Posted on 04/17/2018 8:05:31 AM PDT by Ennis85
“Queer rights activist” and “biblical scholar” Matthew Vines “reinterpreted” Scripture verses that typically condemn homosexuality in an LGBT-“affirming” reading of the Bible at Harvard University, the Crimson reported.
Who is Vines?
Vines is a prominent speaker on pro-gay topics in the context of Christianity and authored “God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships.” The book’s controversial content resulted in WaterBrook Multnomah — which shared staff with the book’s publisher Convergent — resigning its membership with the National Religious Broadcasters in 2014.
What did he say at his Harvard talk?
During his talk Saturday, Vines “discussed six Bible verses that some religious leaders assert condemn homosexuality; he reinterpreted the verses through the lenses of more ‘affirming’ readings that place the lines in cultural and temporal contexts,” the Crimson reported. The paper didn’t say what verses Vines discussed.
In addition, Vines “argued that long-term, monogamous homosexual relationships were not a well-known cultural phenomenon until recently, and that, therefore, no Bible verse responds directly to these relationships,” the Crimson added.
Vines also responded point by point to a talk an “ex-gay” speaker and critic of homosexuality gave at a Harvard College Faith in Action meeting in February, the paper said, which occurred just prior to administrators placing the Christian student group on probation allegedly for pressuring a female leader to resign after she began dating another female.
Vines said Jackie Hill-Perry’s talk in front of Harvard College Faith in Action was one of his motivations for coming to speak, the Crimson said.
“This type of message has done unfathomable harm and destruction to LGBTQ people around the world — broken so many relationships, broken so many lives,” Vines told the crowd, the paper reported.
Vines — a Harvard student himself before leaving as a sophomore in 2010 — also discussed his experiences as a member of conservative Christian student groups at the school, the Crimson said.
“Despite some of the tensions and challenges that I had with those groups, it really was the best community that I found in my first year here,” Vines said, according to the paper. “I actually felt like I was able to get to know people and be seen and not be completely invisible.”
How did one student react?
Student Aidan L. Stoddart helped organize Vines’ talk and said his detailed reading of Scripture “creates a bridge” between Christians of differing stripes, the Crimson noted.
“I think Matthew’s a really important figure because he has a critical and mature and very deeply life-giving relationship with Scripture that is centered on love,” Stoddart added to the paper. “Because it’s based on a love of Scripture that we all share.”
1 John tells us, “Little Children” [of the Father] that if and when we sin, we have “an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:1-2).
Again you are warned that your false doctrine and false gospel of maintaining salvation by works is doubly cursed (Gal 1:8-9).
It appears that you'd read something into my posts that I did not write.
To remain a believer is NOT a work.
Yes, you are calling belief a work by saying you must maintain a certain “level” of belief (your undefined and vague standard which salvation by works always is which is BTW, the same as Muslims - they never know for sure if they’re going to heaven) to remain saved. That is YOU turning “belief” into a work. Once you are saved you remain saved because it is by grace NOT works. I’ve been over this more than once with you.
Good bye and good luck.
As for 1 John, it would be best if one would study the WHOLE book of scripture. John is very clear:
1Jn 3:7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous.
1Jn 3:8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.
You are demanding, to again quote your doctrine, “people who continuously practice sin to fly in the face of God continues a downward spiral in which there is no hope”. You then go on to equivocate that you don’t necessarily mean “Christian” when you say “people”, yet the whole gist of your argument is about God judging the sins of Christians with the clear implication that a Christian can lose his salvation if he sins too much (sin is a work).
Thus, because your doctrine indicates that a Christian can lose his salvation by sinning too much, you espouse salvation/keeping your salvation by works. Of course your standard of unacceptable “continuously practice sin” is undefined and vague which is typical of the doctrine of salvation by works, which is BTW, the same as Muslims - they never know for sure if they’ve done too much bad to go to heaven.
But once you are saved you remain saved because salvation initially and forever, is by grace NOT the works of the law. Scripture says if it is works, it is not grace, and if grace not works (again, sin is a work). We’ve already been over this several times.
1 John is a difficult book to understand especially if you don’t pay attention to whom or about what John is speaking. John, like Peter, was an apostle mainly to the Jews. Sometimes he is speaking to the Agnostics (Chapt 1). Sometimes he is speaking to believers “My little children[of the Father] if we sin we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world” (1 John 2:1-2). Sometimes he is referring to the New Man in you who never sins. “We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself, and the wicked one does not touch him” (v 5:18). Your new man which is born of God cannot sin and never causes you to sin because it is born of God and lives forever - your spirit, the part of you that is going to heaven. Sin is triggered by the flesh (the mind, will, emotions, and body) which will be with you and thus trouble you, until you go to heaven upon which the flesh will perish and not go to heaven.
One thing is for certain, John, like James, does NOT contradict the gospel of the grace of Christ revealed by Paul especially in Romans and Galatians and will last forever (Rev. 22:21) as will all those who have received Christ because they continue in their salvation by the grace of Christ’s finished work, not by works including “not sinning”.
Good bye and good luck.
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