No. Just no. In fact, hell no.

Yep.

Well, this subject is exhausted. Time to move on.

I have noticed there are churches which people tend to go to just because or they have to go, and there are churches where people go to be with other people because they want to be there with other people who want to be there.

I've begun to think some churches are attended by those who only enjoy judging others or being unkind for no good reason.

That last church I was in made me very cynical. You could not get those people to pay any attention to scripture, they spread false gossip constantly to tear down the most valuable members (not me certainly), they ran out the primary donor to the church when he was dying of leukemia on the say-so of vicious gossip about him (which I personally knew he was innocent of because the gossip was about him meddling in another church which I was attending at the time he was allegedly making trouble there). When they kicked this dying man out (and his very sweet wife who was in grief over it as she faced losing her husband), they did just keep all the money he had donated, probably almost half the on-hand funds, like $10K-$12K. Oh, and BTW, the woman who was the false accuser? She had managed to get them to admit her husband as a full member of the church when he was unbaptized. In a Baptist church. Does this illustrate what a bunch of complete dumbasses they were? They didn't exactly enjoy it when I kept asking like, "What part of Baptist do you not get?" or "What part of 'Believe and be baptized' is so complicated?" These people had been raised in that church, heard decades of Baptist preaching, and still didn't grasp the most fundamental facts. They stared at you like dumb cows if you said these things. I think most of them couldn't recite or even recognize a single bible verse. My sarcasm was unrelenting until they terminated his membership. The same woman also had made the church dining hall her own distribution center for tapes by that crackpot at Shepherd's Chapel on satellite. They didn't tell me this but I think they had to consult the Baptist General Conference to make sure that people were supposed to be baptized to belong to a Baptist church.

I think the only reason I lasted there as long as I did was because I just couldn't grasp how they could possibly be that stupid. And I have considered in the years since that they really just weren't interested in Christianity at all. And I wasn't going to quit once I realized they were plotting against a sick man, the finest member that church had had in many years. When I knew they were trying to expel a dying man, I was not going to abandon him. Oh, not to mention they had a family of charismatics that sat behind me, mumbling in tongues. Well, there are churches for charismatics but Baptist churches are not one of those churches. The charismatic family used to attend a charismatic church an equal distance from their home but decided they wanted to be charismatic at a Baptist church instead. I don't think they were troublemakers at the other church and they were actually very nice people. They were not members (yet) but did attend regularly. But they left Kenneth Copeland literature around and kept talking about how excited they were to attend his next conference, like they were eager to get Baptists to go to these charismatic conferences. I kept taking those brochures home and kept forgetting to put them back in the church so somehow those Copeland brochures didn't last long. I think they were evangelizing, maybe even trying for a takeover attempt, to convert a Baptist church to charismatic. That happened around that time to about a half-dozen small Baptist churches down in Texas and I had read of other attempts in other states. All the charismatics have to do is conceal their affiliation and get half the voting membership of a Baptist church to agree and they can do anything they want, including changing denominations entirely. The result is charismatics who get a free Baptist church and its treasury and can do anything they like.

I really should have spraypainted Ichabod over the front door as a safety warning to the general public.

As for why I never told the story before, despite people inquiring here, was because I was embarrassed to have ever been in such a church of dumbasses and heretics who seemed to attend mostly to backstab and gossip.

I'm not saying they should go to hell. But I think that's their destination. They are cows, plodding along the wide path to destruction, chewing their cud placidly.

I quit going the week they kicked him out. I didn't badmouth them around town or spread the accurate story around town because I thought they'd come to their senses. I stopped going to church after that and haven't gone again other than a few clan funerals held at other local churches. I'm more than a little tired of the local Christians. I am avoiding that kind of religion. I never told this before here or at LP and always dodged the question when someone inquired (like watchman who asked me the other day) but I'm tired of hiding their cruelty to him just because someday someone might read this and figure out what church and what people I'm talking about. And, no, I have not forgiven them either. They would first have to confess their cruel sins toward Mel as he was fighting his losing battle with leukemia and make public contrition with his wife, a widow whose heart they broke. And they should return the sizable funds he donated to keep that church open. But Mel did forgive them. Sweet sweet man, a better man than me.

What "line"?

The line against replacement theology. "The Jews killed our savior! HEP! HEP! HEP!"

Rome has officially apologized for the doctrine and the results of preaching it over the centuries, I think it was B16 who did it. He was the best bishop of Rome theologically in a long long time. I know JP2 is the fave but he got pretty senile in office and got worse and worse. JP2's great moment was his role in challenging the Soviets and, in his supporting role to Thatcher and Reagan, bringing down the Soviet Union. No one ever talks about it for some reason. It was a great victory. And so many people seem to never have even noticed it.

Are you sure you're Catholic?

I think you're saying things here that you wouldn't say in front of other Catholics. I think you're telling us doctrinal ideas that the Catholic church does not teach.

What, you only believe Semites, not those wily Asians?

I addressed these fake 6000 years. Please do not distort what I said. Jews are Asians BTW. Arabia is in Asia too.

About 3000-4000 years ago is when the Japs first started creating records

Japanese culture has a little more than 2000 years. Ancestors of Japanese started to arrive about 3000 years ago.

Well, this subject is exhausted. Time to move on.

I think the key difference between us on forgiveness is that I only forgive those who ask for forgiveness. It's only happened a few times in my life. It's quite rare actually, at least in the modern era.

You insist that we must forgive everyone, contrite or not, whether they ask for forgiveness or not.

I'll point out that God does not forgive the sins of anyone unless they have asked for forgiveness. Scripture is uniformly insistent that we ask for forgiveness in order to receive it. But then He guarantees in every passage from every voice in the canon that He will always forgive if asked to forgive. [Except that blaspheming the Holy Spirit. For that sin, there is no forgiveness. Some do argue that only the demon-possessed will blaspheme the Holy Spirit.]

Surprising you could study scripture so long and in such detail and never notice this key feature of Christian teaching on forgiveness.

Christians aren't supposed to be doormats to all aggressors. But they have to forgive their trespassers' sins against them if asked just as God has to forgive their trespasses against Him. And God does not forgive your sins if you do not ask forgiveness. And God does not forgive your sins if you have not forgiven others who have sought forgiveness from you. This is the by-which-ye-measure-ye-shall-be-measured stuff on which we do agree.

You realize that your doctrine requires a Christian to be more forgiving toward others than God Himself is to children of God? Are we really required to be more forgiving toward others than God is toward us, the flock of Christ?

Well, maybe when we get to Heaven, we can give some pointers to God on how He needs to be more like us and just forgive every sin even if the sinners don't ask for forgiveness or have any remorse. Then God can be learn to be as forgiving as we are.

You are not reflecting the Catholic teaching on forgiveness. You've exceeded it considerably IMO. I've simply never heard a Catholic say such things. I've been trying to be more agreeable nowadays but I just don't agree that unsolicited forgiveness is the very heart and soul of Christian praxis and the measure by which God will judge His children to determine their eternal fate.

Japanese culture has a little more than 2000 years. Ancestors of Japanese started to arrive about 3000 years ago.

I don't think it's worth arguing. There are various claims over arrivals and when the present dynastic line was first established, at some point prior to the first written records. I readily admit that there are at least a few thousand years that are legendary, at or below the standard of Oral History before the Old Testament books were committed to writing.

Much of the Old Testament comes to us from Oral History. Setting aside for a moment our natural religious bias in favor of Jewish scripture, is the factual basis for the the Japanese claim to ancient dynastic continuity any less reliable than the Jewish claims to the accuracy of OT books that derived from Oral History? Why do we favor Jewish oral history over Japanese oral history if we are discussing the evidence for or against the claims and merits of either.

Of course, we are getting into matters of when a language becomes established and develops, as Proto-Hebrew spread and developed toward more modern forms of Hebrew. And when the language was established and when it came into common use and which versions of the OT books were authorized translations and the timing of these things over the centuries before the birth of Jesus. But I don't want to debate whether the LXX is better than Masoretic text tradition, whether the LXX was authorized for production, the unknown writers of it, etc.

And you are, like GI, posting at FR.

I haven’t posted on FR since 2005.... and then I only posted for a few months. Went several years before I developed an interest in posting again. 2008, was when I started to post on LP. 2012, election night, paranoid schizophrenic Goldi, banned me for no particular post or reason. Because Goldi was strange as fuck, and none in her family would have anything to do with her, she kicked the bucket and not a soul knew, until the heat of Florida caused her to melt into her hardwood floor. I bet that smelled awesome.

Anyhow, since she banned me, I would occasionally check in... when I noticed the bitch had died, and her kook forum was gonna shit the bed, I decided to post here, knowing Stone was a little more sane than Goldi-schitzoid.

Well, you know the rest of the story... now I mostly lurk here. Try and wait out the impeding doom of all the cop hating, drug loving kooks.

Hope I could straighten up some of that fake news you were posting.

Well, the fellow who is staying with me right now is a Catholic, nephew of an archbishop, in fact. We discuss these things nearly nightly. He and I both note the deep decline of the Church, all of its struggles, and discuss why that is. He has his ideas, I have mine. He thinks that some of what I think is "on the fringes of the Church". No doubt.

Saturday morning in the men's group at Church we discuss all sorts of things. I focus on what I consider to be most important things, and they focus on other things. They all appreciate my scholarship and singular focus. They don't necessarily agree with me. The priest likes the vigorous discussion.

Catholics think a lot of different things. None of my critiques has gotten me asked to stop taking communion.

I've been trying to be more agreeable nowadays but I just don't agree that unsolicited forgiveness is the very heart and soul of Christian praxis and the measure by which God will judge His children to determine their eternal fate.

You've exaggerated what I said.

Do you believe that belief that Jesus was God and that his death forgave all of the sins of anybody who believes that is very heart of Christian praxis and the measure by which God will judge his children to determine their eternal fate?

ETERNAL fate? Nah, just their fate to a very distant time - "for eons".

And God does not forgive your sins if you do not ask forgiveness.

And we are not God.

But as I said above, we have exhausted this line of discussion, I believe.

What you said about the reason you no longer attend church is interesting, and emblematic of why the churches are dying out everywhere. People have not abandoned faith in God, but many are abandoning church attendance. Your story is an example of why.

We don't know what God would have said to Abraham had he not made the decision to become a Molechite because God tested him by asking him too. We don't know if Abraham PASSED the test, only his choice and what God gave him.

I only recall that Abraham's father had an idol shop but Abraham left and built a shrine to Jehovah and entered the Old Covenant with God.

He did do some idol-smashing a bit later, not that interesting or exceptional really. God was making clear His requirement that the Chosen People would not tolerate graven images. But then, of course He did. Idols were everywhere but they were forbidden by the first of the Ten Commandments. Being the first of the Ten Commandments is comparable to the importance of the First Amendment to all the others which followed in the original Bill of Rights.

If he ever asked me to sacrifice my daughter to him, I would tell him no, that would be wrong. If he wants her, he can take her himself. I'm certainly not going to do it."

Well, if He didn't ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, I don't think you should worry about this hypothetical, however dramatic. You aren't Abraham. You aren't as beloved to God as the first Jew but you are luckier than Abraham in many ways.

This is kind of eisegesis, a way of injecting ourselves into historical events in scripture. "I'd never do that, I'm smarter than Saint So-And-So!"

BTW, I thought I'd tell you that I have decided to forgive you for disagreeing with me. I know you didn't ask but I guess I need to forgive you anyway or I'll end up in hell.

What you said about the reason you no longer attend church is interesting, and emblematic of why the churches are dying out everywhere.

I think it was exceptionally bad really. Like a horror movie. You should understand that this was a far more sound church when I was young. And when people were dying of cancer, they didn't get persecuted based on malicious gossip from a newcomer who was distributing Shepherd's Chapel materials in a Baptist church. It would never have been tolerated there when I was young.

I really doubt the other local churches are close to as bad but I am very wary now. I keep feeling asking who I feel could be considered brethren in the biblical sense. We are commanded not to forsake the assembly of the brethren since we are expected to support one another and thoughtfully help each other aspire to higher things. But if I don't agree with any local churches on theology and the churches I should find acceptable in theology and conduct simply can't seem to assemble for an hour a week for quiet and edifying worship without finding something to squabble about, then I don't have any local brethren. I did enjoy attending church other than some of the weak substitute preachers they had sometimes, like the one that actually riled me over Isaiah 14 and the lone useage of the term Lucifer in that passage.

“How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning! how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!”

As you would expect, the guest preacher proceeded to inform the congregation that Lucifer was another name for Satan and, well, yada-yada-yada. I think it has been about 300 years since Rome repudiated this specific reading. Apparently news travels slow.

Of course, the passage if read by any literate person understands that Lucifer is a term used to mock the hated king of Babylon, the sole superpower of the ancient world, the destroyer of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem and the conqueror who carried Israel's people away to captivity in Babylon. And the prophesy against the fate of the mighty kings of Babylon is dire. And it has nothing to do with Satan.

I honestly don't think anyone else in that church (other than 1 guy) even knew that Lucifer=Satan is a minority view, to say the least. Literate people seem to realize Lucifer=Nebuchadnezzar pretty easily.

grave two days later.

3 spinner.

ETERNAL fate? Nah,

Taking away from scripture in true fake christian catholic fashion.

knowing Stone was a little more sane

Just a tiny little bit. :)

He saved us from our sins not by dying ... In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, he asserts, “Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures”. (1 Cor. 15:3).

You are right. Vic is making stuff up. He thinks it is because he got a bump on the head.

You don’t need to forgive me for disagreeing with you. My disagreement with you is not an affront to you. If anything, it is an affront to God, if God agrees with the doctrines if the church that you espouse. Of course, if he doesn’t, then there’s no affront to anyone. We disagree, profoundly, on a great many things. We always have, and we always will, I expect. I forgive you, for disagreeing to the point of being disagreeable and taking the argument “to the man”, at times, which is something I don’t do. I severely criticize, even attack and insult, belief systems, be they political or religious, on very specific grounds, and I discuss the motivations of groups of people. What I don’t do, unless provoked to extreme anger BY ad hominem, is take the argument “to the man”. And the two times that I have done that on this site over the years, in both cases, I admitted that I had left the fold of Christian behavior and apologized to the man. (The second time I was not forgiven, by him, but my conscience is clear on the matter, because in neither case did “the man” admit that he had started down that path of personal attack. That seems to be a Christian debate strategy, I have noticed. Catholics and Protestants both, when I press hard on the sins of the church and the places where the church(es) frankly depart from Jesus - quoting Jesus for good measure - get mad at ME, and adopt the strategy that WAS successful for 1500 years: attack the man and obliterate him as an individual, by calling him a heretic and using the armed power of the state to silence him. This left a butcher’s bill for the Christian Churches that, today, is poison at the very root - they can not deny it, and they will not denounce themselves, as churches, for having been violent mass murderers, over the years. They seek to minimize or trivialize the first of the deadly sins, performed over the course of history by them as organized churches, but they focus like a laser beam on my presumed sins and imperfections. Legitimate, factual criticism of historical behavior is met by vicious ad hominem - and that only because the organizations can rip out tongues and burn to silence. What am I trying to do? To point out that the churches are dying -all of them. Pew Research will tell you that. To point out the specific reasons why. And to point to a way of reform that will work. Simply giving up on God and joining the secular society is not the answer, but doubling down on bad old tradition isn’t either. How about actually being Christians - you know, paying attention to CHRIST for a change, just him. That’s not ad hominem. The replies I get when I press it as insistently as Baptists or JWs IS ad hominem, focusing on MY flaws, on MY perceived “heresy”.

I used to really fight, just as I did over politics. But I figured out something: the status quo itself is moving inexorably in my favor. We have the general military posture I favor, we’re moving towards the social welfare system I think is necessary, we’ve established a regime of broad socio-legal tolerance. God is still there, as always, but the stubborn, unrepentant historical churches that will not reform towards what Christ actually said are dying fast. So, really, I don’t have to fight at all. I just need to wait. The service I could perform is to give those who are wedded to sinking ships a different way to look at things, that will make the transition to a more Nazarene world less painful for them, to allow them to make it their own. But this is error on my part, according to them. So I’m inclined to just fly away and let their world dwindle and die around them. Two boats and a helicopter...I’m the helicopter.

Died Friday.3 PM. Still in the grave 24 hours later, 3 PM Saturday. Rose somewhere before dawn Sunday, say 4 AM, 13 hours later. Total time dead: 37 hours - a day and a half by the Greco-Roman accounting.

Died Friday before Sunset, part of one Jewish day (counted sunset to sunset). Was in the grave sunset to sunset Saturday, one Jewish day. Rose before sunrise Sunday morning. In the grave part of three Jewish days, but not “three days and nights by any accounting. One full day, one full night and most of a second, 3 hours and 10 hours, respectively, of two other days. . It is Saturday noon. By Jesus’ death count, three days and nights from now is Monday morning at 1 AM.

Monday morning 1 AM is not “three days and nights” from now in any language except the weird semantic math of Jesus’ resurrection, to try to avoid a discrepancy.

So, I don't dwell on commas, etc. in Romans, because Paul is not authority. He is persuasion and inspiration and history. Jesus alone is authoritative law. Paul conflicts with Jesus on matters in Romans, in particular. Therefore, I completely disregard Paul on matters where what he says disagrees with Jesus, and don't trouble myself further with that.

You had to be there. Sometimes someone would investigate whether the KJV or other translators had a particular purpose or subtle phrasing in a key passage. I recall a thing like that and I had posted what I intended to be a witty Wizard of Oz quote, "Surrender, Dorothy". And the cleverest poster, an academic overachiever who was an MD, started pointing out the difference a comma makes. Because "Surrender, Dorothy" is a command to Dorothy to surrender herself but "Surrender Dorothy" is a demand for others to surrender Dorothy.

Well, he certainly was right, a very bright man. He pored over text for hidden meanings rigorously. And, as you would guess, he found some doozies. But I raised some objections on going full gnostic about hidden messages in the Bible. Because that was what the gnostics did do. They prided themselves on finding a new and novel doctrine every day, at least according to the bitter complaints of the ancient church fathers about any attempt to reason with them and restrain their wild influence on others. And there are reflections in the text of the NT that indicate an early rise in non-Christians or gnostic Christians trying to enter into the churches as teachers. Certainly, those warnings against false teachers and false doctrines had a source. And, by the time the NT canon was established, they had already had to battle the influence of Marcionism, an attempt by Marcion to establish his own canon in 144AD when the Roman churches lacked any canon of their own. Marcion included the 10 sections of Luke and the Pauline epistles, making 11 books in all. Marcion dismissed the OT entirely and most of the later NT writings and Marcion was more than a little gnostic in philosophy. "Marcionites held that the God of the Hebrew Bible was inconsistent, jealous, wrathful and genocidal, and that the material world he created was defective, a place of suffering; the God who made such a world is a bungling or malicious demiurge." Well, I'm sure you recognize the familiar theme that runs through so many gnostic heresies of the early churches. It was clear that if Rome didn't authorize a canon of scripture, someone else was going to do it for them. Rome shifted into high gear and produced the canon in only 250 years.     : )

I'm trying to convey from my experience with the commas and Dorothy that people with a little time and education and a bent for what are, in essence, literary pursuits can find and invent extremely clever interpretations of even slightly ambiguous phrases. We see this in modern books about prophecy or prosperity gospel or charismatic practices. And you can see how bright people can make a mountain out of a molehill, entire doctrines unknown to the ancient churches. Why, these people are clever enough to give Jesus Himself some pointers if He'd only listen to them.

When I see people making these novel doctrinal claims or "discovering" new doctrines or that some verse that only needs to hammer home a single doctrine suddenly contains six doctrines, I think it is very clever and I admire their ingenuity. But it is too clever by half.

I do not commit the sin of idolatry, pretending that when men have designated as "The Bible" make the Bible a God-maker that elevates mere followers to the status of God's Son, and changing what God said from "Listen to HIM" to "Listen to THEM, and let their words nullify what HE said."

I do agree with this. However, the writers of the Bible have provided doctrinal guidance to isolated communities and a common knowledge and doctrinal base. That is a net plus, as long as people don't fetishize it or endow it with an authority it does not possess. Just as you said.

entire doctrines unknown to the ancient churches

In 381 AD the Church began to advocate for the torture and death of heretics.

The famous St. Augustine, in regard to that very thing, infamously opined "Error has no rights".

So, the very ancient church, before its division, even, into Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic, let alone Catholic and Protestant, decided that it had the divine right to call for the bloody death of Arian heretics.

The ancient church went off the rails very, very early. If you're killing people in the name of Christ, you've lost the bubble, and there's going to be a lot of poisonous fruit coming from that diseased tree.

Claims of the authority of "the Church" fall to mud if "the church" involved has killed people - and that's all of the old ones except the Quakers.

Of course they wouldn't! They're still insisting on priestly celibacy (Jesus chose a married man as the first pope), on the necessity of confession for the forgiveness of sin by God (Jesus said to be forgiven you have to forgive others, and he didn't add anything else), on the all-male clergy (JEsus chose St. Photini, the woman at the well, to carry out the first mass conversion of any village in the Scripture, through her teaching them about him).

Well, you know why they banned married priests. It led to corrupt practices with bishops giving a lot of church wealth to their children. And any pope in the last thousand years could end the practice. And it is not even consistent. Anglicans, Lutherans and so on can become priests even if married but they cannot remarry. And everyone looks the other way when African seminarians get married before they become priests. Because African societies won't accept an unmarried priest, it seems. The pale white sexless priest is a fetish of European and American believers.

Know what Jesus said about married couples using contraception? Nothing.

Shhh...I didn't think that anyone had noticed yet.

The Church would defend the murder of millions by saying that these were mere "disciplinary matters" - when abstaining from killing was the first general commandment given after the flood, and killing is one of the sins on both of Jesus' lists of sins that will get one thrown into the lake of fire at final judgment if not forgiven.

The Church burnt a SAINT alive after a Church trial - St. Joan of Arc.

The Church accumulated the wealth to build the towering Vatican by selling indulgences and other corrupt practices.

You can anticipate all our little Prot arguments in advance. It does show that at least we understand each other. So much better than just talking past each other. If people disagree, let it be over something that matters, not semantics.

Prayers to Mary, to the Saints? Etc.? It's not wrong. Neither are prayers to Jesus or the Holy Spirit. But JESUS taught us to pray to the father. So how about shutting all of our shit traps and just doing it exactly like he said, hmmmm? Or do we really think we know better. (Well, we don't.)

I always think of the scripture that teaches of how Christ ascended and now sits in the presence of the Father, interceding for our every request. Some people assert the Father could not even hear our requests if Jesus were not present to sanctify our request. I don't want another intercessor trying to tug the Father's elbow and get Him to do something. I want to go straight to the source, Jesus Himself. What else is He going to do there if everyone is giving all their prayer traffic to Mary and other sainted figures? Jesus is the Shepherd and His sheep know His voice. Mary and Joan of Arc are certainly admirable but the NT doesn't endow them with intercession duties and they don't have a flock. Or a bride. Like any Prot, I still think the NT is about Jesus, beginning to end. Anything that diminishes Christ's role in any matter is highly suspect, just as a simple rule of thumb.

Of course, us Prots aren't too terribly upset if the Catholics are praying to Mary. It gives us more time to monopolize attention from Christ Himself. And Mary can't tug on Jesus' elbow or on the Father's because she has no throne there. Only the Father does and Jesus has a throne at the right-hand side. There was plenty of ink and paper to write about Mary's throne at the left-hand side of God but no one ever wrote that, probably because it just doesn't exist because Mary is not an intercessor at all. For scripture to claim that Jesus is the sole intermediary necessarily would mean that for Mary to be an intercessor, Jesus' role and authority would be diminished. Jesus' role would be reduced to being a Co-Intercessor. By the time you let all the saints start acting as intercessors, Jesus is just one of thousands of intercessors available, no more important really than Saint Lucifer of Cagliari, my own favorite saint. Well, if Baptists can have favorite saints, he's my pick. A fiery writer who wasn't afraid to tell off the emperor. He must have been a real corker. As you might suspect from an earlier post, having a Saint Lucifer so people understand that Lucifer is not a name for Satan. When the Bible means Satan, it says Satan or the devil. And a Baptist would note that this term, Lucifer, is found only once in the entire Bible. So it fails the two-citations test for doctrinal teaching as well, something for Baptists to feel smug about. And we can point out that the name Lucifer would be largely unknown to modern people were it not for Hollyweird's use of it in various horror movies. They even had a soap opera called Lucifer a few years ago. Naturally, it was a sympathetic portrayal of all the challenges faced by the charming devil.

There is one throne sitting next to the Father's. There is one Heir, one Bridegroom, one Shepherd, one Intercessor, one Sanctifier, one Savior. And, according to scripture, they're all named Jesus which is so easy that even a child can remember it. Like that was the intent all along. Scripture does teach this multiple times, enough to make any Baptist satisfied that the doctrine is supported authoritatively.

The famous St. Augustine, in regard to that very thing, infamously opined "Error has no rights".

Well, Lutherans admit that Martin L. made a few errors as well. We are all human and these two writers are not in the NT canon. For a reason. They're clever enough and passionate but they are also sometimes too clever by half, to continue my use of that tortured phrase.

You don’t need to forgive me for disagreeing with you. My disagreement with you is not an affront to you.

I know you realize I was just trying to rib you from that earlier post about unsolicited forgiveness.

That seems to be a Christian debate strategy, I have noticed.

What am I trying to do? To point out that the churches are dying -all of them. Pew Research will tell you that.

Not to entirely minimize or dismiss your concerns for the churches, I would point out that the churches have had some similar periods of mass apostasy that lasted decades. Then people returned to the church when they were tired of living godlessly. Also, if the apocalyptic element is (finally) correct about the approaching Second Coming, the diminution of churches and believers does square well with prophecies in scripture about itchy ears and persecution by your own brethren.

used to really fight, just as I did over politics. But I figured out something: the status quo itself is moving inexorably in my favor. We have the general military posture I favor, we’re moving towards the social welfare system I think is necessary, we’ve established a regime of broad socio-legal tolerance. God is still there, as always, but the stubborn, unrepentant historical churches that will not reform towards what Christ actually said are dying fast.

Yeah, I think we all like the idea of being in the grandstands for the Grand Finale, that history should end on our watch. It would be satisfying. Until the Tribulation hits.

My Dutch family line in America is an example of that!

I'd think that any student of history could only be surprised if it wasn't.

Those princes and kings were a horny bunch apparently.

Yes, the Law had to be fulfilled, and it was. But the Law itself was not, and is not, for Gentiles. It is for Israel.

I don't doubt that your language was written well but somehow I didn't get that impression from your posts but perhaps I was being slow or was distracted.

I take back (most of) what I said about your posts being too radical for an orthodox Catholic.

So was the argument that in that one verse we see (1) The one offering for Sin in the Blood of the New Covenant in Christ (2) Perfected forever them, as perseverance of the saints/the pledge or down payment and (3) limited atonement? You said there were three others, but I can't see that.

Believe me, it is not worth your time. It used to be one of my favorite verses because it crowns the teachings of verses 1-13.

The reason it bothers me in part is that Baptists believe in bible study that every important doctrine has at least two witnesses in scripture, that it is a hallmark for bible students to look for. If you think you've found some new doctrine in the Bible, go find confirmation in another passage or preferably from another writer.

To put it simply, God know His children don't listen well so He does repeat Himself so we can't ignore Him so easily. I think every parent knows the feeling.

And, in the unprofitable dispute over That Verse, the six doctrines that were cited as belonging in that verse were all taught in numerous other passages and by other writers. So what profit is there to imagine five extra doctrines in a short simple verse? Well, none. So we should avoid any disputes with others over such "discoveries".

And I still insist that no one ever makes a six-way pun. Or writes or speaks a sentence with six different meanings. After all, if the bright guy who found six doctrines in there was that lucky in his "discovery", why shouldn't I claim there are 30 doctrines in that short sentence? Then I would obviously be at least five times smarter than he is? And, if someone objects that no one can find 30 different complex doctrines into just one verse, I can retort that there is no biblical limit to how many doctrines can dance on the head of a verse. Or is that angels dancing on the head of a pin? Anyway, I continue to assert with my usual charm that virtually all bible verses are written in plain language and their context generally leaves no doubt as to their single doctrinal teaching. I can't think of any good examples of a key verse where you have even dualistic meaning.

Of course, it is exciting to grab your fedora and bullwhip and adventure off into the scriptures to make another "discovery" (or six) from ancient times. Perhaps more exciting than just studying scripture for wisdom and doctrine as the Bible itself tells us to do.

Considering that there is no punctuation at all in the original koine Greek, theological disputes over commas really don’t persuade me of anything.

Considering that there is no punctuation at all in the original koine Greek, theological disputes over commas really don’t persuade me of anything.

Yes but one could always dispute whether the choice to use an ordinary comma and/or a hoity-toity semi-colons, liberally sprinkled through every chapter, was an effort by translators to convey subtle context. Which really isn't the case. I never found much rhyme or reason to their system.

Died Friday.3 PM. Still in the grave 24 hours later, 3 PM Saturday. Rose somewhere before dawn Sunday, say 4 AM, 13 hours later. Total time dead: 37 hours - a day and a half by the Greco-Roman accounting.

Died Friday before Sunset, part of one Jewish day (counted sunset to sunset). Was in the grave sunset to sunset Saturday, one Jewish day. Rose before sunrise Sunday morning. In the grave part of three Jewish days, but not “three days and nights by any accounting. One full day, one full night and most of a second, 3 hours and 10 hours, respectively, of two other days. . It is Saturday noon. By Jesus’ death count, three days and nights from now is Monday morning at 1 AM.

Monday morning 1 AM is not “three days and nights” from now in any language except the weird semantic math of Jesus’ resurrection, to try to avoid a discrepancy.

Nope. Just because you make up some bullshit doesn't make it so. That bump might have damaged your brain permanently.

Well done.

Well done.

It was okay to convey my point(s) but I always look back at such posts and tell myself that I should have been able to cogently write the same thing in less than half the words that I used.

I wish I wrote as well as Vic. I guess those guys do get some tangible skills from law school.

...effort by translators to convey subtle context...

And how would the translators, none of whom are native speakers of koine Greek (there being no native speakers of koine Greek; speakers of modern Greek are as close as one can get, and modern Greek is to koine Greek what Portuguese is to Latin), know that such subtle context was there at all? Did they not, rather, see their theology in certain readings of the text, and supply punctuation to cause the text to read "correctly", by their beliefs.

Even a single capitalization changes meaning. It is the difference between helping your uncle Jack off a horse, and helping your uncle jack off a horse.

What did I "make up"?

Jesus died "in the ninth hour" during daylight, on Good Friday. That's Friday at 3 PM. He had to be in the grave before sunset (about 6 PM), because the body had to be put away and people stop working by sunset. The Jewish day begins at sunset, and sunset Friday means Saturday, the Sabbath begins at about 6 PM.

Jesus was in the tomb all day Saturday, from about 6 PM Friday night - by our calendar, which is the beginning of Saturday by the Jewish reckoning. "Saturday night" by Jewish reckoning, was the night between Friday sunset and Saturday sunrise.

When the sun set on Saturday, Sunday night began, circa 6 PM Saturday. It was during Sunday night, before dawn on Sunday morning (circa 6 AM), that Jesus rose from the dead, before the light.

So, by the Jewish calendar, Jesus was dead for three hours on Friday, all day Satruday, from sunset Friday until sunset Saturday, and he rose from the dead Sunday night, about 4 AM, before the sunrise on Sunday morning.

By the Roman, or our Calendar, Jesus was dead on Friday afternoon at 3 PM, in the tomb before sunset, and still in the tomb at midnight Friday night. That's 9 hours. He was in the tomb all day Saturday, that's 24 hours, and he rose from the dead about 4 or 5 AM Sunday, another 4 or 5 hours, for a total time of 37 or 38 hours, not even two full days (that's 48 hours).

By the Jewish calendar he was in the tomb for part of two days - Friday (3 hours), and all day Saturday. He was in the tomb for slightly less than two nights: Sunset Friday until sunrise Saturday, and sunset Saturday until before sunrise Sunday morning.

That's 1 and a quarter days, and 1 and 3/4 nights.

Jesus was not in the grave three days and three nights by either the Hebrew or Roman recknoning. I'm not making this up. It's just basic math.

Jesus was not in the grave three days and three nights by either the Hebrew or Roman recknoning.

Actually, He was...by Hebrew reckoning.

"Three days and three nights" is an Hebrew expression which had the same meaning as simply "three days" (see 1 Sam 30:12-13)

Also, a part of a day can also be referred to as "a day".

If there were any holes in this accounting of Jesus' time in the tomb, the Jews themselves would have used it to tear the whole thing to shreds. They didn't..so obviously they understood very well what Jesus was saying.

Did they not, rather, see their theology in certain readings of the text, and supply punctuation to cause the text to read "correctly", by their beliefs.

I finally conclude they didn't have much of a system. Usually commas in the middle of a verse, semi-colons at the end of a run-on verse to tie it to the next verse.

Even a single capitalization changes meaning. It is the difference between helping your uncle Jack off a horse, and helping your uncle jack off a horse.

Good rule. I guess I didn't pay attention back in second grade to pick up that handy tip. LOL

Samuel 30:12-13 speaks of a man who had had no water for three days and three nights. That would mean three days and three nights. There's nothing in that passage to suggest any other span of time.

12 And they gave him a piece of a cake of figs, and two clusters of raisins: and when he had eaten, his spirit came again to him: for he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any water, three days and three nights.

13 And David said unto him, To whom belongest thou? and whence art thou? And he said, I am a young man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite; and my master left me, because three days agone I fell sick.

In v. 12 "three days and three nights" In v.13 just "three days". Yet both speak of the same time frame.

There is a wealth of commentary on the key verse Matthew 12:40

I'm not going to plaster this thread with copy and paste from all the rich sources available: Lightfoot, Gill, Torrey...

I will paste a bit of Adam Clarke (d.1832) that you might find interesting:

If you number the hours that pass from our Savior's giving up the ghost upon the cross to his resurrection, you shall find almost the same number of hours; and yet that space is called by him three days and three nights, whereas two nights only came between, and one complete day. Nevertheless, while he speaks these words, he is not without the consent both of the Jewish schools and their computation.

And, would you look at that...Clarke agrees with your math!

Of course Clarke agrees with my math. This is called "special pleading" to try to paper over a hole in the evidence.

In the case of Jesus the problem is obvious: the math does not work for three days and three nights. This creates a desperate situation. 1 Samuel is proposed as a solution. But just read it: it isn't.

We're told that he hadn't eaten bread nor drunk water for three days and three nights.

Then "three days agone" - that doesn't change anything.

Three days and three nights ago could be Friday daytime, and Friday night, Saturday daytime, and Saturday night, and Sunday daytime and Sunday night. Or we could call that Friday, Saturday, Sunday and not break out the day and night part.

That would fit the pattern of Genesis, in which the light part of the day is specifically called day, and the dark part, night, but then the night and the day (the dark and the light) are one day.

This is normal use in both Hebrew AND English. The only difference is when the day is measured from. In our, and the Roman calendar, a day is midnight to midnight, comprising the daylight and the nighttime. There could be some ambiguity as to when "Sunday night" is, because with a mid-night division of the day, part of the nighttime was Sunday night, and part of the nighttime was Monday morning. So, was last night Sunday night or was it Monday night, or was it both? Our convention is easy: last night was Sunday night, and tonight is Monday night.

In Hebrew this is easy: the night - the dark part of the day - is never split between two days. The day runs sunset to sunset. So, what WE could all "Friday night" is "Saturday night to the Jews". To us, the night comes AFTER the day. To the Jews, night comes BEFORE the day.

Looking at Samuel, we see the double use in Hebrew of the word day, to mean both the 24 hour period (nighttime then daylight), and also the daylight part, as distinguished from nighttime (three days and three nights).

What we don't see is any reason at all to truncate three days and three nights into a day and a half period. The only reason we strain to do that is because Jesus was clearly NOT in the tomb three days and three nights, so there is a desperate (and dishonest) attempt to square a circle so that a discrepancy in the Bible does not have to be admitted.

That section from Samuel doesn't help the case at all, because there's no reason to think that the guy hadn't fasted and thirsted for three days and three nights. But Jesus wasn't in the tomb for three days and three nights.

3 days and 3 nights is Monday.

You count Friday as the first day then Friday night as the first night. Then Saturday is the second day and Saturday night is the second night. Then you have Sunday morning which is the third day but you haven't had 3 nights yet dummy.

You basically worship yourself and think of yourself as a prophet because you damaged your brain when you hit it. You didn't die. People die one time then they are dead. Tooconservative says you write good but it doesn't count if it is lies and deception.

Yes, three days and three nights IS Monday.

Except in Christian math, when Christ was cruficied on Good Friday, and spend "three days and three nights" in the tomb, then rose from the dead on Sunday morning before dawn.

That's exactly the problem.

He didn't rise on Sunday morning. Unless you are calling Christ a liar. He rose on Monday morning.

You are just trying to make it fit with your Easter Sunday tradition.

Show me in scripture where he rose on Sunday morning. You can't he didn't.

I will give you one point. It may not have been 72 hours. So you taught me something on that detail. Thank You.

Show me in scripture where he rose on Sunday morning. You can't he didn't.

The women went to the grave early in the morning before dawn "on the first day of the week". The last day of the week, to the Hebrews, the Seventh Day, was the Sabbath. Sunday was the First Day of the Week, and that's when the women in the Scriptures went and found the empty tomb.

The Christians celebrate Easter on Sunday because the Bible SAYS he rose on Sunday morning - "the first day of the week".

Nobody who has tried to fix the problem in the text proposes Monday. Instead, they try to say he was crucified on Thursday. "The first day of the week" language in the Gospel texts fixes the resurrection on Sunday biblically.

And now when the even was come, because it was the preparation, that is, the day before the sabbath, Joseph of Arimathaea, an honourable counsellor, which also waited for the kingdom of God, came, and went in boldly unto Pilate, and craved the body of Jesus. Mark 15:42-43

This what I believe...

Mark 15:42-43 establishes that Joseph of Arimathaea asked for Christ's body on "the day before the Sabbath". Ex. 20:10 tells us that the Sabbath Day is the seventh day and this is when the Jews worship. That would make the day before the Sabbath to be the sixth day, when Jesus was crucified.

Jesus' crucifixion on the sixth day works very well, spiritually speaking. The Bible tells us that six is the number of a man. Man was created on the sixth day. That would be in keeping with Christ's death by man and for man...on the sixth day.

That would have Jesus lying in the tomb on the seventh day, the Sabbath Day. The number seven is used by God in the Bible to teach a day of rest, as in God rested from His work of creation...on the seventh day.

Next would be, of course, the eighth day. The eighth day is the day baby boys are circumcised, speaking of a new life, a new beginning. It is a very important day where God teaches an important spiritual lesson. It is also the day when the the disciples gathered to break bread (Acts 20:7). "On the first day of the week" would be the day AFTER the Sabbath (seventh)...the eight day. This, to me, is the perfect day for the Resurrection, a new life and new beginning!

By Hebrew time keeping this would qualify as three days in the tomb. By the same understanding if would even allow for the phrase "three days and three nights".

This is about the best I can do at the moment. I think it fits and it encourages my faith, and teaches needful spiritual truths. Of course, there is much debate on this whole matter.

The same woman also had made the church dining hall her own distribution center for tapes by that crackpot at Shepherd's Chapel on satellite.

You gotta be kidding me. A Baptist church peddling that bogus and blasphemous "serpent seed" doctrine?

I really should have spraypainted Ichabod over the front door as a safety warning to the general public.

As for why I never told the story before, despite people inquiring here, was because I was embarrassed to have ever been in such a church of dumbasses and heretics who seemed to attend mostly to backstab and gossip.

I'm not saying they should go to hell. But I think that's their destination. They are cows, plodding along the wide path to destruction, chewing their cud placidly.

I quit going the week they kicked him out. I didn't badmouth them around town or spread the accurate story around town because I thought they'd come to their senses. I stopped going to church after that and haven't gone again other than a few clan funerals held at other local churches. I'm more than a little tired of the local Christians. I am avoiding that kind of religion. I never told this before here or at LP and always dodged the question when someone inquired (like watchman who asked me the other day) but I'm tired of hiding their cruelty to him just because someday someone might read this and figure out what church and what people I'm talking about. And, no, I have not forgiven them either. They would first have to confess their cruel sins toward Mel as he was fighting his losing battle with leukemia and make public contrition with his wife, a widow whose heart they broke. And they should return the sizable funds he donated to keep that church open. But Mel did forgive them. Sweet sweet man, a better man than me.

Toxic church. No wonder I encounter previously church attending folks in large numbers at Christian sites. I hear of the same backbiting, gossip and lack of charity when they hit rock bottom.

When I did my deacon interview last year, after answering a lot of questions I understood they had to ask, I was asked to ask the elders and pastor questions. Taking care of our own was a main concern. I told them of an elderly man who sat in the back every late service on Sunday morning. I started sitting next to him and formed a rapport. One day he came in tears to tell me that the doctors recommended he go on hospice care. He did have family not far away who were not members. We prayed, already had each other's email and phone numbers and kept in contact. He told me he was a member of the church for "years." After not seeing him for two weeks I called, no answer. Texted email nothing. Last I heard he was going to live with family. Asked the associate pastor to pull his member file so I could go do a hard target search. Nothing in the files.

My point to the church leadership was I had the man fill out a "connect" card months before, the pastor did a follow up and nothing after that. The difference with my church is they listened and asked me to work with the senior deacon to shore up our contact with elderly members. My church is young and there are actually not many elderly. But we do now keep a closer eye on the elderly and I offered the pastors, elders and deacons keep up an active hard target search for the elderly. I told them many fall off the grid when they become shut-ins, don't know how to work their computers (some do) to get the service on Facebook. Not only that but the human to human contact is what we should be doing even with the services broadcast. I also offered what Catholics do, bring communion to the shut-ins. Good news is they listened and acted.

Fair enough. It doesn't MATTER to me, because I don't expect the Bible to be letter-perfect history. I think the tradition has it right, and it fits the general story in the Scriptures: Killed on Friday, in the Tomb on Saturday, raised the morning of the First/8th Day, Sunday. That's what the text says, and that's what the tradition says.

The only reason it's an issue is because of the "three days, three nights" language. That's not accurate, but it doesn't MATTER to me. It matters to other people, for whom the absolute perfection of the historical record in the Bible is a matter of absolute theological necessity. I'm not someone like that, and if I were part of a Church that demanded that thought, I would either have to leave that Church or, more likely, stick around and just disagree with it.

Of course, I were a member of a Church that actually put real pressure on me to give money, I would not be a member for very long!

What did I "make up"?

Jesus died "in the ninth hour" during daylight, on Good Friday. That's Friday at 3 PM. He had to be in the grave before sunset (about 6 PM), because the body had to be put away and people stop working by sunset. The Jewish day begins at sunset, and sunset Friday means Saturday, the Sabbath begins at about 6 PM.

Jesus was in the tomb all day Saturday, from about 6 PM Friday night - by our calendar, which is the beginning of Saturday by the Jewish reckoning. "Saturday night" by Jewish reckoning, was the night between Friday sunset and Saturday sunrise.

When the sun set on Saturday, Sunday night began, circa 6 PM Saturday. It was during Sunday night, before dawn on Sunday morning (circa 6 AM), that Jesus rose from the dead, before the light.

So, by the Jewish calendar, Jesus was dead for three hours on Friday, all day Satruday, from sunset Friday until sunset Saturday, and he rose from the dead Sunday night, about 4 AM, before the sunrise on Sunday morning.

By the Roman, or our Calendar, Jesus was dead on Friday afternoon at 3 PM, in the tomb before sunset, and still in the tomb at midnight Friday night. That's 9 hours. He was in the tomb all day Saturday, that's 24 hours, and he rose from the dead about 4 or 5 AM Sunday, another 4 or 5 hours, for a total time of 37 or 38 hours, not even two full days (that's 48 hours).

By the Jewish calendar he was in the tomb for part of two days - Friday (3 hours), and all day Saturday. He was in the tomb for slightly less than two nights: Sunset Friday until sunrise Saturday, and sunset Saturday until before sunrise Sunday morning.

That's 1 and a quarter days, and 1 and 3/4 nights.

Jesus was not in the grave three days and three nights by either the Hebrew or Roman recknoning. I'm not making this up. It's just basic math.

Enter Screen Names of recipients separated by commas or semicolons.

There are other possibilities to explore examining the pertinent Scriptures. I think the gymnastics used today is try to fit post apostolic "feast days" and calendars in to a 7 day Roman calendar.

Jesus said in Matthew 12:40, “For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of a huge fish, so the Son of Man will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.” Those who argue for a Friday crucifixion say that there is still a valid way in which He could have been considered in the grave for three days. In the Jewish mind of the first century, a part of day was considered as a full day. Since Jesus was in the grave for part of Friday, all of Saturday, and part of Sunday—He could be considered to have been in the grave for three days. One of the principal arguments for Friday is found in Mark 15:42, which notes that Jesus was crucified “the day before the Sabbath.” If that was the weekly Sabbath, i.e. Saturday, then that fact leads to a Friday crucifixion. Another argument for Friday says that verses such as Matthew 16:21 and Luke 9:22 teach that Jesus would rise on the third day; therefore, He would not need to be in the grave a full three days and nights. But while some translations use “on the third day” for these verses, not all do, and not everyone agrees that “on the third day” is the best way to translate these verses. Furthermore, Mark 8:31 says that Jesus will be raised “after” three days.

The Thursday argument expands on the Friday view and argues mainly that there are too many events (some count as many as twenty) happening between Christ's burial and Sunday morning to occur from Friday evening to Sunday morning. Proponents of the Thursday view point out that this is especially a problem when the only full day between Friday and Sunday was Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath. An extra day or two eliminates that problem. The Thursday advocates could reason thus: suppose you haven't seen a friend since Monday evening. The next time you see him it is Thursday morning and you say, “I haven’t seen you in three days” even though it had technically only been 60 hours (2.5 days). If Jesus was crucified on Thursday, this example shows how it could be considered three days.

The Wednesday opinion states that there were two Sabbaths that week. After the first one (the one that occurred on the evening of the crucifixion [Mark 15:42; Luke 23:52-54]), the women purchased spices—note that they made their purchase after the Sabbath (Mark 16:1). The Wednesday view holds that this “Sabbath” was the Passover (see Leviticus 16:29-31, 23:24-32, 39, where high holy days that are not necessarily the seventh day of the week are referred to as the Sabbath). The second Sabbath that week was the normal weekly Sabbath. Note that in Luke 23:56 the women who had purchased spices after the first Sabbath returned and prepared the spices, then “rested on the Sabbath.” The argument states that they could not purchase the spices after the Sabbath, yet prepare those spices before the Sabbath—unless there were two Sabbaths. With the two-Sabbath view, if Christ was crucified on Thursday, then the high holy Sabbath (the Passover) would have begun Thursday at sundown and ended at Friday sundown—at the beginning of the weekly Sabbath or Saturday. Purchasing the spices after the first Sabbath (Passover) would have meant they purchased them on Saturday and were breaking the Sabbath.

Therefore, according to the Wednesday viewpoint, the only explanation that does not violate the biblical account of the women and the spices and holds to a literal understanding of Matthew 12:40 is that Christ was crucified on Wednesday. The Sabbath that was a high holy day (Passover) occurred on Thursday, the women purchased spices (after that) on Friday and returned and prepared the spices on the same day, they rested on Saturday which was the weekly Sabbath, then brought the spices to the tomb early Sunday. Jesus was buried near sundown on Wednesday, which began Thursday in the Jewish calendar. Using a Jewish calendar, you have Thursday night (night one), Thursday day (day one), Friday night (night two), Friday day (day two), Saturday night (night three), Saturday day (day three). We do not know exactly what time He rose, but we do know that it was before sunrise on Sunday. He could have risen as early as just after sunset Saturday evening, which began the first day of the week to the Jews. The discovery of the empty tomb was made just at sunrise (Mark 16:2), before it was fully light (John 20:1).

A possible problem with the Wednesday view is that the disciples who walked with Jesus on the road to Emmaus did so on “the same day” of His resurrection (Luke 24:13). The disciples, who do not recognize Jesus, tell Him of Jesus' crucifixion (24:21) and say that “today is the third day since these things happened” (24:22). Wednesday to Sunday is four days. A possible explanation is that they may have been counting since Wednesday evening at Christ's burial, which begins the Jewish Thursday, and Thursday to Sunday could be counted as three days.

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As for why I never told the story before

always dodged the question when someone inquired (like watchman who asked me the other day)

I didn't see this post until today, TC. I think it is very important to tell these stories...at the right time and when it seems fitting to do so.

What you are talking about here in this post...this is an epidemic. It's repeating itself across the nation like the plague. There has been some abatement, but in my opinion...the damage has been done. The salt has lost it's savour and the light has been hid under a bushel basket (often of bile and venom).

I have a story. My first church had split just before I was called so I thought, great, the problems had left the church and we could just start over. That first Sunday I looked out in the congregation and realized...it had split again, just after the first split left! But somehow, we grew and grew. All the while seismic plates(!) were pressing against each other. Hugh lava domes were forming. Just as victory was looking so sweet! The volcano erupted. New believers crushed, whole families burned alive. A bedrock church from our nation's history...it was gone for good.

That's the thing. The local church IS the bedrock. Its that little community church, in thousands upon thousands of communities and villages, towns and cities. The local church nearest me has taken a novel approach. They tore up their constitution! I figured whatever! If it keeps the doors open and the gospel message going out, I'm all in favor. But as for any serious light emanating, that would breath freedom back into the land...not happening.

Long story short, I moved to a cow pasture. Thankful, everyday. It's safe for now but I see the fabric ripping already. Did I mention, we have Somalians walking the country road past my farm. Its the craziest thing. Middle of nowhere, temps hitting 20 below in winter. I'd like to befriend even share the gospel but they are always gone by the time I walk across the field. Still, its unsettling.

And I will return to my own view of all of this. I am TOTALLY INDIFFERENT to the day on which he was crucified, or rose from the dead. It makes NO DIFFERENCE WHATEVER to me, because I'm not superstitious or idolatrous. That something happened on a certain day does not make that day "more extra special", such that it matters before God.

IF I were a circumcised Hebrew living in Israel when the Temple was still up and the daily offerings were still being made by the Aaronic priesthood, then the Saturday Sabbath would matter, as would the dates of various moons and seasons. But I'm none of those things, so they are completely, utterly, totally irrelevant, in every single respect, to my spiritual OR physical voyage through this world. They're the badges of a defunct religion that neither I nor anybody in my ancestry back to "Adam and Eve" were part of.

I understand very clearly WHY there is such sturm und drang, and effort expended on this very subject: it's a contradiction in the Bible.

But I don't expect a collection of copied human scrolls to be perfect, so such contradictions and imperfections are of no concern to ME either.

They ARE of concern, very great concern, to those people for whom the Bible MUST be word-and-letter perfect, lest their faith be shaken.

I am not such a person - I consider such people to be superstitious at best, and vaguely idolatrous about the Bible, at worst - but their concerns are no skin off my nose, and I'm well content to just let them be - if they let me be also. When they don't, then I bring up obvious issues like this one to repay them for not letting me be by letting them deal with the distress of the obvious imperfections in their book. Perfectionism is not my circus, not my monkey.

I do maintain that the Church is fading all around the world IN PART because of piddling little nits like this. We've got Christians being killed for their faith in the Middle East, China and Africa, and 2 million babies a year being killed for convenience in the USA, and we've got staggering poverty and abuse...and THIS is the sort of trivial shit that Christians fight about?

It's also fading because of more serious issues, such as unchecked abuse, mistreatment of people, bigotry, attitudes about wealth and power, etc. It's not selling well anymore, at all.

My simple, sincere, direct suggestion is: if you want to save the Church, you had better get back to what Jesus himself said, and then insist on DOING THAT. That requires a revamped view of violence, of money, of foreigners, of...everything. It's demanding but consistent.

I don't personally believe that the churches are going to be able to survive if they don't do that. And I'm ok with that. All of the dross falls away, and what is left is Jesus - Just Jesus. That's an improvement, to my eyes. It's sincere, clean and uncomplicated. It's real.