Mystery babylon

Status
Not open for further replies.
yes, that is the point....you may listen to what church greats have to say, but you are to compare even their teachings with scripture. Even the Bereans did this.
 
Originally posted by Scott
Colleen: The visible church (i.e. the organization) is the pillar and ground of truth.

I would disagree. The Text does not specify the "visible" church or the "invisible" church, but simply the church. There is only one church, one Body. WE make these distinctions, not God.

Originally posted by Scott
The Church is Christ's Bride. I want to know what the Bride has to say on interpretive issues.

Then listen to her. Listen to the infallible Bride, particularly the apostles, who gave a clear, infalliable interpretation in the Word of God. Because all those who came after ARE fallible...

I agree that it's good to know what Christians (particularly revered Christians) have thought down through the ages, but you and I are not accountable to them for our beliefs, but to God alone. Interpretation of the Scriptures doesn't hinge on what Augustine or Calvin or Luther or Zwingli or Athanasius or Ireneaus or whomever thought. All of these men with their great insights have no greater means than you or I have to come to the same or a different interpretation. All of our interpretations should be based on the Word of God and that alone. That is why we claim Sola Scriptura as our rallying cry.

And what if you were to reach heaven and discover than none of those men who we hold so dearly are even in heaven? What if everything they taught was mere head knowledge, mere deducements from Scripture and not the outworkings of real faith? Their names are not included in Hebrews 11. Their praise comes from us based on our own interpretations of the Scripture and our concurrence with them.

Look, if it were just a matter of this or that in the Revelation, then we could allow a wide latitude of opinions, but the fact of the matter is that God's messenger clearly says that the woman is responsible for the blood of the saints and the martyrs of Jesus and we are told by no less an authority than the Son of God that Jerusalem and Jerusalem alone is responsible for the blood of ALL the prophets. Stephen (right before he was martyred by this same group) asked the Jews "which of the prophets have NOT your fathers persecuted" and now YOU have betrayed and murdered the Messiah.

There is no way around this indictment. There are no other contenders according to the Word of God. We can change the timing and say that ancient Jerusalem was responsible for this, or we can postpone the timing and say that she will be responsible for this, but I believe even that position is untenable.


[Edited on 2-2-2005 by VERITAS]
 
never thought I'd do this, especially not in this thread....but Cheri....:handshake: !!! (you go, sista!)
 
Originally posted by doulosChristou on 9-5-2003

Believers do not need people to interpret Scripture for them. If you believe they do, you misunderstand the ecclesiastical role of the teacher. Two great and historic errors must be avoided. The first is that of the Jews who had elevated their commentaries to the place of Scripture so that disagreeing with certain rabbinical writings was akin to disagreeing with God. The second is that of Rome which teaches that individuals cannot rightly interpret much of Scripture and therefore the church (an elite leadership, not the entire body of Christ) must interpret Scripture for the masses. Evangelical Protestants can fall victim to both errors, yet both assault the Reformation principle of private interpretation - which is a principle based upon Scriptures' perspicuity. The Reformed doctrine of perspicuity states that some portions of Scripture are more plain than others. It also acknowledges that God is not a God of confusion. The key to the Reformed doctrine of perspicuity is that it asserts that every difficult passage is made plain by clearer passages so that every truth and every teaching of Scripture is perfectly plain and presented as a whole with the greatest of clarity. They are the very words of the Creator and are more clear than any creation of man, including his creeds and his confessions and his commentaries and his commentaries upon his confessions ad infinitum. Man contradicts himself, confuses others, and pens muddy works of half-truths that will wither like grass. The Bible, however, is both an eternal and a holy book. “The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever” (Isa.40:8). “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words shall not pass away” (Mat.24:35). “Every word of God is pure” (Prov.30:5). Do fallible men improve upon God's word? Do they take hold of it with unclean hands and then pass it on more pristine? Do the fallible make the infallible all the more pure and transparent?

Source: www.puritanboard.com/forum/viewthread.php%3Ftid%3D1710%26page%3D8+%22WCF%22+%22rightly+interpret%22&hl=en]Theological Traditionalism: Defined, Examined, Refuted[/url]
 
Originally posted by LadyFlynt
never thought I'd do this, especially not in this thread....but Cheri....:handshake: !!! (you go, sista!)

"Mercy and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other." --Psa 85:10

Awh shucks... :::looking down, shuffling feet::::

Scott, we're not trying to pick on you. We're just trying to illuminate what could be a potential blind spot in your thinking - that is, too much reliance on the "fathers" and not on the Word of God. This was why I originally quoted the passage from Luke 16:29ff. Many Jews blinded themselves to the truths of the prophets because they relied more on the teachers in Israel than on The Teacher of Israel. I'm not saying that YOU do this, I'm just warning you to be careful that you don't think of some
"more highly than we ought to think, but to think soberly"...

Grace and Peace, brother.
 
I would disagree. The Text does not specify the "visible" church or the "invisible" church, but simply the church. There is only one church, one Body. WE make these distinctions, not God.

You are mistaken. Very few references in the NT are to the invisible church (about 1 in 10). To hold that 1 Tim. 3:15 refers to the invisible church makes nonsense of the entire book of 1 Timothy.

Remember, not all Israel is true Israel. See Rom. 9:6. This is an invisible / visible distinction.

[Edited on 2-2-2005 by Scott]
 
What have I said that would make anyone think that I am relying too much on the teachers of the church? I have not criticized anyone's view of mystery Babylon and have not affirmatively stated one of my own. By simply asking the question of what people in history have thought, I get criticized for not being sufficiently faithful to sola scriptura. I would urge Colleen and Cheri to consider whether you are relying too much on yourselves. Remember God has gifted some as teachers and failing to consider the greats of the church is error.

And remember that some parts of the Bible are too hard to understand without teachers. Acts 8:31.

There is a difference between sola scriptura and solo scriptura. I would encourage you to read this article:
http://www.the-highway.com/Sola_Scriptura_Mathison.html
 
I am going to post an excerpt of some notes I made on another topic about the problem of individualism reading the Bible out of context. The context of the Bible is the institutional church.

From notes:
In order to understand the Bible or any document, it is important to understand its purpose. The Bible principally teaches what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man. It does this by instructing God’s people about how to form, administer, and live within a tangible covenant community.

The Five Books of Moses gave Israel a civil government (judges and kings), an ecclesiastical government (the priesthood), a national tabernacle, judicial laws, religious rituals, moral laws, etc. The Book of Psalms provided the prayer book and song book for the public (and private) worship of God. The prophets primarily focused on commenting on the dismal state of the covenant community, Israel, and calling for repentance and restoration. All of these things focused on making the people a coherent and unified whole. That is how God wants to be worshiped and how He wants his people to be.

The New Testament is similar – it teaches how to form, govern, and live within the institutional Church, the community of the New Covenant. This aim in seen in the express teachings of the New Testament. Paul likens the members of the church to a body, with each part needing each other. The New testament expressly covers crucial community topics such as the appointment of officers, qualifications for officers, duties of members, using church councils to resolve controversies of faith, censuring, excommunicating, and absolving sinful church members, how officers are to administer the sacraments, how to publicly worship, etc.

The community nature of the New Testament is also implied by its very structure. Most congregational epistles (such as 1 Corinthians) are addressed to particular organized churches and discuss particular issues facing those organized churches. The epistles often mention real people by name and commend them or instruct them for some particular task. The pastoral epistles (such as 1 Timothy) are directed at elders and instruct them about how to organize and rule the visible church. The very structure of the New Testament presupposes that it is a community book, belonging to the church.

This is important to remember because if taken out of its context, the Bible will be misunderstood. The context of the Bible is the tangible worshipping community. The biblical documents were all created to be read and taught in the context of public worship. This is one reason Paul states that the organized church is the “pillar and ground of truth.” 1 Tim. 3:15. Outside of the institutional church, the Bible becomes incomprehensible. This simple context, which is obvious from even a cursory examination of the Bible, is often lost in the American Christian world. This is a place dominated by individuality, rootless church hopping, lack of commitment to the church, and a consumeristic mentality to church service.

One popular view is that the Bible is a book primarily for individuals. The idea is that the individual can be happy alone and satisfy God alone. All that matters is a personal relationship with God. To use a sports analogy, this view of the Bible is akin to treating it as a book on how to improve one's game in an individual sport, such as golf. In contrast, the Bible is written like a team book, like a football play book. Each individual has responsibility to God and this responsibility expresses itself as much as in advancing the team as it does in advancing the self. Individual performance is critical (every team wants a young Emmitt Smith) but, unlike golf, success is measured by contribution to the team not to the personal game.

The Bible is a team book, more akin to a football playbook than a indivudalistic self-help book.

[Edited on 2-2-2005 by Scott]
 
Scott,

Although I've appreciated everyones post, getting jumped on for one reason or another seems to be a plague in the last day or two.

Be careful. :mad:

Dustin...
 
I'm not jumping anyone...if anyone has read enough of my posts then you know that that is not typical of me. When presented with scripture it seemed that you were saying "well, let's go see what so and so says about that!" Maybe you were taken wrong, I don't know. But you mention the visible church being the Pillar. I honestly, maybe in my ignorance, do not know where you get that. I know that Christ is the foundation, and that scripture was given to us. I enjoy reading what others have to say (in fact that can be my own problem at times, enjoying what others say and not enjoying scripture as much as I used to...seems to be an epidemic of the modern church). You also must consider that we many times will insist upon scripture, IF we think that it contradicts what 'others' may say, and because many of us (common ppl) have not been exposed to these Giants and only have had Scripture to go by...therefore that is all we may know when dealing with some subjects. This is why I supported Cheri on this one point. As you know her and I like many other ppl one this board don't always see eye to eye. But in this matter I do understand....I'll step back out now, so maybe you two can get on with the thread, I was enjoying the action....
popcrn.gif
 
Scott, you are right. Perhaps I was too hasty in concluding that your statements regarding a "Jesuit fraud" and these things being unknown to the ancient church added up to a preference for tradition over and above what I believe to be the clear presentation of the Text. (And Colleen, I very much appreciate what you had to say in your last post.) As I had said in an earlier post, perhaps you're gathering information to compare/contrast the various positions and that includes what past Christians have believed? My point was that no matter what any of us (past saints included) believe, ultimately we must submit to what the Text ACTUALLY says and how it interprets itself (which is not up to private reinterpretation).

Now, as to your other points. I disagree with your premise that God's PRINCIPAL aim is to teach people how to live within a "tangible covenant community" or that the thrust of the entire Bible is concerned with the "institutional church." I don't think God has any interest whatsoever in the "institutional church" or that He even recognizes such a thing. God is concerned about His church, His people. He is concerned with our obedience and our faith in Him and the outworking of that in our lives toward Him and then toward others.

But what God is primarily concerned with is Himself and His glory. His concern over our behaviour/conduct, His people, is because of how it reflects on Him.

The Old Covenant community was a mixed bag and as such the Covenant that they lived under had to be didactic in nature. It was their schoolmaster, their pedagogue, UNTIL Christ. The New Covenant community may be a mixed bag to us, but not to God (see Matt 13:29-30) and it is not an institution in the sense of an organization, but it is an organic organism that is vitally connected to God through His Spirit. It is His Body and as such we are to be a reflection of Him.

While I agree with much of what you had to say about people being too focused on themselves and too individualistic and agree with your team analogy, I do not believe that the New Covenant is PRIMARILY a rule book for the running of the team - i.e. the governing of the team:


--the appointment of officers
--qualifications for officers
--duties of members
--using church councils to resolve controversies of faith
--censuring
--excommunicating
--absolving sinful church members
--how officers are to administer the sacraments
--how to publicly worship

I agree that it addresses these things, but as I said I believe that it does so primarily to reflect the character and nature of God. These "government" things don't seem to be the primary thrust of the New Covenant (like a new Mosaic Law), but the logical outworking of how the body is to function as a whole by the healthy workings of the individual members.

All that said, I will read your link by Keith Mathison and I would very much like to hear more of what you have to say/think in this area. Perhaps under a separate thread? It could be that you are right and I haven't given my attention to something that you have.

My apologies if I seemed to be questioning your motives, your reasons, for asking for early Christian support of a preterist interpretation of The Revelation. I'm sure we have all heard the often repeated maxim that "if it's new then it probably ain't true" and the reverse "if it's true then it probably ain't new"...

I became convinced of my present position by doing word-studies in the Bible, and after reading the histories of Josephus and Edersheim. In fact, I had never heard the term preterist until one of the elders in my church asked me if that was the position that I held. I had to go home and look it up in the dictionary! And then I was so elated that what I believed at least had a name and that maybe I wasn't a heretic! ;) And I'll admit that knowing that other Christians down through the ages also held similiar views was a comfort. But the older I get the less I care about whether my views conform with what other Christians believe or have believed as much as do they conform to the Word of God? Which is what I was getting at when I asked whether or not our admiration of past saints doesn't stem from our concurrence, our assent/agreement with them? And that is what we need to be watchful of so that we don't elevate their views (or ours) above Scripture.

Grace and Peace,
--C
 
OK, we should probably start by focusing on where we agree, which is allot:

[1] The Bible is the sole ultimate authority.
[2] God is concerned with us an individuals, including our individual salvation and moral conduct.
[3] The Bible principally teaches what man is to believe concerning God and what duty God requires of man.
[4] There is at least an invisible church.

Now, about points we may less agree on.

[1] There are many "churches" - meaning visible congregations. For example Rev. 1:4 refers to the seven churches of Asia Minor. These are concrete organizations. Further, each letter is given to the "stars" of the seven churches, which are the presidents, or pastors, of the congregations.
[2] The Bible was written in the context of the visible church. See subpoints:
[a] The various congregational epistles, for example, were not written to individuals for individual devotional material. They were written primarily to be read in public congregational worship. See Col. 4:16: "After this letter has been read to you, see that it is also read in the church of the Laodiceans and that you in turn read the letter from Laodicea." See also 1 Thes. 5:27. These letters were not written to loose ever-changing affiliations of two or more people gathered together. They were written to concrete bodies with lawfully ordained church officers. They had concrete organizational life.
[ b ] There are pastoral epistles, such as 1 Timothy. The primary thrust of these epistles is to instruct a church officer in his pastoral duties. One such duty is appointing church officers. You can only appoint officers to the visible church. Only God can see the visible church.
[3] Acts 15 provides a model for resolving controversies of faith. The very structure requires a visible church.

Anyway, that should give us a start.

Scott

[Edited on 2-3-2005 by Scott]
 
Another point to consider is that we rely on the visible Church's contribution to the very Bible that we read. The Bible did not come to us from the sky in a single, pre-compiled package. Rather what we know that God inspired the books of the Bible that we have today because His bride hears His voice in them. It is the visible church that did the hard work of recognizing the canon of the the New Testament.

In the early period (a few hundred years) after Christ there were many struggles over authenticating what documents were really inspired. Many congregation included documents that we do not now use and many excluded documents that we now use. Some documents used by some congregations were forgeries. Some were not forgeries but were just not inspired. Examples include the Gnostic Gospel of Truth, the various Infancy Gospels (the proto-Gosepl of James and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas), the Secret Gospel of Mark, the Coptic Gospel of Thomas, and many, many others.

The institutional church did the hard work of sorting out the real from the fake and the inspired from the uninspired. We rely on her conclusions today. It is not incumbent on each individual to sort through all these texts and reassemble the canon from scratch based on individualistic research. Instead, we rely on the collective consensus of the Church, Christ's bride.

This is similar in principle to the early church's reliance on the collective mind of the Church as expressed in the Jerusalem Council. See Acts 15 and 16:4. As the Holy Spirit guided the collective council then, so did He guide the church in her deliberations over the canon.

Scott
 
Scott, I'M MOVING OUR DISCUSSION over to the Ecclesiology section to unemcumber this thread where the only relevant point might be who or what are the angels of the 7 churches. ;)

Here's the link: Sola vs Solo Scriptura | Church Government

I pasted an opener. Would you please copy your last posts above and put them over there as well?

Thanks,
--Cheri
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top