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Posted on 04/18/2010 9:49:35 PM PDT by Judith Anne
I seriously wonder about some FReepers, sometimes. Any other person accused of a crime would be defended by every FReeper as being innocent until proven guilty by a court of law. I've seen whole threads written by men who have been accused of child abuse by ex-wives out to deny them their visitation rights or to wrest more money out of them. These men are rightly indignant, and furious about the unjust accusations that cannot be proven but are never withdrawn.
Yet where are those FReepers when a PRIEST is accused? Where is the presumption of innocence? Suddenly, every accusation becomes a verdict, and not only the accused but his entire organization and all its adherents are held responsible.
I can only wonder what some of these so-called conservatives (who so faithfully defend the Constitution) would do, if THEY were the ones accused! It is a nightmare for any man -- all of you know how even the accusation stains the man forever, even if it is proven false!
Not only that, many here assert that the problems of 30, 40 and even 50 years ago must be tried in the media TODAY!
Remember the Duke rape case? There are more similarities than differences here. The priests are accused, nifonged, and instead of being defended, they are vilified!
What other man of you could stand under the weight of such an accusation trumpeted by the press, and come out whole? None! And such accusations made, LONG after the statute of limitations has passed, sometimes even after the accused is dead and buried for YEARS -- are YOU one of those who automatically, reflexively, spitefully, and gleefully act as judge, jury, and executioner?
Women! What if it were YOUR HUSBAND, YOUR BROTHER, YOUR FATHER, YOUR UNCLE, YOUR SON who was accused? Wouldn't you want the best defense possible? Wouldn't YOU believe in their innocence? Wouldn't YOU help protect your loved ones as much as possible? And yet, YOU JUDGE THE CHURCH FOR DOING WHAT YOU WOULD DO?
Shame! Vast shame! On all who have sinned against the innocent!
Oral surgeon had to extract them . . . bottoms with saws from several directions on each of several teeth. Tops less problematically.
Thx for your thoughtful concern and question.
14+ adjustment sessions on bottoms from 2 months ago. 2 on tops from 2 weeks ago. Sharp pains gone. Still too painful to chew more than mush. A long process, it seems.
My advice, make enough money to get implants.
On the other hand, I’ve lain up treasures in Heaven so I really have no complaints about that.
It’s just that dentures do NOT seem to be the same for everyone. I’m glad some folks have it easier. LOL.
That Jesus was a real man none of His disciples doubted. But sometimes it came home to them with special force that there was something extraordinary about Him: “Who then is this?” they asked, when He stilled the tempest with a word (Mark 4:41). The incarnation of Christ (John 1:14, “the Word became flesh”) implies His deity and humanity alike. It is no mere truism that John voices when he insists that “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh,” and makes this confession the crucial test of truth (1 John 4:2, “Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God”). He means, rather, that one Who had His being eternally within the unity of the Godhead became man at a point in time, without relinquishing His oneness with God. And by the word “flesh,” he does not mean a physical body only, but a complete human personality.
Paul speaks of God as “sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh” (Rom. 8:3, “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh”) where “likeness” does not suggest that His manhood was less than real, but that His human nature was like our sinful nature except that His nature was unstained by sin. Again, in the early Christian confession (1Timothy 3:16, “And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory”) the “mystery of our religion” (that is, Christ himself, the “mystery of God,” as He is called in Col. 2:2) is said to have been “manifested in the flesh.” The writer to the Hebrews says of the Son of God, through Whom the world were made, (Heb. 1:2, “Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds”) that since those whom He came to deliver (Heb. 2:14 “are sharers in flesh and blood, he also himself in like manner partook of the same”) in order that He might accomplish his saving purpose through death, which He could not otherwise have undergone.
The Bible certainly does not elaborate a doctrine of kenosis, but it does set forth the data with which serious biblical theologians have developed the doctrine of the divine “self-emptying. “ Basic elements of the scriptural evidence are:
1. The divine relationship or unity between Father and Son.
The Bible clearly says that Jesus is fully God. Paul writes of Jesus in Colossians 2:9, “In him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily.” In addition, when Jesus’ contemporaries called him “Lord;’ they were employing a term that was used over six thousand times in the Greek translation of the Old Testament to refer to God or “the Lord.” Therefore, when the angels announced Jesus’ birth by saying, “For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord” (Luke 2:11), they were saying that the Lord God himself was born.
When asked if he had seen Abraham, Jesus responded by saying, “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:57—58). Those who heard him say this “picked up stones to throw at him” (John 8:59), which is what any self-respecting religious leader would have done if someone claimed to be God. They understood that Jesus was claiming the same title God claimed for himself in Exodus 3:14—”I AM WHO I AM.”
In Revelation 22:13, Jesus says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” This is very similar to what God the Father said at the beginning of the same book: “I am the Alpha and the Omega,’ says the Lord God, ‘who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty” (Rev. 1:8).
The prophet Isaiah affirms Jesus as the king who reigns forever—a role only God could fill: “Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end” (Isa. 9:7). That is why Paul said that Jesus is worthy of worship: “God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil. 2:9—11). Jesus’ divinity is the reason God the Father says, “Let all God’s angels worship him” (Heb. 1:6).
Jesus was fully God. “In him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (Col. 1:19). If Jesus wasn’t fully God, he could not have borne the full penalty for sin for the whole world. And if he didn’t bear the full penalty of sin for the world as a sinless man, there would be no valid payment for anyone’s sins, and nobody could be saved.
John 1:1-18
John 10:30, “I and my Father are one.”
Heb. 1:1-4, “God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds; Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
2. Closely connected with this explicit claim of unity with God is the expression of limitations upon this relationship.
John 5:19, “Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do: for what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.
John 5:30, “I can of mine own self do nothing: as I hear, I judge: and my judgment is just; because I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father which hath sent me.
Matt. 27:46, “And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?”
3. Also, there are specific statements of Jesus in regard to limitations upon His knowledge and pre-incarnate glory. John 17:5, “And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before the world was.
4. The emphasis of New Testament writers upon the real humanity of Jesus can be seen in the account of;
His temptations,’ (Matt. 4:1-11),
His growth and development in wisdom and stature, (Luke 2:52), “And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.
and His learning by the suffering which He endured. (Heb. 4:15), “For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” (Heb. 5:7-8), “Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared; Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience by the things which he suffered;”
5. The most important passage of all, the one which actually contains the term which carries the central idea of the doctrine of kenosis is Philippians 2:5-11, “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
This is further amplified by the Paul’s statement in 2 Corinthians 8:9, “For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his poverty might be rich.”
Paul is not talking about what the Son gave up, but what He gained; not the royal status He forsook, but the role of the Servant which He chose. This is certainly the point of emphasis Paul is making to the Philippians; they are to have the mind of the Servant of God; they are to be filled with humility rather than lording it over one another. It is clear that the context emphasizes the change of form, not the change of content, of the Divine Being. He did not give up deity, but He gained humanity. There was no attrition of the divine nature in the incarnation; His life incarnate, containing the fullness of the Godhead bodily, was offered for man’s redemption.
The doctrine of kenosis emphasizes the divine initiative; it proclaims a salvation which comes from above rather than from below, from God rather than man. It emphasizes the free, voluntary act of the pre-incarnate Son in choosing the path of humiliation. Not of necessity, but out of the sovereign choice of love, He gave up heaven’s glory for the way of the cross. It emphasizes Christ’s conscious restraint in the use of divine powers during the days of His flesh. As the Gospels testify, Jesus had powers upon which He could have called to deliver Himself, but He refused to use them. This voluntary element is of supreme importance in our understanding of the person of Christ. Without it, Christ would become the helpless victim of the incarnation, once the original decision was made; and the significant, repeated, voluntary submission of Christ to suffering and death would be destroyed. The kenosis doctrine preserved the doctrine of the real humanity of Christ. The basic motivation behind most kenotic interpretations is clearly to provide a pattern of thought in which one must take seriously the actual lowliness, condescension, and humiliation of Christ.
If the term "RC" were banished, NYer's post here would also have to be removed.
As another example, Chick is not allowed on the forum at all. If one side cannot use it, neither can the other.
Wonderful post, Blue-duncan. It is a keeper! No one who reads this with an open heart can help but grasp the truth the Holy Spirit intended for all Christians to understand - that our Lord and savior, Jesus Christ, was Jehovah God in the flesh, as promised from the beginning.
Thank you so much for your input!
I now understand why you don't banish the term, I just don't understand why self-proclaimed Christians would consider using it once they are made aware of its history. Perhaps it is just far easier to call oneself a Christian than to actually be one.
As you have wisely, reasonably and skillfully demonstrated, such rules are manageable and fittingly applied evenhandedly.
You have somehow—obviously by Holy Spirit, imho, managed to be a good disciplinarian without losing the human heart and moderately flexible practicality lots of authorities never seem to get the hang of.
I suspect that SOME of the MarkBsnr Capitalizing violations may have happened by too quick a typing and no proof reading. Nevertheless, it’s fitting to apply the rule across the board to that kind of thing.
And the business about thin skinned folks being the disrupters on the open threads is, again, exceedingly sensible and practical.
OF COURSE there will always be folks who NEED to !!!!CONTROL!!!! others
per THEIR sensibilities, priorities and values regardless of who’s turf it is and regardless of who’s in charge. That you manage those aspects of herding all us cats—that you manage those aspects well is probably a miracle day in and day out. Not for your paucity of skills but for our abundance of orneriness.
Hmmmmmm
My Lord, did you have English teeth? Sounds painful.
Given the perjorative use of the contraction RC, I would suggest that it not be allowed. If it means that NYer’s post be removed, so be it, from my perspective. NYer may have a different POV, so I would invite her to post on this.
Yeah, kinda like . . .
a raft of “Christians”
who clearly give Mary far too much billing and fawning adoration while Jesus shuffles alongside—lacking the mother’s lap etc. . . .
A LOT of us Prottys can’t understand folks calling themselves “CHRISTIANS” and engaging in such idolatrous, blasphemous Marian stuff. INCREDIBLE.
Then there’s the rabid clique Roman Catholics et al hereon
who go ballistic when Prottys rail against such ideas, dogmas, rituals, practices, idolatries and blasphemies as though the Prottys were flaying their only son alive with a rusted dull butter knife.
And usually, those are the same folks who insist on taking out of both sides of their fingers while pretending there’s NO contradictions involved!
And STILl they think Prottys should consider them honest, honrable “CHRISTIANS!”
Shockingly amazing.
I don’t know what “English teeth” are.
My heritage is sizeably UK—England, Scotland and Ireland amongst several other threads.
And perhaps not. You speak of control and sensabilities. May I ask if I have ever posted about, say, Pentecostals, without capitalizing the name? Or Reformed? Or Protestant? Have I ever posted a perjorative term in place of their name? With the exception of Episcopagan, I must admit to that. I'm not sure that I am over the top in askng for appropriate decorum as opposed to being too thin skinned.
But the trinity wasn’t what I was supporting with those verses. It was the equality of Jesus to God the Father.
You’ve had your flavors and versions of such. They’ve just not usually been the same sort of rant/irateness/assaultiveness as those you get so exercised over.
Decorum, like a lot of things, is in the eye of the beholder rather frequently and to the largest extent, imho.
My mother had English teeth. Teeth that were crooked, and overlapped, and gums that recessed at alarming rates. Really bad dentition.
Shockingly disappointing that any real Christian would intentionally use that hurtful terms toward another.
Here’s the problem; the verses that you posted do not ‘overcome’ the predominance of the NT showing that Jesus is subordinate to the Father. Every verse that shows that Jesus acts with the Father’s permission, or direction, or action is subordination.
I would ask you to read the Nicene or Athenasian Creed, and then read the Gospels. The Synoptic Gospel teach complete subordinationalism. John, on the other hand, starts to move away from that.
Just my humble 2 cents worth here, but if I use the letters in my posts, it is NEVER intended as a slur. It has seemed to me that it is more of just a convenience than having to spell out Roman Catholic Church - which some people STILL object to, anyway.
We’ve had a discussion, or ten, before about even the use of the title “catholic”. Since the word in the lower case means “universal” it applies to all true Christians who are part of the spiritual body of Christ, to my understanding. So in that sense, I am a catholic but I am no longer a Catholic, nor a member of the Catholic Church under the Bishop of Rome, nor Eastern Orthodox Catholic, or Oriental Catholic, etc.
It seems far easier to just use abbreviations in postings, and I have developed a thicker skin about being called a Protestant, or Protty, or protty, or...
I say don’t look for offence when none is meant and, even then, stick to the issues and not the labels. They don’t mean much to our Lord anyway!
Are you saying that I'm more virtuous than the antiCatholics on FR? :)
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