Posted on 11/28/2014 2:33:31 PM PST by NYer
It was the day after Ash Wednesday in 2012 when I called my mom from my dorm room at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and told her I thought I was going to become Catholic.
“You’re not going to become Catholic, you just know you’re not Southern Baptist,” she said.
“No, I don’t think so.”
A pause. “Oh boy,” she sighed.
I started crying.
I cannot stress enough how much I hated the idea of becoming Catholic. I was bargaining to the last moment. I submitted a sermon for a competition days before withdrawing from school. I was memorizing Psalm 119 to convince myself of sola scriptura. I set up meetings with professors to hear the best arguments. I purposefully read Protestant books about Catholicism, rather than books by Catholic authors.
Further, I knew I would lose my housing money and have to pay a scholarship back if I withdrew from school, not to mention disappointing family, friends, and a dedicated church community.
But when I attempted to do my homework, I collapsed on my bed. All I wanted to do was scream at the textbook, “Who says?!”
I had experienced a huge paradigm shift in my thinking about the faith, and the question of apostolic authority loomed larger than ever.
But let’s rewind back a few years.
I grew up in an evangelical Protestant home. My father was a worship and preaching pastor from when I was in fourth grade onwards. Midway through college, I really fell in love with Jesus Christ and His precious Gospel and decided to become a pastor.
It was during that time that I was hardened in my assumption that the Roman Catholic Church didn’t adhere to the Bible. When I asked one pastor friend of mine during my junior year why Catholics thought Mary remained a virgin after Jesus’ birth when the Bible clearly said Jesus had “brothers,” he simply grimaced: “They don’t read the Bible.”
Though I had been in talks with Seattle’s Mars Hill Church about doing an internship with them, John Piper’s book Don’t Waste Your Life clarified my call to missionary work specifically, and I spent the next summer evangelizing Catholics in Poland.
So I was surprised when I visited my parents and found a silly looking book titled Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic on my father’s desk. What was my dad doing reading something like this? I was curious and hadn’t brought anything home to read, so I gave it a look.
David Currie’s memoir of leaving behind his evangelical education and ministries was bothersome. His unapologetic defense of controversial doctrines regarding Mary and the papacy were most shocking, as I had never seriously considered that Catholics would have sensible, scriptural defenses to these beliefs.
The book’s presence on my father’s desk was explained more fully a few months later when he called me and said he was returning to the Catholicism of his youth. My response? “But, can’t you just be Lutheran or something?” I felt angry, betrayed, and indignant. For the next four months I served as a youth pastor at my local church and, in my free time, read up on why Catholicism was wrong.
During that time, I stumbled across a Christianity Today article that depicted an “evangelical identity crisis.” The author painted a picture of young evangelicals, growing up in a post-modern world, yearning to be firmly rooted in history and encouraged that others had stood strong for Christ in changing and troubled times. Yet, in my experience, most evangelical churches did not observe the liturgical calendar, the Apostles’ Creed was never mentioned, many of the songs were written after 1997, and if any anecdotal story was told about a hero from church history, it was certainly from after the Reformation. Most of Christian history was nowhere to be found.
For the first time, I panicked. I found a copy of the Catechism and started leafing through it, finding the most controversial doctrines and laughing at the silliness of the Catholic Church. Indulgences? Papal infallibility? These things, so obviously wrong, reassured me in my Protestantism. The Mass sounded beautiful and the idea of a visible, unified Church was appealing - but at the expense of the Gospel? It seemed obvious that Satan would build a large organization that would lead so many just short of heaven.
I shook off most of the doubts and enjoyed the remainder of my time at college, having fun with the youth group and sharing my faith with the students. Any lingering doubts, I assumed, would be dealt with in seminary.
I started my classes in January with the excitement of a die-hard football fan going to the Super Bowl. The classes were fantastic and I thought I had finally rid myself of any Catholic problems.
I think do. We are all Catholics and are under the rule of different bishops, depending on location and assuming Orthodoxy; works for me.
December 1, 2014 at 8:58:34 PM EST · 511 of 859 Springfield Reformer to af_vet_1981 Concur; Protestants are descended from the Catholic Church and the church is as responsible for them, regarding them as separated brethren. So... are Protestants Catholics then? That's what all y'all keep saying about the stepchildren of the Protestants. They came from us, so they're still Protestants, right? Well, if we came from you, that makes us Catholic, right? Just trying to play by the same rules for everyone. :) Peace, SR
Glad you clarified. This old geezerette isn’t all that fond of DST, either, especially since I’m retired now. ;o)
But the question bb was asking wasn’t for an explanation of the calendar.
It was how do you deal with not using the calendar the whole rest of the world uses in your dealings with the rest of the world.
Her comment in post 761 was this.......
bb: “I’m just wondering how you keep track of doctor’s appointments, time cards, airline or restaurant reservations, loved ones birthdays, your OWN age, etc. without resorting to Gregorian calendars and the “world’s” marking of time? Can someone do that without being a lover of the world?”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3231876/posts?page=761#761
As of yet, you have not answered it.
All the spam you’ve posted has nothing to do with it.
ouch......
I have bigger things to worry about than how time is kept and measured.
Talk about straining at a gnat while swallowing a camel.
I don't mean to sound like an ignoramus, but who on earth is Michael Rood, without having to google search him? I have never heard of him.
Check your FReepmail
He’s a fraud and false prophet.
Part of the Hebrew Roots movement, a rabbi wannabe who dresses in rabbi looking clothes.
After all these centuries of various forms of autocephaly it's better to now go all the way back to the beginnings --- resulting in retaining said autocephaly (independence).
The man who wrote that which you quoted is a Baptist -- perhaps Southern Baptist.
Do you know that each S. Baptist congregation is in a strong sense autocephalic? And have been for quite some time now?
One of the main reason they are organized as such is obvious, or at least should be, by now.
True apostolicity is not dependent as much as on some (imagined to be) unbroken line of men as successors as it is (and always was) more important to follow the teachings most closely.
On that score, in varied theological considerations the Church of Rome does not fit the bill nearly so well as many of her adherents and/or supporters make it out to be.
Just ask the Orthodox.
On another note, being that you either saved, or accessed again (going back in comments or in thread) the posting which you quoted from -- in the future --- when quoting persons here on this forum, providing link to the comment itself is considered best 'form'.
You included date and time, and comment number, but did not show which thread.
As that same individual just related to you concerning posting scripture ---- which many may like to view in the contexts which whatever is brought here is found, portions of comments when cited are best provided direct link to, also, if that be at all possible.
As for links --- if you experience any difficulty in avoiding having entire paragraphs which have been copied appearing as one giganto, underlined in red link, then the trouble may lay in not including closing htm coding command ---> "< /a>" but creating that last which is between quotation marks without the space between the opening angle bracket "<" and the backslash "/"
He's a Jewish wanna be fraud. Got his start in a cult called "The Way International". He changes scripture per dreams he has and says the New Testament we have in the Greek is a corrupted translation.
There simply was no singular papacy from the very beginnings of the church.
Deal with THAT --before then telling us (or hinting around at idea of) we must now unilaterally submit to the fallacy of it.
Further, when we return again to considerations as towards history of the primitive Church -- did you know that some of the bishoprics which later fell under being included within patriarchate of the bishop of Rome, were as old as the church of Rome itself, having themselves been established either by Apostles themselves or unnamed/unsung individuals who established ekklesia (congregations) in areas of Greece -- and I believe also as widely spread to what is now Czech Republic (?) or thereabouts?
“I don’t mean to sound like an ignoramus, but who on earth is Michael Rood, without having to google search him? I have never heard of him. “
Cultist, self-appointed rabbi and leader of a dedicated group of followers who number in the 10s or maybe the 100s...
You were addressing one of them.
Revelation 3:
[3] Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.
Churchians are blind to the word of God!
Only IF you will not watch, Then he will come as a thief.
Paul promised the Thessalonians that because they diligently kept his times, Yeshua would not come to them as a thief.
Only to those in darkness will he come as a thief.
1Thessalonians 5:
[1] But of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto you.
[2] For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night.
[3] For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.
[4] But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief.
Believers read all of the words, and get all of the message.
Churchians read only that part of the word that fits their Theology, thus miss all of the message.
Theology and the word of God do not mix.
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Ain’t FR RF fun?!
Not many know what even fewer are saying, yet...there is posting like mine happening but to little avail...and there are others who cannot decide whether to try to persuade some to change their mind or just to put them down as losers and condemn them.
Kinduv sad...and embarassing to our Lord, don’t you think.
Perhaps some of us will wise up. I should.
Rood is the head of a messianic group.
He lives mostly in Jerusalem, but has offices in Charlotte NC.
He and Nehemiah Gordon, a Karaite, have restored the Biblical method of establishing the new year, by observation of the condition of the barley growing in the vicinity of Jerusalem.
Once the exact beginning of the Biblical new year is known, each year, then all biblical dates for the year can be accurately established.
The length of a Biblical year is not a constant, since Passover is dependent on the Barley crop being ready to bake the wave offering. The basic year is shorter than a solar year, so a deficiency slowly builds up and has to eventually compensating with a second Adar (Adar Bet) so that Passover has the barley ready.
Basically, this is the reason that so few people understand prophetic dates and periods. You can’t understand God’s prophecy with man’s calendar.
Presently, both Messianics and most orthodox Jews (as of this year) have switched to using Rood’s Biblical calendar instead of the old rabbinical calendar.
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There is a massive global swing to the true worship of Yeshua’s Way.
FReepers, being conservative, are not quick to embrace change, but if they really are his, they will.
The Lord was disgusted with churchianity way back before the crucifixion; that is why Matthew 7:23 is there. He simply does not “know” those that reject his Way, even though they are convinced that they are doing OK.
The Father is a strong persuader, men, not so much.
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I will check him out with Christian Research Institute, formerly of San Juan Capistrano, CA. For many years, I have gotten great fact sheets from them. I always listened to the Bible answer man program, and spoke on the phone with Dr Walter Martin several times. CRI gave me great information on the the Philippine Iglesia Ni Cristo, a real pernicious cult, that at that time (1985) was giving me the blues. They deny the deity of Christ, so I do not hardly ever deal with them anymore.
Rood has continued many of the themes and practices which made TWI theologically a cult of Christianity.
“Michael John Rood is an ordained nondenominational Christian minister and Messianic rabbi,” according to a brochure Rood produced to promote his seminars which have been held around the United States
Unfortunately, Michael John Rood and his teachings are not credible or accurate. Rood is not trained, certified or recognized as a Rabbi, and his “ordination” by a cult called The Way International (TWI) required only minor instruction in an unaccredited TWI program. His central teachings depart radically from the evangelical Christian faith, and several of his teachings and practices are typical among cults rather than among Christians or Messianic Jews (that is, Jews who have accepted Yeshua [Jesus Christ] as Lord and Savior). Furthermore, many of his teachings and practices are drawn from a cult called The Way International which was incorporated in 1954 and widely denounced by Christian leaders and TWI’s ex-followers alike. About 95% of TWI’s followers have left TWI after seeing its severe errors, and many ex-leaders of TWI have founded a variety of splinter groups or ministries, just as Rood has.
Michael John Rood has continued many of the themes and practices which made TWI a cult. Both TWI and Rood:
disparage the Christian Church as full of deception and pagan practices;
consider themselves to be the one source of truth, the revealer of the unknown Mystery and the way out of “pagan” Christianity;
follow the teachings of one Man who can lead them out of deception,
warned that America would be attacked and destroyed by Communist powers,
promote highly speculative, unfounded and inaccurate theories,
devote attention to minute detail on areas of “research” that have essentially little significance,
criticize celebration of Christmas (TWI replaced it with “Happy Household Holidays),
use similar terminology, such as when Rood refers to believers receiving “the gift of holy spirit,” (Mystery of Iniquity, p. 54) meaning that they receive the human spirit which Adam, lost at the fall, not “the Holy Spirit” as evangelical Christianity teaches,
promote the “Lamsa Bible” written by George Lamsa, which claims to the translated from the Aramaic and therefore more accurate than translations from the Greek.
Lamsa actually rejects most central Christian beliefs (his doctrine is similar to the Unity School of Christianity where he worked for many years) and his translation is deeply flawed in many ways (”George M. Lamsa— Christian Scholar or Cultic Torchbearer?” Christian Research Journal, by John Juedes on Rood’s claim to have identified the exact day of Jesus’ birth while defaming the celebration of December 25 is also something TWI claimed to do. TWI’s book, The Promised Seed, also identified Tishri 1, 3 BC, between 6:18 and 7:39 P.M. as the date and time of Jesus’ birth. (Although Rood says that was Sept 23, while TWI says it was Wed. Sept. 11, because Rood claims to use a “corrected” Hebrew calendar.)
Rood is different from TWI in his legalistic requirement that Christians keep the Torah and observe the Saturday Sabbath and Hebrew festivals. (Although TWI did emphasize obeying certain universal laws, such as believing and tithing.) On the surface, Rood seems to contradict TWI teaching by emphasizing Hebrew religion, while TWI showed some anti-Semitic characteristics such as denying the WWII holocaust.
- Source: Michael Rood, Doomsday Prophetoffsite Last accessed, May 4, 2008. Formatted for clarity.
Rood’s teachings are unbiblical to such an extend that he can not be considered to be a Christian.
The evidence is overwhelming that they are not idle words. Looking at Hebrews (3,6,10):
Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus; 2 Who was faithful to him that appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. 3 For this man was counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honour than the house. 4 For every house is builded by some man; but he that built all things is God. 5 And Moses verily was faithful in all his house, as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken after; 6 But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. 7 Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice, 8 Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness: 9 When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works forty years. 10 Wherefore I was grieved with that generation, and said, They do alway err in their heart; and they have not known my ways. 11 So I sware in my wrath, They shall not enter into my rest.) 12 Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. 13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; 15 While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. 16 For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. 17 But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness? 18 And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? 19 So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.
For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, 5 And have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, 6 If they shall fall away, to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. 7 For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God: 8 But that which beareth thorns and briers is rejected, and is nigh unto cursing; whose end is to be burned. 9 But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak. 10 For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister. 11 And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end: 12 That ye be not slothful, but followers of them who through faith and patience inherit the promises.
Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water. 23 Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;) 24 And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: 25 Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching. 26 For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, 27 But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. 28 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: 29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace? 30 For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people. 31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. 32 But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions;
Hebrews is written to believers. It is at odds with Calvinism. The solution is to reject Calvinism and harmonize all the scriptures. The LORD Jesus Christ warned true believers over and over and over again to watch and repent. Calvinism is a deception. The Catholics have this right. Watch and repent. We are not saved by believing we are saved.
Back when Martin was alive they were ok, but when Hank Hannegraf took over they went down the drain.
They are a cult now, a replacementarian cult.
The cults that openly deny the deity are easy to spot.
Its the sneaky ones that try to pretend, while feeding you some sophistry that are dangerous.
Rood is totally scripture and nothing but scripture. He is shaking the churchians to their foundations. Especially the “Good Friday” gang, with his “Jonah Code” series.
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