Posted on 06/21/2012 8:24:00 AM PDT by fishtank
“Calvinism has created more atheists than Christians”
Really? You have objective stats on that? Care to share them with the rest of the class? And do they account for countless conversions in the first Great Awakening, which began under the preaching of Calvinist Jonathan Edwards? Dare I even mention the many more thousands of British converted under Spurgeon, Calvinist Baptist? Or the untold tens of thousands who came to faith through the early Presbyterian missionaries, who were Calvinist to the marrow? I would love to see you try and back that up. But if you are true to form, you will just lob your same one little firecracker and run and hide again. We’ll see.
As for caricatures, virtually all of your oversimplifications are caricatures. Like Einstein says, things should be made as simple as they can be, but no simpler. I am a Calvinist, and I never said “God did it,” in the sense of doing evil. That’s you putting words in my mouth. Is that morally acceptable to you? Just curious. There is that commandment about not bearing false witness. I’m sure it’s in even your version of the Bible.
No, what I asked you to do, and what you have refused steadfastly to do, is to step back from your man-made oversimplifications and consider Scriptures which appear to describe some of those difficult situations you have trouble acknowledging. Is it possible you are under some sort of rule not to engage the “infidel” in Biblical interpretation? I really don’t know. I’m just trying to figure out why you keep ignoring my question. Unlike you, I don’t want to put words in your mouth. I want to know what you think about that passage in Acts. For your benefit, I present it again:
Act 4:27-28 “For truly against Your holy Servant Jesus, whom You anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel, were gathered together to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose determined before to be done.”
To put a fine point on it, my question to you is this. The crucifixion of Christ. Who is responsible for it? Pilate and company, or God?
On the Other Hand" by Randy Travis
Revelations is perhaps the least understood book in the Bible and to base an entire denominational doctrine on the interpretation of it seems a little dubious. You have confused a revelation delivered in a dream by an angel with the direct words spoken by Jesus during His earthly ministry.
That nearly all of the Apostles and man Disciples actually authored some documents addressing His teachings indicates that there was something to compel it. Perhaps that is Tradition.
Peace be with you.
“Curiously, the KJV, and every other modern translation outside of Catholic circles, gets this right. So how did it happen that Jerome got it wrong? HE PROBABLY DIDN’T”...
~ ~ ~
Open to understanding for the above remark. The Vulgate was the first Bible, Jerome better of gotten right!
Hi,
I added the footnote to Genesis 3:15 to explain from the Douay-Rheims. Mary is referred to as “Woman” in Genesis and Revelation, Our Lord address His mother as “Woman” in the Gospel. Mary has a very special place in redemption, the Blessed Trinty’s desire.
The Douay-Rheims Bible is a word for word translation of the Latin Vulgate (382 A.D.) with the Douay-Rheims New Testament published 1582 and the OT published in 1609. The KJV came along in 1611.
See the word change...There is no ministerial priesthood in Protestantism so priest is changed to elder and Bishop is changed to overseerer. There is more than one difference in Acts 20:28. There is a visible hierarchy, the KJV says “feed” instead of “rule.” Those two words do not mean the same. Hundreds of changes and omissions to the KJV. The KJV’s source, King James and his fifty translators doing his bidding, rejecting the Church.
James 5:14
(King James Version) Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord:
(Should be) Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the priests of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
Luke 1:28
( King James Version) Hail, “thou that art highly favored,”the Lord is with thee
(Should Be) Hail “full of grace,” the Lord is with thee.
Genesis 3:15
(King James Version) “Its” shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt “bruise his heel.”
(Should Be) “She” shall bruise thy head in pieces and “thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.”
footnote: She shall crush: Ipsa, the woman; so divers of the fathers read this place, conformably to the Latin: others read it ipsum, viz., the seed. The sense is the same: for it is by her seed, Jesus Christ, that the woman crushes the serpent’s head.
James 5:16
(King James Version)”Confess” your “faults,”
(Should Be) Confess,” therefore, your “sins” one to another
Corinthians 9:5
(King James Version) Instead of “woman”, they translate “wife” here also
(Should Be) Have not we power to lead about a “woman”, a sister
Acts 20:28
(King James Version) Where in the Holy Ghost hath made you “overseers, to feed the church” of God
(Should be) Take heed to yourselves, and to the whole flock, wherein the Holy Ghost hath placed you bishops, to rule the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood.
1 Cor 11:29
(King James Version ) For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body.
(should be) For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord.
Matthew 11:10
(King James Version) Instead of “angel” they say “messenger”
(should Be) For this is he of whom it is written, Behold, I send mine “angel” before thy face.
1 Timothy 3:8
(King James Version) Likewise must the “deacons” be “grave”
(should Be) “Deacons” in like manner “chaste,” not double-tongued
James 5:14
(King James Version) Elders for “priests” here also
(should Be) Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the “priests” of the church, and let them pray over him
Acts 15:2
( King James Version) When therefore Paul and Barnabas hadno small dissension and disputation with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas, and certain other of them, should go upto Jerusalem unto the apostles and elders about this question.
(should Be) They appointed that Paul and Barnabas should go up and certain other of the rest, to the apostles and “priests” unto Jerusalem.
Genesis 47:31
( King James Version) And “Israel bowed himself upon” the bed’s head
(should Be) “Israel adored God, turning to “the bed’s head.
Romans 11:4
(King James Version)I have left me seven thousand men that have not bowed their knees to “THE IMAGE OF” Baal
(should Be) I have left me seven thousand men that have not bowed their knees to Baal
Genesis 37:35
( King James Version) I will go down into the “grave”
should Be) I will go down to my son into “hell” mourning
Genesis 42:38
(King James Version) For “hell” they also say “grave”
(should Be) You will bring down my grey hair with sorrow unto “hell”
3 King 2:6,9
(King James Version) “To the grave
(should Be) Unto “hell”
Hosea 6:14
(King James Version) O death, I will be thy “plagues;” O “grave”, I will be thy destruction
(should Be) O death, I will be thy death; I will be thy sting, O “hell”
2 Timothy 4:8
(King James Version) For “justice” they translate to righteousness and for a “just Judge” they say a righteous judge
(should Be) Concerning the rest, there is laid up for me a crown of “justice,” which our Lord will render to me in that day, a just Judge
1 Timothy 5:17
(King James Version) “Elders” also in this Bible
(should Be) The “priests” that rule will, let them be esteemed worthy of double honor
1 Timothy 5:19
(King James Version) Instead of “priest” they put “elder”
(should Be) Against a “priest” receive not accusation
Can anyone tell me the year Calvin came up with his “irresistible” grace?
Merriam Webster:
irresistible: impossible to resist *an irresistible attraction*
And love conquers all. Go in peace, my friend.
“Robots are not the cursed decendants of an original robot who was once free, but freely choose to enter the curse for himself and all his progeny.”
~ ~ ~
Hi,
I wanted to speak to you about your quote, to maybe change your belief on this subject.
I wondered like most, where Adam and Even ended up? The Church teaches they are both in Heaven. They repented unlike Judas. Oh, the absolute soul saving importance of repentance and Confession.
Continuing...Prophecy (private revelation) helps to make God’s plan explicit. I understand better from prophecy...
God wants to give His creation everything, all of Him, this is how God is. It’s true. We see outside of prophecy even, in Jesus giving humanity His mother from the Cross. She is our mother too. As a human, I don’t know if I could share with everyone one of “the” dearest people to me, probably all of us, my own mother.
Getting to my point, oh how God loved/loves Adam and Eve. They were given three extra gifts called preternatural gifts, which they lost with the fall. One of them is “infused knowledge.” Part of the reasons the fall was so terrible, Adam failed God’s “test” and because of “infused knowledge” given Adam, he knew the consequences of his “no” for all of us.
Oh how God loves Adam even though, his original sin, it’s beautiful to read.
I’ll post an excerpt (a translation) from a “private revelation given Luisa Piccarreta, a Catholic mystic, if not the greatest Catholic mystic. Luisa was given revelations about living in God’s Divine Will. Those revelations are being investigated by the Church at present.
Our Lord to Luisa Piccarreta
September 28, 1928
...My daughter, the first period of the life of ADAM is unforgettable for Us, for him, and for all Heaven. After he fell into sin, he remained like a blind person who, before losing his sight, has done so many beautiful works as to fill Heaven and earth. Who could ever say that those are not works done by him, only because he voluntarily lost his sight? And that, since he can no longer repeat them because he is blind, the ones he has done remain without value? Certainly no one. Or, if a person who applies himself to study science, in the middle of his studies no longer wants to continue, can anyone take away or destroy the good of the science he has acquired, only because he does not continue? Certainly not. If this happens in the human order, much more so, and with more validity and certainty, in the divine order.
So, by virtue of the first period of his life, innocent and carried out all in the unity of Our Fiat, ADAM possesses such glory and beauty that no one can equal him. At the mere sight of him, all of the Blessed recognize how beautiful and majestic the creation of the first man was, enriched with so much grace. In looking at him, they can see, in him, the incalculable good of the Divine Will in the creature, and the joy and happiness that the creature can possess. In him alone, as though within a mirror, the Blessed can see how man was created, the exuberant love that We had for him, the abundance with which We enriched him. We gave him everything, as much as a creature could contain, to the point of overflowing outside and being able to flood the whole earth. If it were not so – if the whole magnificence of Our creative hands could not be seen in ADAM – then the great things We did in the Creation, and that which the creature does and can do in Our Divine Will would not be known even in Heaven. It is Our love that demands this, and also Our justice that wants to keep, in Heaven, the reality of that image, as man was created – and not another man, but the very one who came out of Our creative hands, so that, if the earth does not know him, Heaven may know him. They look at their origin in ADAM, and, grateful, they thank Me and pray that My Fiat may come to reign upon earth, and form more images, more beautiful than ADAM, because he was not a complete work in My Divine Will, but a period of life. Only the Sovereign Queen possesses complete life and works in My Fiat, therefore there is no one who can equal Her. My Will wants to make more complete lives in It, so as to repeat what It did in the Creation, to make known to the earth the way and the order in which the creature was created, and the great, beautiful, holy things that My Divine Will can do in her (Our Lady).
Moreover, you (Luisa) must know that, up to now, I have not manifested to anyone either the great qualities of ADAM, or his sublimity, greatness and sanctity as he lived his first period of life in the unity of My Will; and by virtue of his acts done in It, the great glory that he enjoys in Heaven. Many, on the contrary, believed that since he slipped into sin, he could at most have a glory common to all the other Blessed, or perhaps even less than the others. But wanting to restore again the Kingdom of My Divine Will, I feel within Me a necessity of love to manifest the first epoch of Creation, and the first period of the life of ADAM – all of Divine Will – as well as the glory which he enjoys in Heaven by virtue of It, so that, as the other creatures come to know a good so great, they may dispose themselves and long for the Divine Fiat on earth as It is in Heaven.
>> “All theology is flawed because God is bigger than theology” <<
.
Close!
But all theology is flawed because theology is a creation of men; an attempt to mold God’s word to the ‘sensibilities’ of man.
...My daughter, the first period of the life of ADAM is unforgettable for Us, for him, and for all Heaven. After he fell into sin, he remained like a blind person who, before losing his sight, has done so many beautiful WORKS as to fill Heaven and earth. Who could ever say that those ARE NOT WORKS done by him, only because he VOLUNTARILY lost his sight? And that, since he can no longer repeat them because he is blind, the ones he has done remain without value? Certainly no one.
~ ~ ~
An example, how two sentences of Truth about God and his plan are messed up by believing the heresies, Faith Alone and Calvin’s rejecting Free Will, all from men’s minds not God.
Shrug. I guess you have no interest in discussing how your doctrine of Mary has no support in Genesis 3:15? Your choice.
Didn’t mean to ignore your post. It’s been a busy day and I missed this one. I don’t have my language resources with me at the moment, but a quick survey of your list gives me the impression that the source of your commentary has no regard for original language studies. Just as a quick example, the word “priest” is a modification of “presbyter,” which is a transliteration of the Greek word “presbuteros,” which really does mean “old guy.” We sanitize that a bit and call him “elder.” Trying to retrofit all occurrences of elder to mean priest is horrifically misleading. The KJV translators did just fine with these. Again, I’m not saying it was a perfect translation. But it was and remains a very good one.
I may look at your other passages later, time permitting. Thank you for your response.
Peace,
SR
I have given you my references to the book of Amos in which God Almighty Himself states that He's the one who bring trouble so that people will repent. Additionally, there are multiple verses in which God states that He brings calamity-and He makes no secret about it. And let's not forget the destruction of the world through the Great Flood, the plagues of Egypt, and Sodom, the entire book of Judges, the destruction of Canaan, and God raising up the Chaldean and the Babylonians just for starters. Not to mention calling in demons to execute His plan.
What you are saying is that God doesn't do any of this ignoring the ponderous of scriptural evidence. Incredible. So what do the Orthodox teach about God raining fire down on Sodom? Seems to me, at the very least, what you are saying is that they simply ignore the Old Testament-and I might add probably the verses where Christ Himself talked of these events. It is, after all, easier to fashion a god in the image of our choosing.
And let us not forget the blessed Naomi and Ruth. Naomi left her land with her husbands and two sons and wealth. She lost everything but through her testimony and strength of faith, Ruth returned with her as a believer in God. And Ruth ended up being the great-grandmother of King David.
Yet Naomi said,
Rth 1:20 She said to them, "Do not call me Naomi; call me Mara, for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me.
Rth 1:21 I went away full, and the LORD has brought me back empty. Why call me Naomi, when the LORD has testified against me and the Almighty has brought calamity upon me?"
Rth 4:13 So Boaz took Ruth, and she became his wife. And he went in to her, and the LORD gave her conception, and she bore a son.
Rth 4:14 Then the women said to Naomi, "Blessed be the LORD, who has not left you this day without a redeemer, and may his name be renowned in Israel!
Rth 4:15 He shall be to you a restorer of life and a nourisher of your old age, for your daughter-in-law who loves you, who is more to you than seven sons, has given birth to him."
Rth 4:16 Then Naomi took the child and laid him on her lap and became his nurse.
Rth 4:17 And the women of the neighborhood gave him a name, saying, "A son has been born to Naomi." They named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.
“We sanitize that a bit and call him “elder.”
~ ~ ~
St. Jerome copied “priest”, from the original writings into the first Bible, the Latin Vulgate. An elder is not a priest. You accept an OT priesthood, a priest to offer sacrifice.
The change from priest to “elder”, because there’s no ministerial priesthood in non-Catholic Christianity. I want to follow Our Lord, He established a New Covenant ministerial priesthood. The Apostles were the first priest, Paul too. Read Romans 15:15-16.
May I ask, what about all those other changed verses in the KJV? And what of King James? Is he a holy man to follow by example?
I’ve been made fun of for saying this, I want you to become Catholic, so does God.
Romans 15:15-16
But I have written to you, brethren, more boldly in some sort, as it were putting you in mind: because of the grace which is given me from God. [16] That I should be the minister of Christ Jesus among the Gentiles; sanctifying the gospel of God, that the oblation of the Gentiles may be made acceptable and sanctified in the Holy Ghost.
Merriam Webster
Definition of OBLATION
1
: the act of making a religious offering; : the act of offering the eucharistic elements to God
2
: something offered in worship or devotion : a holy gift offered usually at an altar or shrine
Douay-Rheims Bible
Romans 15:16
That I should be the minister of Christ Jesus among the Gentiles; sanctifying the gospel of God, that THE OBLATION
of the Gentiles may be made acceptable and sanctified in the Holy Ghost.
~ ~ ~
Everyone, throw out the KJV Bible, God won’t be upset. Look, King James’ fellas changed the words and added the word “up.” It doesn’t mean the same, so obvious why.
King James Version (KJV)
Romans 15:16
16 That I should be the minister of Jesus Christ to the Gentiles, ministering the gospel of God, that THE OFFERING UP of the Gentiles might be acceptable, being sanctified by the Holy Ghost.
I remind again, that for Christians our closest image of God is Jesus Christ. If we wish to know God in our human terms...
Your images seem to not wish to do this. But however you get your image if it is of Christ and your Christ causes Hitler in all his wickedness, sending mothers and child to their horrible death..
Then somewhere Harley, no matter how certain you are of your road, you have made a wrong term. This much we can can know.
“Shrug. I guess you have no interest in discussing how your doctrine of Mary has no support in Genesis 3:15? Your choice.”
~ ~ ~
All I can repeat, sorry, do not take it personal, some reformers or other Protestants along the way rejected Mary to distance themselves from Catholicism. You didn’t.
Mary can’t appear to non-Catholic Christians, only by
exception because you all believe heresies. She will soon though appear to you all, maybe during the Great Warning...the awakening...but definitely after. She is your mother and she can help you. It’s the plan of the Trinity. The reason...
Why Our Lord addressed His mother in the Gospel as “woman.”
Mary is the “woman” in Genesis 3:15 and the “woman” in
Rev 12:1. John was introducing her in his last words in
Chapter 11 of Revelation. Mary is the Ark of the New
Covenant.
take care,
“Can anyone tell me the year Calvin came up with his “irresistible” grace?”
~ ~ ~
My question was never answered. It would be good to know.
My statement to you was: "..IMHO, Calvinism has created more atheists than Christians."
Among my reasons for this opinion, repeating myself again, is that the god of atheism strongly resembles the god of Calvinism. Which is, yet again, contrary to the God of orthodox Christianity.
Profitable (or useful) does most definitely not mean 'entirely sufficient.' If this is your proof text for sola scriptura, then it fails its own requirement and is self-negating.
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