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In Day of the Lord, 24 Church Elders with Crowns Join Jesus in His Throne In Day of the Lord, 24 Church Elders with Crowns Join Jesus in His Throne Deadly Saltwater and Deadly Fresh Water to Increase Deadly Cancers to soon Become Thing of the Past? Plague of deadly New Diseases Continues [FULL VIDEO] Police release bodycam footage of Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley traffi Police clash with pro-Palestine protesters on Ohio State University campus Joe Rogan Experience #2138 - Tucker Carlson Police Dispersing Student Protesters at USC - Breaking News Coverage (College Protests) What Passover Means For The New Testament Believer Are We Closer Than Ever To The Next Pandemic? War in Ukraine Turns on Russia what happened during total solar eclipse Israel Attacks Iran, Report Says - LIVE Breaking News Coverage Earth is Scorched with Heat Antiwar Activists Chant ‘Death to America’ at Event Featuring Chicago Alderman Vibe Shift A stream that makes the pleasant Rain sound. 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I'm here for the moneuy Red Tides Plague Gulf Beaches Tucker Carlson calls out Nikki Haley, Ben Shapiro, and every other person calling for war: {Are there 7 Deadly Sins?} I’ve heard people refer to the “7 Deadly Sins,” but I haven’t been able to find that sort of list in Scripture. Abomination of Desolation | THEORY, BIBLE STUDY Bible Help Libertysflame Database Updated Crush EVERYONE with the Alien Gambit! Vladimir Putin tells Tucker Carlson US should stop arming Ukraine to end war Putin hints Moscow and Washington in back-channel talks in revealing Tucker Carlson interview Trump accuses Fulton County DA Fani Willis of lying in court response to Roman's motion Mandatory anti-white racism at Disney. Iceland Volcano Erupts For Third Time In 2 Months, State Of Emergency Declared Tucker Carlson Interview with Vladamir Putin Status: Not Logged In; Sign In Creationism/Evolution See other Creationism/Evolution Articles Title: Pope Francis says Big Bang theory and evolution 'compatible with divine Creator' Source: telegraph.co.uk URL Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor ... tible-with-divine-Creator.html Published: Oct 28, 2014 Author: By Nick Squires Post Date: 2014-10-28 13:42:04 by Ferret Mike Keywords: None Views: 61721 Comments: 132 Theory universe born in cosmic explosion 13.7 billion years ago 'doesn't contradict' divine Creator but 'demands it', says pontiff The theory of the Big Bang is compatible with the Catholic Church's teaching on creation and belief in both is possible, Pope Francis has said. The Pope insisted that God was responsible for the Big Bang, from which all life then evolved. The Big Bang - the theory that the universe was born in a cosmic explosion about 13.7 billion years ago and has expanded and evolved since - "doesn't contradict the intervention of a divine Creator, but demands it," the Pope said. The beginning of the world was not "the work of chaos" but part of a divine plan by the Creator, he said. The Jesuit Pope made the remarks during an address to a meeting of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, which gathered at the Vatican to discuss "Evolving Concepts of Nature". "Evolution in nature is not inconsistent with the notion of creation, because evolution requires the creation of beings that evolve," he told the meeting. God should not be regarded as some sort of "magician", waving a magic wand, he said. "When we read about creation in Genesis, we run the risk of imagining God was a magician, with a magic wand able to do everything. But that is not so," he said. "He created human beings and let them develop according to the internal laws that He gave to each one so they would reach fulfilment." The Pope's remarks were in line with Catholic Church teaching of the last few decades. As far back as 1950, Pope Pius XII said that there was no intrinsic conflict between Catholic doctrine and the theory of evolution, provided that Catholics believed that the human soul was created by God and not the result of random evolutionary forces. That stance was affirmed in 1996 by Pope John Paul II. "The Pope's declaration is significant," said Giovanni Bignami, the president of Italy's National Institute for Astrophysics. "We are the descendants of the Big Bang, which created the universe. You just have to think that in our blood we have a few litres of hydrogen, which was created by the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago. "Our blood is red because it contains iron, which was created by the explosion of a star millions and millions of years ago. Out of creation came evolution." Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread   Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest Comments (1-92) not displayed.       .       .       . #93. To: Liberator (#35) You tell me that all I have to do is cop to a fraud and I will NOT get tortured to death? "Fraud"?? "Death"? Sorry, not following that supposition. Putting myself in the place of the Apostles.....with my life literally being threatened by a horrible, painful death and all I have to do is say "it was all make believe" and I'd get to live? But they didn't say that, none of them did. If it were me, and the whole Jesus story was made up in part BY me, I would have confessed in order to save my own skin. Not one of those guys did that. That tells me a lot. 4 givan 1  posted on  2014-11-02   9:51:10 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #94. To: 4 givan 1 (#93) If it were me, and the whole Jesus story was made up in part BY me, I would have confessed in order to save my own skin. Not one of those guys did that. That tells me a lot. Very good point that I had never considered. A K A Stone  posted on  2014-11-02   10:00:36 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #95. To: Liberator (#62) I'm surprised meggy hasn't demanded the heads of all "intolerants". Or will that be coming later? “Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and rapidly promoted by mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.” CZ82  posted on  2014-11-02   10:21:57 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #96. To: 4 givan 1, out damned spot (#93) Putting myself in the place of the Apostles.....with my life literally being threatened by a horrible, painful death and all I have to do is say "it was all make believe" and I'd get to live? But they didn't say that, none of them did. Aaah, ok. Thanks for the clarification, 4gi. Really hard sometimes to understand context and gists in posts. I don't think the apostles wanted to die...but it was easier to do so than deny God and Jesus. Look at all the Middle Eastern Christians doing the same, and accepting their beheading fate rather than denying Christ instead of converting. True martyrs. If it were me, and the whole Jesus story was made up in part BY me, I would have confessed in order to save my own skin. Not one of those guys did that. That tells me a lot. Well yes -- maybe in the "Save-My-Own-Skin" mode you're in at the moment you can't quite relate. But when push came/comes to shove, you just might surprise yourself and take the bullet at the moment of truth. When you "shook the dust from your sandals" at LP, you did it reflexively without even thinking. You knew it was the ONLY thing to do. When the moment of truth arrives, IF it arrives in our lifetime, many of us may have to make that same decision. I know some may chuckle at that notion, but we ARE in the last days in my opinion (and I know Spot agrees with me.) Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   12:43:58 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #97. To: CZ82, redleghunter (#95) I'm surprised meggy hasn't demanded the heads of all "intolerants". Or will that be coming later? Homo-San would add "intolerants" to his list of "homophobes" and "haters." AS he and his warped hypocritical ilk order the mass Waffen-SS style executions. Think about this for a moment -- to the Homos, the Fascist Left, militant Atheists....AND Muslims, WE are considered "infidels." Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   12:48:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #98. To: redleghunter, hondo68, CZ82 (#90) Is that Gilligan from Gilligan's Island? Lol...As opposed to "Gilligan" from LP?? As hondo confirmed, this "Gilligan" is Maynard Krebs from Dobie Gillis (those of us old enough to remember.) As to "Gilligan" from Gilligan's Island, can someone tell me how HE wasn't gay in that show? Mary-Ann and Ginger were all over him...and yet, it wuz all he could do to avoid those smooches and quickly run back to the Skipper (no, NOT H'up) Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   12:53:12 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #99. To: Redleghunter, Vicomte13 (#82) We should not only observe the words of Christ but His actions of mercy, kindness and longsuffering. The Greatest act of all being crucified for the ransom of many. Matthew 20: 27 And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant: 28 Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.... After the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ we have this: Luke 24: 46 And said unto them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: 47 And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem... Which also Paul confirms all the apostles preached the same Gospel: 1 Corinthians 15: Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand; 2 By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless ye have believed in vain. Worthy of further contemplation. Moreover, we need to bear in mind that not only are the Gospels a definitive authority of instruction of faithfulness, holiness, addressing sin and the redemptive reason for Christ's death...but also the Epistles. Paul wields as the same authority as he speaks on behalf Jesus on all matters -- including the subject of "ransom." Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   13:10:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #100. To: Vicomte13 (#85) (Edited) The Law of Moses, on its own terms, was a covenant between YHWH and the Hebrews there in the Sinai and their circumcised lineal descendants. And the covenant was: Do this, and you'll get a secure farm in Israel. I didn't have any relatives standing there in the Sinai, I'm not an heir to that covenant, and God never promised me and my folks anything for not eating pork. So ever since God told Noah and his sons they could eat any animals, it's been licit for me and my line to eat pork. The Torah after about Genesis 11 never applied to them (and by extension me) either before or after Jesus, and probably didn't apply to you and your'n either. Your points are well taken about the laws for Jews and Gentile. God *did* give the reasons why the meat of shellfish, pork, and birds of prey were considered dirty and unsanitary. Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   13:14:40 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #101. To: Vicomte13 (#86) (Edited) Christians are judged by the deeds, and the standards that Christ set are high, that is true. And Christ set the standard, too, when men fall short. As you readily concede, it can be said that the standard is SO high that ALL men fall short. "He did not say that it was all covered by his death, not at all." Revelation 21…5And He who sits on the throne said, "Behold, I am making all things new." And He said, "Write, for these words are faithful and true." 6Then He said to me, "It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost. 7"He who overcomes will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son.… We note a promise. "It is done" (indicated by Jesus redemptive blood.) And the "water of life" for those who are faithful in accepting His Sacrifice and Grace. There is a strain of theology that essentially sets everything Jesus said aside and says that it's all about the blood. It's an interesting theory, but it isn't based on what Christ SAID, and after all, HE was God, not the Christian theologians. So I'll stick with Christ on this one: what you do matters, there's a (short) list of "Don't dos". Once you find Christ and are baptized, your past sins are indeed completely washed away. But if you commit new sins after that, then you've got to ask God for forgiveness, and he will forgive you TO THE EXTENT THAT you forgive other men their sins. I disagree here. No, I don't believe in such a "strain of theology" that essentially dismisses Christ's "DO's and DON'Ts" instructions and ground rules. The "Our Father" is a prayer to God asking for the Holy Spirit to infuse us with encouragement in deed. BECAUSE WE ARE WEAK AND PRONE TO SIN: "...And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one." (NKJV) In layman's terms, YES, in the finality, "past sins" ARE "washed away" by the blood of Jesus Christ in a pure act of Grace to those accepting this gift. This is not heresy or a misunderstand. ANY admission into the Kingdom of God is based on nothing BUT grace, since NONE of us are worthy. Even IF we've achieved all those "good deeds," and acts of "forgiveness," what about all the other sins left sullying our "account"? Still we remain sinners. "IT. IS. DONE." What's it mean to you, Vic? No one is saying that the importance and requirements of good deeds and forgiveness commanded by Jesus is to be ignored or dismissed. But by THAT criteria, man will still fall short of sinlessness in God's Kingdom because...he is "man." Thus man remains condemned without Jesus blood paid as ransom for an imperfect, sinful man. Liberator  posted on  2014-11-02   14:05:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #102. To: Liberator (#101) No one is saying that the importance and requirements of good deeds and forgiveness commanded by Jesus is to be ignored or dismissed. But by THAT criteria, man will still fall short of sinlessness in God's Kingdom because...he is "man." Thus man remains condemned without Jesus blood paid as ransom for an imperfect, sinful man. Same book, Revelation chapter 7: 13 And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they? 14 And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.(KJV) The apostles emphasized we are saved by God's Grace. It was the subject of the Jerusalem council: Acts 15: 7 And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. 8 And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; 9 And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. 10 Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? 11 But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they. (KJV) The message throughout all epistles is we are saved by Grace through faith in Jesus Christ; His sacrifice is for the remission of sins; and all those who follow Him will obey Him. From 1John 1: 5 This then is the message which we have heard of him, and declare unto you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth: 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. 8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. (KJV) God will not be mocked. If we say we walk with Him, and then go to a brothel, we are liars. It has always been Trust and Obey. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-02   18:58:55 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #103. To: Liberator (#98) and yet, it wuz all he could do to avoid those smooches and quickly run back to the Skipper (no, NOT H'up) Wonder if meggy went to his funeral? “Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and rapidly promoted by mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.” CZ82  posted on  2014-11-03   7:04:53 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #104. To: Liberator (#72) Protestants are more heavily invested in Genesis because it happens to provide the foundation for the rest of Scripture. Genesis sez God's Creation took exactly 6 Days. He rested on the seventh. I don't know if there's much to debate other than whether one believes Genesis' Creation is an allegory, believes "one day" is figurative, or chooses to believe some parts of Genesis, but not others. To me, the issue is to read EXACTLY what Genesis says. Now, to REALLY do that, you have to do it in Hebrew, and you can't even look at just the words, you have to look at the old hieroglyphic-pictographic letters in which it was originally written. Each word is composed of pictographs, and those pictographs THEMSELVES spell out a sentence. So, the words have a surface meaning, but the words are themselves sentences that also carry the meaning of the pictographic sentence of which the word is composed. And the pictographs themselves are words that convey a meaning. When one looks at these three levels of meaning, a fractal picture emerges. God inspired this text, and God has a divine mind and can do things at multiple levels that we can see if we look, but that we could never do. Especially not in the first piece of literature written in a given language. So, where there is ambiguity in meaning on the surface, the pictures beneath the surface bring what is meant into sharp relief, and the sub-pictographic words do too. Translation erases all of this. If the translation is good, the surface meaning is conveyed. The surface meaning is important - the fractal sub- meanings don't contradict it but amplify and clarify it - so if we just look at a good English translation, we have the surface meaning, but we don't have the clarification support, so we have to be careful not to drift. Some assertions can be made that are plausible on the surface meaning in English, but that don't hold up when the deeper Hebrew details are examined. Still, in the case of creation, the surface English meaning serves us reasonably well. "Day" is defined on the first day of creation as "Light", and "Night" is defined as darkness. A day is the evening and the morning. IF we read that to mean the period of darkness and light, then we do have the alternation of dark and light on the first day, second day, third day, fourth day and thereafter, but something changes completely on the fourth day. This is important for understanding time. A "day" is always the alternation of darkness and light, but the Sun and Moon and stars are not placed in the sky to regulate the day and night and times and seasons. There is no yardstick by which to measure the passage of time until the fourth day. After the fourth day, the alternation of day and night in a day is the result of the earth turning and the sun passing overhead, the seasons are measured out by the moon, etc. But before the fourth day none of those things exist. A "day" is the period of darkness and light, but there is no celestial clock for its measurement. So, there is no basis at all in Scripture to conclude that the first four days were 24 hour solar days. They were periods of light and dark, to be sure, but how long the light or dark lasted is not told to us. It is wrong to take the English word "day" and say that a "day" to US is 24 hours, and THEREFORE that means that the first 4 days were 24 hours. That is quite ridiculous. For God DEFINED "day" as meaning "the light". He didn't give a time span for the light. So, what Genesis actually says (in English) is that there were four alternating periods of light and dark in which light was made, the sky was stretched out, land and sea were separated, the beginnings of plant life were placed into the land, and the sun, moon and stars were placed. How LONG those days were is not said, and cannot be surmised. Specifically, to assert that a solar "day", OUR use of the word" is what existed before the fourth day is imposing upon the text and adding a strict detail to Scripture without any authority at all. God DEFINED what a day was, and he didn't define it like that. So, whomever asserts that the first four days were 24 hour solar days is flat out wrong. It's not a matter of opinion. The solar day did not, and could not, exist until God made the sun, and he didn't do that until the FOURTH day. The fourth day ENDED with the Sun being there, but it did not BEGIN so, so we don't have any concept of its length either. The first four days are of unknown length. They were periods of alternation of light and dark. That's all we know from the English. For evolutionary purposes, all of the animals came to be on the fifth and sixth days, and those WERE solar days. So, by Scripture, the flying creatures and swimming creatures began to be made on one day, and the land animals, including man, began to be made on the very next day. All of this was completed on the seventh day, which was a solar day. So, when you say that Genesis sez God's Creation took exactly 6 days, I say that's not right. It took six days and PART OF the seventh, for Genesis, in the English, tells you that on the seventh day God COMPLETED the creation he had begun to make. In the Hebrew this is even clearer, for on all of the earlier days of creation, the verbs are imperfect verbs, meaning that God began to create thus and so, not fully created. Creation wasn't complete until the 7th day, and then God rested. Otherwise, it is true that there are 7 days, but days 1 through 4 are periods of light and dark, not 24 hour solar days. Only after the creation of the sun on the 4th day were solar days visible and possible. The first complete solar day, that began and ended as such, was the fifth day. We cannot say that solar days were exactly 24 hours then. They may have been somewhat faster (18 hours). So yes, Genesis does indeed have all animal life beginning to be created on two solar days (and completed on a third). And those days are probably somewhere in the ballpark of 24 hours. But we can't state how long the first four days were, because there was no sun, moon and stars by which to measure out time as we experience it. The first four days may have been seconds long, or they may have been eons long. There is no way of knowing. That they were periods of evening and morning, light and dark - THAT we know. When the animals were created, then we're talking about recognizable solar days. This doesn't offer any solace to evolutionists at all: animals were created over the course of three days (fifth, sixth and part of the seventh). But it also means that we have to stop short of creationists who go past Scripture and assert things that Scripture doesn't say (in English or otherwise). The earth and stars MAY be billions of years old, if those first days, light and dark, were long periods. But animals came to be on three solar days. Now, when we go into the Hebrew, we discover that the word we translate as "light" is the word AWR, which we'd transcript as "OR". This is the root of "order", "ordinance", "ordain". Pictographically, this is God - El - linked to the head. There are overlapping concepts here. The fundamental message is that from the original conditions of God's spirit hovering in blackness over the primordial chaos, the mem, God said "let there be ORDER", and God brings order out of the chaos. The order and organization is the period of day. What is "light"? Light is the visible form of energy. And what is necessary to overcome entropy and chaos? Energy. A trilogy of ideas come together here, and link to God's breath/spirit over the chaos of the dark mem, the abyss. Now consider of what the universe is composed. Mostly hydrogen and helium. And at absolute zero, in the complete absence of energy (or at extremely low levels - after all, God's spirit was moving the surface of the waters - think of the foam at the level of Plank's Constant), what are hydrogen and helium? They are a liquid. Now think of the "earth" land - matter -being dissolved into that mass of liquid - unformed, invisible, "void" - waiting to be divided out of it. Here, to see the deeper features, we'd have to go into the Hebrew. Just sticking with the English, though, there's a striking set of facts in the text that correspond to much of the physics. The abiogenetic evolution of species, however, simply did not and could not occur in the 3 days of animal life being created and completed in the Genesis account. Genesis IS important. I don't personally believe that it's an allegory. I think it's revealed history. But what is actually REVEALED is the history, and what is actually revealed is different on the granular details than what is said to be revealed by some of the Protestant creationists. Do these differences in details matter? As far as the details go, no, they are irrelevant. God made it all. God made the animals. But the way of looking at Scripture does matter. The Scripture says what it says, and I am very stubborn about insisting that it means what it SAYS. It does not say that creation was done in six days. It says six and part of the seventh. And it does not say six 24-hour periods. Functionally, that latter thing shouldn't matter because it DOES say that animals were made on two solar days (and part of a third), but there could be billions of years of planetary globules floating around in the dark before the fourth day. The length of the early days, before animals, is NOT said, and the it is NOT a solar day, because the solar days don't exist until the fourth day and afterwards. This sort of punctiliousness about Scripture matters, because later on, when we get into Christian doctrine, we're going to be wrestling over a few lines of Paul versus lines of Jesus, and arguing about authorities. So, Genesis is the testing ground. What it says, as far as it goes and where it stops, is really pretty clear. Traditional interpretation has run past what the text actually SAYS, and that's a bad habit of mind that I think should be cut off with Genesis. Example: Christians say how hard the law is, that we can't follow it. Really? Jesus said that the following things will get you thrown into the fire: Murder, sexual immorality, lying, dealing drug "magic", idolatry and cowardice. I don't think that's such a hard law to follow, and I think it's a lie to say that we can't follow that. I follow that. It is not hard to not murder people, not deal in drugs, not follow magic, not worship false gods. It can be harder not to engage in sexual immorality, not to lie and not to be a coward., but it isn't all THAT hard. I recall the honor code at Annapolis, how lying would get you expelled. I recall being very conscious of it all, and I recall wondering how I could possibly get by without fibbing. The answer is, pretty well. I told no lies nor fibs, nor lying by omissions, throughout my time there. In fact, not lying greatly enhances your courage. You tell the truth, you get yelled at sometimes. And the world does not end. Sexual immorality? You have to look at what God said sexual immorality is. Is it hard not to have gay sex? Is it hard not to have sex with animals? Is it hard not to cheat on your wife? Actually, no, really it's not hard. So, I dispute - I deny outright - that it is all that hard to follow the Law of Jesus. Jesus said "My yoke is easy and my burden is light", and for the most part that's right, unless you're addicted to drugs or power or money or flesh or lies. So, what's all this endless business about how the law is too hard and nobody can follow it. That's not true! What has happened is that people have decided that The Law of Moses, given at Sinai to the Hebrews, is "the law". It's not. That was the law FOR THE HEBREWS. Are you a Jew? No. It never applied to you. Christ's coming didn't MAKE it apply to you. The covenant with Abraham was that his descendants would fill that land forever. Arabs and Jews are both descended from Abraham, and that's who fills that land. So, God upheld those covenants, both with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and also with Hagar and Ishmael. And none of that has a thing to do with a Sami Basque Celt like me, or with whatever sort of Gentile you are either. And then there's the Law of Moses: all of you circumcised Hebrews here at Sinai - do this all and I'll give you a secure farm in Canaan and prosperity. Refuse to obey and I'll take it away. Not one word in that about eternal life. Nothing. Are you a circumcised Hebrew, or a descendant of them? Even if you were, do you want a farm in Israel? You won't have it regardless unless a certain number of other similar circumcised Hebrews follow all the laws with you. Are all of those Hebrew commandments - 613 of them by tradition (I could fewer) - really "impossible" to do? I don't know, and I don't care either, because even if I did all of them, I'm not a Hebrew and all that covenant ever offered was a farm in Israel. The deal I'm interested in is Jesus' new covenant. He said I had to follow HIS commandments. And he gave a "bare minimum" list at the end of Scripture. On the last page of Scripture he twice gave the list of things that will earn you the fire and lose you your life: Murder. Not committing murder isn't hard unless you take up the sword as a profession. Sexual immorality. Not committing buggery or bestiality is not a hardship. There is certainly a temptation to adultery and to harlotry, but it is a temptation that men certainly can master. I've mastered it. This is hardly an overwhelming demand for normal people. Lying. Not lying is demanding. It goes hand in hand with not being a coward. Not engaging in pharmakeia. What's that? It's purveying mind-altering drugs to bring on magical hallucinogenic states. I've never done drugs and don't have to resist that temptation. I feel for those who are addicted. They have opened themselves to demons. But note well, pharmakeia isn't being a drug ADDICT, it's being a drug PEDDLER. The poor addict was stupid and got himself infected with devils. But the pharmakon is the guy who sold it to him. Jesus forgives people who have fallen into addiction. He hurls the dealers into the fire though. No, you are NOT FORGIVEN BY THE BLOOD OF CHRIST if, being a Christian, you continue to SELL mind-altering drugs to infect people with demons. Not engaging in idolatry. Well, I believe in God, in El Elyon, God most high, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible or invisible. And I believe that Jesus was his only begotten son - the only one he FATHERED in the FLESH, and that one has to follow Jesus by doing what Jesus said. And I believe that God breathes out his spirit upon the world. That is what I believe. Jesus told me to pray to the Father, so that's who I pray to. I walk with Jesus, and I pray with him to the Father. This is not idolatry. There is nothing remotely idolatrous about it. And that is obeying the laws that will get a man thrown into the fire if he breaks them. The rest - well, that determines one's status and proximity to God in the City at the end. Those who didn't commit the damnable offenses but who were sour, bitter, unloving, uncaring and hectoring of others - they don't get the fire, they followed Christ, but they didn't follow him well, so they end up in a little apartment in the far corner of the City of God. It's eternal life in the city, and that's wonderful, but it's at a level appropriate to their relative lack of compassion and forgiveness. Those who give all and do all, they are much closer to the head table and the throne. None of this should be surprising. It's all there IN Scripture, right out Jesus' mouth. I don't like it when I hear that the law of Jesus is impossible to follow. No it isn't. That's calling Christ a liar! "My yoke is easy and my burden is light" is what HE said, and that means that NO, it is NOT TRUE that his law is brutally hard to follow and his yoke is heavy. Jesus wasn't lying to us. His yoke is easy. But it IS still a yoke. And there are rules. The things that are most important he listed twice at the end of the Scripture. THAT is the law you have to follow if you want to see heaven. And no, it is really not that hard. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   10:16:57 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #105. To: redleghunter (#104) See above. This shouldn't be as hard as it always is. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   10:17:56 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #106. To: Liberator (#101) As you readily concede, it can be said that the standard is SO high that ALL men fall short. I don't think so. Christ set the standard for the lake of fire twice on the last page or two of Scripture: Don't: murder, commit sexual immorality, lie, engage in pharmakeia or idolatry or be a coward. That's not such a high standard that nobody can meet it. In fact, with a change of heart, wrought by Christ, it's a pretty easy standard to meet. It's a high standard, but it's not a particularly hard one. His yoke is easy and his burden is light. Christianity is about following Jesus by doing what he said to do and not doing what he said not to do. That is the marrow of the religion. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   11:00:15 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #107. To: Liberator (#96) I know some may chuckle at that notion, but we ARE in the last days in my opinion (and I know Spot agrees with me.) My wife and I were playfully "arguing" over that very thing recently and I "won" when I suggested that maybe she is right. Maybe the pre-trib rapture IS correct.....it already happened and Jesus took all 4 of those who were His...... My couch is rather uncomfortable. ;o) 4 givan 1  posted on  2014-11-03   11:17:56 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #108. To: Vicomte13, liberator (#105) This shouldn't be as hard as it always is. There are two "operatives" in our (many posters not just you and me) discussions. The first being God's redemptive Grace through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Which we are taught Christ is the propitiation for our sins the mercy seat. The second being the holy standard required of Christians as commanded by Christ and exhorted and instructed by the apostles in the NT. So yes the above is foundational to the Christian faith, and are not mutually exclusive. They can't be. Of all the apostles who we have epistles from, John communicated Trust and Obey in the same thought or "paragraph". So it is not easy to pluck isolated verses from John to come up with a "works based" soteriology nor a disobedient faithless "walk." AKA antinomian belief structure. And you are right. The changed heart and mind seeks the things of God, His Son and strives to walk in the footsteps of Christ. That is our sanctification. And we are to have the same trust and obedience in sanctification as we did as being justified by His Grace. As we are to have the faith, hope and love of our eventual glorification with Christ at His second coming. So yes not difficult. It's all there in the text and written on our hearts and minds. Trust and Obey, there is no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-03   12:08:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #109. To: redleghunter (#108) Thanks. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   13:33:47 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #110. To: A K A Stone, liberator, GarySpFc (#92) Do you believe that you have to be baptized to be saved? I'll try and take a swing. In NT (mostly Acts) we see those who heard the Gospel and believe were baptized. The only example of a believer who was not baptized was the repentant criminal on the cross. Of course that was before Pentecost and the situation where a sinner had direct contact with Christ and was sure to die in minutes or hours. What do we see the disciples and apostles do in Acts? They believed, were filled with the Holy Spirit and then immediately got in the water to be baptized. Probably the best explanation I have seen comes from an acquaintance of GarySpFc(Gary maybe we can have Greg Finch get an account here. Goldi never approved his account, I'm sure Stone will). It is posted at Gary's site evidenceforjesuschrist.org: The following is authored by Mr. Greg Finch: Christian Baptism Since the Protestant Reformation, the issue of baptism has been a source of much controversy. While arguments about doctrine have become less prevalent in recent years as such topics have become less in vogue, there continues to be disagreement over this subject – though it seems as though it ought to be a relatively straightforward and simple topic. This piece is not a comprehensive study of all the various issues associated with baptism with a lengthy series of ‘proof texts’ – there are plenty of articles like that which have been written over the years. Instead, I am addressing this to an audience of believers who have heard confusingly competing teachings about this subject, and who may have ended up being not quite sure what to believe. Rather than seeking to present a series of logical, ‘air-tight arguments,’ I will simply present how I think about the issues associated with baptism, as well as address some of the most common questions. Underlying Roots of Differing Views Much of the controversy seems to me to be rooted in a battle between: 1) the Roman Catholic view of baptism; 2) the Sola Fide view of the Reformationists; 3) an Enlightenment-era (and Hellenistically-rooted) view that ‘spiritual things’ matter, whereas ‘physical things’ (with baptism being a physical act) are ultimately ‘of this world’ and therefore do not. In keeping with the early creeds and writings of the Church Fathers, many Protestants continue to view baptism as a sacrament – a ‘means of grace,’ as opposed to a ceremonial symbol with no real spiritual significance. Since the Reformation, however, for others the Sola Fide tenet often seems to have been used to create a false dichotomy that prevents any real significance from being assigned to this ritual at all. Some even seem to feel as though they are ‘doing the work of God’ by emphatically insisting that this biblical ritual is totally unnecessary and even superfluous. Though it was a universal practice in the early church and is spoken of on numerous occasions within the New Testament (including Jesus’ direct instructions in the Great Commission), for whatever reason, many churches today don’t characterize baptism as being all that important, or even significant enough to include a mention of it in their Statement of Faith. In looking at the various arguments, I do believe this very ‘low view’ of baptism emerged largely as a knee-jerk reaction against what they saw as attributing to the waters of baptism some sort of a mystical power (apart from faith), rather than an intentional desire to ignore the teachings of Scripture (and the example of Jesus) which paint baptism as a practice that was intended to be an integral element of the Christian faith. While I understand and appreciate much of the thinking and motivation of the 16th-century Reformationists, I would nonetheless advocate for a return to classic Christianity rather than using a theological formula from the 16th century as the litmus test for doctrinal truth. Measuring one’s doctrine and theology against a 16th-century standard – or, for that matter, a 19th-century American revivalist view – is simply not as safe or as wise as relying on the Scriptures as the ultimate source of theological and doctrinal truth. Recent Changes in Christian Thinking All that being said, believer baptism has actually become more prevalent in recent years, as fewer ‘exegetes’ have sought to define and defend a comprehensive systematic theology that seeks to excise the need for such a physical expression of faith. In today’s less doctrinaire and more experiential world, new converts have increasingly chosen not only to take the passages pertaining to baptism at face value, but they have also found there to be much meaning found in a physical ritual that signifies the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ – and which emulates the way Christ himself began his own ministry. Even members of denominations that historically have not practiced believers’ baptism increasingly have sought to identify both with Christ and the early Christians, and requested baptism as an adult. Such an approach makes a good deal more sense than losing the importance of baptism in favor of a rationalistic debate over the question of the exact instant at which a person ‘crosses over from death to life’ – with the answer to which being one where I would simply defer to God. I would propose that we collectively quit ‘arguing about words’ (2 Timothy 2:14) and instead simply seek to do what God told us to do, and to practice this most ancient and significant of ceremonies as a part of our commitment to the Lord Jesus Christ. Does being baptized constitute an attempt to earn one’s salvation? Some have made the claim that to attach any real significance to baptism transforms it into a ‘meritorious work’ that one is performing in order to earn their salvation. In Colossians 2:12, Paul notes that the active agent in baptism is God, not man, however – and that the person being baptized is actually a passive recipient: …having been buried with Him in baptism, in which you were also raised up with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead. Such language is not at all consistent with the argument that baptism is something the recipient is doing in an effort to ‘earn their salvation.’ Rather, it is a ritual where a covenant is sealed – not unlike a marriage ceremony – and it is clearly linked to “faith in the working of God.” Saved by Christ Alone When it comes to religious controversies, the issue of erroneous ‘category assignment’ is the source of many problems. Many disputes are rooted in false conflicts between concepts that simply belong at different levels of a hierarchy of belief. This results in numerous controversies and endless arguments where the Bible is used against itself in often illogical and inherently irresolvable disputes as both sides just ceaselessly and unknowingly argue past one another. In an effort to circumvent this problem here, I would always want to note that there is but one, single overarching element that alone accounts for our salvation – there is nothing else that belongs in this same category, or at this same level of the ‘hierarchy.’ That one thing is that Christ shed his blood and died on the cross on our behalf. At the most basic and fundamental level, this is the only thing that saves us – the one thing that atones for our sins and allows us to be reconciled with God. I have often said that it would be important to remember – if you ever find yourself standing in front of God and he were to ask you why you should be allowed to enter heaven – that you most certainly should remember not to tell him it’s because you were baptized . . . or because you have faith . . . or because you ‘tried to live a good Christian life.’ However important these things may be, any one of them at this most fundamental of levels would be the wrong answer – because relying on any of them would be implying that your sins were ultimately being atoned for on the basis of something other than the blood of Christ. Faith Going down a level from Christ’s death on the cross, whether a person comes to have faith in Christ is the pivotal element as to whether or not that person will respond in such a way as to be reconciled as a result of what Christ did on the cross. We come to God in faith – we come to believe that Jesus was who he said he was, and we acknowledge in faith that it is by virtue of his death on the Cross that we are able to be reconciled with him. Repentance As an element of this, however, once we believe we still have to make a decision as to whether we wish to align ourselves with him or to continue to live a life of rebellion. If we choose to submit our lives to him and his will, in faith, we will repent. This will certainly result in a change in our behavior, but the fundamental element is the surrendering of our will to God – not the improved behavior. Baptism Once a decision has been made to turn in faith and repentance to God, the practice we read about in the book of Acts in the early church was to go through a religious ritual – a ceremonial washing. This is what baptism is, and I think of it as being quite analogous to a wedding – a physical ceremony where our covenant with God is sealed. Salvation Some have sought to turn the covenant we have with a personal God into something more akin to a legal contract, the benefits of which are obtained seemingly by perfect adherence to a very explicit and exacting set of terms & conditions. This seems a lot like a formula (“Say these magic words in precisely this way!”) by which one becomes legally entitled to forgiveness from God. On its face, this seems to resemble very little that God ever modeled for us in the Scriptures. Such a mentality often causes its adherents to become consumed by the question, “But, we must establish the point at which someone crosses the threshold from death to life; at what exact moment does an individual become saved?!” – with some even concluding that any misunderstanding regarding the answer to that question renders one’s conversion invalid. Let’s look at another passage – not related to baptism – but one that could have at least something to say in response to this question. In speaking of the old covenant, in Romans 4:9-11: We have been saying that Abraham’s faith was credited to him as righteousness. Under what circumstances was it credited? Was it after he was circumcised, or before? It was not after, but before! And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. Though this is a reference to the Old Testament covenant, it seems to indicate that, at least under the old covenant, God considered coming to faith as the pivotal moment when one ‘crossed from death to life’ – even though that was prior to the point when that covenant was actually sealed. Not only was Paul illustrating the continuity between the Old and the New Covenants, but such thinking would also seem to be consistent with what we read in John 5:24: “I tell you the truth; whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life.” On the flip side, disappointingly and inexplicably, many would-be logicians have pointed to this and other Scriptures to absolve everyone of any need to be baptized at all. Such an approach to the Bible in general and baptism in particular seems very puzzling. Why would any believer exhibit a refusal to submit to a clear biblical practice such as baptism as some sort of a ‘badge of honor’ – seemingly, I suppose, as proof of what a ‘high view of faith’ they hold – and ascribe some sort of nobility to refusing to acknowledge and submit to the clear words of numerous passages from the Scriptures? While ultimately we’re saved only by virtue of Christ’s atoning death on the cross, unless you believe everyone has been reconciled with God, one does need to become a Christian. When we read in the Bible about people becoming Christians, they believed, repented, confessed Christ Jesus as Lord – and they were baptized. This causes me to say that a person isn’t really finished becoming a Christian – they haven’t ‘sealed the covenant’ – until they’ve been baptized. If someone is trying to find a way to justify not being baptized (perhaps finding a ‘loophole’ by pointing to other passages that state that we are ‘saved by faith’) and subsequently decides not to be baptized, I don’t think they – to use the word in a slightly different way – are acting in ‘good faith.’ For whatever reason, they are looking for something that is analogous to a legal loophole. In the Great Commission, Christ himself instructs us to be baptized – so why would motivate we even look for such a loophole? Insofar as possible, shouldn’t each of us just desire to do what Christ told us to do? Do exceptions disprove the rule? Once someone asserts that baptism is ‘necessary’ or important, however, others quickly pose a mystifying array of theoretical questions about whether it is being asserted that a person isn’t saved until ‘their nose breaks the surface’ on their way up out of the water, about what this means for the (apparently, scores of) people who presumably have been killed in car wrecks on their way to be baptized, or about the fate of someone who comes to faith in Christ while they’re stuck in the middle of the Sahara Desert and dies without being able to be baptized. I am not seeking to address such extraordinary circumstances here (though I would refer back to the aforementioned passage in Romans 4), but again would simply say that if a person has come to faith in Christ they ought to be baptized, if at all possible. I find an obsession with questions about extraordinary circumstances or exceptions to the rule to be somewhat distracting, and the motivation for raising them a bit puzzling. I am also reminded of the legal maxim, “Hard cases make bad law” – which highlights the fact that basing normative practices on exceptional, out of the ordinary circumstances is not generally a wise approach. Is simply doing what we were told to do in the face of ordinary circumstances really such a controversial notion? A Straightforward Approach For a number of years, I attended a church where the minister spoke in his sermons of what Christ did on the cross, about the need to come to a saving faith in Christ, to commit your life to him, and to be baptized. When someone was baptized, the person performing the ceremony typically read a number of Bible passages about what baptism means, and everyone just did what God said they were supposed to do upon coming to faith in Christ. Afterwards, everyone was happy that the person had become a Christian. I saw a lot of baptisms, and there were no ‘doctrinal watchdogs’ lurking about, attempting to pin down any of those who were being baptized as to what instant they thought they had ‘crossed over from death to life.’ And that was as far as anyone took it . . . no parsing of words, no trying to bind or reduce God to a set of legal statutes or doctrinal systems – and no derisive observations about any other group’s doctrinal assertions or misconceptions. This is exactly how I believe God would have us approach this subject. The pivotal element toward which we are working is to bring a person to faith, but they’re not really done becoming a Christian until they’ve been baptized, because that is the ceremony where the covenant is sealed . . . but we need always to keep in mind that the ultimate basis for anyone having their sins forgiven is solely a result of the shed blood of Christ. I saw a Statement of Faith on one church’s Web site – they said they would “baptize anyone by immersion upon a credible statement of faith” – such an approach seems to make perfect sense. As I said earlier, I’m often troubled and mystified to see how many churches’ Statements of Faith make no mention of baptism at all. A presentation of the gospel is intended to bring people to where they understand, believe, and commit their lives to Christ – to come to a saving faith in Christ and the power of his blood. Once they’ve come to faith, however, the Scriptures say they are to be baptized. I don’t understand why such a biblical instruction would not even be mentioned in a Statement of Faith – what is the thinking behind such a glaring omission? So, for anyone who is waiting for an incriminating word to pounce upon, I do believe baptism is ‘required’ – but I do think the use of that word sometimes reflects a skewed way of thinking about Christianity. It can easily be construed so as to reduce salvation to a formulaic set of ‘legal requirements,’ making some sort of a ‘lawyerly’ argument that involves a parsing of words similar to debating the definition of the word “is” – but that is most certainly not what I am doing here. Why the Distortions? In everyone’s defense, I think a good bit of the reason that so many who are at different points on the doctrinal spectrum end up taking such skewed positions is in reaction to excesses associated with someone else’s position . . . with that other side’s position, in turn, being distorted as a result of a distortion they were (correctly) perceiving in the first (or some other) party’s doctrinal assertions. I think this has caused people on all sides of this particular doctrinal divide to inadvertently distort their own positions as a reaction to what they perceive as a wrong perception or level of emphasis on the part of another. I think this can best be corrected by refusing to formulate our own theology in response to what we perceive as someone else’s misconceptions. Instead, let’s just look at what we were told in a very straightforward manner to do – and then do our best to do it. Baptismal Practices One additional note . . . while I am not horrified when I hear of a church that offers baptismal services only 2-4 times per year, this practice does seem to me to be out of sync with the spirit of the commands and examples we see in the Bible. Those examples clearly indicate that the normative practice in the early church was to be baptized as soon as one came to faith in Christ. This practice is not difficult to understand, as it seems logical that one would wish to seal the covenant they were entering into with God in the way He had ordained as soon as they were able. Certainly the waters of baptism possess no magical power – we are saved solely by the power and as a result of the grace of God – but baptism was clearly regarded in the 1st-century church as a normative part of a Christian conversion, and I can find no reason not to regard it in that same way today. Bible Passages – About Baptism / Examples of Baptism Below is a cataloguing of many passages that pertain to and illustrate examples of New Testament baptism. Though some will respond that some of these passages are referring to a ‘spiritual baptism’ that has nothing to do with a baptism in water, I have never been able to come to any conclusion other than that the sum total of all these passages clearly indicate that the early church practiced baptism in water. I have seen some of these verses elicit a very hostile reaction on the part of some, but am providing no additional commentary here as to what any of these passages mean – I am simply cataloguing them to be read, meditated upon, and harmonized by the reader – hopefully, with an eye toward coming to understand them in the way the original authors intended that they be understood. Passages Pertaining to Baptism • Romans 6:3-6 – Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. If we have been united with him in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be rendered powerless, that we should no longer be slaves to sin - because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. • Matthew 28:18-20 – Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” • Mark 16:16 – [Then Jesus] said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.” • Acts 2:38-39, 41 – Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ so that your sins may be forgiven, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. This promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off - for all whom the Lord our God will call.” Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. • Acts 22:16 – “And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.” • I Peter 3:21-22 – And this water [of Noah’s flood] symbolizes baptism that now saves you also – not the removal of dirt from the body, but the pledge of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand – with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him. • Galatians 3:26-27 – You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. • Colossians 2:11-12 – In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men, but with the circumcision done by Christ; having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead. • Titus 3:5 – . . . he saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior. • John 3:5 – Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, unless a man is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” • Matthew 3:13-17 – Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to be baptized by John. But John tried to deter him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” Jesus replied, “Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness.” Then John consented. As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and lighting on him. A voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.” • Hebrews 10:22 – . . . let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience, and having our bodies washed with pure water. Examples of Baptism • Acts 2:41 – Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about 3,000 were added to their number that day. • Acts 8:12-13 – But when they believed Philip as he preached the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women. Simon himself believed and was baptized. • Acts 8:35-38 – Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus. As they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, “Look, here is water. Why shouldn’t I be baptized?” And he ordered the chariot to stop. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him. • Acts 10:46-48 – Then Peter said, “Can anyone keep these people from being baptized with water? They have received the Holy Spirit just as we have.” So he ordered that they be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. • Acts 16:14-15 – One of those listening was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul’s message. When she and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. • Acts 16:25-33 – About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everybody’s chains came loose. The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!” The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas. He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved - you and your household.” Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his family were baptized. • Acts 18:8 – Crispus, the synagogue ruler, and his entire household believed in the Lord; and many of the Corinthians who heard him believed and were baptized. • Acts 19:1-5 – While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples and asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” They answered, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.” So Paul asked, “Then what baptism did you receive?” “John’s baptism,” they replied. Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. • Acts 22:14-16 – “The God of our fathers has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and to hear words from his mouth. You will be his witness to all men of what you have seen and heard. And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on His name.” Above fully posted at evidenceforjesuschrist.org Above from a Mr. Greg Finch letter to Dr. Gary Butner and posted with permission at evidenceforchrist.org. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-03   13:44:53 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #111. To: Vicomte13, A K A Stone, GarySpFc, liberator (#109) http://libertysflame.com/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=36450&Disp=110#C110 My apologies, I thought I pinged you to post #110. We discussed this with Gary and other on LP, but the question of Christian baptism came up with AKA Stone upthread. Thought posting the thoughts of Gary's friend Greg Finch were appropriate to add to this discussion. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-03   13:48:21 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #112. To: redleghunter (#111) Baptism: Just do it. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   15:24:09 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #113. To: Vicomte13 (#112) LOL now Nike will take your statement to market goods to Christians. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-03   17:21:51 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #114. To: redleghunter, ALL (#113) Brothers, In 1999 or 2000 I was asked by Linda Holloway, then Chairwoman, of the Kansas School Board to testify before the board during the Kansas Evolution controversy. As I mentioned previously there were reporters from around the world attending, and I would put the number to be at least 1,000. I was the only one testifying against the Darwinists, and the odds were stacked against me 9 to 1. Yesterday, I found the testimony I provided, and I thought you might like to see it. Evolution, God and Atheism I would like to say statements to the effect that one can believe in evolution and God's hand working in creation displays an ignorance of Darwin's belief system and what is being taught. Firstly, if one believes God is using the evolutionary process in creation, then they would use the term "Divine selection," and not "natural selection" as favored by the evolutionists. Evolutionists are very clear that natural selection is an unsupervised, impersonal, and purposelessprocess. In 1995, the official Position Statement of the American National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT) accurately states the general understanding of major science organizations and educators: "The diversity of life on earth is the outcome of evolution: an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable, and natural process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies and changing environments." Or in the words of the famous evolutionist, George Gaylord Simpson, "Man is the result of a purposeless, and natural process that did not have him in mind." I have to ask: How do they know the process was impersonal? How do they know the process was unsupervised? How do they know the process is purposeless? How do they know the process is mindless? ​Their statements are problematic in that they are unscientific. It cannot be proven that evolutionary processes are "impersonal" or that humans were "not in mind." Science cannot demonstrate these assumptions either way--and that's the problem with their position. They become proponents of a religion of atheistic naturalism; I say religion because their conclusion is NOT science, it is faith. Clearly, their definition is diametrically opposed to any concept of a personal Creator being involved in either a creation or evolutionary process. ​In 1997, theologians Alvin Plantinga and Huston Smith notified NABT that their official position statement was really an implied atheism and went beyond what the scientific evidence for the theory could show. NABT discussed the objection for all of five minutes and voted to continue their position statement. Later, NABT removed "impersonal" and "unsupervised" from the language after the evolutionist spokesperson Eugenie Scott informed NABT the definition would give Phillip Johnson ammunition in his fight against their position. They still continue to teach evolution is an unsupervised, impersonal, purposeless, and mindless process. Any teacher denying that is either fired or transferred to teaching another subject. Secondly, in his response to Asa Gray, Darwin specifically stated evolution excludes design. In the view of the great Princeton theologian Charles Hodge, however (as well as every mainstream Christian theologian before the Twentieth Century), excluding design is tantamount to excluding God. Design implies a Designer, God. When one excludes the Designer they have embraced atheism. Darwin's response to Gray is at the end of his 1868 book, "The Variation of Plants and Animals Under Domestication." Darwin concluded his book with a lengthy refutation of Gray's position. Using the metaphor of a house built by an architect utilizing uncut fragments of stone, Darwin explained that "the fragments of stone, though indispensable to the architect, bear to the edifice built by him the same relation which the fluctuating variations of each organic being bear to the varied and admirable structures ultimately acquired by its modified descendants." The shape of each fragment "may be called accidental, but this is not strictly correct; for the shape of each depends on a long sequence of events, all obeying natural laws." Nevertheless, "in regard to the use to which the fragments may be put, their shape may be strictly said to be accidental." In Darwin's metaphor, of course, the architect is natural selection. Darwin continued: "Can it be reasonably maintained that the Creator intentionally ordered, if we use the words in any ordinary sense, that certain fragments of rock should assume certain shapes so that the builder might erect his edifice? If the various laws which have determined the shape of each fragment were not predeter-mined for the builder's sake, can it with any greater probability be maintained that He specially ordained for the sake of the breeder each of the innumerable variations in our domestic animals and plants; - many of these variations being of no service to man, and not beneficial, far more often injurious, to the creatures themselves? Did He ordain that the crop and tail-feathers of the pigeon should vary in order that the fancier might make his grotesque pouter and fantail breeds? Did He cause the frame and mental qualities of the dog to vary in order that a breed might be formed of indomitable ferocity, with jaws fitted to pin down the bull for man's brutal sport? But if we give up the principle in one case - if we do not admit that the variations of the primeval dog were intentionally guided in order that the greyhound, for instance, that perfect image of symmetry and vigor, might be formed - no shadow of reason can be assigned for the belief that variations, alike in nature and the result of the same general laws, which have been the groundwork through natural selection of the formation of the most perfectly adapted animals in the world, man included, were intentionally and specially guided." Americans fought and died for religious liberty, and the right to educate their children in the religion of their choice. Please answer why evolutionists arrogantly DEMAND the right to indoctrinate OUR children into THEIR religion? Gary Butner, Th.D. Merriam, KS www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-03   18:00:04 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #115. To: redleghunter (#113) LOL now Nike will take your statement to market goods to Christians. And what a "Victory" that will be, eh? Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   18:13:09 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #116. To: GarySpFC, liberator (#114) Americans fought and died for religious liberty, and the right to educate their children in the religion of their choice. Please answer why evolutionists arrogantly DEMAND the right to indoctrinate OUR children into THEIR religion? Amazing isn't it. And you presented the testimony over 14 years ago. Now look how deeply embedded the religion of atheism in schools, and now forcing their way into private organizations under the guise of tolerance. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-03   20:03:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #117. To: redleghunter, Vicomte13, A K A Stone, liberator, GarySpFc (#110) Once someone asserts that baptism is ‘necessary’ or important, however, others quickly pose a mystifying array of theoretical questions about whether it is being asserted that a person isn’t saved until ‘their nose breaks the surface’ on their way up out of the water, about what this means for the (apparently, scores of) people who presumably have been killed in car wrecks on their way to be baptized, or about the fate of someone who comes to faith in Christ while they’re stuck in the middle of the Sahara Desert and dies without being able to be baptized. I am not seeking to address such extraordinary circumstances here (though I would refer back to the aforementioned passage in Romans 4), but again would simply say that if a person has come to faith in Christ they ought to be baptized, if at all possible. I find an obsession with questions about extraordinary circumstances or exceptions to the rule to be somewhat distracting, and the motivation for raising them a bit puzzling. I am also reminded of the legal maxim, “Hard cases make bad law” – which highlights the fact that basing normative practices on exceptional, out of the ordinary circumstances is not generally a wise approach. Is simply doing what we were told to do in the face of ordinary circumstances really such a controversial notion? Thanks for posting that, I thought that it was a very well thought out and reasonable approach to baptism for those coming at it from a Protestant background. In particular, I liked the portion that I quoted above. The Orthodox Church refers to the "sacraments" as "Mysteries". And a lot of that is just as above, we don't try to dissect and explain how they work, we just do them because Jesus told us to. And for anyone unfamiliar with Orthodox practice in regards to baptism, while most often it will be performed by ordained clergy, that is not an absolute requirement. In one case a canonized Saint was literally baptized in a pool set up in the Roman arena where people who had professed Christ were being tortured and killed, and this Saint was baptized by a layperson also facing death in the arena in front of the pagan mobs. So when the situation requires it, a baptism by a layperson is perfectly OK. The Orthodox Church normally baptizes by full immersion, but just like with the exception made for lay baptism when the situation requires it, full immersion isn't rigidly required if it isn't logistically possible (someone facing death in a desert, for example). In like manner, the Orthodox Church does not re-baptize a Christian who was given a Trinitarian Baptism in some other Christian Church. By this I mean that we would not consider Mormon, Jehovah's Witnesses, or similar sects who do not worship the Holy Trinity to have a valid baptism -- but pretty much any mainstream Protestant or Roman Catholic would be considered to have had a valid Baptism. If someone from such a confession wished to become a member of the Orthodox Church, they would be received with the Mystery of Chrismation, which is the equivalent of Roman Catholic Confirmation. In Orthodoxy, this anointing with oil is believed to bestow the Holy Spirit upon the believer receiving it. Orthodoxa  posted on  2014-11-03   20:15:49 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #118. To: Orthodoxa (#117) Scripture really is not clear on what exactly baptism does, but it is clear that it's important, and that whole families were baptized. Two virtues of infant baptism, as practiced by the Catholic/Orthodox Churches: (1) the mystical seal on the child - that "magic" part that the writer denies, but that is real nevertheless, and (2) children who are baptized and know it may fall away from the faith, but many find their way back eventually, in part no doubt because that seal is tugging at them, and in part because it lurks in their background and is eventually a solace when life turns black and there's no hope. Look at the good it did St. Patrick, for instance. A baptized child has to actually rebel AGAINST the Church to separate himself, while the unbaptized child never felt a part of it in the first place and has to seek it. Infant baptism is the most effective form of evangelization. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-03   20:36:13 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #119. To: Orthodoxa, redleghunter, Vicomte13, A K A Stone, Don, GarySpFc (#117) I find an obsession with questions about extraordinary circumstances or exceptions to the rule to be somewhat distracting, and the motivation for raising them a bit puzzling. I am also reminded of the legal maxim, “Hard cases make bad law” – which highlights the fact that basing normative practices on exceptional, out of the ordinary circumstances is not generally a wise approach. Is simply doing what we were told to do in the face of ordinary circumstances really such a controversial notion? In particular, I liked the portion that I quoted above. The Orthodox Church refers to the "sacraments" as "Mysteries". And a lot of that is just as above, we don't try to dissect and explain how they work, we just do them because Jesus told us to. Good thread, guys... NOT that Scripture or Jesus didn't explain why things were/are, but yes, there is something to be said for "because Jesus told us it's so." Why a lamb sacrificed instead of calf? Why wine instead of grape juice? Why bread instead of any other food-stuff? Scripture is full of symbolism, mostly to either validate, reinforce, or punctuate faith. Liberator  posted on  2014-11-06   15:54:48 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #120. To: GarySpFC (#114) Awesome, Gary. Liberator  posted on  2014-11-06   16:28:50 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #121. To: Orthodoxa (#117) we just do them because Jesus told us to. Amen! As good soldiers would! But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12) redleghunter  posted on  2014-11-06   22:31:52 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #122. To: Vicomte13, ALL (#118) Scripture really is not clear on what exactly baptism does, but it is clear that it's important, and that whole families were baptized. Two virtues of infant baptism, as practiced by the Catholic/Orthodox Churches: (1) the mystical seal on the child - that "magic" part that the writer denies, but that is real nevertheless, and (2) children who are baptized and know it may fall away from the faith, but many find their way back eventually, in part no doubt because that seal is tugging at them, and in part because it lurks in their background and is eventually a solace when life turns black and there's no hope. Look at the good it did St. Patrick, for instance. A baptized child has to actually rebel AGAINST the Church to separate himself, while the unbaptized child never felt a part of it in the first place and has to seek it. Infant baptism is the most effective form of evangelization. I am reading "Infant Baptism in Historical erspective," and will report more later. I offer the following excerpt. An American scholar, Everett Ferguson, in an article in the Journal of Theological Studies in 1979, used the evidence of the inscriptions to argue that infant baptism developed by the regularising of emergency procedures. ‘Tertullian stood at the point where there was pressure from some to extend the emergency measure to other circumstances.’30 Ferguson linked the emergency baptism of children observed in the inscriptions to the influence of John 3:5, ‘the favourite baptismal text of the second century’, which was thought to deny heaven to the unbaptized. ‘The high mortality rate of infants in the ancient world, to which the Christian inscriptions are a powerful if mournful witness, would encourage the practice of giving baptism soon after birth as insurance no matter what might happen.’31 This thesis is not inconsistent with the evidence surveyed so far. It offers an alternative explanation to Jeremias’ of Justin’s failure to mention infants in his account of baptismal practice at Rome at a time when, from Irenaeus’ assertion, we inferred that baby and infant baptism were already being observed there. Justin’s silence would show that the emergency baptism of infants had not by then become the regular baptism of all infants, while Irenaeus might be alluding to the regular practice of emergency baptism of children. Ferguson’s account also has the advantage of smoothing out the course of the early history of paedobaptism, at least if it did not begin until well into the second century and did not become common until the third century, and then in the fourth century became less common. To Ferguson the fourth-century delay of baptism arose from the same association of baptism with death evident in the emergency baptism of infants.32 Ferguson’s hypothetical account does not comprehensively answer the question when infant baptism began, for it does not tell us when the emergency baptism of infants began. Worth quoting at this point is Beasley-Murray’s comment on 1 Corinthians 15:29: ‘The attitude that could adapt the baptism of believers to baptism for dead people, that they might gain the benefits believed to attach to the rite, would find it a short step to baptize infants, that they too might receive its blessings.’33 It is not clear whether he implies that the baptism of infants might have begun as early as 1 Corinthians, but the link between baptism for the dead and emergency baptism is a suggestive one. Both, in Beasley-Murray’s view, find their roots in a sacramental-magical perversion of Paul’s teaching. Wright, D. F. (2007). Infant Baptism in Historical Perspective (pp. 12–13). Great Britain: Paternoster. www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-07   13:57:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #123. To: GarySpFC (#122) Both, in Beasley-Murray’s view, find their roots in a sacramental-magical perversion of Paul’s teaching. I have tired of this bias. On at least four occasions in Scripture, whole families were baptized: by Peter and by Paul also. The naturally assumption is that children were baptized, this can be assumed to have happened when "households" were baptized - the MULTIPLE households mentioned in the Bible (we could suggest that one household didn't contain children, but there is no basis at all to assume that multiple ancient households were all childless; that would certainly not have been the norm in ancient Jewish or Roman or Greek society - quite the opposite). The argument that children were NOT baptized collides with the baptism, in the Bible, by Peter and by Paul, of at least four named whole households. The first Gentile baptism was of Cornelius and his whole household. There is no Christian OR Jewish basis to argue that young children were not part of a Jewish household. Moreover, three key points made by Jesus himself put the whole argument against infant baptism in a very negative light. The first is that children clearly have angels, who are always facing their Father. The Father loves children. The second is that one must become as a little child if one wants to enter the Kingdom. And the third, which I take is Jesus pointing his finger directly in the face of every latter-day disciple who would keep the children away and telling them to knock it off, is his rebuke: do not prevent the little children from cling unto me, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven. Now add two logical points: (1) Jesus said that rebirth in water was needed - and that's baptism. So why would one deny children this. and (2) Jesus never explicitly explains what exactly baptism does. John's baptism was a baptism of repentance, but what Jesus was doing was much more than that. Truth is, the Scriptures do not clearly tell us what, exactly, baptism does. They tell us that baptism washes away sins, but not just that, there is more to it than that. So, I've got Scripture that has God telling us to do it, and Peter and Paul doing it, and families baptized. So, why is this an argument? Because some Christians started making things up, that's why. I watched a bunch of tutorials on why Christians have to follow the Jewish luni-solar calendar and keep the Sabbath. Once sentence of Paul puts that rubbish to bed. People are going to believe what they want to believe, and they're going to grind whatever axe they want to grind. From my perspective, infant baptism is presumptively in the Bible, and it fits the logic of what Jesus said about children and the childlike state, and what he said about baptism also. I note something else too, from my own life and more generally around the world: Baptism as an infant ties people mystically to that Church. People may walk away, but many are drawn back in their older years, and as they are, they find that they ALREADY are members of the community, but estranged. Over and against this are people on the fringes who scream about the calendar, or about eating pork, or about the modalities of baptism. I try to be endlessly patient with such things, but I'm not endlessly patient. The very notion that some bogus man-made theory by moderns and late medievals renders something that Peter and Paul did a "sacramental-magical PERVERSION" is ITSELF a lie and a perversion. Ultimately, that's what some people want to obsess about, and they're going to, but it is nonsense. I've reached the limits of my patience on the subject of infant baptism, really. I wish you luck in your continued study of it, and I hope you come to the correct conclusion, in the end, which is that Peter and Paul baptized ENTIRE HOUSEHOLDS, with all the children in them, and that this is perfectly in line with what Jesus said about children. I hope that you will come to realize that the Christians who oppose infant baptism are nothing more than new disciples taking up the same role as Jesus' disciples who tried to prevent the children from coming to the Master. Jesus sharply rebuked them then, and they're worthy of rebuke now. To call infant baptism a "perversion" is ITSELF blameworthy, calumnious, and wrong. I hope you come through to the right answer, but my patience with this subject is exhausted. Infant baptism is Biblical, it's what God has always wanted, it's the right thing to do, and there is no more powerful form of permanent evangelism than bringing people into the Church as babies. The sheer size and durability of the Catholic Church proves it. So does the behavior of countless saints over history who, having sown their wild oats and lived badly, were pulled back by God into line with his will, and whose baptism called them back. Baptism of infants requires godparents to ensure the training of the child. I'm not going to argue the matter any further. To my mind it has always been Scriptural, clear, holy, from Jesus, the Holy Spirit, Peter and Paul and IN SCRIPTURE. To my mind, those arguing against infant baptism have always been agents of Satan, however unwitting, and the ferocity of their arguments proof of the intrinsic evil that drives the argument. They are as sincere, and as wrong, as the people who claim that if we don't keep kosher we're going to Hell. And the Apostle who agrees with me most in all of this? The one I never quote: PAUL. For PAUL baptized several whole households, and did it right there in Scripture. Said he was doing it. Against that, what has Satan got? Inferences and make believe. "Suffer the little children to come unto me and deny them not, for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven." - Jesus Christ. In other words, if you oppose infant baptism, you're arguing with Christ. I hope you come to the right answer on this. But I've said all that I can say on the subject. I will just keep repeating myself: it happens four time in Scripture, Peter and Paul both do it, and Jesus' own words about children, and about the general necessity of baptism in water, all point to infant baptism. The arguments against it are anti-Scriptural and the artifices of Satan. Good luck. Hope you come out in the right place. In general, if you're reading a book that holds the view that the roots of baptism are "in a sacramental-magical perversion of Paul’s teaching", you're reading some guy whose not as smart as he thinks he is. He's following his logic, and it's faulty. I'm following Jesus. You're coming from a tradition that thinks that infant baptism is bad. I'm hoping that Jesus' voice will smash through that and persuade you. Peter and Paul baptized infants: four whole households. That means children, presumptively, in ancient societies that valued children. Jesus said to baptize, and Jesus told the disciples to stop trying to block children coming to him. THOSE things are clear. Jesus never clearly spelled out exactly WHAT Baptism does, he merely said to DO IT. Peter and Paul baptized children, and so should we. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-07   16:06:31 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #124. To: Vicomte13 (#123) Scripture really is not clear on what exactly baptism does, but it is clear that it's important, and that whole families were baptized. Two virtues of infant baptism, as practiced by the Catholic/Orthodox Churches: (1) the mystical seal on the child - that "magic" part that the writer denies, but that is real nevertheless, and (2) children who are baptized and know it may fall away from the faith, but many find their way back eventually, in part no doubt because that seal is tugging at them, and in part because it lurks in their background and is eventually a solace when life turns black and there's no hope. Look at the good it did St. Patrick, for instance. A baptized child has to actually rebel AGAINST the Church to separate himself, while the unbaptized child never felt a part of it in the first place and has to seek it. Infant baptism is the most effective form of evangelization. It sounds as if you are demanding the final word on baptism, and that after stating you really don't know what baptism does. The items I post are always meant to honor Christ, and I would be very careful attributing them to Satan. www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-08   10:26:24 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #125. To: GarySpFC, Vicomte13 (#124) It sounds as if you are demanding the final word on baptism, and that after stating you really don't know what baptism does. The items I post are always meant to honor Christ, and I would be very careful attributing them to Satan. To be fair, the name-calling started with your post, when it labeled the historical baptismal practices of the overwhelming majority of Christians in the world today and the historical baptismal practice as a "sacramental-magical perversion." The simple fact is that an insistence that only adults could be baptized was never taught in the Christian Church until the Anabaptist movement in the 15th century. It is THEY who changed from the historical practice of Christianity, therefore it falls to them and their defenders to explain why infant baptism was wrong for over 1500 years. Christ promised that the gates of hell would never prevail over the Church -- if the Anabaptists want to be taken seriously, they should explain why it was in their view that something as fundamental as the second clause of the Great Commission was done incorrectly (according to them) for over 1,500 years! It also amuses me somewhat that traditional baptism is labeled as some sort of "magical perversion" when there are aspects within some sections of Protestantism which could be accused of the same thing. I recall reading a tract urging the reader to repent of their sins and to recite the tract- writer's version of "the sinner's prayer". The tract literally ended with the phrase: "That's it, you're saved!" In other words, the entirety of the Christian Faith had been reduced to the recitation of a single incantation, and that was all that was needed. Presumably, the reader accepting the premise could then move on to becoming a Mormon, Muslim, or some other non-Christian faith; could never even attempt to attend a single Christian Church service, never seek to receive a single Sacrament, could lead as sinful a lifestyle as they might choose -- and it was all covered because at one point in their life they had recited the magical spell. Orthodoxa  posted on  2014-11-08   13:56:10 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #126. To: Orthodoxa (#125) I think you are quoting an excerpt I posted from another author, NOT what I stated. There was no name calling on my part. www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-08   14:56:27 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #127. To: GarySpFC (#126) I think you are quoting an excerpt I posted from another author, NOT what I stated. There was no name calling on my part. Ah, that's fair enough. I'm sorry for misunderstanding your post. But at the same time I hope that you can appreciate why Vicomte13 may be a bit defensive on that issue. I'm not Roman Catholic, but it shouldn't be a mystery that all too often members of that confession are characterized as all sorts of horrible things. While I would argue with Roman Catholic friends that full immersion baptism would be preferable, as I stated up thread I would never question that their baptism is invalid or that they are not Christian if they are living up to their Church's teachings. The "sacramental-magical perversion" phrase that was quoted was of course quite inflammatory. It would be akin to if someone posted on a thread about marriage and quoted someone stating that marriage between a man and woman was a "perversion" that was introduced only because of "extreme circumstances" and that actually gay marriages were the norm because a "scholar" said so... Everyone knows that marriage has been between men and women for thousands of years, the burden of proof that it was somehow changed and that the "real" marriages were only gay ones would be upon the people making the wild claim. In like manner, infant baptism has been the historical norm since the beginning of the Church. The overwhelming majority of Christians practice it and have done so throughout the centuries. Every Church that can trace it's direct origin back to the Apostles baptizes babies. Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, Anglicans, etc. So in my view, the group introducing a change in practice after 1,500 years of consistent and uncontroversial infant baptism would need to have very solid arguments for why something as fundamental as that was done wrong for most of the Church's history. Orthodoxa  posted on  2014-11-08   15:21:08 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #128. To: Orthodoxa (#127) I am very familiar with the pain of questioning one's baptism, because I went through the process of questioning my own. I likewise was baptized (sprinkled) as an infant. I am not questioning if the baptism of others is valid, but offering what i discovered. Let each be persuaded in his/her own mind. Later, when I was approximately 13 years old, I went to our church pastor, and asked to be baptized, "exactly like Jesus." His response was, "We can go down to the creek chop a hole in the ice, and baptize you there. Or, we can go over to the vacant parsonage and baptize you there, but there's not any heat in the vacant building. Or, we can simply baptize you the normal way in the church service next quarter." Once again I was sprinkled by that pastor.. There was something that didn't sit right with me the way he handled my baptism, but I didn't dwell on it too much at that time. Many years later after entering seminary, I did an extensive study on the subject, and came to the conclusion I wanted to be baptized by immersion. It was my view that baptism was a command to be obeyed for the remission of sins. Acts 2:38. Baptism in the Greek actually should be translated as immersion. I also saw that baptism was a death, burial, and resurrection with Jesus Christ by faith. Romans 6, and I Peter 3 18-22. 6 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. 5 If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with,a that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been freed from sin. 8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God. The Holy Bible: New International Version. (1984). (Ro 6:1–10). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan. 18 For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit, 19 through whomd also he went and preached to the spirits in prison 20 who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water, 21 and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledgee of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22 who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand—with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him. The Holy Bible: New International Version. (1984). (1 Pe 3:18–22). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan. Once again, let each be convinced in his own mind. www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-08   16:23:27 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #129. To: GarySpFC (#128) I am very familiar with the pain of questioning one's baptism, because I went through the process of questioning my own. I likewise was baptized (sprinkled) as an infant. I am not questioning if the baptism of others is valid, but offering what i discovered. Let each be persuaded in his/her own mind. Later, when I was approximately 13 years old, I went to our church pastor, and asked to be baptized, "exactly like Jesus." His response was, "We can go down to the creek chop a hole in the ice, and baptize you there. Or, we can go over to the vacant parsonage and baptize you there, but there's not any heat in the vacant building. Or, we can simply baptize you the normal way in the church service next quarter." Once again I was sprinkled by that pastor.. It's disappointimg if your past pastor either did not understand what you were seeking or chose to ignore it. The Orthodox Church would not at all disagree with your view that immersion is preferable for baptism. I was baptized by full immersion as a child. And at the same time we can recognize that sometimes difficult circumstances arise that would make immersion difficult. It is possible that your pastor who sprinkled you really did not think that immersion was feasible -- although perhaps if he had understood that it was important to you to be immersed he might have come up with ways to work around the logistical problems -- heating the water in the building or just postponing your baptism until there was warm enough weather for it if you live in an area where it gets warm enough to swim in the summer. And at the same time, Orthodoxy would not call into question as to whether someone who was sprinkled was genuinely Christian. I'm happy for you that you did finally get the form of baptism that you sought, may it continue to bless you both in this life and the next. Orthodoxa  posted on  2014-11-08   17:20:19 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #130. To: Orthodoxa (#129) I made it clear to the pastor that I wanted to be immersed, but the UMC seeks to disregard immersion. My wife is Orthodox and I have read some of your theologians. www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-08   21:04:26 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #131. To: Orthodoxa (#127) Ah, that's fair enough. I'm sorry for misunderstanding your post. But at the same time I hope that you can appreciate why Vicomte13 may be a bit defensive on that issue. I'm not Roman Catholic, but it shouldn't be a mystery that all too often members of that confession are characterized as all sorts of horrible things. While I would argue with Roman Catholic friends that full immersion baptism would be preferable, as I stated up thread I would never question that their baptism is invalid or that they are not Christian if they are living up to their Church's teachings. The "sacramental-magical perversion" phrase that was quoted was of course quite inflammatory (1) I'm not really "defensive" at all. I stated the truth: I'm tired of the subject of infant baptism, because I consider to be distempered. I'm not willing to "defend" infant baptism. I'm just not interested in discussing the matter. It is self-evidently obvious from Scripture that the Apostles practiced the baptism of children - multiple times they baptized "their whole household", of ancients, who had no birth control and who were of military age. Of course there were children there. And also what Jesus said about the children. And what I said myself awhile ago: that infant baptism is the most effective form of Christian evangelization. To me this is all utterly obvious. It's not an open question, and I'm not willing to spend any time discussing it. That's not really being defensive. It's being truthful and adult, if somewhat brusque. When a Jehovah's Witness knocks on my door, I'm not defensive about my religion. I'm patient with these poor addled souls who are following a ridiculous pretension. So I invite them in, offer them a glass of cold water, and have a talk with them, Bible in hand, trying to show them where they go off the rails. But eventually the time comes when I'm simply tired of it: they are convicted, committed to their idiocy, and it is a waste of my time to keep going on. I consider the arguments against infant baptism to be ill tempered, anti-scriptural and idiotic. They are a waste of my time, and I won't engage in them any more. Of course babies should be baptized. It is powerful and effective, and God loves them the most. That's not defensive. If anything, it's offensive, though it is not exactly intended to be. When I wrote, I did say the truth also: that I hoped my interlocutor would work his way through it and come to the right answer. But I told the truth: the right answer is obvious from Scripture, the arguments against infant baptism are stupid, and I myself am not interested in spending any more of my time on a pointless topic. (2) Baptism by full immersion in running water would be preferable if only for symbolic reasons: that's how Jesus himself was baptized. But, as is stated in the Didache, baptism is baptism, and you use what you can: running water if there is some, standing water if not, pouring if not that. Could churches be built with a mikvah that had running water in it? Yes, and if I were in charge of building and accoutering Churches, they would be. But I'm not, and you only get baptized once, generally as a baby, you don't remember it, so ultimately it doesn't really make a difference how. It becomes a matter of quibbling over the pattern on the drapes. Meanwhile, the floor is rotting out because the Church is aging and emptying. I once thought that Christianity could be brought back together with understanding and patience. I now think that that was as forlorn a hope as my hope to see a Christian party arise in America. People are too wedded to their norms, and their traditions are so tied into their theology that they can no more distinguish the two than Pharisees could. Infant baptism and the modalities of baptism are examples of that. When you've got half the Church tacitly supporting abortion rights, you have a much bigger theological problem than the matter of the color of the drapes or the modality of baptism. Vicomte13  posted on  2014-11-10   8:36:35 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   #132. To: Orthodoxa (#129) And at the same time, Orthodoxy would not call into question as to whether someone who was sprinkled was genuinely Christian. I'm happy for you that you did finally get the form of baptism that you sought, may it continue to bless you both in this life and the next. Indeed, Orthodoxy does not call into question the mode of baptism, nor does it question the issue of age. That said, it is obvious to me Christ was addressing the issue of baptism with Nicodemus needing to be born again of the water and Spirit in John 3. Jesus stated, "You must be born again." Furthermore, Christ connected the need to "believe in the Son" with baptism in verse 15, which clearly involves choice. That whole households were baptized were in the NT goes without saying, but it is an assumption that infants were involved. I don't have a problem with young children making a choice to follow Christ in baptism if they have the mental capacity to make that choice. “Let no one mourn that he has fallen again and again; for forgiveness has risen, from the grave.” John Chrysostom www.evidenceforJesusChrist.org/Bible GarySpFC  posted on  2014-11-10   21:29:36 ET  Reply   Trace   Private Reply   Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest

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