Jesus Christ - Bible Study

[benedictus2]

I am trying to be very candid and not offensive with this comment. It seems when I discuss the Scriptures with almost all Mormon Christians and some Roman Catholics, they will shut down the conversation by runining from the light of the Scriptures. I may know in part but have faith that God the Holy Spirit will illuminate truth in the Scriptures for God’s purpose, His own glory, and our good. If you run from the Scriptures, you will grieve the work of the Holy Spirit. You don’t have to agree with my interpretations, but don’t be afraid of studying the Scriptures together. This is a Catholic forum site; therfore, more Catholics will post than non-Catholics. What do you have to be afraid of? You are not participating in a Protestant Bible Study.

Martha and Mary
Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.” - Luke 10

John 17:17

Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth.

Hebrews 4

Therefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it. For good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened. For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said,

“As I swore in my wrath,
‘They shall not enter my rest,’”

although his works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.” And again in this passage he said,

“They shall not enter my rest.”

Since therefore it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly received the good news failed to enter because of disobedience, again he appoints a certain day, “Today,” saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted,

“Today, if you hear his voice,
do not harden your hearts.”

For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God’s rest has also rested from his works as God did from his.

Let us therefore strive to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by the same sort of disobedience. For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.

Okay. However, you make a promise that you will reply to the questions posed to you 100% of the time. You will not ignore any hard questions. Deal?

 

[Reformed]

Okay. However, you make a promise that you will reply to the questions posed to you 100% of the time. You will not ignore any hard questions. Deal?

I will do my best, but I tell you right now that I know in part. Therefore, I can only give you an answer in what I currently know. The author of the Bible is infinite and we are fallen finite creatures, being renewed by the Spirit over a lifetime. Growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ is a marathon that last a lifetime…and probably all eternity.

 

[benedictus2]

I will do my best, but I tell you right now that I know in part. Therefore, I can only give you an answer in what I currently know. The author of the Bible is infinite and we are fallen finite creatures, being renewed by the Spirit over a lifetime. Growing in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ is a marathon that last a lifetime…and probably all eternity.

I am not talking about your knowledge of the Bible here. You have ignored questions in the past when you don’t know the answer and the discussion is pointless when you ignore questions you do not have the answer for. You have to answer all questions that are posed to you even if the answer is "I don’t know."

Also, a ground rule, it is very arrogant of you to start throwing passages like that. That is not how you do a study. Pick a single passage, the ones that peoople have already replied to and discuss that.

So first off. You need to zero in a particular passage that you want to study.

One passage at a time.

So to start. Pick one.

 

[cfrancis]

I will do my best, but I tell you right now that I know in part.

OK, I have to address this. Reformed, you use the highligted portion above very often, as a defense against the Catholic (and Scriptural) statement of the fullness of Truth.
From 1 Cor 13:
1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 **If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. **
3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,
5 does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,
6 does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;
7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.
9 **For we know in part and we prophesy in part; **
10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.
11 When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.
12 **For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. **
13 But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Paul’s context of “knowing” is not about the Truth of the faith; how could Paul declare that any Truth of the faith could be “done away”?

From the mouth of Jesus Christ, to the Apostles:
John 16:
12 "I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
13 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.

You pit the words of Paul against the words of Christ, when it is all the same Word.

 

[mercygate]

OK, I have to address this. Reformed, you use the highligted portion above very often, as a defense against the Catholic (and Scriptural) statement of the fullness of Truth.
From 1 Cor 13:
1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 **If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. **
3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,
5 does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,
6 does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;
7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.
9 **For we know in part and we prophesy in part; **
10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.
11 When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.
12 **For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. **
13 But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Paul’s context of “knowing” is not about the Truth of the faith; how could Paul declare that any Truth of the faith could be “done away”?

From the mouth of Jesus Christ, to the Apostles:
John 16:
12 "I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
13 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.

You pit the words of Paul against the words of Christ, when it is all the same Word.

Just a note on this. The Church also “knows in part” because she “knows” doctrinal truth on a need-to-know basis. That’s what “He WILL disclose” means. So for us, “fullness of truth” is about fullness of the truth we need to know right NOW.

 

[M0nkey]

Of course I disagree with your understanding. Here is the Scripture that you paraphrased. Nicodemus did not understand the teaching of Jesus that you must be born again before you can even see the kingdom of God. How can you get baptismal regeneration from the ministry and teaching of John the Baptist?

Matthew 3:11
“I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

Luke 3:16
John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

Are we reading different texts? From what you wrote from the scriptures I see baptismal regeneration in black and white. Let me help you in case you missed it.

*John answered them all, saying, “I **baptize **you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will **baptize *you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.

The obdedient act of being baptized is an outward sign of the inward reality of being born from above. How else can you obey the command of Christ to be baptised? The Scripture clearly teaches in Romans 8 that those in the flesh cannot please God. Did you obey God to be baptised by the power of the Spirit and being united to Christ? John 15 teaches that apart from Christ we can do nothing.Or, are you trying to say that while still dead in your sins and trespasses, being in the flesh and united to Adam, you were able to obey the command to be baptised to be the cause of your regeneration? You cannot will yourself to a new life in Christ. It is an act of God.

Colossians 2:13

And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses,

By Grace Through Faith
2:1 And you were dead in the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— 3 among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body [1] and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But [2] God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— 6 and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

• Ephesians 2

You keep quoting Ephesians and circumambulating the point. Have you or have you not been baptized? In case you are not aware. St. Paul is speaking about circumcision, this does not mean that he’s taking baptism out of the picture. :tsktsk:

 

[M0nkey]

I am trying to be very candid and not offensive with this comment. It seems when I discuss the Scriptures with almost all Mormon Christians and some Roman Catholics, they will shut down the conversation by runining from the light of the Scriptures. I may know in part but have faith that God the Holy Spirit will illuminate truth in the Scriptures for God’s purpose, His own glory, and our good. If you run from the Scriptures, you will grieve the work of the Holy Spirit. You don’t have to agree with my interpretations, but don’t be afraid of studying the Scriptures together. This is a Catholic forum site; therfore, more Catholics will post than non-Catholics. What do you have to be afraid of? You are not participating in a Protestant Bible Study.

You keep saying that but you are not the most charitable person when someone disagrees with you.

Catholics do not run away from scripture, in fact, we embrace the WHOLE of scripture as it is taught in the light of Christ. Catholics do not have a cafeteria approach to scripture and don’t pick and choose what makes them feel more comfortable. Catholics respect and venerate the scriptures by reading it in it’s formal context according to apostolic tradition.

Unlike Martin Luther, who, because of issues with scrupulosity, decided to change the whole outlook of the written word based on what was more convenient for him. This is really what constitutes man-made tradition.

 

[Reformed]

I am not talking about your knowledge of the Bible here. You have ignored questions in the past when you don’t know the answer and the discussion is pointless when you ignore questions you do not have the answer for. You have to answer all questions that are posed to you even if the answer is "I don’t know."

Also, a ground rule, it is very arrogant of you to start throwing passages like that. That is not how you do a study. Pick a single passage, the ones that peoople have already replied to and discuss that.

So first off. You need to zero in a particular passage that you want to study.

One passage at a time.

So to start. Pick one.

Your welcome to participate with the general format. But, I’m not sure if you are in the position to change the way the study is currently going. You cannot just pick a scripture and comment. They need to be understood in the proper context of the particular book, or at least to a few chapters. A single verse needs to be understood with all of Scripture.

 

[Reformed]

OK, I have to address this. Reformed, you use the highligted portion above very often, as a defense against the Catholic (and Scriptural) statement of the fullness of Truth.
From 1 Cor 13:
1 If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 **If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. **
3 And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
4 Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,
5 does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,
6 does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;
7 bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
8 Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.
9 **For we know in part and we prophesy in part; **
10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.
11 When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.
12 **For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known. **
13 But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Paul’s context of “knowing” is not about the Truth of the faith; how could Paul declare that any Truth of the faith could be “done away”?

From the mouth of Jesus Christ, to the Apostles:
John 16:
12 "I have many more things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.
13 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come.

You pit the words of Paul against the words of Christ, when it is all the same Word.

Well, I don’t believe I have done that. It’s a matter of perspective because I think Catholics do not understand the words of Jesus with the rest of Scripture. The best commentaries for Scripture is the rest of Scripture.

 

[mercygate]

Your welcome to participate with the general format. But, I’m not sure if you are in the position to change the way the study is currently going. You cannot just pick a scripture and comment. They need to be understood in the proper context of the particular book, or at least to a few chapters. A single verse needs to be understood with all of Scripture.

As a Protestant, you may be a few pages ahead of us Catholics there. When you throw up a rash of scriptures, some of us can’t connect the dots for oursrelves.

 

[Reformed]

As a Protestant, you may be a few pages ahead of us Catholics there. When you throw up a rash of scriptures, some of us can’t connect the dots for oursrelves.

Thanks for the kind posting. Maybe you are trying to imply that Protestants participate in more personal Bible Studies than Roman Catholics. It just something we do throughout our pilgrimage as Protestant Christians. Obviously, if I understood John chapter 3 as baptismal regeneration, I would live out my life as a Roman Catholic Christian. And, if Roman Catholics did not understand John chapter 3 as baptismal regeneration, then they would convert to Protestantism. We really should move on and disagree agreeably on John chapter 3. Here’s chapter 4: Please share your comments on this chapter.

John 4

Jesus and the Woman of Samaria
4:1 Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John 2 (although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples), 3 he left Judea and departed again for Galilee. 4 And he had to pass through Samaria. 5 So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. 6 Jacob’s well was there; so Jesus, wearied as he was from his journey, was sitting beside the well. It was about the sixth hour. [1]

7 A woman from Samaria came to draw water. Jesus said to her, “Give me a drink.” 8 (For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, “How is it that you, a Jew, ask for a drink from me, a woman of Samaria?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that is saying to you, ‘Give me a drink,’ you would have asked him, and he would have given you living water.” 11 The woman said to him, “Sir, you have nothing to draw water with, and the well is deep. Where do you get that living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob? He gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did his sons and his livestock.” 13 Jesus said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. [2] The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” 15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water, so that I will not be thirsty or have to come here to draw water.”

16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.”

27 Just then his disciples came back. They marveled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you seek?” or, “Why are you talking with her?” 28 So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” 30 They went out of the town and were coming to him.

31 Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, saying, “Rabbi, eat.” 32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” 33 So the disciples said to one another, “Has anyone brought him something to eat?” 34 Jesus said to them, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work. 35 Do you not say, ‘There are yet four months, then comes the harvest’? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest. 36 Already the one who reaps is receiving wages and gathering fruit for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. 37 For here the saying holds true, ‘One sows and another reaps.’ 38 I sent you to reap that for which you did not labor. Others have labored, and you have entered into their labor.”

39 Many Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me all that I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they asked him to stay with them, and he stayed there two days. 41 And many more believed because of his word. 42 They said to the woman, “It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the Savior of the world.”

43 After the two days he departed for Galilee. 44 (For Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in his own hometown.) 45 So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast. For they too had gone to the feast.

 

[guanophore]

Well, I don’t believe I have done that. It’s a matter of perspective because I think Catholics do not understand the words of Jesus with the rest of Scripture. The best commentaries for Scripture is the rest of Scripture.

It is a matter of perspective, and I would appreciate it if you could refrain from disparaging the Catholic perspective. I would have thought it was clear to you by now that this attitude is not helping you evangelistic effort.

I am really pleading with you to stop making these sweeping generalizations and prejudicial remarks about Catholics. I guess you can embrace bigotry if you feel such a deep need to do so, but please do not publicize it on CAF. This is not a venue for you to disparage Catholics, or the Catholic faith.

 Obviously, if I understood John chapter 3 as baptismal regeneration, I would live out my life as a Roman Catholic Christian.

No, I don’t find that obvious at all. It seems clear to me that you have dozens of objections to the Roman Catholic faith, this being only one.

Such a statement is disingenuous.

It also seems to lack perspective that there are a vast majority of Christians that believe this doctrine who are not Roman Catholic.

And, if Roman Catholics did not understand John chapter 3 as baptismal regeneration, then they would convert to Protestantism.

Hogwash.

 

[benedictus2]

Well, I don’t believe I have done that. It’s a matter of perspective because I think Catholics do not understand the words of Jesus with the rest of Scripture. The best commentaries for Scripture is the rest of Scripture.

Do you even understand what circular reasoning means? If not google it.

Someone wrote that some Protestants don’t know the rudiments of logical reasoning and you are so proving them right.