Here’s a start: Stop reciting passages from your story book and show me that you have a working brain. Explain what YOU think.
Allow me to pose a good question to you: Do you believe in God only because scripture tells you to believe in God?
If so, you only believe in scripture.
I’ve attended churches for years and have listened to people who puff with pride in their ability to cite scripture — instead of arguing their theological case. If you can do no better, I understand. You’re in good company.
What more does one have to believe in order to be saved other than God's inerrant, infallible, indestructible Word? The bible is our ONLY guide to salvation. Any and every other "guide" to salvation is nothing more than another man's opinion.
Virtually every tyrannical dictator or government in history has tried to keep His Word out of the common people's hands, but it was all in vain. Why was that? Because those who would rule us by tyrannical force hate the liberating Word of God that guided and directed the majority of the founders of our once-bible believing, God honoring America. The bible is like no other book ever composed, because it wasn't composed by mortal man, but by Almighty God of the bible who created all that was, is, or ever will be. His holy book is the only true guide to eternal life, nothing else in print, electronic simulation, or spoken word can compare to it's eternal truth and wisdom. Every human being's eternal life depends on the truth and validity of His word, and nothing else in print or any other medium is comparable in the slightest degree.
You're making a good point and one I've tried to see beyond on the many religious threads that eventually turn into the usual PvC battle.
"PvC" can be taken as "Protestant versus Catholic", as is the impression and claim of the participants, or as "Pharisee versus Christian", since by words, appearance and "feel" that is the impression they leave with the observer/spectator.
In those battles, one can observe a difference between mental and memory based religion and the belief and faith that seems more heart-felt than head-based but still combines both head and heart.
I usually find myself wondering what blocks them from moving from the first to the second.
This is always the easiest reply, because it is from actual life experience, not just hearing, reading, studying, etc. No looking up scriptures to respond to some debate. Just witness. It’s long, but that’s the way I need to do this.
For my first 28 yrs I was a Calvinist, but not so different from many other groups that professed a faith that Jesus Christ died for my sins, was buried, and rose again. The big difference was this: The biblical rebirth experience.
While I had done, as a teen, the ‘give my heart to Jesus’, ‘accept him as my personal Savior’, moments, that are so commonly used as conversion ‘proofs’, deep down I just knew there HAD to be more. It was something that would enter my mind during a church service, or funeral, or just when I would dwell on thoughts of spiritual things.
My step-mother, an attractive but very worldly woman, stole my dad from my mother. My dad, while an adulterer, was conservative in every other way. I was 23, and figured I understood women enough by then to make a educated opinion: There’s no way the marriage would last a year. I was wrong.
She visited a church (independent, but like United Pentecostals) simply because it was nearby their new (to them) home. She felt the tug at her heart while there, and refused to go back. But, staying away didn’t fill the hole either. She eventually went back, and had a biblical conversion, following the Acts 2:38 formula. She spoke in tongues as the Spirit gave the utterance. I wasn’t present, but through the days and weeks saw her change dramatically in almost every way. Her joy was constant. I remained skeptical.
In the meantime, I married a very lovely woman. She was always curteous to my dad and step-mother, but was adamant: “I’m not going to their church!” That was no problem, for I was in total agreement.
Then ‘idiot president 1.0’, already letting the economy go out of control, embargoed grain to Russia. Reagan steps in and hits inflation with a sledge hammer. The combined chaos was financial hardship for many, and not just farmers.
It knocked down my trust in the wisdom of men across the board, myself included. Even made me take a hard look at my church’s leadership. As my studying expanded, I thought it strange that the miraculous experiences of rebirth in the book of Acts were not happening in mainline churchs in my area.
Then one of my brothers received the same Acts 2:38 rebirth as my step-mother, ONLY, he lived 900 miles away. That wasn’t all, as a couple of months later it happened to my youngest brother, that lived with my dad. I decided I had to step in and ‘save’ my family.
My wife and I made an exception to our rule, and visited my dad’s church on Father’s day, 1982. We DID have to admit that the people there were genuinely happy, the preacher very neighborly, and not at all pushy. We felt that we were believers, and repentant in our walk with God, so we felt a church change was completely unecessary.
We didn’t go back for a few months, but only then because of our seeing the command of baptism in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins. Our Calvinist church didn’t meet on Sunday nights, so we went to the other church at those times for a few weeks.
My wife and I were baptized, by immersion, in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins. We felt glad, and praised God. We still wanted that biblical Spirit birth, that the Lord promises (Acts 2:38) “to them that obey him” (Acts 5:32). A week later, in prayer, my wife began praising God in a language she had previously never spoken, lasting about a minute or so. It was so smooth, as if she had spoken it all of her life. It happened to me almost five months later, during a revival service.
That was our ‘beginning’, our being born again. It changes your life like nothing else. In my previous years, my reverence for the Word of God kept me from many troubles. The Word is wisdom.
That’s why many ‘preachers’ (I use the term loosely) can ‘write’ books, and make a nice payday doing so. In most cases all they are doing is putting the scriptures in their ‘own’ words. Folks use the excuse: “The Bible is too hard to understand”. Much of the prophecy is hard, but most of the Word is not not. Mostly, people are just lazy.
Did you ever prepare a report for a class in school, and simply just copy from a resource, then change some words with those of similar meaning, make shorter or longer sentences? If so, then you too can write a commentary on the Word, find a publisher, and maybe turn a profit. lol
Seriously, I hope this helps explain my position. If you need more, I’ll try to accomodate.
God bless