In Christ Alone (Happy reformation day)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExnTlIM5QgE ^ | Getty, Julian Keith; Townend, Stuart Richard;

[annalex]

Gabriel told Mary about Elisabeth, who was in her sixth month of pregnancy and she hurried to visit her. Mary was engaged to be a normal married Jewish woman and she knew she could not be pregnant until she and Joseph were over the betrothal period. That is where I see "immediacy". See?

No, I am afraid I don't see. Elizabeth had an ongoing pregnancy indeed but that does not in any way attach "immediacy" to the foretold Mary's pregnancy. Besides, Mary's reaction (v 34) preceded the Angel's response to which you refer me.

[annalex]

Well no, scriptures certainly are not ALL catholic as these threads do attest to

On "these threads" (which and where?) I see plenty of questions about the Catholic faith in general and asking for Catholic explanations of certain passages. I also see the explanation then causing further questions, some stemming form lack of understanding, others from curiosity, yet others from a desire not to leave the field after the game is over. I do not see any instance where a biblical passage would be posed to me and I would not be able to give a Catholic explanation, other than, of course where a miracle not subject to laws of nature is discussed. If there is such an instance, please point it to me by thread and post number. You will do me a favor by also reviewing for yourself the answer I gave to that post before we go into circular posts.

[annalex]

Annalex: How do you knwo the scripture reflects what God had to say?

Metmom: How do you know that church tradition reflects what God had to say?

In the same way you believe the Holy Scripture, by believing the witness of the Holy Catholic Apostolic Church.

You were supposed to answer the question, posed in irony, in your own head, Mom.

[kosta50]

Without reference to anything Kolo said, man's sovereignty is limited and man's will never supersedes God's.

Then Judas really didn't betray Jesus, he only acted according to God's will?

In my translation I don't see any conflict in word or intent: Deut. 30:14 No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

The Hebrew version says "so that you may do it."  And what is the "it " in this case? Paul, however, misquotes Deuteronomy 30:14, and introjects faith in it to support his novel theology.

The problem is your Bible version (NIV), FK, which is notorious for ad libing and "doctoring" the Bible to fit Protestant doctrine. In this case, the KJV, English Standard Version, Young's Literal Version, etc. agree with the Hebrew. The Catholic NAB version, strangely says "observe it" thereby translating the Qal as a Niphal! But the NIV choice (obey it) is not in the lexicon for Hebrew asah.

Paul's correct starting point is that it is God Who gives us our faith and that by faith we are saved.

But there is no faith mentioned in the Deuteronomy 30:14.  Paul added it. We can's say he was using the Septuagint, because the Septuagint also says "do it" (poiein).

Paul is very clear in his teachings that this Christian heart is not something that we earn through works or because we are "good" enough.

But that's not what Deuteronomy 30 is all about, FK. Paul alters the holiest of Jewish scriptures (the Torah) for his own doctrinal purpose. That's fraud.

satan's will is certainly subjugated to God's, as we see at the beginning of Job. But I think whether we should characterize satan as "doing God's will" is a matter of semantics. In one sense "yes" because nothing can overrule God's will and everything that God wills, happens. In another sense, "no" because of course God hates all sin and is the author of none of it.

I hope you realize that this is untenable. If it is merely semantics, then it is insignificant (something like Clinton's "is"), a way to wiggle out of a logical corner. You can't serve two masters, not even the devil. If God is in charge than what's with the final "battle" between the good and evil? A show?

Naturally if we took the time to give individual thanks for all that is due God, then that is all we would be doing every waking minute.

And what is not due to God?

So, Christians understandably focus on giving thanks for those things that are easily understood. But of course that doesn't mean we shouldn't give thanks for what is painful. Paul gives us a perfect example...2 Cor 12:10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Do I take it then that your Church gives thanks to God for the tsunamis, the Holocaust, and the like? Do you thank him when someone falls ill or dies? It's funny that I find the Protestant attitude as a direct opposite of showing any delight in being weak, or giving thanks to God for persecutions, insults, and so on.

As far as other Protestants, I don't know how many would agree with the way I am expressing these ideas, but I know that every Reformer would agree with my sentiments that nothing trumps the will of God, and that whatever God wills is done.

So, when do Reformers celebrate the Andrea Yates Day?

Absolutely, couldn't have said it better myself! Isn't it glorious? :)

No wonder, FK, that Calivnsits make up only 10% of Baptists...

I still disagree that everything is God's "doing" just because He wills it.

LOL! Does that include the Bible?

Now, if evil was a part of the plan and God "injected" evil into a person thus forcing the desired result then you would be right.

Evidently you must have missed the passages where God intentionally sends evil and confusing spirits into someone to get what he wants.

But I say it doesn't work like that.

Oh yes, that makes all the difference...

[annalex]

When Protestants allow for individuality, it's a sign of the problems inherent in Protestantism, we're shredded for our alleged 30,000 different denominations, and yet Catholics laud the Catholic church for the very thing they condemn in others.

Diversity of practice is good. It is also good among the Protestants. Diversity of doctrine is a sign of traditions of men, not a good thing. It is true that "the core belief in salvation by faith alone in Christ alone" is common to all Protestants, but that is not the fullness of faith, nor is it an agreement with your own Bible Alone since it is not to be found, and is directly controverted, by the Bible in the second half of James 2.

You have, for example, a serious division between the Armenians and the Calvinists, the High Church and the Low Church, and even in how you interpret your cardinal error of Faith Alone. On occasion, for example, I come across posts that could be validly made by a Catholic, on the other hand, posts grossly discordant with the Scripture. Interestingly, when I adress the latter, I am told that in fact I shoudl not generalize about all Protestants. Is it not then a sign of doctrinal disunity among the Protestants?

[kosta50]

The prohibition against eating blood predates the Law. Yes, it was reiterated again in the Law and was a sin.

Oh sure, that's why good German Lutherans and Spanish Catholics make really tasty blood sausages. :)

[annalex]

You mean Ελα, βρε, παιδακι μου?

I need to visit Greece again. However, the inner ear says "μπρε".

[count-your-change]

Though I’ll not take time to search the dictionary for you, I’m confident that it shows “conceived” has not the same meaning as “cleansed” despite your claim that it’s just timing.

“The difference is in the moment of the cleaning, but that is not indicated in the scripture you cite”

That statement makes no sense.

[boatbums]

If works are a by-product of faith, why does the Bible exhort to them,

Is that a rhetorical question? I'll give you an answer anyway so you cannot come back and say I never did. We are reminded, exhorted, encouraged, etc., to good works because we are still here. Simple as that! As long as we are in this human flesh, we still have the old nature within as well as the new. Paul spoke about the battles he still had with the sin nature - doing what he didn't want to do, and not doing what he did want to do - and he had been saved 25+ years or so when he wrote it.

Certainly you understand that just because a person is a Christian, it doesn't mean they never sin again. In fact, I think the devil tries even harder to tempt believers into sinful living - especially those in ministry - so as to discourage them and cast shame upon the name of Christ. The clerical scandals within your own church are ample proof of that. The unsaved need no temptation as it just goes along with their natural self. Children of God have within them the new nature, the spiritual nature, and they have a strength as well as the desire to not give in to the sin nature. That is what is meant by good works naturally following true faith. It is a byproduct of the new nature and if a new convert says he has faith but his life shows no change towards a godly life or even a desire TO change, then we may conclude that their faith is not genuine.

Not everyone is the same, obviously, so we all have our own walk with the Lord, our own race to run, so to speak. So we should be exhorted and encouraged in how to walk and run in the way that brings glory to God. We "work out our salvation" not to get it but because we have it and we need to grow in grace and in the power of God.

I don't know why God leaves us here on earth to sometimes fall, other than I have seen these lo 40+ years with him that he uses every trial, every sin, every failing to bring me closer to him. Through it all I've seen that he has never forsaken me, never lost me, never cast me out or left me but, as the father of the prodigal son, he was always drawing me back to him. My sins have brought me to a deeper remorse and repentance than I ever would have had as an outsider. So, yes, we are a new creation in Christ that God leads and directs and disciplines through his Word. I am a far different person spiritually now than when I first was saved. That is what this new nature causes to happen within us and it is how we can know that we really are His, we are really born again.

Finally, you say "I choose to do good works because the Bible tell me I will not be saved otherwise" . What this proves to me is that you don't grasp the meaning of grace for, if you did, you would understand that no amount of works we can possibly do can bring us salvation. If they could, Christ is dead in vain. I and others have given you verse after verse that says this and only you can answer why you don't see it. But, I mean this from the bottom of my heart, I pray you one day will.

[kosta50]

Raising of hands in praise to God is an ancient practice, in fact the OT Jews made it a tradition.

Did they? You mean the Jews worship "Portestant" style? Nehemiah 8:6 And Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God. And all the people answered, Amen, Amen, with lifting up their hands: and they bowed their heads, and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground

The Hebrew text Tanakh) says "and they bent their heads and prostrated themselves to the Lord on their faces to the ground."

Now, I have yet to see Protestants prostrate themsleves face to the ground...

Lifting up the hands is not the same as stretching out arms of the arms, but turning their palms upwards, boatbums.

This is like night and day what the Portestants do...

[kosta50]

I need to visit Greece again. However, the inner ear says "μπρε"

Technically speaking you may be right. The word is I believe Turkish.

[boatbums]

I am POSTIVE that you have not seen every Portestant(sic) and how they worship. Regardless, it is none of your concern how anyone worships God. You can mock it, sure, as you so eagerly do whenever the mood strikes, it seems, but, as Metmom's posts showed each person answers to God in how they worship him and live their lives. I shouldn't judge them in that and you shouldn't either. It's unbecoming and juvenile. I thought you were supposed to be above all that.

[annalex]

I'll probably have the stamina for this first post, but not for the second. Understand that often in your posts I agree to much, so if I do not respond to some passage that is because I do not find enough to disagree upon.

based upon faith, presumably due to some evidence

Yes, and the evidence is twofold. First, it is the scriptural evidence (like the Bereans). I do not see anything in the scripture that the Catholic Church does not teach, -- as opposed to things some interpretations insinuate contradict the Church, while the Church has its plausible explanation that fits the context better. Second is the guidance of the Holy Ghost manifest in continuing survival and adaptibility of both the Catholic Church and her Eastern sister Orthodox Church. That is contrary to the spirit of the times so perfectly catered to by the Protestantism. No other pre-medieval institution survives today in such historical authenticity. One coming close is the Roman Republic, but you win no arguments today in the American Senate by saying "Romans did it" or "Cicero wrote it". An analogous argument today in the Catholic Chruch has not lost any potency -- it usually wins.

Rome is the OTC

OTC is Old Testament Church? We don't claim it. The Catholic Priesthood is Melchizedek, not Levi. We claim provenance with the pregnancy of Mary in some mystical sense, and the Pentecost in the Upper Room in the formal sense. The "OTS" is at best a type, such as Abel, or the baptismal types in the Flood, the Exodus and Joshua, or David impersonating Elizabeth and the leaping John with the Tora scroll.

in no place do we see the church being promised that it would be infallible whenever it universally spoken on faith and morals, in union with the Pope, while Jesus reproof of magisterial presumption teaching things which were contrary to Scripture, some of which they could have argued was derived from it, argues against Rome's presumption in doing likewise

We see the promise of not failing in Matthew 16:18, in Peter having the prayer of Christ to confirm his brethren in Luke 22:31-32, -- the promise made even more substantial because it contains the admission of human frailty of all Pertine successors, starting with Peter himself. As I admit, were I to see a scripture that is in contradiction to the teaching of the Church, that would possibly destroy my faith, -- but it would by the same token destroy my faith in the Scripture also, because one cannot have faith in the product while not trusting the deliverer of the product. But I do not see such contradiction, and I sure asked you Protestants to show it to me. I see perceived contradictions, but nothing I cannot see with a Catholic eye as a harmony.

insofar as belief that the Roman Catholic magisterium “eliminates the doubts, confusion and misunderstanding which inevitably results from individual interpretations” (see below) this is a rather specious claim, as [7 points follow]

Well, it eliminates doubt where the Magisterium desires to eliminate doubt. For example, one who does not believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist (belief coming form the Holy Scripture) or efficacy of prayer to Mary and the saints (Holy Tradition) or the intrinsic evilhood of abortion (Living Magisterium) cannot make a reasonable mistake of being Catholic. Where there is leeway is because the Apostolic Church does not intend to have a single determination (e.g. what language to use in the liturgy, whether married men can be priests, whether the donkey literally spoke to Balaam, whether divinely authored evolution is a possibility). Both certainty and incertainty serve the same purpose, to lead men away from error and allow healthy exchange of ideas at the same time.

the cult-like requirement of implicit trust in a teaching magisterium, which in times past implied loss of salvation by failure to do so

It still implies a danger of losing one's salvation. However, Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus is often misunderstood by Protestants because of their Faith Alone instincts. We are judged by our works (Rm 2:6-10, Mt 25:31-46). One dissenting from the Living Church of the Living God endangers his salvation because of the sustenance that the sacrament of the Church would have given him. It is not a direct, or automatic result of his dissent. For example, a Protestant cut off from the living water of the Church still can read the scripture and be inspired to his feat of faith. If he follows the call to holy life, he will be saved and die Catholic.

a highly presumptuous stretch

So test the presumtion. I have not seen a verse that cannot be easily and in context explained, again, barring attempts at explainign the miraculous. Many tried, on this thread alone.

Catholics come in close to last in Bible reading, and substantially disagree with her and each other

You are inserting a Protestant yardstick to get a Protestantism-favoring response. The Catholic may not read the scripture because they do not get the essentials of the faith from the scripture alone. They hear the scripture in a larger percentage than in a typical Protestant sermon in the course of the Mass; they know the lessons of the scripture. The Catholics are not trained to deliver chapter and verse prooftexts. That skill is a sport, not knowledge. When a Catholic, such as the Catholic Answers crew, or even yours truly, gives the idea of learning scriptural prooftexting some attention, we do just fine. There is not a verse in the New Testament that in context contraverts any Catholic doctrine. Whether many Catholics cannot prove it is not the point: the Priotestants, as I demonstrate daily, cannot prooftext their point either, and they sure try.

Catholic unity is based upon confidence in the church itself

Yes. Which stands in stark contrast to the Protestant unity based on a few prooftexts from Pauline epistles that do not say what you pretend they say and came from the same Church in the first place.

[Quix]

Protestants [including me], have prostrated themselves in worship, with their faces to the floor . . . routinely in churches I've been in, virtually all my 64 years. The Chinese term is kowtow ("kuh tow").

It would appear, Kosta, that your awareness & convictions about such practices is as flawed as your awareness and convictions about God, His Ways and His Word generally, these days.

Further, It's highly likely that the Old Testament outstretched arms, lifting 'holy' hands up to God was the same as in Pentecostal circles.

1. Pentecostals do it both ways.

2. Old Testament Jews likely did it both ways.

3. The outstretched arms way is obeying Scripture in Christ's own words about coming to God as little children. Perhaps you've seen a 2 year old with outstretched arms reaching for Daddy to pick her up.

4. There are times when "assuming the position" [i.e. "the position" of waiting expectantly receptively on The Lord--with hands held palms open and up--held half-way up at slightly above or at waist level] a la your Jewish pic, suddenly becomes inadequate. One's worship rising up within, Holy Spirit rising up within--compels one, urges one, fosters one, leads one, to stretch as far as possible TOWARD DADDY GOD.

5. I'd have thought that someone purportedly as versed in the Old Testament as you, would have recalled the WAVE OFFERING of the Old Testament. One doesn't do a "WAVE OFFERING" with arms held half way. GOD is virtually NEVER THAT interested in HALF-WAY WORSHIP. WAVE OFFERINGS by their very NATURE are with OUT-STRETCHED ARMS.

1.Exodus 29:24
And thou shalt put all in the hands of Aaron, and in the hands of his sons; and shalt wave them for a wave offering before the LORD.

2.Exodus 29:26
And thou shalt take the breast of the ram of Aaron's consecration, and wave it for a wave offering before the LORD: and it shall be thy part.

3.Exodus 29:27
And thou shalt sanctify the breast of the wave offering, and the shoulder of the heave offering, which is waved, and which is heaved up, of the ram of the consecration, even of that which is for Aaron, and of that which is for his sons:

4.Leviticus 7:30
His own hands shall bring the offerings of the LORD made by fire, the fat with the breast, it shall he bring, that the breast may be waved for a wave offering before the LORD.

5.Leviticus 8:27
And he put all upon Aaron's hands, and upon his sons' hands, and waved them for a wave offering before the LORD.

6.Leviticus 8:29
And Moses took the breast, and waved it for a wave offering before the LORD: for of the ram of consecration it was Moses' part; as the LORD commanded Moses.

7.Leviticus 9:21
And the breasts and the right shoulder Aaron waved for a wave offering before the LORD; as Moses commanded.

8.Leviticus 10:15
The heave shoulder and the wave breast shall they bring with the offerings made by fire of the fat, to wave it for a wave offering before the LORD; and it shall be thine, and thy sons' with thee, by a statute for ever; as the LORD hath commanded.

9.Leviticus 14:12
And the priest shall take one he lamb, and offer him for a trespass offering, and the log of oil, and wave them for a wave offering before the LORD:

10.Leviticus 14:24
And the priest shall take the lamb of the trespass offering, and the log of oil, and the priest shall wave them for a wave offering before the LORD:

11.Leviticus 23:15
And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven sabbaths shall be complete:

12.Leviticus 23:20
And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the firstfruits for a wave offering before the LORD, with the two lambs: they shall be holy to the LORD for the priest.

13.Numbers 6:20
And the priest shall wave them for a wave offering before the LORD: this is holy for the priest, with the wave breast and heave shoulder: and after that the Nazarite may drink wine.

.

6. However, Proddys likely welcome your being your habitual contrarianly wrong most any time, about Scripture and authentic Christianity. It's become a sad to an occasionally amusing FR !!!!TRADITION!!!!

7. Worshippers of The Living God in congregations not given to such practices are missing out on a very Biblical Blessing in their avoidance of a very Biblical practice. Avoidant, passive !!!!TRADITIONS!!!! of man are no more Christian and admirable or Godly than active !!!!TRADITIONS!!!! of man.

8. Both sacrifice a deree of, a measure of, obedience and of a Blessing strictly because of giving social pressure and what other humans think of one's actions, priority over God. I can't find a single Biblical example of God EVER being PLEASED with such an upside-down priority, practice.

[Quix]

[HossB86]

Fantastic post—and how wonderful an example of how Papists argue always from a false premise.

I would echo rnmom’s query: does this poster KNOW what The Gospel is???

Hoss

[HossB86]

Be careful: you’re painting with a mighty broad brush...

“...rampant homosexualism, and rampant promiscuity...”

Those charges alone could be leveled at the priesthood of the RCC alone!!

Hoss

[HossB86]

“...embrace an omnipotent, omniscient, timeless, infinitely perfect God.”

Funny. If you would only do that, you’d leave the falsehoods of Papism behind.

Hoss

[Kolokotronis]

"I need to visit Greece again. However, the inner ear says "μπρε" Nope. Kosta was right; it's "vrai" not "brai".

Alex, shall I send Kosta the clip of a real Metropolitan? :)

[esquirette]

“Scare tactics? Is that all you have?”

Fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. Psalm 111:10