Baptist

[Lillith]

12volt_man:

Actually, praying to the dead is condemned in scripture. Several times, as a matter of fact.

Yes…As Della said…talking to Spirits…Fortune telling…that is condemned

12volt_man:

Funny, my Bible says that Enoch and Elijah are the only two people who went to Heaven without dying.

That is exactly why Jesus died on the Cross for us…so that we may have life! Before the crucifixion it was Enoch and Elijah…After we all have access!! That is the good news…the Promise of Christ…

 

[Eden]

12volt_man:

You’ve got to be kidding. Mary is not my “spiritual mother” any more than the Man in the Moon.

There’s nothing in scripture that even remotely suggests such a thing.

Except here:

John 19:26 - Jesus makes Mary the Mother of us all as He dies on the Cross by saying “behold your mother.” Jesus did not say “John, behold your mother” because he gave Mary to all of us, his beloved disciples. All the words that Jesus spoke on Cross had a divine purpose. Jesus was not just telling John to take care of his mother.

Rev. 12:17 - this verse proves the meaning of John 19:26. The “woman’s” (Mary’s) offspring are those who follow Jesus. She is our Mother and we are her offspring in Jesus Christ. The master plan of God’s covenant love for us is family. But we cannot be a complete family with the Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Christ without the Motherhood of Mary.

John 2:3 - this is a very signifcant verse in Scripture. As our mother, Mary tells all of us to do whatever Jesus tells us. Further, Mary’s intercession at the marriage feast in Cana triggers Jesus’ ministry and a foreshadowing of the Eucharistic celebration of the Lamb. This celebration unites all believers into one famiy through the marriage of divinity and humanity.

John 2:7 - Jesus allows His mother to intercede for the people on His behalf, and responds to His mother’s request by ordering the servants to fill the jars with water.

Psalm 45:9 - the psalmist teaches that the Queen stands at the right hand of God. The role of the Queen is important in God’s kingdom. Mary the Queen of heaven is at the right hand of the Son of God.

1 Kings 2:17, 20 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom, the King does not refuse his mother. Jesus is the new Davidic King, and He does not refuse the requests of his mother Mary, the Queen.

1 Kings 2:18 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom, the Queen intercedes on behalf of the King’s followers. She is the Queen Mother (or “Gebirah”). Mary is our eternal Gebirah.

1 Kings 2:19 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom the King bows down to his mother and she sits at his right hand. We, as children of the New Covenant, should imitate our King and pay the same homage to Mary our Mother. By honoring Mary, we honor our King, Jesus Christ.

1 Kings 15:13 - the Queen Mother is a powerful position in Israel’s royal monarchy. Here the Queen is removed from office. But now, the Davidic kingdom is perfected by Jesus, and our Mother Mary is forever at His right hand.

2 Chron. 22:10 - here Queen Mother Athalia destroys the royal family of Judah after she sees her son, King Ahaziah, dead. The Queen mother plays a significant role in the kingdom.

Neh. 2:6 - the Queen Mother sits beside the King. She is the primary intercessor before the King.

 

[12volt_man]

Eden:

I agree it’s relevant. Or did you mean relative?

Relative. Yes. Good speller, lousy typer.

You know you have been treated with courtesy.

What part of telling someone those things do you believe is courteous?

 

[Eden]

Prayer and Saints and the Bible:

1 Tim 2:1-2 - because Jesus Christ is the one mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5), many Protestants deny the Catholic belief that the saints on earth and in heaven can mediate on our behalf. But before Paul’s teaching about Jesus as the “one mediator,” Paul urges supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people. Paul is thus appealing for mediation from others besides Christ, the one mediator. Why?

1 Tim 2:3 - because this subordinate mediation is good and acceptable to God our Savior. Because God is our Father and we are His children, God invites us to participate in Christ’s role as mediator.

1 Tim. 2:5 - therefore, although Jesus Christ is the sole mediator between God and man, there are many intercessors (subordinate mediators).

1 Cor. 3:9 - God invites us to participate in Christ’s work because we are God’s “fellow workers” and one family in the body of Christ. God wants His children to participate. The phrase used to describe “fellow workers” is “sunergoi,” which literally means synergists, or cooperators with God in salvific matters. Does God need fellow workers? Of course not, but this shows how much He, as Father, loves His children. God wants us to work with Him.

Mark 16:20 - this is another example of how the Lord “worked with them” (“sunergountos”). God cooperates with us. Out of His eternal love, He invites our participation.

Rom. 8:28 - God “works for good with” (the Greek is “sunergei eis agathon”) those who love Him. We work as subordinate mediators.

2 Cor. 6:1 - “working together” (the Greek is “sunergountes”) with him, don’t accept His grace in vain. God allows us to participate in His work, not because He needs our help, but because He loves us and wants to exalt us in His Son. It is like the father who lets his child join him in carrying the groceries in the house. The father does not need help, but he invites the child to assist to raise up the child in dignity and love.

Heb. 12:1 - the “cloud of witnesses” (nephos marturon) that we are surrounded by is a great amphitheatre of witnesses to the earthly race, and they actively participate and cheer us (the runners) on, in our race to salvation.

1 Peter 2:5 - we are a holy priesthood, instructed to offer spiritual sacrifices to God. We are therefore subordinate priests to the Head Priest, but we are still priests who participate in Christ’s work of redemption.

Rev. 1:6, 5:10 - Jesus made us a kingdom of priests for God. Priests intercede through Christ on behalf of God’s people.

James 5:16; Proverbs 15:8, 29 - the prayers of the righteous (the saints) have powerful effects. This is why we ask for their prayers. How much more powerful are the saints’ prayers in heaven, in whom righteousness has been perfected. 1 Tim 2:5-6 - therefore, it is because Jesus Christ is the one mediator before God that we can be subordinate mediators. Jesus is the reason. The Catholic position thus gives Jesus the most glory. He does it all but loves us so much He desires our participation.

 

[pro_universal]

12volt,

the logical argument I posted is clear. You didn’t even attempt to refute it. Instead, you said this:

I see. So then, who is God’s father?

Obvious. God, the father…you know, the person of the Trinity?

You are ignoring the argument because you don’t have a response. That’s fine, but now you can’t claim ignorance. You are a willful denier of the truth.

One more time:

Mary is Jesus’s mom. Can you explain to me how Mary can be the mother of Jesus the human only? Where in the bible does it say that Jesus can be divided into two parts?

Would you answer those two questions above specifically please?

 

[Eden]

12volt_man:

Relative. Yes. Good speller, lousy typer.

What part of telling someone those things do you believe is courteous?

The fact that they care enough to tell you the Truth.

 

[12volt_man]

Eden:

Except here:

John 19:26 - Jesus makes Mary the Mother of us all as He dies on the Cross by saying “behold your mother.”

No, actually, this verse never says such a thing.

Rev. 12:17 - this verse proves the meaning of John 19:26. The “woman’s” (Mary’s) offspring are those who follow Jesus…

That verse does not support such view.

John 2:3 - this is a very signifcant verse in Scripture. As our mother, Mary tells all of us to do whatever Jesus tells us.

No, Mary’s instruction is not axiomatic. Further, even if she did, so did Paul. Is he our mother, too?

John 2:7 - Jesus allows His mother to intercede for the people on His behalf, and responds to His mother’s request by ordering the servants to fill the jars with water.

Actually, this verse says nothing about Mary interceding for anyone.

Psalm 45:9 - the psalmist teaches that the Queen stands at the right hand of God. The role of the Queen is important in God’s kingdom. Mary the Queen of heaven is at the right hand of the Son of God.

Actually, this chapter doesn’t refer to God.

1 Kings 2:17, 20 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom, the King does not refuse his mother. Jesus is the new Davidic King, and He does not refuse the requests of his mother Mary, the Queen.

Even if that were true, that doesn’t show how Mary is my “spiritual mother”.

1 Kings 2:18 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom, the Queen intercedes on behalf of the King’s followers. She is the Queen Mother (or “Gebirah”). Mary is our eternal Gebirah.

1 Kings 2:19 - in the Old Testament Davidic kingdom the King bows down to his mother and she sits at his right hand. We, as children of the New Covenant, should imitate our King and pay the same homage to Mary our Mother. By honoring Mary, we honor our King, Jesus Christ.

1 Kings 15:13 - the Queen Mother is a powerful position in Israel’s royal monarchy. Here the Queen is removed from office. But now, the Davidic kingdom is perfected by Jesus, and our Mother Mary is forever at His right hand.

2 Chron. 22:10 - here Queen Mother Athalia destroys the royal family of Judah after she sees her son, King Ahaziah, dead. The Queen mother plays a significant role in the kingdom.

Neh. 2:6 - the Queen Mother sits beside the King. She is the primary intercessor before the King.

None of these things show how Mary is my “spiritual mother”.

 

[12volt_man]

Eden:

The fact that they care enough to tell you the Truth.

So then, you don’t believe that we’re real Christians, either?

 

[pro_universal]

None of these things show how Mary is my “spiritual mother”.

I meant the Church, the one that Jesus founded…the Catholic Church.

If Jesus is a man, his flesh comes from Mary’s body. God was born into the world through Mary’s flesh. If that doesn’t make Mary the Mother of God, then you have a serious problem with basic logic…either Jesus is not one person, or Mary is not his mother. Those are your only two options for denying that Mary is the mother of God.

Which do you choose? If you answer my two specific questions above, you’ll see the problem with your thinking.

 

[12volt_man]

12volt,

the logical argument I posted is clear. You didn’t even attempt to refute it. Instead, you said this:

Obvious. God, the father…you know, the person of the Trinity?

How can God be God’s Father when God hadn’t been born yet?

Mary is Jesus’s mom. Can you explain to me how Mary can be the mother of Jesus the human only? Where in the bible does it say that Jesus can be divided into two parts?

The hypostatic union tells us that Jesus Christ has two natures: one human, one divine.

It is a logical impossibility for Mary to be the mother of God the Son, when the Bible tells us that God the Son created Mary. God the Son must have already existed in order to create Mary.

While we do believe that something can be created out of nothing, we do not believe that nothing can create something.

 

[mercygate]

12volt_man:

She is a women. She has no divine power or authority. She holds no more sway over the will of God than anyone else.

My KJV Bible says that “the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” (Jas 5:16) Would you argue that the Mother of Christ is less righteous than the “righteous man” commended by St. James?

According to the Bible, they are dead and contact with them is strictly forbidden.

According to my Protestant Bible those who die in faith – and not even explicit faith in Jesus is required – are not dead: **"Have you not read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God said to him, `I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? **
He is not God of the dead, but of the living; you are quite wrong." (Mk 12:26-27)

Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had all been “dead” for centuries, when Moses heard the voice from the bush, but Jesus says they are “the living.”

Necromancy is a completely different thing from the communion of saints. We do not consult spirits who roam the earth in order that we may learn the future. The doctrine of the Communion of Saints expresses the essential unity of all the faithful in this world and the next.

Many Roman Catholics do.

Even if it were true that many catholics “worship” statues – and I assure you, even simple peasants know better – it would still not speak to true Catholic teaching which, for 2000 years has consistently affirmed that we are to worship no one and no thing other than God, and God alone – and specifically declared this teaching at the Second Ecumenical Council of Nicea which made the definitive statement on the use of images in worship. Since God himself specifically commands the use of images for worship in several places in the Old Testament, who are we to spurn his directives?

Statements like “many Roman Catholics [worship statues]” border on bearing false witness.

Why would you pray to dead people when God has condemned it? Why would you pray to anyone other than God when God has condemned that?

We don’t pray to dead people. And “prayer” is not the essential feature of worship. Prayer is “pleading;” we ask the saints to pray for us.

Yeah, I’m just some poor apostate with a grad degree. I’m just too stupid to understand.

Well, if you have a graduate education, then how about exhibiting the gentlemanliness that one expects to find in the company of such scholarly achievement? Some of us also have graduate degrees. Some of us have graduate degrees from Protestant seminaries. Some of us read Scripture in the original languages. Does that help level the playing field for you?

 

[12volt_man]

Eden:

Prayer and Saints and the Bible:

1 Tim 2:1-2 - because Jesus Christ is the one mediator between God and man (1 Tim. 2:5), many Protestants deny the Catholic belief that the saints on earth and in heaven can mediate on our behalf. But before Paul’s teaching about Jesus as the “one mediator,” Paul urges supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people. Paul is thus appealing for mediation from others besides Christ, the one mediator. Why?

1 Tim 2:3 - because this subordinate mediation is good and acceptable to God our Savior. Because God is our Father and we are His children, God invites us to participate in Christ’s role as mediator.

1 Tim. 2:5 - therefore, although Jesus Christ is the sole mediator between God and man, there are many intercessors (subordinate mediators).

1 Cor. 3:9 - God invites us to participate in Christ’s work because we are God’s “fellow workers” and one family in the body of Christ. God wants His children to participate. The phrase used to describe “fellow workers” is “sunergoi,” which literally means synergists, or cooperators with God in salvific matters. Does God need fellow workers? Of course not, but this shows how much He, as Father, loves His children. God wants us to work with Him.

Mark 16:20 - this is another example of how the Lord “worked with them” (“sunergountos”). God cooperates with us. Out of His eternal love, He invites our participation.

Rom. 8:28 - God “works for good with” (the Greek is “sunergei eis agathon”) those who love Him. We work as subordinate mediators.

2 Cor. 6:1 - “working together” (the Greek is “sunergountes”) with him, don’t accept His grace in vain. God allows us to participate in His work, not because He needs our help, but because He loves us and wants to exalt us in His Son. It is like the father who lets his child join him in carrying the groceries in the house. The father does not need help, but he invites the child to assist to raise up the child in dignity and love.

Heb. 12:1 - the “cloud of witnesses” (nephos marturon) that we are surrounded by is a great amphitheatre of witnesses to the earthly race, and they actively participate and cheer us (the runners) on, in our race to salvation.

1 Peter 2:5 - we are a holy priesthood, instructed to offer spiritual sacrifices to God. We are therefore subordinate priests to the Head Priest, but we are still priests who participate in Christ’s work of redemption.

Rev. 1:6, 5:10 - Jesus made us a kingdom of priests for God. Priests intercede through Christ on behalf of God’s people.

James 5:16; Proverbs 15:8, 29 - the prayers of the righteous (the saints) have powerful effects. This is why we ask for their prayers. How much more powerful are the saints’ prayers in heaven, in whom righteousness has been perfected. 1 Tim 2:5-6 - therefore, it is because Jesus Christ is the one mediator before God that we can be subordinate mediators. Jesus is the reason. The Catholic position thus gives Jesus the most glory. He does it all but loves us so much He desires our participation.

None of these verses justify prayers to the dead or praying to anyone but God.

 

[mercygate]

12volt_man:

How can God be God’s Father when God hadn’t been born yet?

The hypostatic union tells us that Jesus Christ has two natures: one human, one divine.

It is a logical impossibility for Mary to be the mother of God the Son, when the Bible tells us that God the Son created Mary. God the Son must have already existed in order to create Mary.

While we do believe that something can be created out of nothing, we do not believe that nothing can create something.

How can anybody who knows the term “hypostatic union” not grasp the simple logic of the title, “Mother of God?” Theology one-oh-one.

No mainstream denomination denies this: Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists, Anglicans, all recognize that the term “Mother of God” is a protection of the doctrine of the hypostatic union and points to the nature of Christ, not the nature of Mary.

Let me guess: your graduate degree was not in philosophy or theology. Am I right?

 

[pro_universal]

How can God be God’s Father when God hadn’t been born yet?

By way of his relationship to the second person of the trinity. See Augustine, “On the Trinity”.

The hypostatic union tells us that Jesus Christ has two natures: one human, one divine.

Right, and what does it tell us about those two natures? That they are inseparable and intertwined in one person . That’s why it is called the hypostatic union and not the hypostatic conjunction.

It is a logical impossibility for Mary to be the mother of God the Son, when the Bible tells us that God the Son created Mary. God the Son must have already existed in order to create Mary.

He did exist, but his flesh was from Mary. Jesus is both Human and Divine. Flesh is temporal, it comes from other bodies…and Jesus’s flesh came from Mary’s body in part. Or are you claiming that none of the food mary ate went to Jesus? Was there a magic pipeline that fed muscle to be built on Jesus’s body? If so…let’s see the scripture. Otherwise, all we have is that Jesus was born a man to his mother, Mary.

While we do believe that something can be created out of nothing, we do not believe that nothing can create something.

That’s really not even close to relevant. Mary was a human. God is spirit and human. If God can create flesh, he can create the flesh that gave birth to his existence in the world.

 

[Eden]

So then, you don’t believe that we’re real Christians, either?

You know that I said you are a Christian who does not have the fullness of faith. Why do you pretend not to understand? Of course, one must correct heretical beliefs and direct them to Truth.

You described yourself as an apostate earlier. But by definition, you would have to become pagan, Jewish, atheist, etc. to call yourself apostate.

 

[Eden]

12volt_man:

None of these verses justify prayers to the dead or praying to anyone but God.

I realize that you will not accept biblical evidence of beliefs that you do not hold in your Baptist faith. But there it is for you.

 

[12volt_man]

mercygate:

My KJV Bible says that “the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” (Jas 5:16) Would you argue that the Mother of Christ is less righteous than the “righteous man” commended by St. James?

I would argue that we still are commanded not to pray to the dead and not to pray for anyone but God.

According to my Protestant Bible those who die in faith – and not even explicit faith in Jesus is required – are not dead: **"Have you not read in the book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God said to him, `I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? **
He is not God of the dead, but of the living; you are quite wrong." (Mk 12:26-27)

Like I said, the Bible tells us that the only two people who have ever gone to Heaven without dying are Enoch and Elijah.

We do not consult spirits who roam the earth in order that we may learn the future.

Does Mary offer prophecies of the future?

Even if it were true that many catholics “worship” statues – and I assure you, even simple peasants know better

So then, when I take a trip to St. Patricks’ in New York and have to step over people bowing to statues and lighting candles to them, what are they doing?

Statements like “many Roman Catholics [worship statues]” border on bearing false witness.

No, it is simply an observation.

We don’t pray to dead people.

So then you don’t actually pray to Mary and the saints?

 

[12volt_man]

Eden:

I realize that you will not accept biblical evidence of beliefs that you do not hold in your Baptist faith. But there it is for you.

Where have you been? I’ve been begging for scriptural evidence.

 

[Therese_Martin]

Note:

This thread is closed. Thanks to all who participated in the discussion.