, and the only relief in sight may be when God tears the earth up, and puts in his new heavenly city, but who knows when that will happen, and when I asked someone when the big day was coming, I was told that, that day and hour knows no man, and since I cant find time to get away from my job, I guess I'll just have to keep listening to all these whiners down there asking for such stupid things as if I know where he put his dumb car keys, heck, I had some keys once, but I don't even remember what I did with them, let alone yours.
Somebody's lied to you and you're repeating the lie:
[20:4](1)Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image,(2a) or any likeness {of any thing} that {is} in heaven above,(2b) or that {is} in the earth beneath,(2c) or that {is} in the water under the earth. [20:5](3) Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them,(4) nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God {am} a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth {generation} of them that hate me; [20:6] And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
Four distinct commands encompassed here. One of which is set in three parts so there would be no excuses for misunderstanding.
Yeah kind of like how you guys try to find loop-holes and not take Christ's words at face value for the whole This is My Body; My Flesh is true food thing.
Pray for the successor to Peter; aka Cephas; aka Rock.
I thought the benefit of singing that song was the chance that people would think about the meaning of the words they were singing and why they were singing it and recognize that maybe it might take more than words and volume to obtain their desires. I would hope reflection would lead them to convert,repent,pray and fast.
Another person thought it was almost an insult to call on God while refusing to obey His commandments and a third person was sure that Americans were good people and had been attacked by evil-doers,consequently God would grant the request to bless the country. What do you all think?
I would be interested in any one's take on the subject but please no nit-picking. Thanks.
First of all, Peter and the others advised how prophecy should be handled. So that's one down. Secondly, the latter is a statement that people will twist words to their own use. Which is why the Apostles charged us to check every word against scripture. Saying that some may use a truck to blow up a government building is not an excuse not to drive a truck. You have a non argument there. There is nothing in either of these two verses telling you you cannot through the holy spirit, understand the deep things of God in Scripture. And the Apostles commanded that ye prove yourselves in the word. You need to read to know the word, bud. If you are going to be judged by it, you should want to know it. And how are you going to know it if you rely on others to tell you what it means till you die. That is irresponsible, bud. If I know you as I think I do, you don't have much tolerance for being wrongly accused of anything. Think of it like this - Jesus will be your lawyer if you got it right. If you didn't, he'll be your prosecutor and your life will defend you - not the Catholic Church. I helped a friend defend himself in court once because he couldn't afford a lawyer. You don't go into court without knowing every thing in the law that you can possibly learn. There is procedure and precedent. And the judge doesn't care that you aren't an attourney. If you walk into his court, you've been practicing for 30 years for all he cares - you work within the rules. How can you do that if you don't know them? How can you do that if you take someone else's word for it. Now you may say, 'well they're a lawyer aren't they.' They can't defend you. You will rise or fall based on what you know - not what they think they know and impart to you. If you cling to their councel and they are wrong, you are responsible. You stand accused, what do you do? Answer it for yourself - I don't need a response. You need it.
Yeah and five minutes later God is telling them images of angels to put on the Ark of the Covenant and in the Tabernacle. See Exodus 25:18-22; 26:1,31.
Lets not forget the brass serpent that God told Moses to make in Numbers 21:8-9.
The final touch is images of cheribum in Solomon's Temple. See 1 Kings 6:23-29, 35; 7:29. Other images that Solomon had made were oxen and lions. See 1 Kings 7:25, 29.
But you're right, God forbade ALL images. (/sarcasm off!!!)
Pray for John Paul II
Should read "telling them to make images of angels..."
The magic sternum has no such garauntee.
The Holy spirit is for all (Acts 5). And only the obedient will not be led astray. The disobedient have no such promise.
No, I read it and recognized it as what it is - bunk. An image is a likeness. I'm an artist. I can find more semantic acrobatics than you'll ever find in a million years. My art teacher - a Catholic btw - used to hold up portraits I did and say, it was a better likeness than a photograph. (I'm an exceptional portrait artist). Needless to say, I haven't done a portrait in quite some time now.
Have you bothered reading the parts of the Old Testament concerning the Ark of the Covenant? God commanded images (not idols or likenesses) of cherubim be made to adorn it.
Uh, no. I have read the verses in question. God commanded a house made to his specifications. It was commanded that it be made for Him. And as a commandment from God, it was to be followed as surely as the commandments against image making for ourselves is to be followed.
Do you think the ancient Jews did not venerate the Ark of the Covenant? Think again.
They respected God's house. If any worshipped God's house rather than God, they are rotting in hell. And their example is one to learn from that we may avoid the same fate.. Not an excuse to lead others to their fate.
All kinds of things. But my specialty was portrature. I could create a portrate of such exquisite detail that a photograph would pale in comparison. I won regional and National gold medals for my work. I would rather be obedient and little than huge in disobedience.
God doesn't honor the breaking of his laws by rewarding those who do so. What makes you think it's ok for you to break God's laws?
How's the lady on the street? Lol
It is hard sometimes to know how to pray for certain people, and now our country, but God considered not destroying Sodom and Gamora if Abraham could produce 50 righteous people he would spare the city.
Our Country has around 180 mil. I believe, and if Sodom was a city of say 500,000, and 50 would have saved them, that would mean that less then 1%, so do you think there is 1% righteous in the USA?
From that point of view, God would save the USA, just for us Christians.
Sometimes when I pray, I just say, thank you for being in total charge, and I don't have to worry about it, so I just pray for them as though they are Christians, and let God handle it from there on out.
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