Sin is disobeying God, so yes all commands are giving us God’s standard, and to fail to meet the standard is sin. But we don’t derive our doctrines about sin (what it is, what it does to us and our relationship with God, what is to be done about it) from commands, we get them from other places in Scripture.
We don’t know that. [quote=“RHernandez, post:100, topic:36732”]
Jesus Christ teaches what we should do, and how we should love the least of our fellow people.
[/quote]
Yes, this is orthopraxy, right living. It’s very important. It’s central to Kingdom work, but it isn’t the whole of the gospel, or the only thing churches or Christians should focus on. Paul and the other apostles write a lot about sin. And what not to do. And every Evangelical I know is going to affirm that the whole counsel of Scripture is useful for teaching, correcting, and training in righteousness, not just Jesus’ words.
No, he agreed with someone who said theistic evolution was a threat to Christianity. There is a difference. I think materialism is a threat to Christianity, but that doesn’t mean I think everyone who owns a boat is out to destroy my faith, or that rich people can’t be devout Christians.
@RHernandez
Honestly, my church doesn’t really focus on what we do/don’t do much at all; our main focus is on Christ, who died on the cross to pay the penalty that we deserved because of our sins, and rose again giving us hope of everlasting life. Ultimately, salvation is not at all because of what we do or don’t do, for it is by grace that we have been saved through faith and that is a gift of God, not a result of our works so that no one may boast.[quote=“Christy, post:101, topic:36732”]
He started this thread to say that we are threats to christianity, no?
[/quote]
I don’t really consider theistic evolution as a threat to Christianity; at the moment, I view it as more of a “why bother” factor. Over my time in the online world of the creation vs. evolution debate, I have noticed that the atheists (slight assumption alert) or the professional scientists typically say something akin to “There is no debate!” and hang up. I found it interesting, though, that when I reached BioLogos, the people here seemed more willing to talk about the issues, even though “no one’s mind is ever changed in online debate forums.” Admittedly, BioLogos would have been one of the last places I would have thought to look (and I didn’t really think of it either, I came here on recommendation). Initially, I was greatly surprised when I found out how dissimilar BioLogos was to AIG (for instance, I was genuinely shocked when I got “are you kidding?” when I said “I assume you don’t believe in the big bang…” I also found it interesting that BioLogos is so dead-set against AIG; I initially thought that BioLogos was a mediator/compromise, but it is really more of it’s own thing. That digression aside, there are still (of course) many things about the creation vs. evolution debate that I do not know and/or remember (and about science in general), and, even if the science of BioLogos may seem good on the outside, the theology appears to make for some pretty drastic changes, ones which it “doesn’t seem worth it” to accept…
@jammycakes
That’s the same one that @cwhenderson gave me…
And I was thinking, after reading it, that that still should cast some doubt on the ice core’s legitimacy, as:
"Even if the argument has geographical considerations (which it does, simply look at the other pictures I uploaded), it still opens up the possibility that the uniformitarianism of the ice cores may not be as uniform as we thought (or as some of us thought)…
First: The plane(s) crashed in an area that has the highest accumulation of annual snow:
“This leaves the question: How could
some 250 feet of snow in the area of GISP2
cover a period of c. 250 years while 250 feet
of snow in the area of the Lost Squadron
planes only covers c. 50 years? In Richard
Alley’s book, The Two Mile Time Machine,
he says he is often asked this question. The
answer is: “The World War II planes landed
in one of the regions of Greenland where
snow accumulates fastest.”45 And in answer
to the question: Did anyone ever figure out
why the Lost Squadron planes were buried
so much deeper than expected? Bob Cardin
told me that it was because the average snow
accumulation in that area is c. 7 feet/year
(7 x 50 = 350 feet deep). If you allow for some
compression, it is easy to understand how
the planes got buried 250 feet deep.”
Second: YECs are counting melt lines in addition to 'Annual Layers:
"Two experienced glaciologists informed
me that Hovind is largely correct about the
“hundreds” of lines in the hole dug to
remove the WW2 planes. They both said that
the area where the planes landed is a relatively
warm area because of its lower, southern
elevation, and several melt layers can be
formed every year in regions like that which
would appear as layers in the hole. Add to
these melt layers the actual annual layers,
which near the top show up as several lines
within the space of a few inches, and you
can have an off the cuff estimate of “hundreds
of lines.” One can understand Hovind’s
confusion. "
Three: scientists can differentiate between melt layers and annual layers:
“But let’s make this perfectly clear: The
110,000 layers of the GISP2 ice core are not
due to melting. They are definitely not melt
layers. Even if melting had occurred more
often in the past, layers due to melting are
readily recognized and would certainly not
be counted as annual.” FN 44
Footnote 44: See Footnote 7: "Alley, The Two Mile Time Machine, 43–4. A layer from melting is easy to spot in the ice core because melted and refrozen ice is nearly bubble free and is glassy looking where the rest of the ice core is bubbly and milky. "
“On the nature of melt layers and the ease with which they are spotted, see R. B. Alley, et. al., “Visual-Stratigraphic Dating of the Greenland Ice Sheet Project 2 Ice Core: Basis, Reproducibility, and Application,” Journal of Geophysics Research 102 (1997): 26,367–8,” [and]…
“Michael M. Herron, Susan L. Herron and Chester C. Langway, Jr., “Climatic Signal of Ice Melt Features in Southern Greenland,” Nature 293 (1981): 389, and R. B. Alley and S. Ananda-krishnan, “Variations in Melt-Layer Frequency in the GISP2 Ice Core: Implications for Holocene Summer Temperatures in Central Greenland,” Annual Glaciology 21 (1990): 64.”
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
So, @J.E.S, if you sync up the low snow fall cores with the layering of the high snow fall cores, you can calibrate the longer stretches of time represented in the low snow fall areas. This is how science works…
I think that the article that Jonathan endorsed makes that clear.
[quote=“Christy, post:101, topic:36732”]Yes, this is orthopraxy, right living. It’s very important. It’s central to Kingdom work, but it isn’t the whole of the gospel, or the only thing churches or Christians should focus on.
[/quote]
I did not say it was the whole of the gospel. Jesus Christ tells us what are the two most important commandments. I agree with Jesus Christ. Jonathan does not seem to agree that these are important at all. Do you?
They do. But Jesus Christ did not! That is my point!
But will they agree that Jesus Christ is correct about the two most important commandments? I think not. Do you agree with Jesus, Christy?
[quote=“Christy, post:101, topic:36732”]No, he agreed with someone who said theistic evolution was a threat to Christianity. There is a difference.
[/quote]There is a difference, but I think that you missed that the author switched from making false claims about ideas, which is very bad already, to targeting a group of people with those false claims in the last two points, which is much worse.
Of course I agree what Jesus said is important. I think what the apostles said is important too, since Jesus taught them.
I go to an Evangelical church. The church’s mission statement, the motto emblazoned over the door, is “loving God, loving people, equipping to serve.” Yes, of course Evangelicals believe when Jesus said they were the two most important commandments, it means they are the most important commandments and love for God and others are the defining characteristics of Christians. I know plenty of YEC Christians who would say the same. I don’t know how YEC theology pushes anyone away from the idea that loving God and loving people are hallmarks of faith. It’s an unfair characterization to imply it does.
Jonathan, who is a guest here and shouldn’t be treated like an enemy, said flat out he did not personally think evolution was a threat to Christianity. I will take him at his word on that.
Jesus taught the apostles for 3 years. You can read all of the recorded teachings of Jesus in a couple of hours. It is obvious that not everything Jesus said was recorded. If you can’t trust the apostles to relay by word and deed what they were taught by Jesus then you might was well chuck it all in.
Awwww… that seems so melodramatic! If most of the Bible comes from the Pauline schools … and Paul never once met the man… that’s an awful lot of room for disputing between “God’s Dictation” vs. “God’s Inspiration”.
Do you think God dictated the parts in the New Testament about women? Or the parts about slavery? Did you know that there were two schools of Pharisees… of which, the principle difference (but not the only difference) was that one group thought Divorce was permissible, and the other school thought it wasn’t!
Now what do we do? Even if we accept the New Testament view on divorce… it does seem we have pretty much abandoned one of the most emphatic planks of the New Testament platform!
Do we think Jesus really said the two most difficult verses in the New Testament?:
A: To be perfect, give all your money to the poor? (At the very least, this is an instruction to join a monastic movement!)
EXAMPLES (2 of 3)
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Mat 19:21
Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor [the Ebonim], and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me.
Mar 10:21
Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor [the Ebonim], and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
B: With enough faith, we can move mountains.
Matthew 17:20
"…truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and lnothing will be impossible for you.”
And yet most certainly, in the 2000 year history of Christianity, nobody seems to have had anywhere near the tiniest mustard seed of faith … for no mountains have ever been miraculously moved!
Luke + Acts is almost 25% of the NT. Luke was certainly a big part of the Pauline mission, so George isn’t incorrect, but I am not impressed with the attempts of many NT scholars to reconstruct the sitz em leben (life setting) of various books and then reinterpret the meaning based on their reconstructed past. It usually results in an interpretation that says more about the interpreter’s assumptions than about the text itself.
Wha? I don’t believe I’ve ever heard someone suggest that Paul got his “innovations” (in opposition to James and/or the Circumcisers) from anyone Other than his personal communications from Jesus!
I am not sure what how this bears credence on whether this is God dictated or inspired?
There is nothing negative about women or slavery in the NT.
Women are simply to submit with the authority of man, like man is supposed to submit to the authority of God. We are not forced to follow His will, but it is our best interests to. Same for a woman, who is not forced to, but it will result in a more successful marriage (or one tenant of that).
Slavery is also allowed and somewhat advocated by God as a means to deal with things in this fallen world. Divorce is also a means to deal with this fallen world.
But we can’t compare slavery of then to slavery of our recent past, or more-so, the bad parts of slavery or our recent past. Slavery isn’t a bad thing, guns are not a bad thing, Monarchy isn’t a bad thing, but all of those can be used for very bad things. Slaves of the Israelite’s were to be freed on the 7th year. A person who owed debt, would be a slave (don’t go into debt). Aliens were slaves, a way to assimilate them but not give them great power or respect to corrupt when they first joined. Israelite’s were also instructed to treat them kindly and not abuse them. Slaves were a very merciful and logical thing to have in society.
I am not saying Pauline schools were or were not God dictated, merely, the fact that slaves and perceived/perverted used of degrading women does not invalidate the godlyness of a passage.
As BioLogos says, the Bible was written for everyone, not to everyone. Jesus is speaking to this person. Perhaps it was a hold sin had on him, the only hold. And giving this hold up, would have resulted in perfection from then on. I don’t think Jesus is saying “everyone will be perfect if they give all our money away”.
This verse bolsters that above logic. He was lacking in one thing, he trusted God in all things but money, this would have resulted in his perfection. The cross that Jesus took up was following the will of God, even when it seems like (in our spiritual myopia) that our way is better.
I don’t disbelieve this at all. Though I think it was somewhat of a metaphor to say, one that has even a little faith, can create a huge change.
John 14:14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.
It isn’t merely asking with the physical name of Jesus coming out of ones mouth. It is the name/authority of the life of Jesus, who is the glory of God. Like when they used to say Joseph, son of Jacob, son of Issac, son of Abraham. Your name was your identity, your heritage. If you ask something in the name of Jesus (who also said, “not my will but yours be done”) it will be done. I have no doubt in that. But at that point, it was going to be done anyway, so your asking didn’t really do it.
But if you knew it to be God’s will for a mountain to move, and you asked Him to, it would happen. In believing something you are asking is God’s will, that is faith of a mustard seed (little faith), and it will be done, if it was indeed God’s will. I believe everything Jesus asked was granted to Him (that was God’s will). Jesus asked for the cup to be removed, it wasn’t. Was Jesus lacking in faith? Is that why it didn’t happen? None of those are false or contradictory statements, they just need to be understood differently.
And yes, I do think Jesus really did say those two things. I can weight them against the Bible in it’s entirety and it is not in conflict with any of it, and actually agrees many of it.
I have come to the understanding that much of the law (old testament and prophets) that deals with our fallen nature is actually a compromise and a limit:
Matthew 19:8 ESV “He said to them, “It was because you were so hard-hearted that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.”
The law is also called perfect and spiritual yet Jesus clearly points out this balance. The NT also does not go as far as to push the balance of being able to be faithful and change from within to outright revolution. Paul and Jesus repeatedly admonish people (and us) to be faithful in the place/situation of our calling and live our His life with some limitations. As was mentioned, Paul does suggest the value of freedom and that slaves should take the opportunity when presented but mostly about living in the current state while a transformed vessel for God’s use. The trajectory of freedom from earthly identities and constraints is a debated topic (with some preferring a hard limit of NT times and others preferring the break from those limits) and it is not simple. The resulting question is how do Christians live in light of eternity, understanding from the bible, and our current culture?
Slavery was a poor means to and end as other alternative mechanisms could have worked and many slaves in the Roman empire were the result of war and despicable arrangements. Alternatives could have also worked in OT times if culture and hardheartedness did not impede God’s ability to use us.
One could say that negative things were admonished/used in the bible, but many perceive the underlying and often implicit greater message of God through those circumstances.
