Fundamental or Conservative??

I respect fundamentalist teachings. However I believe that to adhere to a fundamentalist doctrine is a matter of personal choice and represents an individuals desire to set themselves apart to follow a path of righteousness that, under other circumstances, they feel they could not attain. The problems arise when certain fundies get overzealous and begin proclaiming that their narrow walk is the only true Christian experience and is a doctrine to be adhered to with the looming threat of eternal damnation for all dissenters. I've heard fundies in my lifetime preach that people were going to be sentenced to hell for what they, the fundies, consider to be immodest dress, which amounted to something like women wearing jeans or shorts. I beleive that these types of fundamentalists sects are bordering on, if not already practicing cultic behavior. But its always the goofballs that get the most press and make a bad name for everyone who's well meaning.

 

These are not conservative ideals. They are positions that some conservatives hold. The vast majority of fundamentalists do not hold these positions.

From the other side, it is time that those who love the word of God in modern translations and who see the appropriateness of pants in some cases are respected as genuine fundamentalists who have not added to the doctrines of Scripture.

 

These are not conservative ideals. They are positions that some conservatives hold. The vast majority of fundamentalists do not hold these positions because we do not see them as mandates of Scripture, but rather as standards that people have added in. To believe that a particular version is the only word of God is in direct and explicit contradiction of the tenets of fundamentalism. To hold a KJVO position does indeed disqualify one from being fundamental, according to the definition laid out by the early fundamentalists.

From the other side, it is time that those who love the word of God in modern translations and who see the appropriateness of pants in some cases are respected as genuine fundamentalists who have not added to the doctrines of Scripture.

 

But happymom, this is a discussion board. If a separate section is formed for every variation of belief among baptists and we segregate ourselves into areas in which only those who agree with us can enter, what will there be to discuss? If your standards and your KJVOnly position cannot bear scrutiny, it is not worth holding.

 

Names are transient; they move along with the times. In the early days of modernist invasion of the Baptist Convention in Canada, we, who held to the fundamentals of theology, called ourselves fundamentalists.

Over time, the term embraced many who deviated from those fundamentals, including Pentecostalists of all shapes, charlatans, as telly evangelism took hold.

We eventually abandoned the term fundamentalists. If we must embrace a label, we choose conservative, but even this term falls short.

Fundamentalism came to include dispensationalism and premillennialism, which many of us left many years before.

In this sense, I am not a fundamentalist, but very much a believer in the validity of the bible, in any translation, and, inerrant in the original form, but not in any translation.

These theological beliefs have nothing to do with the side issues, but the essentials of doctrine. Side issues, dress, deportment, per se, are just that, side issues.

Cheers,

Jim

PS. I happen to prefer the KJV, with all its mistakes, but I don't think it is specially inspired anymore than the RSV, NIV or any other modern translation.

 

Jim1999: I happen to prefer the KJV, with all its mistakes.

Jim . . . Jim . . . Jim, you can come out of your bomb shelter now!

I respect a KJV "toter" who admits their preferred translation is not "lord" over any and all others!

On topic: I consider myself both conservative and fundamental. I am a Southern Baptist! I stand against the invasion of liberal, post-modern theology within my denomination and within the body of believers as a whole.

A few thoughts:
The greatest threats to the fundamentals of the Christian faith today are post-modern "tolerance" (which differs like night and day from biblical tolerance), and evolution.

Post-modern tolerance says: accept those whose ideas and moral values differ from yours (which biblical tolerance teaches also), but it goes beyond biblical tolerance by teaching that all ideas and moral values are equal and should be accepted also.

Although I think evolution has crested its peak (as a threat to Christian faith) and is actually on its slippery downslope, as scientific discoveries are validating the impossibility of a cosmos existing without a Creator everyday. Still, it's the theistic evolutionist who, by their "double-minded" beliefs, create such a distorted view of what is and isn't true in the Bible that confuses "seekers" and tears down, rather than builds up God's kingdom.

 

Squire, Jude 3 does not demand separation. I do believe in separation and that ecclesiastical is the primary way, but that is another passage.

Jude commands us to contend for THE faith. That was done by the SBC leaders in taking back the convention from the apostate libs and mods (who are libs but want people to think otherwise).

 

Actually, it is the opposition to evolution that is on its slippery slope downslope. Many staunch anti-evolutionists have conceded a little bit of evolution - even between species. The beginnings of the slippery slope. Meanwhile, the mainstream scientific establishment continues to view anti evolutionist groups as anti science kooks. This does not help us witness to them, by the way!

What discovery are you referring to dated 8/14/2003? Or any other date you care to name?

The proper interpretation of the bible is consistent with the truth of evolution and I can prove it.

Here is the proof.

a) The Bible is always true when correctly interpreted (axiom)

b) Evolution is true (as per innumerable scientific validations)

therefore the proper interpretation of the Bible is consistent with the truth of evolution.

I leave the working out of the interpretation of the Bible as an exercise for the reader.

 

Co-discoverer of DNA Crick, and brilliant astronomer Hoyle, both conceded that the complexity of DNA led them to conclude the mathematical implausibility that DNA could have arisen by natural causes on Earth; and so they independently proposed to the world that biological life was planted on Earth, by aliens.

"One of the most difficult problems in evolutionary paleontology has been the almost abrupt appearance of the major animal groups--classes and phyla--in full-fledged form, in the Cambrian and Ordovician periods. This must reflect a sudden acquisition of skeletons by the various groups, in itself a problem."

Theories and probabilities centered on genetics and variation/mutation as a cause for evolution of species are entirely inadequate. Not only do you encounter time limitation problems (probability for all practical purposes of zero chance), but observed genetic processes are working in the opposite direction of “progress.”

Paul of Eugene: I leave the working out of the interpretation of the Bible as an exercise for the reader.

Good! The Bible tells me that God created all that we see ex nihilo, i.e., "out of nothing." That way I don't have to do a song and dance around the many NT references to "The Fall," Adam and Eve, death entering the world thru sin, etc.

 

Paul,

BTW, you are trespassing in this forum as a non-creationist. Read the rules!

 

could you point me to them please?

edit:

opps! - I didn't realise that - so anyone who believes in evolution at all is not welcome here?

 

Not that it is an evolutionists strong suit but would you mind citing empirical evidence for this claim?

Typical double standard. When creationists 'adjust' their views, we are on a slippery slope. But when evolutionists are forced to face and re-explain huge chunks of previously accepted "truth", you call it honest science.

To set the record straight, creationists believe that the animals we see today are descendents of a smaller group of "kinds" in the past through a general loss of genetic variability and increase in specialization. Past animals would have been much more adaptable with their descendents losing certain abilities. At some point in this process, breeding between isolated lines becomes genetically impossible or results in sterile offspring (the mule).

The truth is more important than preserving the modernistic philosophical presumptions of secular 'scientists'.

The Bible and an interpretation cannot both be true when the interpretation denies the very words of the Bible.

There are NO conclusive scientific validations of evolution. Evolution deals exclusively with situations that at best can be proven plausible. They can never be observed and can therefore can never be termed "true" as long as any other possibility, however remote, exists.

Fortunately, in the case of creation, the Creator did not. Genesis says what it says. Creation is ascribed to an omnipotent God speaking everything into existence by His own will. Not a single character in the NT questions the Genesis account. Jesus had no problem correcting erroneous interpretations of the OT. Yet He affirms that God made them male and female in Matthew 19. BTW, the context is divorce so it cannot apply to brute animals.

 

could you point me to them please?

edit:

opps! - I didn't realise that - so anyone who believes in evolution at all is not welcome here? </font>[/QUOTE]As opposed to many later additions, creation was in "The Fundamentals" from the very start.

 

oops

I believe in creation ex nihlo, and I think that happened at the big bang!

But I'll conform and not follow up on that issue here

 

I've never really thought of myself as a fundamentalist, although I certainly hold to the infallibility and authority of the Bible. What label we wear is, to me at least, unimportant. God knows what I believe; I am unconcerned what others think of me. And I'm afraid that there are some (none on this board, of course) who love to call themselves fundamentalists in order to look down on other believers as being less faithful to God in some way. Why can't we have compassion on those who are in error, assuming that to be the case, rather than enjoy feeling superior to them?