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Discussion Forum : Scriptures and Doctrine : What is the point of prophecy?

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 Re:


Ron, I know where you stand on this. But it completely befuddles me. If the Bible is literal and inerrant, as you say, what is the point of the Holy Spirit? It can only deliver messages that you already have in the book!

Revelation of God's word is not done! (and it wasn't done the day they wrapped a cover on the Bible.) We are responsible for carrying the Word of salvation into the future, instead of advancing the cultural biases of the time the Bible was written. (Women should be submissive to their husbands!!! etc.)

Context in writing is everything. There is much in the Bible that is being taken in the wrong context because we have so little understanding of the cultural idiosyncrasies that produced it. The Inner Light is all we have to discern meaning and intent.

I am reminded that absolutism, which is what you advance in claiming literal inerrancy, is the wrong approach to complex issues such as this. When I see absolutism Bells go aringing. Warning signs flash. Every instinct says "run!"

I am laboring (and learning) with all of you on this because of your faith in Jesus, not because of your beliefs about the Bible. That said, the Bible is very important. It provides the foundations of our faith and is profitable to study.

Bubbaguy (Jake)

 2005/3/22 16:52
TheophilusMD
Member



Joined: 2003/12/1
Posts: 124
New Jersey

 Re:

Quote:
If the Bible is literal and inerrant, as you say, what is the point of the Holy Spirit? It can only deliver messages that you already have in the book!



Hi Jake,

The best illustration that I can think of, as far as the Holy Spirit is concerned, is the similarity of the role of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices in interpreting the law. All of their decisions, however, are ONLY within the confines of the constitution.

We believe, however, that the real author of the bible is the Holy Spirit who inspired man to declare truth. Hence, the word is infallible and inerrant. It's authority is inherent. Consider this:

Quote:
9But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
10But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.
11For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. 1 Cor 2:9-11



It is only the Holy Spirit who can bring us into all truth about God, that we may know Him. Indeed how can a finite being even begin to grasp the mind of God who is infinite? That the intellect is not the organ of knowledge is clearly declared in Jeremaiah 24:7

Quote:
7And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart.



We stand on level ground. This is why many geniuses are atheists and many idiots, even in their simplicity, know God in reality. Truth is eternal, unchanging. As important as context is, the truth of God is as true thousands of years ago as it is today. But the real context that we need to be conscious of is that the truth is never separate from Christ. Didn't He say

Quote:
39Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me. John 5:39



He is the truth. The truth is a Person. He is the completeness of God's revelation to man. All truth is wrapped up in Christ. To say that the bible "can [b]only[/b] deliver the messages that you already have in the book!" shows how far you have gone digging up the truth found therein. There is no such thing as "unimportant" or "old" or "common" revelation of Christ. I fear that the truth you have already known is apart from Christ and that kind of knowledge puffs up. One of the sad and natural consequences of which is to put man as the final arbiter of truth.


Quote:
We are responsible for carrying the Word of salvation into the future, instead of advancing the cultural biases of the time the Bible was written.



We are responsible in declaring the truth of God's word, yes, but the convicting, regenerating, changing, sanctifying of anyone is never our responsibility but the Holy Spirit's. Thank God He is not limited by our abilities or inabilities to do His works. Nor by our perceived biases. After all, He is God.

I hope this helps.

In Christ,
Rey


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Rey O.

 2005/3/22 19:27Profile
Rahman
Member



Joined: 2004/3/24
Posts: 1374


 Re: What is the point of prophecy?


Brother Ron,

So as not to intefere with the broader gist of this thread i've posted this thread entitled ...

THE REVELATION:
An Online Discussion ...
Chapters 1-3 ...
https://www.sermonindex.net/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?viewmode=flat&order=0&topic_id=5014&forum=36&post_id=&refresh=Go

 2005/3/22 20:15Profile
philologos
Member



Joined: 2003/7/18
Posts: 6566
Reading, UK

 Re:

Quote:
Ron, I know where you stand on this. But it completely befuddles me. If the Bible is literal and inerrant, as you say, what is the point of the Holy Spirit? It can only deliver messages that you already have in the book!

Of course, I have never said that the Bible is literal; that was a straw man that you set up. There are different genres in the scripture, narrative, discourse, poetry, symbol, apocalyptic. The point of the Holy Spirit is to lead you into truth, so that the unchanging Truth become your truth; true in Him and in you, as John puts it. It is interesting to me how you frequently slip into referring to the Holy Spirit as an it. You can no no relationship with an it, as your posts illustrate.

The revelation of God's word is not done! If the 'epistles of Jake' are anything to go by, God help us!

Context is indeed everthing, and because you persist, as pseudo Quakers, in the route dictated by your 'inner darkness' you have less and less in common with the propositional revelation as we have it in the Scriptures. Pseudo quakerism will drift further and further from the Truth as it is in Jesus, and ultimately become indistinguishable from Buddhism. The context of the Scriptures is the the Spirit who breathed them, and they cannot be interpreted aright without His continuing presence and fellowship.


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Ron Bailey

 2005/3/23 3:05Profile
crsschk
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Joined: 2003/6/11
Posts: 9192
Santa Clara, CA

 Re: But still, the point

Jake, still the contradictions are with us:

Quote:
Revelation of God's word is not done! (and it wasn't done the day they wrapped a cover on the Bible.) We are responsible for carrying the Word of salvation into the future, [b]instead of advancing the cultural biases of the time the Bible was written. (Women should be submissive to their husbands!!! etc.)[/b]


Quote:
[u]Context in writing is everything[/u]. There is much in the Bible that is being taken in the wrong context because we have so [u]little understanding of the cultural idiosyncrasies that produced it.[/u] The Inner Light is all we have to discern meaning and intent.



Just in these two items alone, the context [b]IS[/b] [i]everything[/i]...

Eph 5:24 Indeed, [u]just as[/u] the church is [u]submissive to Christ[/u], so wives must be submissive to their husbands in everything.
Eph 5:25 [b]Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and [u]gave himself for it[/u][/b],
Eph 5:26 so that he might make it holy by cleansing it, washing it with water and the word,
Eph 5:27 and might present the church to himself in all its glory, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind, but holy and without fault.
Eph 5:28 [u]In the same way, husbands must love their wives as they love their own bodies. A man who loves his wife loves himself.[/u]
Eph 5:29 For no one has ever hated his own body, but he [u]nourishes and tenderly cares for it[/u], [b]as Christ does[/b] the church.
Eph 5:30 For we are parts of his body-of his flesh and of his bones.
Eph 5:31 "That is why a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and [u]the two will become one flesh[/u]."
Eph 5:32 This is a great secret, but I am talking about Christ and the church.
Eph 5:33 But each individual man among you must love his wife as he loves himself; and may the wife fear her husband.

This is a 'cultural' issue? If men could grasp just the essence of the first two verses..
Don't see where we need to go into 'roles' as that is what is at issue here, not [i]lording it over[/i] as some are want to think.
Quote:
The Holy Spirit is available to us in the here and now. We know this because Christ promises this.


And we got that promise from where?
Quote:
The Word (Bible) is the another source we have for learning about God.


That makes it sound arbitrary and the whole mess could be attributed to just that, [i]that we[/i] will decide what applies or doesn't apply. Certainly the creation 'speaks' but God has [b]said[/b], [i]in His word[/i] and [u]we[/u] fail to heed those words;

Mat 4:4 But he answered and said, [b]It is written[/b], Man shall not live by bread alone, [b]but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God[/b].

Quote:
Contradictions among these are bound to happen. How do Quakers deal with this? Listen to the still, small voice inside, not your head or your ego. It doesn't lie.


Of course not, not '[i]The[/i] still, small voice', the problem is in our refusal to measure what we 'think' we are hearing against what has already [i]been written[/i].

Perfect illustration in a recent David Wilkerson message I was listening to. He was discussing about a pastor who prayed and agonized over leaving his wife for a younger women in his church. He was fully convinced after all his soul searching that it was the Lords will to leave her, despite the clear instructions in the word of God. That God approved of him doing this and he went on to continue to preach and teach and praise God and it was all completely worthless, because he flatly turned away from what was fixed and unchanging and allowed the voices in his head to dictate over and against what God has already clearly laid out before him.

This is [i]the[/i] problem with Christianity in our day, a stubborn refusal to humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God and what He has stated. It is [i]our[/i] [u]opinions[/u] that we have set up as the final arbitrator of truth, the experiences of our own fallen nature, which certainly has affected our minds to such an extent that every kooky thing that passes through there is considered to be of the Holy Spirit with nothing to test it by except for twisting Scripture to suit our own needs as it suits our fancy.

Joh 14:26 But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, [u]and bring all things to your remembrance[/u], whatsoever [b]I have said[/b] unto you.


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Mike Balog

 2005/3/23 10:31Profile
Compton
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Joined: 2005/2/24
Posts: 2732


 Re: INner Light?

Ron said...

Quote:
I am saying, and you know it, that if the 'inner light' is not in full conformity to the revealed Word of God, it is darkness, and a blasphemy to call it light.


Jake,

There is something terribly disturbing about the term "Inner Light." Your reference to this enigmatic phenomena strikes me as something paranormal and quite different from the person of the Holy Spirit.

Whatever this "Inner Light" may be, it is supplying your intellect with many rhetorical weapons for assailing the faithfulness of the scriptures, which are the only trustworthy revelation of Gods'words to mankind. Certainly you recognize that God has used prophets and apostles to reveal and record His truth to all mankind, not just those living within a certain cultural niche. This controversy over the scriptures within your heart is not born of the Holy Spirt.

1 John 4:6 We are of God: he that knoweth God heareth us; he that is not of God heareth not us. Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error. 1 John 5:6 This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.


See to it, then, that the light within you is not darkness. Luke 11

I pray that "the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you. Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust."

MC


_________________
Mike Compton

 2005/3/23 13:39Profile









 Re:

"that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature"

As I stated before,QUakers believe there is that of God in every person. We refer to this as the Inner Light or the God within.

We are commanded to follow after this Light.

The Bible is the record of our predecessors struggle in doing this; in following God. It is their experiences. I accept this but understand also that the culture I live in is Very different from the Hebrew culture that produced the Bible.

This is what I understand from the Bible. Love conquers all, forgiveness is available through Grace provide us by Jesus' sacrifice.

But I don't expect the Bible to tell me about archeology, biology, or other sciences. And I don't expect the stories in it to relate not only religious, spiritual and philosophical truths, but also an explanation of gravity or the development of life on earth.

But it seems you do. I think Christians need to have a broad outlook on life and be ready to assimilate new information that challenges their views. Evolution does not challenge Christ, but offers hope for a world where hatred is banished. In the meantime, we have His self-evident truths.

Jake

 2005/3/23 14:19
ZekeO
Member



Joined: 2004/7/4
Posts: 1014
Pietermaritzburg, South Africa

 Re:

Quote:

bubbaguy wrote:
We are commanded to follow after this Light.



I am sorry, please help me find this command?


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Zeke Oosthuis

 2005/3/23 14:27Profile
philologos
Member



Joined: 2003/7/18
Posts: 6566
Reading, UK

 Re:

Quote:

bubbaguy wrote:
"that by these you might be partakers of the divine nature"

As I stated before,QUakers believe there is that of God in every person. We refer to this as the Inner Light or the God within.

We are commanded to follow after this Light.


Just to get the record straight.
Quakers did not believe that the inner light was 'God within'. Pseudo Quakers believe that. You are not distinguishing between 'the light' which Fox regarded as a witness 'to' God in everyman, and the 'seed' which had to be sown by God in an individual.

Fox, his trusted friend Robert Barclay, and the genuine Quakers, said that they were always willing for their 'inner light' to be challenged by Scripture. Pseudo Quakers are always willing for the Scripture to be challenged by their 'inner light'.

and who commanded you to follow 'after this light'? Don't tell me.. the light 'commanded' you. Wake up, and smell the coffee, Jake.


_________________
Ron Bailey

 2005/3/23 14:32Profile
PreachParsly
Member



Joined: 2005/1/14
Posts: 2164
Arkansas

 Re:

Quote:
As I stated before,QUakers believe there is that of God in every person



Sinner and saint?


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Josh Parsley

 2005/3/23 14:34Profile





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