Featured Top Ten Reasons not to join a Reformed Baptist Church

God given revelation is not theory...but in fact it is truth. We must take the God given teaching and understand it......as coming down from God to us.

It is not for fallen man to re-define reality in any way different from God given meaning....God as creator alone can define reality for us.
that fallen men use, or mis-use a word does not interest me.

 

Yes ....exactly! :applause::thumbs:

 

I could hardly agree with you more! And it is here that I personally run afoul with reformed Covenant theology. While I clearly see in the Bible that we are saved by grace I don't see a covenant of works, grace and redemption that i can claim for myself. I don't see in the Bible an assembly of believers in Jesus in the Hebrew Scriptures. And I ask myself the question "if Jehovah is through with the Jew's because of unbelief, where does that put the Church? Are we any better at the believing thing than the Jew's were?" I say no we are not. And this is confirmed in Scripture, the seven Churches in Revelation, subject to judgement.

Reformed Covenant theology insists that the Church replaces the Jew's as the people of God. OK, but Israel was a nation, a nation set aside among other nations. The Church is not a nation, never was. How can a person, using the Bible find one particular nation (which had in it's membership believers) replaced by strictly a body of believers? Like the reformed covenant of grace, it's not there. And how do the promises given by Jehovah to a particular nation get transferred to a body of believers? Where does the Bible teach this?

Personally, I don't think John Calvin, Martin Luther, or J.N. Darby for that matter came up with their respective theologies in a vacuum. Like theologians of today, I believe they built on the work of others. So I would not identify myself as a Calvinist in the strict sense of the word, I tend to put more weight in that direction rather than those of the free will camp.

 

Unsaved people can know a lot of truth. (Romans 1 teaches that). They just do not know God. Some of the biggest liars I have seen in business are in churches. Are they are saved? How does truth work if Christians are the only ones who hold it? Would you say the Holy Spirit never uses a non-believer in your life? I never assume that Christians are the only holders of truth. If that were so then most Christians are not believers because not one is completely sinless. Nobody has all the truth.

Where did I ever mention second temple Judaism? Lots of the practices in second Temple Judaism were in place long before that time. Gen 12 was long before Mt. 28:19, 20. The discipleship of disciples (talmidim) was in place long before Jesus came to earth.

Jesus taught His disciples and led them much the same as a rabbi would have. He used what they already knew just as Paul did too to reach and lead them. Read Gen 12 and compare that to Mt. 28:19, 20. If you were study what the talmidim did to become a rabbi you would see many similarities to what Jesus did with His disciples. Discipleship did not begin with Jesus on earth. It was already in practice and Jesus led His disciples instead of a rabbi.

To suggest that all Jews crucified Jesus is similar to suggesting that all Americans are thieves because the south practiced slavery and segregation. Some of the Jews followed Jesus and every apostle was a Jew. Every writer of the Bible with the possible exception of Luke was a Jew.

 

Given the correct hermeneutical tools I am unable to see how anyone can take God's word when it is from man's perspective and then another time from a divine perspective and call it God's perspective because it is God's word. That is what the dispensationalists promoted a lot this time last century and through a large part of it. Dispensationalism fell on the heels of German Rationalism and it used the same thinking to try and steer clear of liberalism. In essence they created a different kind of liberalism--Rationalism.

 

What are the correct hermeneutical tools? Are they a consistant hermenutic from Genesis to Revelation or are they customized to get the OT to say one thing and the NT to say another?

 

Things such as historical context, and literary context and just a few. For example how Paul uses salvation in past. present, and future tenses does not mean you can apply that to a study of 1 Peter. When studying Hebrew poetry you must apply the rules for Hebrew poetry. When things are written from man's perspective then you cannot say they are from God's perspective. When things are written for Jewish readers you must not interpret as a Greek/American reader who has a Greek perspective. They are very different.

While the Bible may have a thread running through it, it does not have words which are always used the same over a 1400 year period. There are cases in the NT when OT words are redefined. for example the same word used for baptize is also use din the OT. The word used for elder/overseer in the NT in the Christian Church does not mean the same thing as used in the OT in Judaism.

When do you consistently use one method of interpreting what another says. Do you interpret a joke the same way as a serious exclamatory statement? Do you interpret "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" literally?

 

So it really does boil down to having two modes of hermenutic, one for the Hebrew Scriptures and one for the Greek. And in the event that we run into interpretation problems, we further insert what I call a sub-mode which allows different New Testament writers to speak different interpretive languages. And finally, we can re-package the whole ball of wax into a theology that places little empahsis on things we deem unimportant and a high degree of emphasis on things we hold to be very important, even when the intent of the Biblical writer is clearly opposite of what our theology holds or the passages are not clear.

The Bible: one message with many modes of interpretation depending on when or where the reader happens to stumble upon the Scriptures. I like it!

 

Do you know how to interpret idioms? Then do that. Do you know how to interpret narratives then do not interpret them as apocryphal literature. You interpret moment by moment when people talk to you and write things. Then apply the same principle with scripture. The problem is that scripture was mostly written in a historical context of a Jewish worldview and philosophical mindset. Do you ever refer to the logos as many philosophers and John did in Jn 1:1, 14? Why or why not? Do you refer to your pastor as an elder? Why or why not? Do you use the word elder for a pastor in the NT as the Jews used elder in the OT? Why or why not? Do you use the word elder as the NT defines it or as the OT defines it?

Not all the four gospels are exactly alike. Is only one right and the others a fraud. The Sermon on the Mount is different than the Sermon on the Plain. Why? Is one wrong and the other right?

In one gospel there are two demoniacs and in another there is one. Is one gospel wrong and the other right?

 

Are you serious?