Posted on 01/27/2008 7:56:14 PM PST by Manfred the Wonder Dawg
Yes everything is find. My Internet connection has been reduced and I have been extremely busy the rest of the time. My son won first place in his high school science fair and is moving on to the regionals. Talk about miracles!!!! My wife and I told him to do some simple little thing but we insisted he do it well. All we were interested is that he get an "A" for his project. You could have knocked us over with a feather when they called his name out as a first place winner. (about 10 first place winners out of 550)
Well enough yaking... (the world doesn't need more yaks)
I would certainly agree with your first (transcending natural laws) and third (enlightening the human mind) examples. I would have a problem with "moral" miracles. I'm not quite sure what that would be. Thomas More refusal to accept King Henry's leadership as the head of the Church of England, doesn't speak to me as a "moral" miracle but rather someone who simply believes, rightly or wrongly, in his Church. You could say the same thing about Wycliff or Jan Hus but I doubt if you'll find the Church crediting Wycliff or Hus as a "moral" miracle.
Sorry for the double post. I got this weird error and then it posted again. Now everyone will have to suffer through my dumb jokes twice. :O)
Doesn’t make it twice as dumb, though :>)
If you're going to misrepresent what I am saying we might as well go back and argue theology.
Is their theology as deeply flawed as we see elsewhere? If not, they should probably welcome them, support them and point them in the direction of the muslims.
So, then you must think the Orthodox are not Christians if they need to be evangelized. And just whose theology are you teaching them? Your own? Or is there some "official Protestant truth" that all have to subscribe to? Is it some Protestant "magisterium" that decides who is a Christian and who is not?
For Protestants to call Orthodox un-Christian and in need to be evangelized is like a thief calling cops "bad guys."
Protestants have no business evangelizing Orthodox Russia. There are billions of people who don't know Christ all over the world. But, it 's safer to try to make Russians into "Christians" then to try to evangelize Muslims. You have 1.2 billion of them in this world. But they tend to decapitate Christian ... and that's probably more where their zeal to evangelize stops.
Forest Keeper and I had this discussion a while back. The verse simply says believers. Just like the verse before: those who believe and are baptized shall be saved. It doesn't mean "some" of those who believe and are baptized, HD. It means all who believe and are baptized shall be saved (I emphasize also shall be; it doesn't say are).
It's just like the verse where Jesus says He was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel that Protestants suddenly lose their "eyes" and cannot see the word only. Similarly, they cannot see that Christ is speaking to the disciples only at the Sermon on the Mount.
Funny "visions" and "hearings" Protestants have. Selective, just like their verses.
***Similarly, they cannot see that Christ is speaking to the disciples only at the Sermon on the Mount.***
Must be another Bible. Mine says that he was speaking to GREAT CROWDS in Matthew 5. Not just a few disciples.
As I said in the prior post:
Is their theology as deeply flawed as we see elsewhere? If not, they should probably welcome them, support them and point them in the direction of the muslims.
Clearly you feel intimidated by evangelists, is this because the EOC is so inexperienced in this area? As old as the EOC is I would think there would be a lengthy history of sending evangelists through out the world. Yet most people know very little about the EOC.
Mark 16:15 And He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature."
Perhaps this fell between the cracks:
KOSTA50 SAID:
I am not opposed to Mark 16:17-18. I am simply asking where are those signs the verse speak of as a promise to the believers?!
= = = =
How often are those signs in your local congregation and to what extent . . .
i.e.
How often in terms of times per service or some such?
How dramatically?
How miraculously?
Your post reminds me of something from the great Reformed theologian, Herman Bavinck.
A dogma is not based on the results of any historical-critical research but only on the witness of God, on the self-testimony of Holy Scripture. A Christian believes, not because everything in life reveals the love of God, but rather despite everything that raises doubt.In scripture too there is much that raises doubt. All believers know from experience that this is true. Those who engage in biblical criticism frequently talk as if simple church people know nothing about the objections that are advanced against Scripture and are insensitive to the difficulty of continuing to believe in Scripture. But that is a false picture. Certainly, simple Christians do not know all the obstacles that science raises to belief in Scripture. But they do to a greater or lesser degree know the hard struggle fought both in head and heart against Scripture.
There is not a single Christian who has not in his or her own way learned to know the antithesis between the “wisdom of the world” and “the foolishness of God.” It is one and the same battle, an ever-continuing battle, which has to be waged by all Christians, learned or unlearned, to “take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5).
Here on earth no one ever rises above that Battle. Throughout the whole domain of faith, there remain “crosses” (cruces) that have to be overcome. There is no faith without struggle. To believe is to struggle, to struggle against the appearance of things. As long as people still believe in anything, their belief is challenged from all directions. No modern believer is spared from this either. Thus for those who in childlike faith subject themselves to Scripture, there still remain more than enough objections. These need not be disguised.
Their are intellectual problems (cruces) in Scripture that cannot be ignored and that will probably never be resolved. But these difficulties, which Scripture itself presents against its own inspiration, are in large part not recent discoveries of our century. They have been known at all times. Nevertheless, Jesus and the apostles, Athanasius and Augustine, Thomas and Bonaventure, Luther and Calvin, and Christians of all churches have down the centuries confessed and recognized Scripture as the word of God. Those who want to delay belief in Scripture till all the objections have been cleared up and all the contradictions have been resolved will never arrive at faith. “For who hopes for what he sees?” [Rom. 8:24]. Jesus calls blessed those who have not seen and yet believe [John 20:29].
No, I am annoyed by them! Just as I am annoyed by LDS and WT people peddling their heresy to Christians.
Your assertion that Orthodox theology is "deeply flawed" is laughable. The part that is serious is that they dare to evangelize Christians. I ask you by whose authority? Whose theology are the Protestants peddling in Christian Russia?
As old as the EOC is I would think there would be a lengthy history of sending evangelists through out the world
As far as I know, before Orthodxy was enslaved by the Ottomans, they Christianized all the lands to the east and North of Constantinople, including Russia.
During the 500 years of Ottoman empire they couldn't. During communism they couldn't. Today, the Orthodox have very active missions in Africa and other parts of the world where there are few, if any Christians, which is where all evangelists ought to be.
The Orthodox, no matter how much they disagree with Protestant theology, are not so un-Christian as to evenagelize Protestant countries, such as Norway!
Yet most people know very little about the EOC
I can't help the ignorant. A cursory interest in Christianity would soon lead one to discover that Eastern Orthodoxy is the second largest Christian group in the world.
It didn't fall through the cracks. I have no cue what you are asking.
What is your point?
And I have led you forty years in the wilderness: your clothes are not waxen old upon you, and thy shoe is not waxen old upon thy foot. - Deut 29:2-5
And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father. – John 6:65
My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: - John 10:27
It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, [they] are spirit, and [they] are life. - John 6:63
Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? - Isaiah 53:1
No, it's the same bible.
There is nothing here to suggest that anyone but His disciples were in the mountain. All this says is that He saw the crowds and went into (eiV) the mountain, it doesn't say He went to them, or that they followed Him. It does say that His disicples followed Him and caught up with Him, and He becgan to speak to them. We don't know where the crowds were relative to where Jesus was. But we do know that His disciples were with Him and thye heared Him.
Matthew 7:28 “When Jesus had finished saying these things, the CROWDS were amazed at his teaching...”
Read the WHOLE thing.
??? No one but the apostles heard the Sermon on the Mount?
Where do you get this stuff?
Yet this error does fit with the absurd amount of power you invest in "other Christs." No wonder you so easily dismiss the Scriptures if you don't think they were written with your ears in mind. And now you even deny the ears of thoses the Bible says were actually present.
Have you read the concurrent verses in Luke 6?
And they that were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed. And the whole multitude sought to touch him: for there went virtue out of him, and healed them all. And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God..." -- Luke 6:17-20 "And he came down with them, and stood in the plain, and the company of his disciples, and a great multitude of people out of all Judaea and Jerusalem, and from the sea coast of Tyre and Sidon, which came to hear him, and to be healed of their diseases;
It's even clearer in versions like the NASB...
who had come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases; and those who were troubled with unclean spirits were being cured. And all the people were trying to touch Him, for power was coming from Him and healing them all. And turning His gaze toward His disciples, He began to say, "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God..." -- Luke 6:17-20 "Jesus came down with them and stood on a level place; and there was a large crowd of His disciples, and a great throng of people from all Judea and Jerusalem and the coastal region of Tyre and Sidon,
Cheer up, Kosta! God willing, Christ was addressing the Sermon on the Mount to you, too.
That's easy. In high school I played the trombone in our jazz band. In Senior year I had the featured solo for our rendition of Lionel Ritchie's "Truly". Right before a big-deal competition, I dedicated it to my then number one squeeze (now wife), and it's been our song ever since. :)
HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY EVERYONE!! :)
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