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Originally Posted by Der Pilger  Quote:
Originally Posted by Pergamum I have found testimonies to be a way for people to receive the Gospel with being repulsed due to preachiness. A personal testimony often glorified God, has good results, and is a very biblical way of witnessing to others. | I'm not so sure. Testimonies have been made popular, I believe, due to the influences of postmodernism on our culture, but the Bible never--to my knowledge--affirms testimonies as a means of communicating the gospel. A testimony is at bottom a story about me, but the gospel is the story about Jesus--and more than a story, it consists of the divine command to repent and believe, the explanation of God's character, and teaching on what sin is and its consequences. | Quote:
Mark 5
1And they came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes.
2And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit,
3Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains:
4Because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him.
5And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones.
6But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him,
7And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not.
8For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit.
9And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.
10And he besought him much that he would not send them away out of the country.
11Now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding.
12And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them.
13And forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, (they were about two thousand and were choked in the sea.
14And they that fed the swine fled, and told it in the city, and in the country. And they went out to see what it was that was done.
15And they come to Jesus, and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid.
16And they that saw it told them how it befell to him that was possessed with the devil, and also concerning the swine.
17And they began to pray him to depart out of their coasts.
18And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he might be with him.
19Howbeit Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee.
20And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him: and all men did marvel.
| Jesus commands personal testimonies!
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Pergamum
"If a commission by an earthly king is considered a honor, how can a commission by a Heavenly King be considered a sacrifice?"
-- David Livingstone
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