I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."That seems so clear. Really, really clear. And for 20 centuries almost all of Christendom understood those clear words. Actually, the vast majority still do. They are called Catholic or Universal. Thanks for posting the Truth.
I think that metmom has stumbled onto something that Protestants do not get. Peter has the keys to Heaven and Jesus still holds the keys to Hell. Salvation through His Church, and Jesus, the Judge, holds the keys to open the door of hell for those whom He damns.
That verse alone does no justify the papacy.
Aside from that and the misinterpreted verse about Peter being the rock on which Christ will build His church, there is precious little mentioned in the NT about it.
Peter takes no role of preeminence after the first few years of the very early church. Neither of his letters refer to it at all, nor does he refer to choosing his successor, or anything that indicated that he thought more highly of himself than others.
None of the other writers of the NT refer to him in that manner either. None of the Peter/pope stuff came along until centuries after he had died.
The whole idea of the papacy has very weak Scriptural support, especially in the book of the Acts of the Apostles, where you’d at least expect it to be addressed somewhere.
We don’t need priests or a hierarchy of religious leaders to procure our salvation for us. Jesus Himself did it and we can go directly to him.
John 14:6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.
I Timothy 2:5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6who gave himself as a ransom for all men—the testimony given in its proper time.
Hebrews 4: 14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. 16Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
Hebrews 8:6 But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises.
Hebrews 9:15 For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant.