Moreover, YOU are the one putting yourself in a dangerous position by ignoring the fact that Jesus promised to give his apostles further revelation beyond what he explicitly taught in his lifetime .
[quote]JayPierce wrote:
[quote]Brother Chris wrote:
[quote]JayPierce wrote:
No, the Catholics stamped out the true Christian Church, not its own faithful. If you were ok with the church mixing in any old customs and myths from other religions as they saw fit, you were cool.
[/quote]
Documentation please.[/quote]
You do know that it’s ok to cut out all but the statement you are questioning, right? Makes your questions clearer.
The documentation is the church itself. If that didn’t happen, the church wouldn’t be the way it is today. Plus, Paul admitted to intentionally cutting the ground out from under the feet of other churches. Again, look at the epistles. Why didn’t Paul write any kind, reassuring letter to any congregations other than his own? Then look at 2+3 John. Is it possible that Diotrephes is Paul? Certainly fits the bill.
BTW, I wrongly lumped the letters from John in with the epistles. John’s writings reflect great joy in the truth (even in their persecution), and he espouses strict adherence to the teachings of Christ. He gives many warnings about deception and deviation from the Word of Christ, and specifically warns about idols at the end of 1 John[/quote]
LOL this is nothing but baseless conjecture. “If that didn’t happen, the church wouldn’t be the way it is today?” So you are trained historian and sociologist? You are able to retrace the historical steps and rule out ALL possibilities EXCEPT THAT PAUL WAS NOT A GENUINE APOSTLE? THat’s the “only” way the church could be the way it is today? What a bloated and ridiculous statement.
And you are completely wrong in your evaluation of Paul. Your complete lack of knowledge about the Greco-Roman world is apparent in your every comment. I can only pray that you repent before God calls you to account for publicly insulting one of his most loyal and devoted servants. And believe me, whether you are received into eternal life or not (I make no assumptions about your final spiritual state), you WILL answer for denigrating a servant so far superior to you that you are unworthy to even wash his feet.
You’re right, dude, Paul was so stupid that he FREELY ADMITTED to STEALING from other churches, despite the fact that his letters were already being circulated among the churches to whom he ministered, and thus his admission would be known to those churches. Oh my goodness, how could we have all missed it? Man, without your complete lack of exegetical and historical knowledge, coupled with your ignorance of the biblical languages, and your total reliance on crappy, outdated translations and statements taken out of context, we would NEVER have known the truth.
What is going on in 2 Corinthians? First of all, Paul is NOT attacking the apostles of Jesus Christ. No, Paul is attacked a group of individuals he sarcastically refers to as “super apostles” (2 Cor. 11:5), men who came to the Corinthians with letters of recommendation supposedly proving their authority (2 Cor 3:1). This was a common practice in the ancient world, and forgeries were COMMON. These men come and start to preach things different from what Paul preached, and moreover, they publicly attacked Paul, the founder of the Corinthian church. Paul writes to his congregation (which, if you read 1 Corinthians, struggled with a TON of very public sins) to encourage the Corinthians to ignore these “super apostles,” whom he also calls “false apostles” (11:13). These individuals took money from the Corinthians, something Paul refused to do (11:7).
Here’s the part you just don’t get - in the Greco-Roman world, NOTHING valuable was free. Consequently, if someone refused to accept money for a service, it reflected badly on the service. Paul was completely counter-cultural - he refused to take money from the incipient Corinthian community, relying instead on gifts from the more spiritually established Macedonians (2 Cor. 11:9) in order to support himself. Paul did this because the community was just beginning to come into existence, and he didn’t want to add any burden to them. Instead, he relied on other, more well-established churches to fund his ministry. It is in THIS context that Paul says, "I robbed other churches by accepting support from them in order to serve you." His “robbery” consisted of ACCEPTING THE AID OF OTHER CHURCHES TO HELP THE CORINTHIANS RATHER THAN REQUIRING PAYMENT FROM THE CORINTHIANS THEMSELVES. In other words, Paul is not admitting to wrongdoing; rather, Paul is making a comment about his work among the Corinthians - the unrepentance of Corinthians makes Paul’s ACCEPTANCE OF MONEY OFFERED HIM essentially a waste, like robbery.
Since you don’t pay attention to context, I’ll just point something out for you - Paul is being extremely sarcastic in 2 Corinthians 10-12. He is NOT elevating himself above the other legitimate apostles like Peter and John; rather, he is trying to defend himself when the congregation PAUL FOUNDED is rejecting him in favor of these false apostles who take money from the community. He is not elevating himself above the other legitimate apostles; he is defending himself against attacks leveled by his own community under the misleading influence of FALSE apostles.
And in what does Paul’s “boasting” consist? “Are they (the FALSE apostles) ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool!) I am more - I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again. Five times I received from the Jews forty lashes minus one. Three times I was beaten with rods, once I was pelted with stones, three times I was shipwrecked, I spent a night and day in the open sea, I have been constantly on the move. I have been in danger from rivers, in danger of bandits, in danger from my fellow Jews, in danger from Gentiles; in danger in the city, in danger in the country, in danger at sea, and in danger from false believers. I have labored and toiled and have often gone without sleep; I have known hunger and thirst and have often gone without food; I have been cold and naked” (2 Cor. 11:23-27).
Since you don’t know anything about the Greco-Roman milieu, I’ll explain - in Paul’s context, NONE OF THESE THINGS WERE ACTUAL BOASTS. Not a single one of the things Paul said would have been respected by Greeks or Romans. In their perspective, to suffer in the ways Paul suffered was an indication that fate was against Paul, that he was actually a bad person. Paul’s sufferings distinguish him from the false apostles - they extort money from the Corinthians and give them falsehood in return. These false apostles do not experience suffering, and in the Greco-Roman world, that made them automatically better than Paul. In that context, suffering was a mark of shame. Paul, however, REVELS in his shame, because his suffering mirrors the suffering of Christ. This proves that he is a real apostle. In fact, Paul says, “If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness .”
In other words, Paul’s “boasts,” in that context, aren’t really boasts at all, anymore than a man today would “boast” about having a small penis. Indeed, Paul’s humility is evident throughout the passage, in such statements as, “I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses” (2 Cor. 12:5). Why boast in his weaknesses? Because Christ promised that HIS power would be with Paul in weakness, supporting him and working through him. Paul relies ON CHRIST, not on himself. He delights in his sufferings, which the sinful world regards as marks of shames, because by admitting his weakness and frailty, Paul allows Christ to work through him all the more.
[quote]JayPierce wrote:
Name one war fought out of love[/quote]
Love of justice; many?
[quote]
Condoms are inanimate. Blaming them for sin is like blaming a stick for beating someone to death.[/quote]
How about using condoms?
How do we know Paul and the Church has made up their own doctrines?
You gentlemen work so hard to cast away what Christ taught and elevate Paul above Him. Exactly what Christ said the world would do in John 5:43.
He tries to give you a clue in John 2:4.
And then Paul all but laughs in your face in Acts 3:14, and you still don’t see it.
Don’t bother responding to this post or any others I’ve posted. I’ll be silent and not question your centuries of wisdom now. I wish you the best. And yes, without fear of weirdness, I still love you guys.
[quote]JayPierce wrote:
You gentlemen work so hard to cast away what Christ taught and elevate Paul above Him. Exactly what Christ said the world would do in John 5:43.
He tries to give you a clue in John 2:4.
And then Paul all but laughs in your face in Acts 3:14, and you still don’t see it.
Don’t bother responding to this post or any others I’ve posted. I’ll be silent and not question your centuries of wisdom now. I wish you the best. And yes, without fear of weirdness, I still love you guys.[/quote]
I ask for documentation and you leave?
[quote]JayPierce wrote:
You gentlemen work so hard to cast away what Christ taught and elevate Paul above Him. Exactly what Christ said the world would do in John 5:43.
He tries to give you a clue in John 2:4.
And then Paul all but laughs in your face in Acts 3:14, and you still don’t see it.
Don’t bother responding to this post or any others I’ve posted. I’ll be silent and not question your centuries of wisdom now. I wish you the best. And yes, without fear of weirdness, I still love you guys.[/quote]
Translation - I’d rather not have anyone else point out my inability to interpret texts, so I’m giving up. And for the record, Acts 3:14 is a speech by Peter critiquing the Jews who killed Jesus and asked instead for the release of Barabbas (Mark 15:7-15). It has NOTHING to do with Paul. This isn’t even a prophetic passage, dude, and you cannot understand it. If you want to convince anyone of your radical views, learn to read texts in context . How any self-respecting person can pretend to know “the true message behind Scripture” without even knowing what’s going on in Acts 3:14 is BEYOND me.
[quote]KingKai25 wrote:<<< LOL this is nothing but baseless conjecture. >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>[/quote]That was a really great post man. I don’t know where to start except you ripped me off with that quote from 2nd Cor. 11:22-29. I was gonna post that again as I was reading yours and then there it was. I always throw in with 4:17 where he talks about how light this present affliction is compared with the glory that he was running his race for. Paul gave up as nearly a perfect Jewish life as anybody could want at that time to be, starved, beaten and stoned only to write from prison “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.”
Paul left a life of prestige and prosperity for all this suffering so he could hear the master say “well done my good and faithful servant”. JP, as KK says, you need to get yourself into a solid church and get surrounded by people who are full of the word and worship God in Spirit and truth. Seriously. Let them love you and you’ll see how unbelievably wrong you are about almost everything.
As pertaining to the topic this thread does well.
http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showthread.php?152032-Petrus-Romanus-the-Latest-End-Times-Quackery
[quote]JoabSonOfZeruiah wrote:
As pertaining to the topic this thread does well.
http://www.theologyweb.com/campus/showthread.php?152032-Petrus-Romanus-the-Latest-End-Times-Quackery [/quote]There you go tryin to get all on topic on us. I actually saw that thread when I was looking for stuff on this topic.