If there apostolic succession why is it not mentioned in the scriptures?

[justasking4]

Ephesians 4:11-13
It was he who gave some to be apostles, some to be prophets, some to be evangelists, and some to be pastors and teachers, to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

1 Timothy 3:1-13
Here is a trustworthy saying: If anyone sets his heart on being an overseer, he desires a noble task. Now the overseer must be above reproach, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him with proper respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God’s church?) He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap. Deacons, likewise, are to be men worthy of respect, sincere, not indulging in much wine, and not pursuing dishonest gain. They must keep hold of the deep truths of the faith with a clear conscience. They must first be tested; and then if there is nothing against them, let them serve as deacons. In the same way, their wives are to be women worthy of respect, not malicious talkers but temperate and trustworthy in everything. A deacon must be the husband of but one wife and must manage his children and his household well. Those who have served well gain an excellent standing and great assurance in their faith in Christ Jesus.

“Overseer” was traditionally understood to mean “bishop”.

1 Timothy 4:13-14
Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.

1 Timothy 5:17-22
The elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching.

2 Timothy 2:1-2

You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others.

There are five generations of believers contained in this one passage: 1. Those who came before Paul and instructed him, 2. Paul himself, 3. Timothy, who was Paul’s disciple, 4. Those whom Timothy would disciple, and 5. Those to whom Timothy’s disciples would preach.

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Titus 1:5

The reason I left you in Crete was that you might straighten out what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you.

Apostolic Succession is illustrated here as Paul had appointed Titus and left him in charge of appointing elders in the Cretan church.

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2 Peter 1:12-15
****So I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have. I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body, because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me. And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things. ****

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What effort could Peter make to ensure his message would be remembered after his departure?

We have 2 letters from Peter himself and thats it. It was the HS that ensured that he would be remembered.

Now i have a question for you about Peter passing his apostleship on. Where is it recorded that he did so? When?

These are important questions since he probably died in the early 60’s which would mean that other apostles would have also been aware of their new leader. There is good reason to believe that the gospel of John and his letters were written after his death and they say nothing about his successor.

 

[Orionthehunter]

Now where in scripture did the Spirit guide them into what the mass was to look like? Where do we see any evidence of how a person was to change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ?

Just remember that the Apostles and Early Church Fathers were having Mass before a single page of the NT was written. Additionally for over 200 years they were having Mass before the Bible was canonized by the same Church by the Magisterium in communion with the Pope.

Mass preceded the Bible and was done by the very people who God used to write Scripture. A very inconvenient Truth for the new age believers like justasking, Sandusky et. al.

 

[Erich]

Do you seriously believe that Christ intended His church to have inquistions that lasted for so long the resulted in the death and torture of so many people?

Yes, actually… The Bible itself records instances where God commanded that formal, legal inquiries—that is, inquisitions—be carried out to expose secret believers in false religions. In Deuteronomy 17:2–5 God said: “If there is found among you, within any of your towns which the Lord your God gives you, a man or woman who does what is evil in the sight of the Lord your God, in transgressing his covenant, and has gone and served other gods and worshiped them, or the sun or the moon or any of the host of heaven, which I have forbidden, and it is told you and you hear of it; then you shall inquire diligently, and if it is true and certain that such an abominable thing has been done in Israel, then you shall bring forth to your gates that man or woman who has done this evil thing, and you shall stone that man or woman to death with stones.”

Also, Paul – as well as Christ himself – warned us that there would be a few ravenous wolves among Church leaders (Acts 20:29; Matt. 7:15), so I would say that inquisitions must somehow have been “part of the plan.”

Finally, I don’t know how many people you consider “so many”, but the plague, which killed a third of Europe’s population, is credited by historians with major changes in the social structure. The Inquisition is credited with few — precisely because the number of its victims was comparitively small.

 

[Erich]

From The Inquisition,

Luther and Calvin both endorsed the right of the state to protect society by purging false religion. In fact, Calvin not only banished from Geneva those who did not share his views, he permitted and in some cases ordered others to be executed for “heresy” (e.g. Jacques Gouet, tortured and beheaded in 1547; and Michael Servetus, burned at the stake in 1553). In England and Ireland, Reformers engaged in their own ruthless inquisitions and executions. Conservative estimates indicate that thousands of English and Irish Catholics were put to death—many by being hanged, drawn, and quartered—for practicing the Catholic faith and refusing to become Protestant. An even greater number were forced to flee to the Continent for their safety.

 

[Randy_Carson]

No it does not say it like this.

Are there other inspired-inerrant that claims in and of themselves to be “God-breathed” as the scriptures are? If you claim Sacred Tradition please give me a specific example and where it says this.

Perhaps you might slow the frantic pace of your posting in multiple threads and answer this fundamental question.

Where does the Bible claim to be the sole infallible rule of faith for the believer?

No one disputes that scripture is “God-breathed” or theopneustos. What is in question is whether God intended that the Bible Alone would have authority when Jesus clearly established an authoritative Church according to your Bible.

I have verses that point to the Church…you can offer nothing to support sola scriptura, and I think you know this which is why you duck the question.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Do you believe that the way the catholic church aligned itself with the secular authorties in the past centuries was what Christ intended for His church? Do you seriously believe that Christ intended His church to have inquistions that lasted for so long the resulted in the death and torture of so many people?

Okay, JA…how many people do you claim the Catholic Church killed in the Inquisition, hmmm?

 

[guanophore]

Originally Posted by
"andzy:

Your answers keep confusing me: you say that only in the Scripture can we look for Christian teachings, but then you also say that the Scriptures don’t say that specifically.
I have been asking you this question three times since about 150 posts ago, but haven’t been able to get an answer from you:
Do you or do you not agree that the Bible does not say that it is the ONLY inspired-inerrant and foundation for all doctrine and practice?
Please see post #201 to remind you the “history” of this question.
(I’m not looking for a long philosophical answer, but a simple one, for example, yes, no, sometimes when…, or something like that).
Appreciate your answer!

No it does not say it like this.

This is amazing andzy! You have managed to get ja4 to contradict himself. Congratulations!

Originally Posted by justasking

The NT is inspired-inerrant. Nothing else is. It is the foundation for all doctrine and practices because it alone is inspired-inerrant. From it we can have everything we need for salvation. It actually makes this claim as you may know. I go to the inspired-inerrant scriptures as the final authority.

 

[guanophore]

Do you believe that the way the catholic church aligned itself with the secular authorties in the past centuries was what Christ intended for His church? Do you seriously believe that Christ intended His church to have inquistions that lasted for so long the resulted in the death and torture of so many people?

This is another strawman, ja4. You have been told repeatedly that the Teachings of the Apostles, inerrantly preserve in the Catholic Church, are infallible and inerrant. You have also been told that individuals within the Church who departed from those teachings and fell into sins are not considered infallible or inerrant. Inerrancy does not equal impeccability.

However, I have grown weary of this inquisition strawman, and now that I am convinced you are not here to learn but to criticize and attempt to turn Catholics away from their faith, I will not try to educate you any longer.

 

[guanophore]

Okay, JA…how many people do you claim the Catholic Church killed in the Inquisition, hmmm?

Don’t feed into him derailing yet another thread!

 

[Randy_Carson]

We have 2 letters from Peter himself and thats it. It was the HS that ensured that he would be remembered.

How absurd. Peter is remembered because Jesus chose him as the chief Apostle.

Peter’s comment about making “**every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things” **indicates that Peter would appoint a reliable man to continue his work, a successor, just as Paul exhorted Timothy to do.

Now i have a question for you about Peter passing his apostleship on. Where is it recorded that he did so? When?

**Irenaeus **

“The blessed apostles [Peter and Paul], having founded and built up the church [of Rome], they handed over the office of the episcopate to Linus. Paul makes mention of this Linus in the epistle to Timothy [2 Tim. 4:21]. To him succeeded Anencletus, and after him, in the third place from the apostles, Clement was chosen for the episcopate. He had seen the blessed apostles and was acquainted with them. It might be said that he still heard the echoes of the preaching of the apostles and had their traditions before his eyes. And not only he, for there were many still remaining who had been instructed by the apostles. In the time of Clement, no small dissension having arisen among the brethren in Corinth, the Church in Rome sent a very strong letter to the Corinthians, exhorting them to peace and renewing their faith. . . To this Clement, Evaristus succeeded. . . and now, in the twelfth place after the apostles, the lot of the episcopate [of Rome] has fallen to Eleutherus. In this order, and by the teaching of the apostles handed down in the Church, the preaching of the truth has come down to us” (Against Heresies 3:3:3 [inter AD. 180-190]).

These are important questions since he probably died in the early 60’s which would mean that other apostles would have also been aware of their new leader. There is good reason to believe that the gospel of John and his letters were written after his death and they say nothing about his successor.

Do you honestly think that John would be STUPID enough to put the name of the new leader of the Church into a letter that could have been confiscated at any time by the Roman authorities who were occupying Israel? :nope:

How many Apostles were dead by the time John wrote his gospel? ALL OF THEM EXCEPT HIM. Would John risk revealing the leadership of the Church to the murderous Roman army? Why do you think that Peter wrote that he was in “Babylon” - a code word for Rome - in his letter? Because any courier could have been stopped and searched, and Peter wasn’t foolish enough to put his location in writing that might fall into the hands of the men who sought to kill him.

But let’s put this in perspective…we change presidents every four to eight years assuming no premature deaths. In our nation’s history we have had 43 presidents. Most reasonably well-educated middle schoolers can name them all, and these names are not nearly so important to them as the names of the bishops were to the early Church. You can bet your bottom dollar that the names of the popes were known with certainty by the Church long before Ireneaus recorded them in the passage I quoted above.

 

[Randy_Carson]

All we have of what Jesus and the apostles taught is to be found only in the scriptures. Now where in scripture did the Spirit guide them into what the mass was to look like? Where do we see any evidence of how a person was to change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ?

The teaching of the Apostles regarding this matter is recorded in the Didache, an early writing that tells us much about the beliefs and practice of the Early Church.

As I have asked before: Do you believe the Bible is a comprehensive work of systematic theology? Does it contain all of the prayers and liturgical norms for each of the sacraments? or were these things being taught by the actual practice of the Church long before the first word of the New Testament was ever written.

IOW, mass was being celebrated, baptisms were being performed for at least 20 years before the first book of the New Testament was penned. Clearly, the teaching of the Apostles was being handed on orally long before anything about baptism was ever put on paper or parchment.

Later, when the scriptures were written, they were not an attempt to capture EVERYTHING that the Apostles had handed on…many things were simply passed over in silence precisely because an authoritative Church was still teaching orally and by its practice those things which the Apostles had taught from the beginning.

How would we know? What would be the evidence for the guidance of the Spirit?

We would know that the Church is being led by the Spirit because Jesus promised that this would be the case.

Gee, does it strike anyone as ironic that Protestants all want to claim that they are individually led by the Spirit (based on a false understanding of John 17) while they deny that the Church built by Christ can be led that way? Why are they infallible in their personal interpretations that the Spirit allegedly leads them to but the Church responsible for the entire flock is simply on its own and prone to error? (Of course, they will be very careful to avoid claiming to be infallible, but the fact is that none of them thinks that his interpretation of the Bible is in error, and they are all quite sure that other denominations “just don’t get it.”)

Finally, how is it that the Baptist “Bible Only” believer who is led by the Holy Spirit determines from his study of the word of God that infants should not be baptized and that baptism is purely symbolic and not regenerative while a Lutheran “Bible Only” believer determines from his study and prayer that infants should be baptized and that it regenerates the soul?

Does the Holy Spirit teach contradictory doctrines to men of God in different denominations?

The scriptures are sufficent for all that we need to live our lives in Christ.

Where does the bible claim to be “sufficient”? You’re not going to pin your hopes to 2 Timothy 3:16, are you?

 

[justasking4]

Randy Carson;2852470]

Quote:
Originally Posted by justasking4
We have 2 letters from Peter himself and thats it. It was the HS that ensured that he would be remembered.
Randy Carson;2852470]
How absurd. Peter is remembered because Jesus chose him as the chief Apostle.

How is this absurd? You asked how he i.e. Peter would ensure he himself would be remembered did you not? I understood you to mean how this would be done. Perhaps i misunderstood you.

Randy Carson;2852470]
Peter’s comment about making “every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things” indicates that Peter would appoint a reliable man to continue his work, a successor, just as Paul exhorted Timothy to do.

What makes you think this letter is to only one man instead of the churches he was writing to?

 

[justasking4]

Randy Carson;2852470]

Quote:justasking4

These are important questions since he probably died in the early 60’s which would mean that other apostles would have also been aware of their new leader. There is good reason to believe that the gospel of John and his letters were written after his death and they say nothing about his successor.
Randy Carson;2852470]
Do you honestly think that John would be STUPID enough to put the name of the new leader of the Church into a letter that could have been confiscated at any time by the Roman authorities who were occupying Israel?

Its also possible that John was not aware of such thing happening also.

Randy Carson;2852470]

How many Apostles were dead by the time John wrote his gospel? ALL OF THEM EXCEPT HIM. Would John risk revealing the leadership of the Church to the murderous Roman army? Why do you think that Peter wrote that he was in “Babylon” - a code word for Rome - in his letter? Because any courier could have been stopped and searched, and Peter wasn’t foolish enough to put his location in writing that might fall into the hands of the men who sought to kill him.

You might be right. There are also other possiblities that could be just as probable.

Randy Carson;2852470]
But let’s put this in perspective…we change presidents every four to eight years assuming no premature deaths. In our nation’s history we have had 43 presidents. Most reasonably well-educated middle schoolers can name them all, and these names are not nearly so important to them as the names of the bishops were to the early Church. You can bet your bottom dollar that the names of the popes were known with certainty by the Church long before Ireneaus recorded them in the passage I quoted above.

Are there not a number of different lists of popes in the church that don’t match exactly? I thought i had read this somewhere.

 

[justasking4]

Randy Carson;2852550]

As I have asked before: Do you believe the Bible is a comprehensive work of systematic theology?

Not in the way we think of.

Does it contain all of the prayers and liturgical norms for each of the sacraments?

What do you mean by sacraments? Which ones?

or were these things being taught by the actual practice of the Church long before the first word of the New Testament was ever written.

Last rites and beoming a priest are sacraments. Correct? If so, where are they mentioned as such in the NT?

 

[Randy_Carson]

What makes you think this letter is to only one man instead of the churches he was writing to?

You are unclear here.

If you mean Paul’s letter to Timothy:

2 Timothy 1:1-2
1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, according to the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus,
2To Timothy, my dear son:
Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

If you mean Peter’s letter, then it does not matter who he was writing to (it was most likely a local church). Peter tells the believers that he will make every effort to ensure that they will be reminded of his teachings after he is gone.

One sure way is to appoint someone to continue his work just as Billy Graham has passed his ministry on to Franklin Graham. This is just what happened.

Peter > Linus > Anacletus > Clement > Evaristus > Alexander > Sixtus

And so on down to Benedict XVI today.

Hope this helps. :tiphat:

 

[justasking4]

Randy Carson;2852550]

Quote:justasking4

How would we know? What would be the evidence for the guidance of the Spirit?
Randy Carson;2852550]

We would know that the Church is being led by the Spirit because Jesus promised that this would be the case.

Many people claim this but what characteristics do you look for in a particular individual being guided by the Spirit?

 

[justasking4]

You are unclear here.

If you mean Paul’s letter to Timothy:

2 Timothy 1:1-2
1Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, according to the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus,
2To Timothy, my dear son:
Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.

If you mean Peter’s letter, then it does not matter who he was writing to (it was most likely a local church). Peter tells the believers that he will make every effort to ensure that they will be reminded of his teachings after he is gone.

One sure way is to appoint someone to continue his work just as Billy Graham has passed his ministry on to Franklin Graham. This is just what happened.

Peter > Linus > Anacletus > Clement > Evaristus > Alexander > Sixtus

And so on down to Benedict XVI today.

Hope this helps. :tiphat:

I was referring to Peter and the quote from it in I Peter 1:15.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Its also possible that John was not aware of such thing happening also.

Good point. Being exiled to the island of Patmos, he may not have been aware of who the pope was after Peter. That would explain the silence, too, I suppose.

Are there not a number of different lists of popes in the church that don’t match exactly? I thought i had read this somewhere.

Did you read this on the Vatican’s website? I didn’t think so.

But let me ask you this: so what?

Suppose that we have an incomplete or imperfect list of popes. How does this negate the validity of Apostolic Succession? One pope succeeded another whether we know his name or not.

 

[Randy_Carson]

I was referring to Peter and the quote from it in I Peter 1:15.

Fine. I responded to both possibilities just in case.

 

[Randy_Carson]

Many people claim this but what characteristics do you look for in a particular individual being guided by the Spirit?

In the context of understanding a specific doctrine, I don’t look to an individual at all. I look to the Church.