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Originally posted by twhiteheadIt means to me that I do not have to be able to explain exhaustively how God carried out inspiration.
So does this mean that the records were kept accurate by God, or does is mean that they do not necessarily reflect the true history but rather reflect what God wanted to say?
If inspiration was involved then does it really matter when a document was written?
But what is written in the New Testament is adaquate to express to me the truth which is essential for salvation.
I know that John writes that Jesus went into the temple with a whip at the beginning of His ministry. I know that other Gospels have what appears to be the same event towards the end of His ministry.
I know that there is an apparent discrepancy. Perhaps there was more than one event. Perhaps there was one event and it was placed historically in the wrong place by one of the Gospel writers.
I don't know why that event appears to be in two places. However, I give each evangelist the liberty to relate to us the important facts about what Christ did, as they each wrote them down.
The contradiction is less of a test on God's inspiration than it is on man's tendency to miss the point.
So if someone wants to play "Fun with Fundies" by pointing out contradictions of this nature in an argument to disprove "inspiration" it does not concern me that much.
John is inspired and Matthew, Mark, and Luke are also inspired. Obviously each had a certain distinct style. Each may have had a different emphasis. To one sequence of history may have been a little more important. To another essence of an event or teaching may have been more important than historical sequence.
What we have is adaquate to convey the message of God's salvation and the means to contact God in the human spirit.
Like incarnation, inspiration is also a rather mysterious process. I do not assume I can explain all aspects of it.
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Originally posted by jaywillIn other words,
It means to me that I do not have to be able to explain exhaustively how God carried out inspiration.
But what is written in the New Testament is adaquate to express to me the truth which is essential for salvation.
I know that John writes that Jesus went into the temple with a whip at the beginning of His ministry. I know that other Gospels have wh on is also a rather mysterious process. I do not assume I can explain all aspects of it.
If in the day of judgment a person tells God "Well, I did not believe in Christ because I could not figure out if Jesus drove the people out of the temple early in His ministry or late in His ministry. Since there was this contradiction between the synoptic Gospels and the Gospel of John as to when this happened, you see God, I couldn't trust your book. So here I am with all my sins undealt with by Christ's death. It wasn't my fault. If there had been no contradiction then I would have gotten saved. But you see God, I just couldn't trust the whole message because I got hung up on this contradiction in your supposedly inspired word."
perhaps the answer will come that it was not required that he believed in the doctrine of inspiration. It was only required that he believed in Jesus.
Then God may re-run a recording of that person's life and show them how MANY things they went out after half cocked in assurance, because they wanted to.
Originally posted by jaywillCorrect.
"Atheist," is essentially just a definition of what you do [b]not believe. [/b]
There you go. That is all you have, what you don't believe in.
What makes you think that? I am sorry but I personally do not count as my proudest possessions all my disbeliefs anymore than you do. The fact that you assume that I do only shows your bias due to the fact that you believe something I don't.
I'm more impressed with the Bible.
More impressed than what?
It deals with the nature of man, the purpose of man's creation, the problem of man's alienation from God, the source of the problem, the remedy for the problem. Such things as answers to the big questions of life - life, death, judgment, salvation, etc.
They could be answers if 1. they are true and 2. the questions are genuine in the first place.
I on the other hand have both different questions and different answers.
I have become much more impressed with that content of the Bible.
Again, more impressed than what?
"I don't believe in a god. What else do you want to know?" impresses me far less than the Person, words, and deeds of Jesus.
Did I say I was trying to compete with Jesus for your attention? Where did you get that idea? Does a persons impressive deeds make their other beliefs correct? Do they make what others write about them true?
I am impressed by the words and deeds of Jesus, Ghandi, Mandela, and even Obama far more than I am impressed by you. But what is the relevance?
Originally posted by jaywillI do not expect you to. But I would like to understand what you do believe. It also seems to me that many Christians can be quite contradictory when it comes to the inspiration of the writers.
It means to me that I do not have to be able to explain exhaustively how God carried out inspiration.
So do you believe that it is possible that Jesus never actually went into a temple with a whip? Could that have been something that God inspired the writers to write for other reasons than historical accuracy?
Do you believe that the inspiration ran out at some point? ie are books younger than a certain date guaranteed to be uninspired?
Are the books infallible in your opinion or just generally correct?
If the main reason for the books accuracy is inspiration why are you so concerned about the timing ie that Paul wrote before the gospels? Surely it would be irrelevant to someone who believes the writers were inspired?
Originally posted by jaywillAnd perhaps the answer will come that what was required was that you take the parable of the sheep and the goats seriously and forget about the doctrine of salvation by faith. Surely if you really badly want to get into heaven then you should do your utmost to find out what the requirements are. The problem is that Jesus appears to set up a rather clever paradox ie those that want to get into heaven for purely selfish reasons are those that will be denied.
perhaps the answer will come that it was not required that he believed in the doctrine of inspiration. It was only required that he believed in Jesus.
Originally posted by twhitehead================================
And perhaps the answer will come that what was required was that you take the parable of the sheep and the goats seriously and forget about the doctrine of salvation by faith. Surely if you really badly want to get into heaven then you should do your utmost to find out what the requirements are. The problem is that Jesus appears to set up a rather clever ...[text shortened]... ie those that want to get into heaven for purely selfish reasons are those that will be denied.
And perhaps the answer will come that what was required was that you take the parable of the sheep and the goats seriously and forget about the doctrine of salvation by faith.
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I take Matthew 25:31-46 seriously.
That judgment is not the last judgment recorded in Revelation 20:12-15.
The nations at the judgement in the sheep and goat passage are living nations, on the earth when Christ returns, who have passed through the great tribulation.
That judgment is not in response to the gospel of grace preached by the church. It is a judgment bassed upon those who did not know who Christ was, but made a decision of conscience either to assist or persecute the people of God who passed with them through the tribulation.
They did not know who Christ was. The sheep did not follow the Antichrist. The goats did follow the Antichrist.
That is the short explanation of that passage. I said the short explanation.
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Surely if you really badly want to get into heaven then you should do your utmost to find out what the requirements are.
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The passage that you are refering to does not speak about getting into heaven. It speaks about inheriting the kingdom which God has prepared from the foundation of the world. That kingdom is on the earth and corresponds to what God originally designed for the created man before Adam fell.
That is a further short explanation of that passage.
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The problem is that Jesus appears to set up a rather clever paradox ie those that want to get into heaven for purely selfish reasons are those that will be denied.
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If the essence of what you are saying is that Christ desires to save us from self centered selfishness, I have no debate against that thought.
However, denying the existence of God, as the atheist does, is not a step towards being a "sheep" in that passage. It is much more likely that the goats in that passage are those who are atheists.
For "the least of these my brothers" are those homeless, starving, sick, and in prison because they have not worshipped the Antichrist who proclaims himself as God. They cannot buy or sell anything because they do not have the mark of the beast in Revelation.
The sheep nations are those who were not Christians or Jews, but did not follow the Antichrist. They will be kind to the least of the Lord's brothers. The goat nations are those who will not be kind to them because they have been totatally led astray by the Antichrist.
In short Matthew 25:36-41 is a particular judgment distinct from the final judgment of mankind as recorded in Revelation 20.
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Originally posted by twhitehead=============================
I do not expect you to. But I would like to understand what you do believe. It also seems to me that many Christians can be quite contradictory when it comes to the inspiration of the writers.
So do you believe that it is possible that Jesus never actually went into a temple with a whip? Could that have been something that God inspired the writers to w ...[text shortened]... re the gospels? Surely it would be irrelevant to someone who believes the writers were inspired?
So do you believe that it is possible that Jesus never actually went into a temple with a whip?
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I think He went in to the temple with a whip as the Gospels tell us.
I don't take the account as fiction.
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Could that have been something that God inspired the writers to write for other reasons than historical accuracy?
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Of course the Holy Spirit intended to teach us something about Jesus, of which, the precise historical placement of the event, is secondary, to one of the evangelists.
If God the Creator was so careful to number even the very hairs on our head (Luke 12:17), why then should I expect Him to be sloppy about conveying His word to us ?
The whole idea that "maybe He doesn't realize" that John placed the incident in one section of the life of Jesus and Matthew placed in another, is preposterous to me.
Each of the evangelists had his own particular emphasis. Obviously to one of them, (if there was only one such incident), when this occured is less important than that it occured.
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Do you believe that the inspiration ran out at some point?
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No.
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Are the books infallible in your opinion or just generally correct?
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That would involve a discussion on what is meant by infallible. Scholars know that as the Scripture was copied again and again copyists made obvious errors. Of the thousands of minor variant readings made because of copyist errors, less than 1% make any real significant problem to the major tenets of the Christian faith.
The autographs were infallible. None of the autographs exist any more. We have copies of copies. And evanglical scholars acknowledge with more modernist ones that copyists made errors in copying.
What we have today is adaquate transmission to us of the inspired oracles of God.
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If the main reason for the books accuracy is inspiration why are you so concerned about the timing ie that Paul wrote before the gospels?
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I am not so concerned about it. I mentioned it to point out that if FMF wants to know what Christians first believed, the earliest writing concerning such are Paul's epistles.
That is a matter of historical record. You are confusing the issue.
That Paul's epistles were written before the four Gospels were written is one matter. That the four Gospels placed an event of Christ in different stages of His ministry because of varied emphasis, is another matter.
The two matters do not effect the inspiration of the Scripture.
Rethinking this post:
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Do you believe that the inspiration ran out at some point?
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I first said no. But I will qualify this. I don't think inspiration ran out as in a car running out of gas.
I do believe that at some point God completed His word. When the New Testament revelation was completed, the inspiration stopped.
The tons of spiritual writings of the church fathers, both good and bad, were not recognized as having the same inspiration as the New Testament canon.
So I would not use the phrase "ran out". It stopped.
Originally posted by jaywillNot quite. I was saying that the message I read when I read Jesus's words is that he wants people to be less selfish of their own accord. I is not trying to 'save' us at all.
If the essence of what you are saying is that Christ desires to save us from self centered selfishness, I have no debate against that thought.
However, denying the existence of God, as the atheist does, is not a step towards being a [b]"sheep" in that passage.[/b]
I agree.
It is much more likely that the goats in that passage are those who are atheists.
Now there I would disagree. I have seen no evidence that theists are less selfish than atheists. In fact I tend to suspect the opposite statistically but it is no hard and fast rule.
For [b]"the least of these my brothers" are those homeless, starving, sick, and in prison because they have not worshipped the Antichrist who proclaims himself as God. They cannot buy or sell anything because they do not have the mark of the beast in Revelation.
The sheep nations are those who were not Christians or Jews, but did not follow the Antichrist. They will be kind to the least of the Lord's brothers. The goat nations are those who will not be kind to them because they have been totatally led astray by the Antichrist.
In short Matthew 25:36-41 is a particular judgment distinct from the final judgment of mankind as recorded in Revelation 20.[/b]
Interesting. So to you it is a deep parable full of lots of hidden meaning. I always took it at face value and assumed it was a direct answer to the question "who will get to heaven and why".
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Originally posted by twhitehead=======================================
Not quite. I was saying that the message I read when I read Jesus's words is that he wants people to be less selfish of their own accord. I is not trying to 'save' us at all.
[b]However, denying the existence of God, as the atheist does, is not a step towards being a [b]"sheep" in that passage.[/b]
I agree.
It is much more likely that the g e and assumed it was a direct answer to the question "who will get to heaven and why".
Not quite. I was saying that the message I read when I read Jesus's words is that he wants people to be less selfish of their own accord. I is not trying to 'save' us at all.
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[/b]
You are in a perculiar position. On one hand you desire to deny that God exists at all. On the other hand you want to glean or salvage some "useful" aspects of Jesus ministry. Yet Jesus speaks so much about His Father.
To say that Jesus does not want to save us at all is exceedingly problematic. His very names - Jesus, strongly implies He comes to save us. "You shall call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins."
Perhaps a better approach would be to expand the appreciation of seing saved. It is not simply a saving from hell to a happy place called heaven. It is a saving from many other things more indicative of character defects.
That you could do and still stay within the bounds of the Bible's teaching for certain. But to assert that Jesus did not come to save us at all, is very precarious position for us who study the New Testament.
Your attempt to parse out the saying of Jesus which you find as contributing to some humanist philosophy from the midst of His proclaimation of His being Son of God, is very problematic.
You will have to chop up the NT and chisel away those few sentences which support your "non-salvific" teaching of Jesus. The result will be a hodgepod of arbitrarily selected sayings which will make little sense.
Originally posted by znshoThis retort of yours is in reply to my retort about someone else's retort twenty one pages ago??
As it stands, not much at all. And, only an intellectual retard would claim anything but.
Is this is genuine 'contribution' here?
Or are you just stalking me because I showed you up as an ignorant bigot in debates?
Originally posted by jaywillI don't know why you find that peculiar. I have learnt a lot from Ghandi without becoming Hindu. Is that peculiar too? Must I be Christian before reading anything written by Mandela? Must I be a Democrat before I can take what Obama says seriously?
You are in a perculiar position. On one hand you desire to deny that God exists at all. On the other hand you want to glean or salvage some "useful" aspects of Jesus ministry.
I like some aspects of what Jesus said, especially his pacifism and message of selflessness. I do not know what the real Jesus was like, I do not know if he even existed. I am however fairly sure that much of what is contained in the gospels was made up.
That you could do and still stay within the bounds of the Bible's teaching for certain. But to assert that Jesus did not come to save us at all, is very precarious position for us who study the New Testament.
I didn't think I was asserting that. I was asserting that one of his key messages was that we should love our neighbour - and all that that entails. I do not think that it makes sense to interpret that as saving us from anything.
Originally posted by FMFI am researching you because I am fascinated by your pompous stupidity. In addition, I want to try and find out if you are genuine or playing a game / hoaxer.
This retort of yours is in reply to my retort about someone else's retort twenty one pages ago??
Is this is genuine 'contribution' here?
Or are you just stalking me because I showed you up as an ignorant bigot in debates?