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proudpapa
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Joined: 2012/5/13
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 The story is told of an Irishman..........

"The story is told of an Irishman who all of his life had been, as so many of his nation are, a member of the Roman Catholic church but some one had given him a New Testament and through reading it he had been brought to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. He had learned that a man may have eternal life in this world and know it, that he may have all his sins forgiven and be certain of it, that he need not go to any human intermediary but may go direct to the blessed Lord Himself to confess his sins and obtain forgiveness. The result of his study gave Patrick great joy and happiness. He did not know any one like minded with whom he could have Christian fellowship so when others went to the parish church, he remained at home poring over the sacred pages of his New Testament, a Book which he had never seen before but which now meant so much to him. Finally the parish priest missed his erstwhile faithful parishioner so he arranged to visit him. He came on a day when this happy convert was reading his New Testament and as the priest entered the room Patrick rose to meet him with the Book in his hand. “What book is that?” the priest asked.

And Patrick answered, “Well, sure and your Reverence, it’s the New Testament.”

“But Patrick don’t you know that that is not a Book for an ignorant man like you to be reading without instruction and help? You will be forming your own private judgment about things and making all kinds of mistakes and going off into some heresy.”

But Patrick said, “Well sure, I have just been reading here, and it’s the blessed apostle Peter says it, ‘As new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby’ (1 Peter 2:2), and sure, your Reverence, I have just been born again and I am a babe in Christ and it is the milk I’m thirsting after and I am reading the Word to get it.”

“That is very good, Patrick, but you need help and instruction, and the Almighty has appointed the clergy to be the milkmen; He has given them the knowledge of the truth and when you want instruction, you should come to the church and we will give it to you as you are able to bear it. You get to studying for yourself and you are sure to go wrong.”

But Patrick said, “Out there in the shed I have a cow and when I was sick some time ago, I had to hire a man to milk her and I soon found he was stealing half of the milk and filling the bucket with water, but when I got well, I discharged him and took to milking me own cow and now I am getting the rich cream. When I was depending upon you, it was milk and water stuff you were giving me, now, thank God, I am milking me own cow and it’s the cream of the Word I am getting.”

Excerpt from : Is Peter the Rock Upon Which the Church is Built?
By Dr. Harry A. Ironside | 1935

https://www.moodymedia.org/articles/peter-rock-upon-which-church-built/

 2017/3/17 0:18Profile
StirItUp
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 Re: The story is told of an Irishman..........

LOL!

Take that, you hirelings and false prophets!


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William

 2017/3/17 2:35Profile
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 Re:


Of course this article is showing and extreme in church history to prove a point. But the balance would be that independent bible thinking apart from any instruction from Christian leaders in the body of Christ that God gifts will result in people being tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine.

Ephesians 4:14 New International Version (NIV)

14 Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming.

And how can we not be in this circumstance of never knowing the truth and always believing a new teaching by some brother or sister? it is by the instruction of God gifted leaders in the body of Christ, a few verses earlier in Ephesians 4:11 gives us that answer.

God never wanted us to try and re-figure out all of Christianity every generation from the Bible alone by ourselves. We have believers who have passed on the truth and traditions of the Apostles that we can learn from.

Modern evangelicalism in America is a picture of this "waves of the sea" thousands of denominations starting with all different ideas of the truth. Instead we should ask what is the faith delivered to the saints in the beginning? (Jude 1:3). The answer lies not in a new doctrine or revelation but in the old belief since the beginning.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2017/3/17 5:52Profile
StirItUp
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 Re:

Agreed Greg,

As long as leaders do not move away from that teaching already delivered to us by the apostles and prophets and in accordance with the written Word of God (in context) we can and will certainly benefit from it.

Blessings,


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William

 2017/3/17 8:15Profile
proudpapa
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 Re:

"Another story is told of a little lad sitting on the curb in Johannesburg in South Africa, reading a New Testament when the priest passed by and, recognizing him as a child of a family belonging to his flock, said, “My boy, what is that book you are reading?”

“It is the New Testament, father,” he said.

“But that is not for an ignorant little boy like you to be reading.”

The lad replied, “Sure but I have a search warrant to read it.”

“A search warrant! Why, what do you mean?”

“It says here, ‘Search the Scriptures,’ and so I am after doing what I am told.”

How can any one say that Christians are not capable of reading the Word of God and getting the mind of the Lord when the Holy Spirit has been sent from heaven for the express purpose of opening the truth to those who honestly seek that truth and are prepared to walk according to it?

Our blessed Lord said of the Holy Spirit, “But the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you” (John 14:26). Imagine a man cast out on a desert island with nothing but a copy of the Bible, no teacher, no clergy man, no priest, no church, no other books of any kind to instruct him. Do you mean to say that that man is left without the possibility of acquiring sufficient truth for the saving of his soul because he is beyond the reach of the visible church? Surely not. Wherever a man honestly seeks to know the mind of God, the Holy Spirit is there to reveal the truth to him." - Harry Ironside

 2017/3/17 9:26Profile
proudpapa
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 Re:

RE : /// Modern evangelicalism in America is a picture of this "waves of the sea" thousands of denominations starting with all different ideas of the truth.///

The divisions did not start with American evangelicalism, divisions have been going on throughout church history and there has been very little continuity on any subject.
and so we should conclude that church history or tradition is not an adequate lens by which to read the Scripture.

add : The reason for the divisions throughout history can be answered with a very deep study of 1 Cor.,.
Leadership has to often served as or covered the Head of each man instead of pointing each man to there true "Head"

The Word "evangelicalism" encompasses a certain amount of Basic unity in itself :

"Evangelicalism (/ˌiːvænˈdʒɛlɪkəlˌɪzəm/, /ˌɛvən/-), Evangelical Christianity, or Evangelical Protestantism[a] is a worldwide, transdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity which maintains the belief that the essence of the gospel consists of the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ's atonement.[1][2] Evangelicals believe in the centrality of the conversion or the "born again" experience in receiving salvation, in the authority of the Bible as God's revelation to humanity, and in spreading the Christian message."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangelicalism






 2017/3/17 10:16Profile









 Re:

Bro Greg writes............

"Of course this article is showing and extreme in church history to prove a point."

I am going to have to disagree with that point. Far from being an extreme or an anecdote, this was the norm for 1500 years. In fact the truth goes further than the article. The truth is that Catholics were told never to read the Bible. I know that is shocking to North Americans but their fundamental lack of understanding of Catholic tradition should not cloud their judgement.

There was a reason why the Bible was chained to the pew. There was a reason why the Catholics were so upset when John Wycliff translated the Bible. In fact " upset," is far too mild a word. All hell broke loose against those who would dare to disseminate the word and share it without license. As we know, the Pope had John's body exhumed and his bones burned.

Knowledge is power. And those in power had no desire whatsoever to share what they thought they had, so they kept the people ignorant of what the Word truly said. Poor John Hus, who shared the Bible that Wycliff had translated was burned to death in 1415 for daring to do so and they used the translated Bible as kindling to start the fire. Pure evil.

So, certainly no extreme in church history. The extreme was the so called clergy or leaders of the people stifling and holding the Word back from the ordinary folks........bro Frank

 2017/3/17 10:16
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 Re:

Quote:
I am going to have to disagree with that point. Far from being an extreme or an anecdote, this was the norm for 1500 years.



Dear brother,

Are you saying that since AD 0- 1500 the Catholic system was in place? Or since the death of the original apostles?

I personally believe what we see as the modern catholic church did not start to exist towards the dark ages AD 500-800 and the official split of the Roman Catholic Church from the Eastern Orthodox Church was in 1100 AD.

Martin Luther in AD 1500 did not repudiate all of what was the Roman Catholic Church neither did most reformers they sought to keep many of the traditions of the Church as they were apostolic since the beginning.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2017/3/17 14:20Profile









 Re:

Bro Greg writes...........

"I personally believe what we see as the modern catholic church did not start to exist towards the dark ages AD 500-800 and the official split of the Roman Catholic Church from the Eastern Orthodox Church was in 1100 AD."

Well bro, if 500 is correct and it is probably a wee bit before this, then 2000-500 = 1500 years :) But, as you probably know, it was in the mid fourth century (350 or thereabouts) that the established catholic church created a licensing system, whereby one could not teach/share Gospel unless one was licensed by the "Universal Church." This practice of not allowing Catholics to read the Bible existed still in Scotland in the 1960s and 70s. It was uterrly frowned upon ( ancient evil spirit of control) because people were considered too stupid to read and understand the Scriptures. Now this is rich from the organization that gave us Maryology, salvation by works, purgatory, co-medeatrix, paying and praying souls out of purgatory,confession , infant baptism, transubstantiation and so on and so on. One error on top of another error multiplied by every decade and every century until the Gospel itself is wiped out and replaced by something very ugly..........bro Frank

 2017/3/17 18:04
Heydave
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Joined: 2008/4/12
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 Re:

"I defy the Pope and all his laws. If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy who drives the plough to know more of the scriptures than you do."

-William Tyndale.


"I perceived how that it was impossible to establish the lay people in any truth except the Scripture were plainly laid before their eyes in their mother tongue."

- William Tyndale





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Dave

 2017/3/17 18:11Profile





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