"I accept all of scripture and not what men have added to it and claimed to be from God."
If someone honestly believed that or believed Scripture interprets itself, then the tens of thousands of different interpretations is proof that they should throw out the entire New Testament. But then, everyone really knows Scripture never has been the self-explanatory collection of nursery rhymes Luther and so many others want to pretend it is. That's exactly why so many non-Catholics refer to various self-illuminating, obvious, Scriptures to "prove" it's fine for them to ordain queers, marry queers one to another, excuse abortion as no different than stealing a pencil at work, and all the other things that “the clear meaning of Scripture” rationalizes for tens of millions of people in this country. Face the facts, Luther threw out portions of the Old Testament because they so clearly disagreed with his desire to worship Self. Likewise, there are tens of thousands of different groups each preaching what makes them feel good or makes them a buck, and when folks throw out Scripture before they even begin to interpret His Word there’s no limit to what sort of heresy and falsehood they can claim to find in whatever subset of the Scriptures they decide to retain.
Why would anyone who is honestly seeking to follow Christ believe that a council of Jews who were trying to kill off Christianity and murdering Christians whenever they could is the proper authority to dictate the Christian canon? That's exactly what those who refuse the Christian canon as it stood from the time of Christ until Luther do. They’re agreeing with men who were actively trying to halt the conversion of Jews to Christianity and knew what they threw out was extremely effective in leading Jews to Christ. That’s exactly the same reason Luther wanted shed of James, Hebrews, Jude and Revelation, along with so much else in the New Testament, because those Scriptures clearly do not teach the gospel of Self and Luther knew it. Most people these days aren’t even familiar with what Luther threw out, so it’s that much easier for those who claim Self deification to agree with Luther rather than what has been accepted as Scripture ever since the Apostles. If someone claims be guided by the Word of God but starts out by throwing away portions of Scripture Jewish, anti-Christian, survivors of the revolt against Rome thought were too Christian, they’re not serious about Christ or Christianity. They’re serious about being comfortable with their worship of Self. Without removing such clear teaching about Christ and Christianity, it’s much more difficult to preach another gospel while pretending to base it on the Word of God. Self worshipers can easily get by preaching their gospel of Self as long as they keep anyone from focusing on the fact that they really only believe a select subset of the Bible even though they claim to believe in Scripture Alone. They really begin with Scripture I Like Alone and try to keep anyone from noticing that fact.
When someone accepts that sort of reasoning there’s no doubt they’ll go along with all sorts of revisions and reinterpretations of whatever subset of the Scriptures they pretend to believe if that’s what it takes to make themselves comfortable. Claiming that they are really, really, full of the Holy Spirit is simply an attempt to skip over the facts they’ve already denied, and one thing they’ve already denied is the power of the Holy Spirit. Never mind that minor tidbit, they just argue their personal favorite (for the moment) interpretation of Scripture or one of the tens of thousands of available interpretations that all claim they are correct. Once someone is doing that, it’s a short step to absurdities like, “those millions of souls who thought they were Christian before Reverend Johnny Come Lately was shown the truth were just wrong and all in Hell”, or “God didn’t love mankind until Calvin, people before that were zombies born into this world predestined to Hell with no way to avoid it”. So, why stop with just throwing out Scripture? Why not add a few books of your own the way some people have or at least just one the way Calvin did? Use some snazzy 1830s style PowerPoint charts to “prove” those millions who the Holy Spirit let think they were Christian when they really weren’t don’t matter anyway. Better still; claim those folks were all in a different sales region of the health and wealth machine God is running. People who begin by throwing out portions of the Bible will do whatever it takes to rationalize their religion of Self.
Of course, if someone honestly believes what the Bible teaches about the Holy Spirit, they know it’s absurd to pretend that Holy Spirit was on vacation for fifteen hundred years and returned just in time to cheer Luther on as he threw out parts of both the Old and New Testaments. The reality is that anyone who believes in guidance from the Holy Spirit knows that if the Holy Spirit allowed the canon as established by the Catholic Church to stand for fifteen hundred years, then that canon is correct. If someone can’t agree with that, they’re denying the power of the Holy Spirit. There’s absolutely no reason to believe someone arrived at what they’re preaching due to their being guided by the Holy Spirit if that person has already denied the power of the Holy Spirit.
Unfortunately, the majority of folks will keep wallowing in that sort of contradiction along with hundreds of others in order to frolic through their lives worshiping their own Most High and Holy Self and following Eve rather than Christ. Exactly like Eve, they’ll alter the Word of God to suit themselves and their goals even if it means throwing a portion of His Word into the garbage to avoid what His Word teaches. Such folks all insist they each one have the authority to revise or ignore any portion of the Word of God that denies them something they want exactly the same way Eve ignored the Word of God when she wanted to eat the forbidden fruit. Anyone who can't bear the cross of obedience isn't following Christ. They're refusing to follow Christ exactly because Christ expects them to surrender to Him, not enthrone their Self and claim the power and authority to negotiate the terms of their surrender.
Such folks are just so much tepid water flowing along the path of least resistance. And the path of least resistance in this country has always been to call yourself a Protestant Christian of whatever flavor is popular at the moment. Jesus Christ Himself founded The One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, entrusted His Church to His Apostles until His return, and defined that Church as His Body we’re all to be a part of. Furthermore, Christ called His Church a bright shining city on a hill, not some sort of invisible phantom or shadow organization with tens of thousands of differing doctrines.
Just because someone roots around in the muck and tosses out a pearl they’ve stumbled across doesn’t change the fact that refusing to accept portions of the Word of God before even discussing the meaning of what’s in His Word is a clear refusal to surrender to Christ. That much is proved by the fact that even with, clear, direct quotes, of Christ Himself to refer to, many people refuse to accept the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. There’s no need to go beyond the fact that someone doesn’t accept and won’t accept the entire Bible before even discussing interpretation to know that whichever doctrine they want to challenge, Purgatory or whatever, isn’t what they care about. What they care is about rationalizing the same thing Eve did, deciding for themselves what God really commands. Defending a subset of Scripture as interpreted by the Most High and Holy Self isn’t defending the Truth, the Bible, or Christ; it’s defending the pyramid scam Self has fallen for and trying to avoid the Truth so buyer’s remorse won’t set in. As they say, busy hands are happy hands and no good con artist like Satan wants his marks idle rather generating interest to help sell speaking engagements, books, DVDs, and anything else that generates new marks.
Purgatory is every bit as clear in both the Old and New Testament as the Trinity is and is backed up by the sacred Tradition of His Church as handed down from Christ through the Apostles to us through His Church. Most sincere people will over time recognize their error and become a part of His Church unless they actively work to stay distracted or to avoid the Truth for fear of having to admit they were wrong. Those who are happy with Self Worship, though, don’t actually care whether Purgatory exists as long as they’re comfortable with their Self so they can eat, drink, and be merry in this life. Most such folks are really not worried about being Christian in this life because they’ve accepted the heresy that says Christ will forgive them even though they spent their lives making a fool of Christ by claiming to be Christian but preaching something He and the Apostles never preached, and even though they’ve slandered the Holy Spirit by denying the Holy Spirit is capable of protecting His Word. It’s very sad, heartbreaking in fact, but the fear of the Lord just isn’t in them because they’ve fallen into the worship of Self. Unfortunately for them, Christ said He will be telling such Self worshipers, “I never knew you”.
So much for a first and second admonition.
have a nice day
“That’s exactly why so many non-Catholics refer to various self-illuminating, obvious, Scriptures to ‘prove’ it’s fine for them to ordain queers, marry queers one to another, excuse abortion as no different than stealing a pencil at work, and all the other things that ‘the clear meaning of Scripture’ rationalizes for tens of millions of people in this country.”
Many false and wrong interpretations of scripture is no basis for claiming yours is the one and only correct one or that what I believe is false. The scriptures are the final and highest authority.Your approach to identifying and understanding scriptures puts Catholic clergymen in a position above the scriptures, above the apostles and above Christ.
Jesus said His sheep hear His voice. Either this is true or it is false. You do not hear His voice because you are not one of His sheep.
Jesus said that whoever is willing to do the will of My Father will know My doctrine whether it is from God. Either this is true or it is false. You cannot hear, identify or understand His doctrine because you are unwilling to obey His commandments.
Protestant groups have no monopoly on false claims of Christianity while promoting homosexuality. The local Catholic bishop in my area sets aside scriptural rebuke of this perversion and instead justifies it as normal. The Catholic church is full of devotees who ignore both the Catholic doctrine and the scriptures on this along with abortion and many other wicked things. The Catholic priesthood has plenty of sexually immoral men who the scripture identify as having no inheritance in God’s kingdom, but these same men are not only not ex-communicated, they are often relocated to continue their wickedness and further damage the name of Christ. Your familiarity with Catholic clergy training necessitates an awareness that extremely little study of scriptures is involved in spite of such devotion being required by the apostles from those who exercise church leadership. Paul told Timothy to give himself completely to them.
“Face the facts, Luther threw out portions of the Old Testament because they so clearly disagreed with his desire to worship Self.”
You brought him up, not me. I have no affiliation with
Luther accept in your mind.
“If someone claims be guided by the Word of God but starts out by throwing away portions of Scripture Jewish, anti-Christian, survivors of the revolt against Rome thought were too Christian, they’re not serious about Christ or Christianity.”
Your history is quite confused. History records the use of the Septuagint and the abandonment of it by non-Christian Jews. That part is correct. Greek was the most common language of the day. While I do not follow Luther, it is a fact he not only translated the books of the Apocrypha into German, he also included them in his German Bible. This is not throwing them away.
Again I have already cited specific internal evidence which you simply choose to ignore and not respond to:
Why did Jesus refer to the “the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah” in Matthew 23:55 and not cite the death of someone later than 400 b.c. if the disputed texts are to be regarded as scripture?
Why did He never quote from the disputed texts? Why did the apostles not?
Why are the disputed texts not included in “all scripture” identified in Luke 24?
Further... why did Christ and the apostles only quote the Septuagint part of the time when quoting the Old Testament? Why did some of their word choices support alternative (including Masoretic) renderings of the Old Testament?
Why in Matt 11:29 does Jesus tell his audience to take his yoke upon them: “and you will find rest [anapausin] for your souls” when Jer 6:16 being alluded to says “walk in (the good way), and find rest [nirgw`] for your souls” in the Masoretic texts while the Septuagint has “and you will find purification [hagnismon] for your souls”?
Why does Mark 4:26-29, when Jesus alluded to Joel 4:13 use therismos (”harvest”) like the Masoretic text rather than the Septuagint’s trygetos (”vintage”)?
Why does Jesus in Mark 13:8 warn His disciples that “nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom” when He alludes to Isa 19:2 in the Hebrew reads: “city against city, kingdom against kingdom” while the Septuagint reads: “city against city, province against province”?
Why in Mark 14:24 does Jesus speak of His blood, “which is poured out [ekchynnomenon] for many”, which alludes to Isaiah 53:12 in the Hebrew: “He poured out [h’rh] his soul to death”; while the Septuagint says: “His soul was given over [paredothe] to death”?
“And the path of least resistance in this country has always been to call yourself a Protestant Christian of whatever flavor is popular at the moment.”
No it hasn’t. When this nation was formed, it was less than 2% Catholic. Now it is over 20%. There is no group who identify as Christian in the USA that is larger than the Catholics. The explosion in of this percentage happened in the late 1800’s when so many other destructive forces were at work here including civil war, feminism and the introduction of “higher criticism” of biblical texts by Catholic influenced “scholars” Wescott & Hort. This nation has ever been a thorn in the side of Rome but those days have long passed. The current supreme court has not a single protestant among its members. Plenty of Catholic leaders there and in Congress though.
“Jesus Christ Himself founded The One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, entrusted His Church to His Apostles until His return, and defined that Church as His Body we’re all to be a part of. Furthermore, Christ called His Church a bright shining city on a hill, not some sort of invisible phantom or shadow organization with tens of thousands of differing doctrines.”
And the Roman Catholic church is not that one true church no matter how much you and its other clergymen assert it to be so. The true church has the same apostles today as at the beginning and does not need this foundation laid again and again since it was already laid. The church of Rome has no apostolic authority having met none of the biblical criteria. While God requires all men to submit to authority, He does not command us to submit to everyone who claims to have authority. Such is the case with Rome.
“Purgatory is every bit as clear in both the Old and New Testament as the Trinity is and is backed up by the sacred Tradition of His Church as handed down from Christ through the Apostles to us through His Church. “
I see the doctrine of the Trinity supported throughout scriptures. To elevate the man-made doctrine of purgatory to this level is as absurd as it is dangerous. Purgatory is clear in the New Testament? Name three passages supporting it.