Posted on 12/21/2002 11:21:49 AM PST by DouglasKC
I really do know where your unbelief is coming from because I was there not to terribly long ago. The thought that really opened up my mind was that the most godless, anti-relgious people in America celebrate Christmas in almost the exact same fashion as most Christians do. That told me right there who had won in the battle to Christianize pagan holidays.
Then they should have also outlawed their own church buildings since there is no Biblical basis for them.
The New Testament is full of references against organized religion as now practiced.
Acutally, I have. I've done a word-by-word study on the book of Romans from start to finish.
Romans is explicit on the purpose of the law (which contains your Jewish holy days): "We have been released from the Law, having died to that by which we were bound, so thatwe serve, in newness of spirit, and not in oldness of the letter." (Romans 7:6). The old laws no longer are a sword suspended over the neck of the Christian, but are done away with. In ancient Greek culture, the child, once he reaches the age of majority, does not revert back to his pedagogue (The NASB renders this Greek word "tutor" in Gal 3:24).
The holy days had their fulfillment in Christ -- their purpose was to be a kind of divine advertisement of what was to come. For instance, the Day of Atonement siginified the future propitiatory death of Christ. Once Christ's propitiatory death has come, what need have we for the feast day? That's sort of like downloading the trailer of a movie you have the DVD for -- completely superfluous.
Is there a conservative forum that is not dominated by Bush-bots and fundamentalist Christians?
If so, please direct me there.
No doubt they were shadows of what is to come and memorial of what has come. But Paul didn't understand that they were done away with.
Col 2:16 Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days:
Col 2:17 Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ.
They ARE a shadow of things to come. Paul was writing how many years after Christ death here? Thirty or so? Thirty or so years have gone by and Paul thinks the holy days and sabbaths ARE, not were shadows of things to come.
But what's really interesting is if you take out the words, punctuation and numbered verses that translators add to the greek to make it more "clear":
Then do not let anyone judge you in eating or in drinking or in part of a feast, or of a new moon or of sabbaths, which are a shadow of coming things, but the body of Christ.
What does it say? Kind of changes the whole meaning when read as it was originally. It seems to be saying that you shouldn't let anyone judge your for how you observe God's Holy Days except for the body of Christ. Your brethren. And the greek here isn't referring to any other days except the ones God designated as holy.
Believe it or not.
lol...come on in the waters fine!
You just described nearly every pulpit in America.
Read what Jude24 said. Then read my proof in 2sheep logic that using the internet is a sin. See if you can understand the logical fallacy.
And please don't use the word Christian in quotes when referring to me. I don't doubt your salvation, just your common sense.
And some things are hardly pagan at all: Santa, for one, who, while taken to extremes by an unbelieving world eager for something that seems to dissasociate with the holiday's true significance, still embodies the generosity and eagerness to give all believers are to have. Oh, you might come up with some dim association with Nimrod or some other figure: but what element of our faith can you not do that too?
But, I will say, if you choose, for matters of conscience, to not celebrate this season, I say all the power to you. It takes a firm conscience, though I doubt its wisdom, to "resist". I hope you do not swear off all celebration, even if you disagree on the time and mode (which is quite all right)- for we have all the reason to celebrate and be joyful!
lol...you need to check who you addressed this to...
A lie from the pit of Hell.
I denied, and will continue to deny, your willful abuse of Scripture, intended to lay burdens too heavy to be born and lead us back into bondage to the curse of the Law.
Repent of your foolish sophistry; repent of your legalism.
I posted the whole verse but you chose to cut off the parts that offend you.
Another lie.
I focused it on idolatry because you did.
You also cut the above verse off before the next word in the list of bad fruit: witchcraft.
Do you want to accuse me of something, heretic?
Are we to believe that under some other viewpoint, "One person regards one day above another, another regards every day alike. Each person must be fully convinced in his own mind. 6 He who observes the day, observes it for the Lord, and he who eats, does so for the Lord, for he gives thanks to God; and he who eats not, for the Lord he does not eat, and gives thanks to God," means that we must observe certain days and must not observe others? Postmodernism, anyone?
Jeremiah 10 10:1 Hear ye the word which the LORD speaketh unto you, O house of Israel:
10:2 Thus saith the LORD, Learn not the way of the heathen, and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed at them.
10:3 For the customs of the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.
10:4 They deck it with silver and with gold; they fasten it with nails and with hammers, that it move not.
10:5 They are upright as the palm tree, but speak not: they must needs be borne, because they cannot go.
There's true logic and there's false logic. Satan relied on false logic in his temptation. Jesus relied on true logic to rebut him. I've demonstrated 2sheep's circular reasoning against celebrating Christmas to be false logic (and no, I'm not comparing 2sheep to Satan).
God is the author of logic and it would be hard to live in a universe where things didn't function in a logical, orderly fashion. Jesus used logic in his parables and Paul employed logic as pretty much his sole method of argument in his epistles.
So why are you so against using logic? Could it be because you recognize that your position is illogical?
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