Posted on 10/08/2010 3:51:38 PM PDT by Colofornian
We stepped outside on Sunday for our ritual family walk.
I immediately heard shouts from my kids.
"Mom, the neighbor kids are riding their bikes on Sunday!"
We have had this conversation a thousand times: Our family has rules that don't apply to other families. They go to different churches. All churches are good.
We are in that stage with our children where we try and do the delicate balance of teaching them correct principles without turning them into Pharisees for the rest of the neighborhood.
I'm sure you've all had that experience where you go out to a restaurant, your child stands up in the booth and yells across the room, "That man over there is smoking!" And you whisper between clenched teeth, "That's OK. They don't know better. We don't judge others. Sit down, please."
We're not big soda drinkers, so every time our kids see an aluminum can emblazoned with the Coca-Cola symbol, they go into hysterics. The same goes for coffee makers. My oldest son was crushed when he discovered that his beloved kindergarten teacher drank a cup of coffee every morning.
It's a tricky thing, this teaching business. I feel strongly that our children need to learn right from wrong. If we don't teach it to them, they'll learn to judge by the world's standards, which at the moment are pretty low.
So we teach them about honoring the Sabbath, keeping the Word of Wisdom, sharing their toys, being baptized and growing up with very specific commandments.
We couch it all by trying to explain that these are our beliefs and our family rules. They only apply to us. But children see things in black and white.
So they trudge into the house, as my son did on a recent afternoon, looking very dejected.
"Mom," Jackson said, "Jimmy doesn't want to join our church. He only reads the Bible, even though it's incorrect. And he said he believes in one hundred different gods. I don't know if we can ever be friends again."
I put my arm around his shoulder.
"Jimmy is Catholic," I told him. "Catholics are wonderful. He believes in one God. He was probably referring to Catholic saints. And your friendship with Jimmy is not over. You can be friends with all people." Jackson shrugged and looked relieved.
"OK, well I'm going out to play."
These are important conversations. It shows that my kids are actually trying to ponder and fit their own belief system in a world filled with various ideologies. I believe it's an important step in religious development.
And sometimes kids simply have to learn the hard way.
When I was 9 we visited family in Washington State. A group of us cousins gathered around my cousin Darcy for some sobering news.
"Grandma and Grandpa smoke!" she told us.
This was an absolute shock. Didn't they know about the Word of Wisdom, not to mention lung cancer?
We decided Grandma and Grandpa needed to be informed. We ran inside and drew "No Smoking" signs on paper plates.
Then we gathered outside in a circle around Grandma and Grandpa's trailer and chanted "PEOPLE THAT SMOKE— ARE PEOPLE THAT'LL CHOKE!"
We bellowed and marched, determined to educate our grandparents and bring them back to the fold.
My grandparents didn't say a word to us. They were so offended they simply packed their bags and drove back to Florida.
That day I learned a whopping lesson in tolerance and love. My grandparents were outstanding people. They were fully aware of the Word of Wisdom and lung cancer. It was not my place to judge them. More than a decade later, they were present at my marriage in the Portland Oregon Temple. They remained faithful to the gospel until the end of their lives.
How to explain these shades of gray to my children?
At the recent General Relief Society Broadcast, President Monson gave a remarkable talk on judging others.
It was a reminder to me that I teach my children right and wrong, but they learn to apply love and tolerance by watching my day-to-day actions. The application doesn't always happen in an instant. Sometimes it takes years for our children to really grasp these principles.
In the meantime, I will continue to gently remind my children that it is not their job to call the neighborhood kids to repentance. You can ride bikes on Sunday and still go to heaven. You can drink coffee and still be a fantastic kindergarten teacher.
You can smoke and learn to forgive an obstinate granddaughter brandishing a paper-plate sign, and love her enough to be present at her wedding.
The learning continues for all of us. You're never too old to stop judging.
THIS Christian doesn't claim to be JEWISH, and doesn't think that LAWS, given to a SPECIFIC GROUP, apply to him!
(As some kind of REQUIREMENT or ELSE! anyway...)
If it's your assertation that these are the ONLY things that were expected of gentile Christians than early Christians must have been very unrighteous indeed.
For example could gentile Christians kill others? It's not on the list. How about coveting? It's not on the list. Stealing? It's not on the list. I think the answer is clar that these aren't the ONLY things expected of gentile Christians. So what was happening?
Well, gentile Christians came out of pagan religions and pagan cultures. It just so happens that these were the most common elements of pagan worship.
What the council determined was that in order to attend services with Jewish Christians that these things must be stopped immediatedly so as not to offend the brethren.
Act 15:19 Therefore I judge that we should not trouble those from among the Gentiles who are turning to God,
Act 15:20 but that we write to them to abstain from things polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from things strangled, and from blood.
Act 15:21 For Moses has had throughout many generations those who preach him in every city, being read in the synagogues every Sabbath."
That last verse is curious. Why did they add it if they meant that the ONLY thing expected of gentile Christians was those thing?
Well it's BECAUSE they would learn the way, Christianity, from the synagogues every sabbath day.
Following your line of reasoning there were two standards of Christianity...one for Jewish Christians and one for gentile Christians. That's goes against logic, history and scripture:
Eph 4:4 There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling;
Eph 4:5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism;
Eph 4:6 one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
1Co 12:12 For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ.
1Co 12:13 For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit.
There's no scripture that says that Christians are to be divided. That Christian standards are different according to what you were before you became a Christian.
And again, the sabbath wasn't a controversy. If the Jewish Christians THOUGHT that this meant the overthrow of the Lord 4th commandment there would surely have been a huge argument.
But of course this didn't happen. Again this is just modern Christians attempting to justify behavior that goes against scripture. It's tradition and not supportable by scripture.
I didn't WRITE the letter that was delivered to the GENTILES.
If you want to say that the SCRIPTURE is ACTS 15 is wrong; I guess you can; but for me; I'll believe is says EXACTLY what it means.
You're not though. You're disregarding all context, all logic, all scripture and all history and trying to shoehorn it into a postbiblical, traditional view. I'll admit it works, but only if one keeps their head buried in the sand.
Can you answer one question? Why was there no controversy about sabbath keeping in scripture? Why no big arguement about breaking one of the Lord Jesus Christ's ten commandments? There was a huge controversy about circumcision for example. Why not the same for the sabbath commandment?
I'm not sure what your point is....can you explain?
I can't mindread TODAY; let alone go back some 2000 years to do it!
I can't mindread TODAY; let alone go back some 2000 years to do it!
It's a response to:
Following your line of reasoning there were two standards of Christianity...one for Jewish Christians and one for gentile Christians. That's goes against logic, history and scripture:
The answer is because there was no controversy. It was as normal for Christians to hallow the 7th day sabbath in biblical times as it is for the Vatican to hallow Sunday today. It was the cultural norm, brought about by the written word of Lord and thousands of years of history and culture. It took hundreds of years to finally stop sabbath keeping among gentile Christians in what became traditional Christianity. And this was only by the traditional church ruling that their word took precedence over God's word:
In the year 365, The Council of Laodicea: Canon 29:
Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord's Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ.
Are you saying that there were two standards of Christianity for those who came from a Jewish background and those who came from a gentile background?
The Jews, and especially the Pharisees, considered that their rabbincal interpretation of the Law of Moses were as binding as the actual written text. For example:
Gal 2:11 Now when Peter had come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed;
Gal 2:12 for before certain men came from James, he would eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing those who were of the circumcision.
Gal 2:13 And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy.
Gal 2:14 But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter before them all, "If you, being a Jew, live in the manner of Gentiles and not as the Jews, why do you compel Gentiles to live as Jews?
Gal 2:15 We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles,
Gal 2:16 knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.
Now why this is germane is that there was NO law in scripture, from the Lord, that said that Jews couldn't dine with gentiles. But over the years the Jews had lost their way and had put up walls and barriers that not only separated them from gentiles, but also separated gentiles from the gospel. This isn't what God intended.
Eph 2:11 Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands—
Eph 2:12 that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
Eph 2:13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
Eph 2:14 For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation,
Eph 2:15 having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace,
These ordinances were the countless rules and regulations developed by the jewish religion over the centuries...the burdens that even they couldn't bear.
Eph 2:16 and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.
This is what the Lord intended all the time...a unfied people unified by obeying and submitting to the Lord and his commands.
It took time for Peter and some other Jews to learn and understand the division between what was scriptural and what was cultural and traditional.
Nope.
Jesus said He came for the lost sheep of Israel; NOT the Gentiles; did He not?
Therefore, one would assume that everything He did and said in the Scriptures would be appled to them.
Are you saying there is a difference between the LAW and the law?
I wonder how long it'll take the MORMONs to figger this out!
And to future Christians, those who follow Christ:
Mat 10:17 But beware of men, for they will deliver you up to councils and scourge you in their synagogues.
Mat 10:18 You will be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles.
Mat 12:15 But when Jesus knew it, He withdrew from there. And great multitudes followed Him, and He healed them all.
Mat 12:16 Yet He warned them not to make Him known,
Mat 12:17 that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
Mat 12:18 "BEHOLD! MY SERVANT WHOM I HAVE CHOSEN, MY BELOVED IN WHOM MY SOUL IS WELL PLEASED! I WILL PUT MY SPIRIT UPON HIM, AND HE WILL DECLARE JUSTICE TO THE GENTILES.
Mat 12:17 that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying:
Mat 12:18 "BEHOLD! MY SERVANT WHOM I HAVE CHOSEN, MY BELOVED IN WHOM MY SOUL IS WELL PLEASED! I WILL PUT MY SPIRIT UPON HIM, AND HE WILL DECLARE JUSTICE TO THE GENTILES.
Mat 12:19 HE WILL NOT QUARREL NOR CRY OUT, NOR WILL ANYONE HEAR HIS VOICE IN THE STREETS.
Mat 12:20 A BRUISED REED HE WILL NOT BREAK, AND SMOKING FLAX HE WILL NOT QUENCH, TILL HE SENDS FORTH JUSTICE TO VICTORY;
Mat 12:21 AND IN HIS NAME GENTILES WILL TRUST."
Luk 2:29 "Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, According to Your word;
Luk 2:30 For my eyes have seen Your salvation
Luk 2:31 Which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,
Luk 2:32 A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, And the glory of Your people Israel."
Because he was sent to preach to Israel during his earthly incarnation doesn't mean that the gentiles, later preached to by Paul, wouldn't follow the commandments he created holy.
Paul himself said:
1Co 11:1 Imitate me, just as I also imitate Christ.
Scripture shows clearly that Christ created and affirmed the 7th day sabbath as his, the Lord's sabbath:
Mat 12:8 For the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath."
Paul kept the sabbath and taught gentiles to do the same since he was imitating Christ:
Act 13:42 So when the Jews went out of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath.
Since Christ created the sabbath it's only clear that he would keep the sabbath:
Heb 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Sure there is. In that verse I showed you a totally non-scriptural practice (jews refusing to eat with gentiles) and it was referred to as a "work of the law".
It was a law of the Jews, but not a scriptural one. There are (or were) thousands of such laws which were a burden to the Jewish people.
For example:
Joh 5:8 Jesus said to him, "Rise, take up your bed and walk."
Joh 5:9 And immediately the man was made well, took up his bed, and walked. And that day was the Sabbath.
Joh 5:10 The Jews therefore said to him who was cured, "It is the Sabbath; it is not lawful for you to carry your bed."
It was against the law for a man to carry a bed on the sabbath...where is that in scripture? I'll save you the time...it doesn't exist. It was a law added by the Jews.
So yes, there are two laws. Laws of men and laws of God.
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