So how is one person to know when he is in error? Up until 1930ish... All Christian denominations scrripturally showed and believed that artificial birth control was sinful... Then the episcopalians caved and said it was ok... Then most followed suit. So the question follows... We’re Christians properly interpreting the scriptures for the first 2000 years? Or have they only been properly interpreted just he last 100?
What is the Biblical teaching on this issue? What does God, in His revealed Word, say? What did Jesus during His Incarnation say? What do the NT writers, in their God-breathed texts, say?
“So how is one person to know when he is in error?”
“When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.” - John 16:13
For context:
“I have not spoken like this to you before, because I have been with you; 5-11 but now the time has come for me to go away to the one who sent me. None of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ That is because you are so distressed at what I have told you. Yet I am telling you the simple truth when I assure you that it is a good thing for you that I should go away. For if I did not go away, the divine helper would not come to you. But if I go, then I will send him to you. When he comes, he will convince the world of the meaning of sin, of true goodness and of judgment. He will expose their sin because they do not believe in me; he will reveal true goodness for I am going away to the Father and you will see me no longer; and he will show them the meaning of judgment, for the spirit which rules this world will have been judged.
12-15 “I have much more to tell you but you cannot bear it now. Yet when that one I have spoken to you about comes—the Spirit of truth—he will guide you into everything that is true. For he will not be speaking of his own accord but exactly as he hears, and he will inform you about what is to come. He will bring glory to me for he will draw on my truth and reveal it to you. Whatever the Father possesses is also mine; that is why I tell you that he will draw on my truth and will show it to you.”
No easy answers. After all, as Peter put it:
“This is the second letter I have written to you, dear friends of mine, and in both of them I have tried to stimulate you, as men with minds uncontaminated by error, by simply reminding you of what you really know already. For I want you to remember the words spoken of old by the holy prophets as well as the commands of our Lord and saviour given to you through his messengers...
...Meanwhile, consider that God’s patience is meant to be man’s salvation, as our dear brother Paul pointed out in his letter to you, written out of the wisdom God gave him. In that letter, as indeed in all his letters, he referred to these matters. There are, of course, some things which are difficult to understand, and which, unhappily, ill-informed and unbalanced people distort (as they do the other scriptures), and bring disaster on their own heads.
17-18 But you, my friends whom I love, are forewarned, and should therefore be very careful not to be carried away by the errors of wicked men and so lose your proper foothold.” - 2 Peter 3
Notice: Peter doesn’t say “Your Bishops will tell you what is right or wrong, and you can trust my successors, who will be the Vicar of Jesus Christ Himself!”
Nope. No reference to clinging to “The True Church”, but instead:
“...remember the words spoken of old by the holy prophets as well as the commands of our Lord and saviour given to you through his messengers...In that letter, as indeed in all his letters, he referred to these matters. There are, of course, some things which are difficult to understand, and which, unhappily, ill-informed and unbalanced people distort (as they do the other scriptures), and bring disaster on their own heads.”
No church can carry you past Heaven’s portal.