Posted on 05/12/2014 6:52:28 PM PDT by Gamecock
Edited on 05/12/2014 6:57:47 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
VATICAN CITY - Pope Francis on Monday declared that everyone has the right to be baptized, even aliens should they come knocking on the church's door.
Christians cannot "close the door" to all those who seek baptism even if they are "green men, with a long nose and big ears, like children draw," the pope said at his daily Mass, according to Vatican Radio.
(Excerpt) Read more at gmanetwork.com ...
Churches identifying as New Testament assemblies are not a denomination, because they are independent, autonomous local assemblies of regenerated believer-disciples baptized by immersion, led by spiritually mature elders and deacons, maintaining their purity through strong preaching and Scripture-based church discipline. There are thousands and thousands of these local churches across our nation and across the global world, subscribing to the principle of "one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism of Disciples. They eschew the paradigm of catholicity, seeing it as an early intrusion of philosophy into the Christ-ordained Holy Spirit-led conduct of the local assembly, ascribing catholicity as the logical end of the outworking of Platonic pantheism.
Regarding the recognition of water baptism of disciples, part of which can be thought of as a funeral, you might want to take a look at this article:
BAPTISM OF DISCIPLES OR WATER BAPTISM UNTO RESURRECTION - FUNERAL
written by Fred Wittman and published by Happy Heralds, Inc.
This is self-contradictory. The paradigm of catholicity IS "one Lord, one Faith, and one Baptism"
We might actually share something here. We see in baptism symbolism with Christ's death and rebirth.
So would you say the church you attend is "non-denominational"? The web-broadcaster you cite *seems* to lean Baptist. Some would call Baptists non-denominational, at least the Southern ones. :)
Commissioned by authority and command of Jesus Christ (Mt. 28:18-0, Mk. 16:15-16, Lk. 24:46-47, 2 Tim. 2:2); and discipled by several, principally by a retired pastor/missionary who is founder of a Bible seminary, writer/teacher, and translator of the entire Greek New Tsstament.
And you? And why do you ask? Is the Scripture unable to stand alone?
Apparently scripture is not able to stand alone for you - you cite your teachers and their exegesis.
The reason I asked is because the context of your previous reply: “Thus the first Disciples were to bear the fruit of disciples, which is more disciples. They were also to train their disciples so that they (the disciplers) could commission their second generation of disciples likewise....”
You seemed to imply an apostolic church with a lineage, handed down teaching discipler to disciple who becomes a discipler and so on.
You reply here indicates perhaps not. It seems it’s all up to you. I guess you decide whether your discipler has “personally instructing [them] in The Faith as they had been taught by Him, to the point where these new disciples were fit.”
Seems the idea or method you cite in one reply - special disciples personally instructing and deeming fit, passing down through the ages - goes off the rails into individualism when it gets to you today.
Do you have the same Lord, the same Faith, and the same Baptism of the Spirit?
Nope. It's all up to the promises of a generative Seed, a God saving, a genuine gospel preached, a discipler pointing to doctrines taught by The Holy Ghost in a verbally inspired, infallible, inerrant, written Word, a faithful translation, interpreted by a literal/grammatical/historucal/cultural hermeneutic, and preached by faithful stewards of His Dominion.
No, it’s upside down. You decide who the discipler is and pointing to what doctrines. The student picks the teacher that agrees with the student.
This is an individualistic schema, not the model in Acts.
I don't know your views on who Christ is, whether they are Arian, Gnostic or whatever; so, I'm don't know on this one. However it does seem obvious that we differ quite a bit on the doctrines of faith and baptism.
Outside the Church we say a great variety of difference in all three of these. I think this is obviously a result of sola scriptura - as noted earlier.
Churches referring to congregations of the same in different locations; all under the same teaching authority, not the authority of each individual as he/she wishes to teach.
I’m sorry, meant to type:
“Outside the Church we *see* a great variety..”
Even the Romanists do not have a single view. The problem is not with the Scriptures. My opinion, based on the testimony of Scripture, is errant translation and/or faulty interpretation, as well as the vista of a man's spirit dead to The God. Of course, it is the fallibility of man coming in when unguided by the Holy Spirit's version of the Scriptures as set down by His vessels. That includes you, and it includes me, and it includes the patristics, and it includes the magisterium of the Romanists. In the end, every one has a slightly different outlook from any other, which will be harmonized by further Bible study and fellowship in Heaven, when rivalry is not an issue and righteousness is the rule. IIRC He honors His Word above even His Name under Whose authority the Disciple's Baptism is administered.
If God created the universe then that included Martians. If the Martians are believers, then why should they be denied baptism?
That sounds a little bent to me. How can a disciple agree with the master when he doesn't yet know what the master is going to teach? And why should a rabbi not choose students who already have a different opinion than what he is going to teach?
Recognizing that Jesus is the first-begotten from the dead ones, but was He reborn? Or was His soul and spirit rejoined to His previous wounded, bloodless, but uncorrupted un-reborn body?
Slightly is a relative term. Sola scriptura is not a slightly different outlook. For starters it is unscriptural - it fails its own test.
Your first choice was to pick a teacher who you approved of because he taught the same unscriptural doctrine. From there the path sways and branches in a myriad of ways.
You knew he was going to teach sola scriptura; you agree on that or else you would not have picked him.
Christ’s death/our rebirth:
… the believer enters through Baptism into communion with Christ’s death, is buried with him, and rises with him:
Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, so that as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
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