The danger here is not recognizing that it could be Me, my Self and I who is in error.
The real danger is that it's not the other person who is being held captive to error, but rather it is me who is not only held captive in error, but has then added condemnation by my hypocrisy, which the Holy Spirit would show me if my ego would get out of the way.
I would see this in others, but would somehow think I was clean and pure and right. What a hoot!
Fact is,
You're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.Instead,
--Obi-Wan Kenobi
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.But we don't, which is why there are so many versions of Him.
Proverbs 3:5
Whatever was in his heart, Luther opened the doors to whatever version we each like best.
Personally, I think we're all in for quite a surprise.
There is only one version of Christ....right? He doesn’t change.
It would be helpful to me to have an idea of how well you know the Bible. I’ll tell you that I’ve read the Bible more than once, including many parts of it many times, and have kept on studying it.
Respectfully, it seems to me that you’re not taking a number of things into consideration.
For one thing, given all that you’ve said, what’s the basis, then, for you to be commenting here? Anything you say is equally subject to these statements of yours. Why not, as you say, keep silent? Then again, since you’re acknowledging the Holy Spirit speaking to you and giving you direction, how about recognizing that He can speak to and direct other Christians, too?
There’s no doubt there’s going to be self in most if not all of everything we do in this world. There’s a difference, though, between it affecting us, and us being driven by it. Self affects believers, but it drives unbelievers. Jesus left the early development of His Church to His apostles, and clearly there were many times that self got the better of them, as the New Testament records. But because in their hearts they were submitted to the Lord, they were correctable. Either God Himself directly corrected them, or others did at His direction - but in both cases because the Christians involved recognized His voice and heeded it. And the result was that the Christians involved somehow matured in Christ. Paul also wrote that God entrusted the Gospel to imperfect vessels, human beings. That was His plan. The imperfect vessels will still be used for God’s purposes, despite their imperfection, because they depend on God, not themselves.
5 For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. 7 But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. (2 Corinthians 4)
Consider also what Paul wrote in the book of Philippians, chapter 3:
12 Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
15 Let us therefore, as many as be perfect, be thus minded: and if in any thing ye be otherwise minded, God shall reveal even this unto you.
Self is going to be there. We’re naturally like the blind and the lost who don’t know which way to go, or our left hand from our right hand, and the natural man is part of us as long as we’re in this world. But in Christians there’s also the spiritual man, who has God to guide and correct them. That’s what Proverbs 3:5 refers to.
“Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.”
That certainly doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t use our own understanding at all. We simply have to, just to live. What it does mean is that our own understanding shouldn’t be our highest authority. What’s more, Proverbs 3:6 says, “In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” In all things, we should acknowledge God’s authority over us as our God, as we are His creatures, and trust Him and seek His will for us. James wrote that if anyone lacks wisdom, they can ask God in faith for it and God will give it to them. “Ask, and it shall be given,” the Lord Himself said. Finally, in Hebrews as well as Proverbs were told that God will also at times chasten us, punishing us for our own good, to correct and discipline His children. These are just a few passages, while there are also many others, that tell us that God Himself is there guiding, teaching and correcting us, if we accept Him. We have to depend on Him.
What you write seems to assume that everyone takes the position of unbelievers - driven by pride of self, not listening to God and so not correctable by Him, not truly willing to go to God, and not wanting to do His will, but merely one’s own.
Now on Luther and Christians not seeing many things the same way, there are a great many things that have led to the type of individualism we see today. The Catholic Church even contributed to quite a number of them. Just to name one, the Renaissance, which is beloved by secular humanists. I’d be happy to discuss the Protestant Reformation and the rise of secular humanism in more detail with you, but my conclusion on the Reformation is that it was necessary and justified, and would have happened whether or not Luther had ever lived. You also said this:
“Whatever his good intentions may have been, he lead the rebellion against the western half of Christ’s Body.”
That’s a pretty ironic statement when your point is about the unity and wholeness of Christ’s Body.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.
Proverbs 3:5. But we don’t, which is why there are so many versions of Him.”
In Acts we learn that originally the church held all things in common. How long did that last? The church grew rapidly and got very big, and there are millions of Christians now, perhaps a billion professing Christians. Have your views changed on anything during your life, that something you believed one thing about, you now believe something different, so that you’re not even united with yourself over your lifetime? Then there are the developments of two thousand years, and questions that arose over time in different places like what should baptism be? And from Jesus saying the Son of Man had nowhere to lay His head, and Paul saying we should be content with food and clothing, the Church developed a great amount of worldly power and wealth.
“Whatever was in his heart, Luther opened the doors to whatever version we each like best.”
That door was opened by Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, or even earlier by Satan, and Adam and Eve followed. Satan has been luring people through it ever since, as is recorded over and over again the Old Testament and the New, and I will add that at times that has involved the Catholic Church as well. When you speak of “whatever version we each like best,” what about Christians who pick up their cross and follow Jesus, not choosing what they naturally like best but God’s will for them? As I said, I’m not sure from what you say how well you know the Bible. I’m not saying you don’t know it, but have to ask if you’re familiar with what the Bible says about the natural man versus the spiritual man. The natural man is the rebellious sinner who doesn’t know God, while the spiritual man is the man born again in Christ, who is a new creature. The natural man is proud of his sin while the spiritual man hates it.
“Personally, I think we’re all in for quite a surprise.”
I believe we are, too. Over all, with many exceptions, the church in our time and place seems to resemble Laodicea quite a bit.