Posted on 03/11/2012 4:27:55 PM PDT by Heart-Rest
We may be using different translations of the Bible, but what you quoted is correct. And is the same meaning as being “born again (by the spirit)”, a second birth than the natural one.
That is not hell, that is the functional definition of a Protestant.
All of your “issues” are strawman representations of the real issue, so if they swayed you, its time to turn back to Christ.
Exactly! God is bigger than all of us, and can speak to man any time he wishes. The bible is the record of a single tribe of Israel. I don’t limit God.
That was quite unnecessary and unclassy. Here’s someone making a personal statement of what he/se believes is his/her path to find the Truth and then you call this “weird as hell.” I think you can do better than that.
The NT Scriptures were used and considered authoritative from the time they were written because they were penned by the Apostles or those close to them.
They were compiled later to delineate them from competing pseudo scripture; that doesn't mean they were not considered authoritative from the beginning.
“Catholic apologetical drivel” it is not. Go do some serious reading. It’s the faith of the greatest numbers of scholars, saints, scientists, nobel-laureates, sculptors, philosophers, painters, essayists; astronomers; theologians, statesmen, people from all four corners of the world, the hospital for sinners, and converts from all other faiths, including agnostic and atheists.
The book of John says that Jesus is the Good Shephard and that His sheep hear his voice. He goes on to say that we are not all in the same “pen”. For any church to claim that they are the only way is wrong.
One word that makes me reject the Catholic religion:
Ustasha
Look it up. It’s horrifying. Crimes perpetuated by priests and monks and friars, with the blessing of Pope Pius. Crimes against humanity that were so heinous, that the Nazis themselves decried them.
Then there’s the Catholic church’s role in the slaughter in Rwanda. Look it up if you are interested.
>> “Although there were many inspired writings as early as 40 AD there was no New Testament for another 300 years.” <<
.
An ugly falsehood.
All of the NT writings except the late writings of John were complete within 35 years +/- 0f the day Christ ascended.
The 300 years is when the pagan catholic church was formed by the Pharisees in Rome.
King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
See how faith worked with his works, and by works was faith made perfect? James 2:22
Found a germane quote by preacher Charles Spurgeon, well loved and respected Baptist of the 1800s. He says things ever so much better than I do:
“Is it not written, “The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity”? To liken our thoughts to the great thoughts of God, would be a gross absurdity. Would you bring your candle to show the sun? Your nothingness to replenish the eternal all? It is better to be silent before the Lord, than to dream of supplementing what he has spoken. The Word of the Lord is to the conceptions of men as a garden to a wilderness. Keep within the covers of the sacred book, and you are in the land which floweth with milk and honey; why seek to add to it the desert sands?”
I have a friend who is Greek Orthodox who swears that his church was the very first church, and that the Catholic church broke away and formed their own church during the Byzantine era. So, I guess to find the truth, I need to dig through hundreds of years of church history to determine which is correct.
No thanks.
I have the Bible. It’s all I need. Thanks, anyway.
King James 2000 Bible (©2003)
Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which you have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle.”
2Thessalonians 2:15
The “other sheep” of which Christ spoke to the Jews were the gentiles, and the remaining 10 tribes that had already been dispersed across the globe.
Christ’s church is a mystical body, not a man made corporation, and his church has no buildings, nor wealth. It exists in the hearts of the believers (whever two or 3 are gathered).
The “catholic church” is the whore of the book of revelation, and the rest of the earthly churches are the daughters. None are Christ’s.
Is that the north German-Lutheran or English-Lutheran, Swiss-Lutheran, or Moravian-Lutheran section of heaven? ;^)
Yes. Those words do not apply to post-Biblical catholic creations.
Please, don’t bother trying to “convince” me of the false doctrines of catholicism. I am not buying, and I never will. Peace be with you.
Yes, Jesus does say otherwise. Christianity is not a religion. It is a belief based totally on the Bible. People add their own do’s and don’ts and can’s and cant’s, and it becomes demonations.
I wouldn’t say that the Catholic church is the whore of Babylon mentioned in Revelation. I don’t believe we know for sure who that is until the Tribulation. However, the continuous stating that the Catholic church is the only church is very frustrating to me. Especially when my Greek Orthodox friend says that his church was the very first church and the Catholics broke away. Who am I supposed to believe? Both are adamant in their arguments that they were first. Then I realized - who cares who was first. All we need is the Bible.
The idea that the “one true church” could have carried out the Ustasha tells me that this one true church does not hold to the teachings of Christ.
Right. I'm against "religion," except in the sense that the Bible defines it: helping widows and orphans in their distress.
There were many inspired works including some actually written by Apostles and eye witnesses to the ministry of Jesus and many of these were rejected by the Church as not meeting the standard of inerrancy as the final 27 books of the New Testament. There was heated disagreement over some excluded books like the Epistle of Barnabas and included books like Revelation. We even have books written by the original 12 Apostles, Thomas and Philip, excluded. The matter was not settled until the Catholic Church set the Canon of Scripture at the Council of Rome in A.D. 382 under the authority of Pope Damasus I. Damasus I, the 37th pope was the one who commissioned St. Jermome to write the Vulgate translation of the Bible.
It should be noted that the Sacred Tradition sustained the Church throughout the period from the first Pentecost until the Canon was set. It was this Tradition, as expressed in the Creeds, that served as the standard against which the various writings were compared to determine their acceptability.
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