Posted on 07/22/2007 7:40:38 PM PDT by xzins
You haven’t answered my post as to whether the God-breathed verses in Numbers are as important as the God-spoken Sermon on the Mount.
I don’t expect you to, since that would expose a great weakness in the recent theologies that have been developed. All the certain and relevant ground has already been broken. For 1500 years.
So, I’ll answer your question in return, even if you don’t dare to answer mine.
I have nothing against the second greatest of all the Apostles. Paul is relentless in spreading the Gospel (the Gospel, mind you) and in chastizing and beating the churches in his bishopric into line. He is a hard taskmaster and will not tolerate dissent or heresy.
I find it ironic that the greatest followers of Paul are some of the greatest heretics themselves, but I digress.
Paul was an Apostle and was changed by the Lord. He was great and did great things.
Jesus Christ was God come down to us in human form, but was still God. His words are, well, Gospel. The Apostles used His words in their fashion to spread to all the world. But it all comes back to His words.
Analogy: Albert Einstein came up with the theory of relativity. All scientific and engineering work that developed from that was very important, but Einstein is always referred back to.
Same with Planck. Same with Newton.
First principles, sir. You must go back to first principles if the originator was a man. You must certainly go back to first principles if the originator was God.
Never said that was not good.
Now, I want you to look me in the metaphorical eye and tell me that the list of begettors in Genesis is of exactly equal value to Matt 25:
Go on, I dare you!!!!
Perhaps you could benefit from a glass of Ruby Port and chill a bit.
I will tell you to your face that the entire word of God is of equal value. It is the WORD OF GOD. How dare you denigrate any of it.
I believe they can. I wish I weren’t at work where I could spend some time with it, but I do believe that all of the Bible works in concert. You just have to listen to it more :>)
What parts are you having trouble reconciling?
Jesus went back up to Heaven and let us work out our own future, with His help if we asked for it.
What I am objecting to is the obvious changing of the Gospel messages by misinterpretation of Pauline epistles. It is not Peter who is misconstrued, it is normally Paul. But why?
Because Paul had the most difficult, straying churches and he had to be most strict with them. He had a very difficult hand and he played it as well as any man could have. But you Protestants deify him and misinterpret him to the point where a Calvin could completely change the Gospel message and millions of people fall for it.
I don’t believe in Paul? You guys are only trying to justify your rather shaky beliefs built on a very shaky foundation. I think of Paul as the second greatest of all Apostles, as does the Church. We understand Paul and understand his works. We do not cherry pick them out of context and apply them to the general situation where he meant them specifically.
I appreciate your candor in post 5980 where you say that you cannot reconcile James with Paul. Neither could Luther - he wanted to axe James. But do you see? You are attempting to assume the role of the Magisterium which dictated the content of the Bible.
Either you accept the Bible’s contents and its interpretation which was dictated by the Magisterium, or you reject them all. You cannot cherry pick the Magisterium’s decisions with any more accuracy than you can cherry pick the Bible’s passages.
When you select a misinterpretation of Paul over huge swathes of the Gospels, then you, not Paul, are in error.
And I agree, sir.
There is nothing not Scriptural about Paul. It’s just that there are those who misinterpret him and attempt to create an alternate Christianity.
Answer the question, if you can.
Romans and James 2 cannot be reconciled. James is contradicting Paul regarding works and faith.
Ruby Port.
It has amazing restorative properties, does it?
Works wonders for minor daily arthritis discomfort.
I understand it perfectly. If you say you have faith, but you do not demonstrate it by works of love, then your faith is dead, worthless, no faith at all. Likewise, trying to do good works without faith is worthless. Your faith compels you to do go works. Your faith in God gives you the works your Father set out for you to do. Faith without works is dead, and works without faith is refuse, garbage, to God. Works do not save you, but works demonstrate the faith that you have.
Sounds interesting.
My hemachromatosis has precluded significant ethanol consumption even if I wished; Guinness (as Irish as I can get it - which means Canadian imports when I can get them) is an occasional treat.
Any particular brand? My brew beering in university and my distillation (engineering studies only, really) attempts have bypassed specific knowledge of the fruit of the vine.
If you would actually read my response, I did.
If I may:
The Bible was selected as God’s Word.
If one passage or chapter or book cannot be reconciled against another, does that mean that God’s Word is incorrect?
What if you are not among the elect?
Am I right in saying that neither faith nor works will save you?
So you did.
Well, I guess that that brings us to loggerheads, then.
When a list of begettors in the OT is as important to you as the words of Jesus, I wonder if we can possibly reconcile.
Jesus came to point out where the OT Jews got it wrong. God wasn’t wrong, the OT Jews were, but that’s pushed out of the way. Jesus spends whole chapters telling us that it’s what we do that counts; you give me the occasional Pauline verse that says that works don’t matter and anyhow if you’re not of the mysterious elect you’re going to hell anyhow, in spite of entire verses where Jesus tells us that Heaven is supposed to be for all if only we’d believe and do good.
I’m kinda at a loss right now. I suppose that I oughta get to bed. G’night all. Let’s take this up again after we sleep on it. Later, irish. Have a good one.
You would be right. If I am not of the elect, if I am not saved, then nothing I can do will save me. If fact, I would not even have the desire to turn to God. I would only want to do works that benefit me somehow.
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