Posted on 06/16/2019 4:55:18 AM PDT by CharlesOConnell
In Captains Courageous, with Spencer Tracey, Freddy Batholomew is a blowhard millionaire's son who is socially, poorly adjusted. He uses his father's incredible wealth, to bully his classmates and even his teacher, but he's roundly disliked, and ostracized. While on an ocean liner, he unsuccessfully tries to impress some other boys by eating 5 ice cream sodas. When he has to throw up, to escape the mocking boys, he runs into a lifeboat area to evade their ridicule while purging his overindulgence, and manages to fall overboard into the ocean.
Instances of people falling overboard into the open ocean are rather commonly reported in the news. Usually they are lost, but if by chance their accidents are observed and a life-preserver is thrown to them, is that the end of the story, do we just say, "oh, well, you have a floatation device, you're okay now"?
No, we have to pull them in. The life-preserver, the lifesaver, is only part of the formula for saving their lives. There is also a rope, which must be attached to the life-preserver, and must be used to finally accomplish their salvation.
Jesus Christ is the one mediator between God and man. But on the man side of the equation, unlike the radical individuality most typified by J.J. Rousseau, we who life the life of Christians do so in communities. But even then, we do not abide as atomistic individualists. We live our Jesus-oriented life in relation to our fellows. "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." – Hebrews 10:25.
Jesus' first disciple was his mother, who gave us the total account of his early life and who "treasured these things up in her heart". "A sword will pierce your own soul too, so that the secret thoughts of many hearts might be revealed". On the cross, he gave his mother to John to take in his home, but when you take your master's mother, she takes care of you.
Then God's temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning, voices, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail. And a great portent appeared in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars; she was with child and she cried out in her pangs of birth, in anguish for delivery.
And another portent appeared in heaven; behold, a great red dragon, with seven heads and ten horns, and seven diadems upon his heads. His tail swept down a third of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman who was about to bear a child, that he might devour her child when she brought it forth; she brought forth a male child, one who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron, but her child was caught up to God and to his throne, and the woman fled into the wilderness, where she has a place prepared by God, in which to be nourished for one thousand two hundred and sixty days. …
And when the dragon saw that he had been thrown down to the earth, he pursued the woman who had borne the male child. But the woman was given the two wings of the great eagle that she might fly from the serpent into the wilderness, to the place where she is to be nourished for a time, and times, and half a time. The serpent poured water like a river out of his mouth after the woman, to sweep her away with the flood. But the earth came to the help of the woman, and the earth opened its mouth and swallowed the river which the dragon had poured from his mouth. Then the dragon was angry with the woman, and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus. - Rev 11:19 -- 12:17
She forms the body of Christ. She schools her son's disciples. Those who won't attend her school, remain ignorant.
We are in a time when any merely human institution would be washed away. Our churches are going under the shadow of a new Heresy of Ba'al of Peor, as when the Hebrew people were successfully attacked and overwhelmed through human sexuality. Our churches are now pro-gay and as soon as the civil authority authorizes child sex, they will be indistinguishable from the denizens of the town of Sodom: "Bring them out that we may know them".
Jesus' mother forms the few of the elect who will resist being fooled by the great apostasy. Those who will not avail themselves of the lifeline of Mary, will be lost.
If God Himself is incapable of doing enough for you, then what makes you think adding a human to the mix is going to help?***
What would Jesus Say to that?
hehehe
Be careful of looking for help in the wrong places.
Let me offer this commentary from the Billy Graham Association re: https://billygraham.org/answer/jesus-was-god-in-human-form/
"... He (Jesus) was both fully human and fully divine (which is why He was called the Son of God). Think of it: God became a man, and that Man was Jesus Christ. As the Bible says, “God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him” (Colossians 1:19).
Jesus remains in a human body, albeit glorified/changed, body.
Mary conceived Jesus by the Holy Spirit. Nine months later Jesus was born in Bethlehem. Jesus is not 2 persons. He is not the God Jesus and the human Jesus. He is one person referred to as the God-man. For many in Christiandom it's quite simple. God is Jesus' Father and Mary is His mother. When a woman conceives and gives birth, we refer to her as the mother of the child. Jesus is no exception.
And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me? - Luke 1:43
See post 263.
God is capable to do it all by himself, but to reach more of His children, He uses others, be they begotten Son or the mother...
burn me as a heretic, my faith will keep me safe.
Yes those two phrases ARE different aren’t they!
God is Jesus’ Father
This GOD is GodMan’s father
WHAT??
I guess this particular Mary scheme cuts back on the workload of the Holy Spirit!
And thus I am sure some Catholics, making Mary to be as the Ark, hold that Joseph (not Biden) did not touch Mary at all, at least during her pregnancy.
Would [you] have us believe that Joseph, though well acquainted with such surprising wonders, dared to touch the temple of God, the abode of the Holy Ghost, the mother of his Lord? ( (Jerome - The Perpetual Virginity of Blessed Mary)
Being God, He does not NEED anything. He does not NEED His mother Mary, nor all of his great-grands including David the King, Father Abraham, Adam: you see, since Jesus has a mother, He therefore has, according to the flesh, specifically-named great-grandmas like Bathsheba, Ruth, Rahab, Tamar, yes, human grannies going back to Eve)---
He does not need any of that: angels, humans, Moses, Israel, Church, Apostles, brethren, disciples, anything. He can create and save a billion human souls per nanosecond if He wishes.
But that is not, evidently, what He wishes. He created us "without us," but he He evidently does not intend to save us "without us," without associating us effectively with His singular, all-sufficient saving act.
Since we are all members of the Body of Christ, He has chosen that we must need each other IN HIM.
You will find it enlightening to read all of what St. Paul wrote about our role as members of the Body of Christ of which He is Head. Use search-word Body at BibleGateway, from "Pauline Epistles," since these doctrines extend across four or five of Paul's Epistles, and read them all at once.
The impact is mind-blowing.
Notice especially the aspect of "need":
1 Corinthians 12:21The Head doesn't say to the feet, "I don't need you."
The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.”
Paul clearly sees that Christ, the Only Savior, is associating each one of us in His work of salvation--- which we need to pray and work for, with Jesus, our Head:
Romans 10:1
Brothers and sisters, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.
1 Corinthians 7:16
Wife, for all you know, you might save your husband. Husband, for all you know, you might save your wife.1 Corinthians 9:22
To the weak I became weak, so that I might win the weak. I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some.
1 Corinthians 10:33
just as I try to please everyone in everything I do, not seeking my own advantage, but that of many, so that they may be saved.1 Corinthians 15:1-2
Now I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received, in which also you stand, through which also you are being saved, ---[if ???]--[IF ???] ---IF you hold firmly to the message that I proclaimed to you--unless you have come to believe in vain.1 Timothy 4:16
Take heed to yourself, and to the doctrine; continue in them: for in doing this you shall both save yourself, and them that hear you.
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In all of these quotes, who is doing the saving? Jesus Christ Our Lord.
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In all of these quotes, through whom is He doing the saving? Through the prayers and works of the members of His Body. Through the cooperation of all of us in Him. Which is to say: Jesus Christ Our Lord.
Yeah, that worked well in resolving the dispute between Luther and Zwingli on whether the Eucharist has the real presence of Christ (see the Marburg Colloquy). Sola Scriptura didn't resolve their incompatible views. Yes, scripture is infallible. But their interpretations weren't. So much for the "supreme authority".
I have no desire to burn anyone as a heretic. Reach out to those than help you. Mary can do nothing for you or anyone else.
Hows the supreme authority of your pope working out for you? Than certainly seems to resolve a lot of problems...
His personal opinions don't overturn the teaching of the Church.
Really. His encyclicals are part of the teaching of your church. Yet I see many catholics here condemning his writings. So I will ask again, how is that working for you
Yes, really.
His encyclicals are part of the teaching of your church.
You need to learn more about the Church before we rely on your expertise. This may help you: Is Every Encyclical Infallible
Still believe in mutual prayer? I'm with you.
Whether you consider them infallible or not they are a part of the teaching of your church. Even the article you linked me to said that. The truth is catholics have no more unity on issues than protestants. All one has to do is look at catholic postings on free republic to see that.
The way it is supposed to work.
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