Not of Scripture??

[Katholikos]

I wrote:
Originally Posted by Katholikos
*Proof-texting the Scriptures invariably leads to interpretation errors. *

Shibboleth wrote:

Protestants do not disagree with this statement. Our sinful and imperfect nature makes it impossible for anyone to interpret Scripture infallably.

Since Scripture is the only rule of faith and morals for a Protestant, it is therefore impossible to know the Truth about God and man’s salvation. Christianity is a guessing game.

JMJ Jay

 

[Katholikos]

An incomplete list of man-made, invented Protestant words of doctrines not found in the Bible (from Steve Ray’s website):

(click on “writings” - then on “Steve Ray” - then on “Why do Protestants Invent Doctrines?”)

Age of accountability
Total depravity of man
Personal Lord and Savior
Ask Jesus into your heart
The Rapture
Invisible church
Folding your hands, bowing your head
“Personal relationship with Christ”
Accepting Christ as Lord and Savior
Enthroning the Bible in your heart
“Covered with the righteousness of Christ”
Limited atonement
Imputed righteousness
Altar call
Dedication; rededication
“Giving your life to the Lord”
Revival
Inerrancy
Eternal Security
Once saved, always saved
Faith **Alone (Sola Fide)
Scripture Alone (Sola Scriptura)
Devotions
Wedding rings
Full-time ministry
Church as a building

Words not found in the Bible used by Catholics & Protestants

Trinity
Incarnation
Protestant
Bible
Denomination

JMJ Jay

 

[flameburns623]

christianitytoday.com/history/features/ask/2003/may2.html

**When and why did the custom of conducting altar calls begin? . . . **

The history lesson is rather irrelevant. The issue was whether or not there is scriptural basis for altar calls. Evangelicals point to the book of Acts for precedent.

As respects ‘proof texting’: it is nothing more than the citation of a representative passage from the text, to illustrate or demonstrate a point being made from Scripture, or to establish what the Scriptures say. It is done in other venues: this forum even allows me to “quote” others, which is a form of “proof-texting” other forum members. There are rules for making citiations–I cannot parse a citation from someone so as to make them say something they absolutely do NOT say, for example. The same sorts of rules apply to the citation of Scripture: one must cite passages in context, for example.

 

[flameburns623]

Katholikos:

Proof-texting the Scriptures invariably leads to interpretation errors.

See my previous post.

I’ve already posted the origin of the fallacy of Sola Fide, *Faith Alone. *

And authors on both sides of the theological divide on this issue write massive tomes on the topic ‘proving’ or ‘disproving’ the doctrine alternately. I doubt we will resove the matter in an Internet forum with posting restrictions of not more than 4000 words.

There is only one correct interpretation of the Scriptures.

Oh balderdash. There are many passages which simulataneously have literal, figurative, prophetic, and mystical interpretations. Some would say that ALL passages of Scripture contain such multiple levels of meaning. I note this assertion comes from a religious tradition whose monks once applied EVERY ONE of the 150 Psalms in some fashion or the other to Jesus Christ.

The meaning the Sacred Writers put into them is the meaning we should get out of them.

Christians are much more interested in getting from the Scriptures the meaning which God put into them.

To do that, we have to read the Scriptures with the mind of the Church.

The Catholic Church is the People of God, the New Israel (Gal 6:16), the new House of Jacob (Lk 1:32-33) . . . .
So it professes itself and wishes itself to be. The assertion of a thing is not the establishment thereof.

. . . .All the NT writers belonged to the Church and were its leaders.

They belonged to Christ’s church. What is in controversy is what represents Christ’s church, and whether any single institution extant today is synonymous with His Church.

***They were the Church ***. . .

The Church is wherever two or three believers are gathered in the Name of Christ. The position of many Protestants is that it is not nor ever has been primarily a visible organization.

The NT is a collection of writings . . . {/QUOTE]

Not quite: the New Testament is an infallible, Divinely-inspired collection of writings.

It is not an instruction book in Christianity as Protestants try to make it

. . . .
Your assertion does not make this so. Protestants generally believe that this is EXACTLY what God intended the Scriptures to be.

It is a record of the spiritual life of the newborn Catholic Church . . .

The Scriptures most assuredly are no record of the Roman Catholic Church, which is nowhere mentioned in the Scriptures.

The Church wrote, then later selected, collected, and canonized 27 of her many writings and named them the NT.

The (Catholic) Church did no such thing. God spoke, and His people know His voice. Even in Scripture, the epistles of Peter and of Paul are cited as Scripture. Christians knew what Scripture was and needed no church to tell them.

She canonized the 46 writings of the Greek Septuagint that she had inherited as Scripture from Jesus and the Apostles.

Actually: some of those OT books are deemed, even by the RCC, as belonging to a secondary ‘lesser’ canon–hence they are deemed ‘deutero-canonical’.

She was nearly 400 years old at the time . . . .

“She” was not yet fully congealed into what “she” would transmogrify into, but no part of “she”, most assuredly, was yet 400 years old. “She” is not co-terminous with Christ’s Church, though I am certain you long to think otherwise.

Now that bald assertion has been swapped for bald assertion, perhaps I can recommend to the original poster of this thread that some greater measure of time be taken to determine “why” Protestants believe so many of their unique practices are indeed rooted in Scriptural precedent, however so evermuch the Roman Catholic Church begs to differ.

 

[Katholikos]

flameburns623:

The history lesson is rather irrelevant.

Oh, it’s relevant alright!

The issue was whether or not there is scriptural basis for altar calls. Evangelicals point to the book of Acts for precedent

The practice of “altar calls” began in the early 19th century – it was only*** then***, after the fact***,*** that a verse from Acts was found and interpreted as justification for it. It’s called eisogesis – reading beliefs and practices into the Scriptures.

As respects ‘proof texting’: it is nothing more than the citation of a representative passage from the text, to illustrate or demonstrate a point being made from Scripture, or to establish what the Scriptures say. It is done in other venues: this forum even allows me to “quote” others, which is a form of “proof-texting” other forum members. There are rules for making citiations–I cannot parse a citation from someone so as to make them say something they absolutely do NOT say, for example. The same sorts of rules apply to the citation of Scripture: one must cite passages in context, for example.

Protestants – and other heretics before them – have always parsed the Scriptures “to make them say what they absolutely DO NOT say.” There are thousands of competing and conflicting denominations to prove it. "There are some things in them [Paul’s letters] hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures" 2 Peter 3:16 RSV.

Your definition of “context” is the surrounding words or paragraphs. There’s another, more important context. The NT was written in the heart of the Church – by the leaders of the believing, teaching Church or their disciples, to other members of the believing, teaching Church. It’s an “insider’s” book, and Protestants are outsiders. You have to know the milieu in which the NT was written – the culture, the language and idioms intimates used with each other, the historical and geographic settings in which the writing was accomplished, what the writer intended to convey, and other factors. You have to know all that influenced the writer’s choice of words going in order to get the right meaning out of them. Above all, you have to know what the newborn Catholic Church was teaching. The Church’s doctrines are written into the NT – either expressly or impliedly. The NT came out of the Church – not vice versa.

Have you ever examined to whom the ‘books’ of the NT were each addressed? And what their purpose was? And have you ever asked yourself such questions as why a personal letter from Paul to a slave owner ended up as the “Word of God”?

The NT is not an instruction book in Christianity.

Peace be with you,

JMJ Jay

Blessed Father Damien, pray for us

 

[Katholikos]

Part 1 of 3

Regarding the origin of Sola Fide, flameburns wrote:

flameburns623:

And authors on both sides of the theological divide on this issue write massive tomes on the topic ‘proving’ or ‘disproving’ the doctrine alternately. I doubt we will resove the matter in an Internet forum with posting restrictions of not more than 4000 words.

I didn’t argue the merits of the doctrine; I merely reported the origin of it. (Hint: It didn’t come from the Apostles.)

Oh balderdash. There are many passages which simulataneously have literal, figurative, prophetic, and mystical interpretations. Some would say that ALL passages of Scripture contain such multiple levels of meaning. I note this assertion comes from a religious tradition whose monks once applied EVERY ONE of the 150 Psalms in some fashion or the other to Jesus Christ.

I wasn’t referring to the four senses of Scripture – literal, allegorical, moral, and anagogical. There is only one correct doctrinal interpretation of the Scriptures – and that’s the one that was written into them. The Church didn’t write the NT to teach doctrine. The doctrines came straight from the lips of the Apostles to the ears of the Church; she, in turn, taught others.

Christians are much more interested in getting from the Scriptures the meaning which God put into them.

The Catholic Church was God’s Agent in writing, selecting, canonizing, and preserving the NT Scriptures and forming the Bible. The Holy Spirit has no hands.

I wrote: “To do that, we have to read the Scriptures with the mind of the Church.”

You replied: Funny: Christians read the Scriptures to acquire the mind of God, Who is the ultimate Author.

Absolutely! But the penultimate author of the NT is the Church founded by Christ for the salvation of the world.

I wrote: The Catholic Church is the People of God, the New Israel (Gal 6:16), the new House of Jacob (Lk 1:32-33) . . .

You replied: So it professes itself and wishes itself to be. The assertion of a thing is not the establishment thereof.

It was St. Paul who called the only existing Church – the Catholic Church – the Israel of God (Gal 6:16). But you certainly don’t have to believe him. Ditto for St. Luke.

Continued

 

[Katholikos]

Part 2 of 3
Reply to flameburns

I wrote: . . . .All the NT writers belonged to the Church and were its leaders.

You replied: . . . What is in controversy is what represents Christ’s church, and whether any single institution extant today is synonymous with His Church.

The controversy is only among come-lately Protestants. The One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church has existed for 2,000 years, reaching back in an unbroken in a continuum to Christ and the Apostles. You may, of course, choose not to believe it.

Recommended reading:

TRIUMPH, The Power and the Glory of the Catholic Church – A 2,000-Year History by H.W. Crocker III. Mr. Crocker, a noted Civil War historian, is a recent convert to the Catholic Church from Anglicanism.

The Church is wherever two or three believers are gathered in the Name of Christ.

Is that what Mt 16:18-19 means?

The position of many Protestants is that it is not nor ever has been primarily a visible organization.

That’s a 16th century doctrine invented to accommodate the jillions of churches that developed following Luther’s declaration that the Scriptures were the sole rule of faith and every individual could interpret them for himself.

I wrote: The NT is a collection of writings . . .

You replied: Not quite: the New Testament is an infallible, Divinely-inspired collection of writings.

How do you know this?

I wrote: It [the NT] is not an instruction book in Christianity as Protestants try to make it . . . .

You replied: Your assertion does not make this so. Protestants generally believe that this is EXACTLY what God intended the Scriptures to be.

An instruction book is an orderly presentation, thematically arranged, with a beginning, middle, and end, containing everything anyone needs to know about a given subject.

The Scriptures are a collection of disparate writings – written by different people at different times and locations for different audiences and purposes.

The letters were written in response to problems that arose in some of the local Churches that were founded and instructed orally by the Apostles. Their purpose was not to teach doctrine, but to remind members of the Church of what they had already been taught and to admonish the faithful with a little fraternal correction now and then if it was needed. The letters are arranged in the NT by their length – the longest first, the shortest last.

The Gospels were described by St. Justin Martyr as “memoirs of the Apostles.” They were written so that there would be a record for posterity. They don’t tell us everything Jesus said and did, as plainly stated by St. John (20:30, 21:25).

Acts is the first history of the newborn Church. Revelation is written in apocalyptic code to a suffering, persecuted Church.

Continued

 

[Katholikos]

Part 3 of 3
Reply to Flameburns

The Scriptures most assuredly are no record of the Roman Catholic Church, which is nowhere mentioned in the Scriptures.

Jesus called it “the Church” or “My Church.” It was one of a kind and needed no name. The name “Catholic” was written in 107 A.D. by a student of St. John, Ignatius of Antioch, in his letter to the Smyrnaeans: “Where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church.” The heresies which had already developed by the time the NT was being written made a name necessary to distinguish the real Church from its rival imposters.

I wrote: The Church wrote, then later selected, collected, and canonized 27 of her many writings and named them the NT.

You replied: The (Catholic) Church did no such thing. God spoke, and His people know His voice. Even in Scripture, the epistles of Peter and of Paul are cited as Scripture. Christians knew what Scripture was and needed no church to tell them.

This is from the (Protestant) Ryrie Study Bible, KJV: “The church or its councils recognized and verified certain books as the Word of God, and in time those so recognized were collected together in what we now call the Bible…The first church council to list all twenty-seven books of the New Testament was the Council of Carthage in 397.” Ryrie doesn’t say so, but the council canonized all 46 books of the Old Testament at the same time].

Actually: some of those OT books are deemed, even by the RCC, as belonging to a secondary ‘lesser’ canon–hence they are deemed ‘deutero-canonical’.

That’s not what ‘deuterocanonical’ means. The term refers to writings in both the OT and the NT that gained general acceptance later than other writings. The “deuterocanonical” books of the OT are Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus (aka Sirach), Baruch, 1 and 2 Maccabees. The “deuterocanonical” books of the NT are Hebrews, James, II Peter, II and III John, Revelation, and Mark 16:9-20. Protestants call the OT deuterocanonical books “apocryphal” (doubtful). Catholics call them Scripture. All of the “deuterocanonical” writings of both Testaments were canonized at the same time. There is no “second canon.”

“She” was not yet fully congealed into what “she” would transmogrify into, but no part of “she”, most assuredly, was yet 400 years old. “She” is not co-terminous with Christ’s Church, though I am certain you long to think otherwise.

I have 2,000 years of history to offer as evidence. You have only your opinion.

Recommended reading: The Founding of Christendom by Warren H. Carroll, a Columbia-trained historian and convert to the Catholic Church.

Now that bald assertion has been swapped for bald assertion, perhaps I can recommend to the original poster of this thread that some greater measure of time be taken to determine “why” Protestants believe so many of their unique practices are indeed rooted in Scriptural precedent, however so evermuch the Roman Catholic Church begs to differ.

Protestants believe it because they choose to. And they have “found” thousands of different answers to the same questions in the same 66-book cut version of their incomplete Bible. There was not a single Protestant in sight for the first 16 centuries of Christianity. (Well, there were the 12th century Cathars and Waldensians, the 13th century Flagellanti, the 14th century John Wyclif and John Hus . . .)

When the Catholic Church named the canon of the NT, one of the citerions was that a writing had to conform to her teaching. The Church’s own teaching was the standard of orthodoxy – not the writings themselves. Any writing that didn’t meet this test was rejected. So any scriptural interpretation that does not conform to the teaching of the Catholic Church is a misinterpretation.

Peace be with you,

JMJ Jay

 

[Anne]

eleusis:

Does anyone have a magic list of Protestant beliefs or practices and of them are any considered binding on the faithful, which are not found in scripture such as:
Solo Fide
Solo Scriptura
and Altar Calls

s there is no way baptism isMy BAPTIST buddy at work say required for salvation. He said he thinks this because the thief who was with Christ went to heaven that same day.

But anyway a list of this kind of stuff would help me in a discussion I am working on .
Thanks much

How could the thief go to heaven that same day when heaven was NOT as of yet opened? I believe we Catholics do not view paradise as heaven.

 

[Catholic4aReasn]

flameburns623:

As respects ‘proof texting’: it is nothing more than the citation of a representative passage from the text, to illustrate or demonstrate a point being made from Scripture, or to establish what the Scriptures say. QUOTE]

Hi flameburns623!

Nah. Prooftexting is using texts which include the word to which you are referring in the hopes that the sheer numbers of verses will appear to prove your point when the content does not.

Recently, I was in an e-mail conversation with someone about “faith alone”. His method of “proving” from scripture that the bible “clearly” teaches faith alone was a classic case of proof texting.

He apparently went to one of those bible search sites and did a search on the word “faith”. He posted every verse from the NT that had the word “faith” in it, to which he triumphantly added “Need I say more”? The fact that none of the verses said anything about faith alone or that only a handful of them even dealt with salvation at all didn’t seem to bother him in the least. In his mind he’d “won” simply by producing verses with the word “faith” in it.

That’s prooftexting.

In Christ,
Nancy

 

[Shibboleth]

Katholikos:

Shibboleth,

Sola Fide was Luther’s doctrine, revealed to him in the 16th century by the Holy Spirit (so he thought) while he was on the privy. (See my earlier post for documentation.)

Representatives of 61.7 million of the world’s 64.5 million Lutherans (94.3%) in the Lutheran World Federation signed the Lutheran-Catholic Joint Declaration on Justification in 1999. The salient part of the agreement reads: “Together we confess: By grace alone, in faith in Christ’s saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works.”

The LWF essentially came to a Catholic POV on this issue of Justification. Sola Fide had its origin in Luther’s now five-centuries-old misunderstanding of Catholic doctrine.

I take it that your particular Lutheran group was not a signer?

Good article here: firstthings.com/ftissues/ft9912/articles/dulles.html

Peace be with you,

JMJ Jay

No I am ELCA. The LC-MS was not a signer. Actually we look at the Joint Doctrine of Justification from the other end. Of course you have probably heard a few Lutherans say that Vatican II should be renamed “Luther was Right.”

I do not personally feel this way. I believe that Luther got some things wrong and the Catholic Church also had and has some things incorrect.

The joint doctrine of justification is such that one side can say that it supports their view, and the other can claim the same. Why? Because the same words mean different things to each side. When I read through the Joint Doctrine of Justification I do not see anything that contradicts with Luther’s teachings.

In reference to your quote from the JDJ I am guessing that you are not talking about Sola Gracia because both sides have always held to that tenant. I assume you are referring to this line.

who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works

This does not contradict Luther in any way; in fact it supports what he said. Luther said that faith being the active and living thing that it is drives us to do good works as a gift of God’s Grace. We are not justified or in any way earn our way into heaven based off of those works. Even our greatest works are but filthy rags to God.

Of course God calls us to do good works and guides us with the Holy Spirit. If one denies every aspect of this then one most likely has denied God which is a lack of faith and subject to damnation.

 

[Uncle_Abee]

Which church is the right church and whose following scripture and whose not has been questioned for a long time. We all point fingers at each other (Protestants and Catholics) while being guilty of the crime ourselves.

Protestants break scripture by “branding” their own churches. Christ only started one church. He didn’t give it a name. He plead for unity among His followers in John 17:21. The first Protestant that “branded” or “labeled” what he thought Christ wanted him to do sinned in the process. We can only spread what is in existence. We have no authority from the scriptures to go around creating and naming our own churches. This makes all Protestant churches (Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Holiness, Lutheran, etc.) illegal according to scripture. Christ didn’t start any of them. Denominations isolate Christians into groups. These groups believe different things and separate believers one from another. This very idea violates Jesus’ plea for unity among His believers.

Roman Catholics do understand the concept of the “one” church. Protestants don’t understand this. Protestants think you can “go to the church of your choice.” This idea is unscriptural. Christ started one church. Therefore you have no choices. Roman Catholics err because they created a brand (Roman Catholic) and then said this brand that they created is the “one” brand. No place in scripture can you find a “Roman Catholic” church. You can’t find the word “Pope” or any evidence of Peter being appointed the head of the church. The scriptural example of congregations is that they were all independant with their own leaders. The RC’s think that to be in the one church you have to be in a church that pertains to some specific lineage. This is better called “Apostolic Succession” by the RC’s. This idea is unscriptural as well. Paul says in 1st Timothy 1:4 -

Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies

, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: [so do]. He also said in Titus 3:9 -

But avoid

foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain. Apostolic succession is a genealogy argument. You’re tracing by lineage your way back to Christ. This is not the way the bible says you get in to Christ. What the RC’s fail to realize that all you need to do to become a part of Christ’s church is to keep His commandments. If you follow Christ’s teachings you will end up in Christ’s church. It doesn’t matter what your lineage is. Christ says in John 14:21 -

He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.

No place in the bible does Christ say that some lineage requirement has to be kept to put one in the “one” church. No apostle says it either. Instead Christ says keep my commands and I will show myself to you and become a part of you and you a part of me.

 

[Uncle_Abee]

Someone also talked about “altars.” The idea behind the altar is scriptural. The use of the altar is unscriptural.

The idea comes from two places. One is the OT. The Israelites used the altar as a place to sacrifice animals for the atonement of their sins. They placed their sins on the animal. They then discarded the carcass of the animal outside the camp. In a sense they “left their sins at the altar.” This is what happens during the altar call. One comes down and confesses his sins to God. When you go back to your seat that sin is no longer with you. The other place is Matthew 11:28-30. Christ is making an invitation for folks to come and become a part of Him. This same invitation is made during the altar call.

Using an altar during this process is unscriptural. In Leviticus God told the Israelites the specific purpose for the altar. God had them to build it and specifically told them what its use was. It was to sacrifice animals for the atonement of sin. We no longer sacrifice animals for sin. Christ is our atonement for sins. Hebrews 10:4 says -

For [it is] not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins.

No longer do we sacrifice animals. Therefore the altar serves no purpose in NT worship. The altar’s specific God-given purpose was to lay animals on and kill them for the atonement of sins. Once Christ was sacrificed for our sins the altar lost its purpose and part in God’s church.

The process is not unscriptural but using an altar in this process is.

 

[Shibboleth]

Of course you know this because I am sure as you present your opinions that you have been told, “You are using language far to literally and ignoring connotation.”

The alter spoken of in Old Testament is different that the alter used today. The use of the alter is actually what creates its definition. I suppose you could insert that which is implied and state ‘sacrificial alter’ in such instances vs. the alter of worship as used by the Church.

What do I mean by this… well I suppose one could consider whatever Jesus placed the bread and wine on in the last supper as equivalent to the alter of today.

I guess all that needs to be realized is that OT alter does not equal NT alter. Alas, the Bible is not an end of what can be said and done but a reference. There is nothing in the Bible prohibiting the use of the Alter as it stands today. Adaphoria

 

[Fiat]

Dear Uncle Abee:

Very interesting arguments! I’m interested in hearing what you think the universal church is. What was the church the Jesus founded, exactly, and how does one become a part of it?

(I realize that we are perhaps drifting a little bit from the purpose of this thread, so perhaps you could start another thread called “universal church” or something.")

Your brother,
Fiat

 

[Katholikos]

Part 1 of 2
Reply to Shibboleth

Shibboleth:

No I am ELCA. The LC-MS was not a signer. Actually we look at the Joint Doctrine of Justification from the other end. Of course you have probably heard a few Lutherans say that Vatican II should be renamed “Luther was Right.”

That’s odd. There was nothing new in VII. It taught the same doctrines as Vatican I, Trent, Florence, and all other councils before it. The Church’s doctrines are all contained in the Depositum Fides (Deposit of Faith) left to her by the Apostles. Unlike Luther, the Church cannot invent new doctrines. Catholicism views the truth of the gospel as “deposited” once-for-all (Jude 3), in the Church, and all that comes forth in the centuries following is essentially a clarification or development but never a deviation from that original, God-given Truth.

Nicea in 325 was affirmation of what the Church had always believed, but the Council of Nicea defined the Trinity within a narrow framework, in response to the Arian heresy, so that there could be no ambiguity of belief possible for an orthodox Christian. But it was not a new doctrine.

I do not personally feel this way. I believe that Luther got some things wrong and the Catholic Church also had and has some things incorrect.

Since you believe in private interpretation of Scritures (it’s a part of Sola Scriptura), that’s not surprising. You are your own Pope. No offense intended; it’s just a statement of fact. You (and every other Protestant) are the authority on “correctess.” (I used to be Pope, too .)

The joint doctrine of justification is such that one side can say that it supports their view, and the other can claim the same. Why? Because the same words mean different things to each side.

Then the document is not an “Accord” – it’s utterly meaningless. I don’t think the parties to the Accord would agree with you.

When I read through the Joint Doctrine of Justification I do not see anything that contradicts with Luther’s teachings

Okay . . . I can’t argue against your perception.

In reference to your quote from the JDJ I am guessing that you are not talking about Sola Gracia because both sides have always held to that tenant.

I’m not sure we would define “grace” in the same way. But this was certainly minor in comparison to “Sola Scriptura” and “Sola Fide.”

I assume you are referring to this line.

No, I had in mind: “By grace alone . . .” Luther’s teaching was “By faith alone . . .,” Sola Fide.

Continued

 

[Katholikos]

Part 2 of 2
Reply to Shibboleth

This does not contradict Luther in any way; in fact it supports what he said. Luther said that faith being the active and living thing that it is drives us to do good works as a gift of God’s Grace. We are not justified or in any way earn our way into heaven based off of those works.

We cannot “work” our way into heaven. Salvation is a free gift. But see Matthew 25:31-46. There’s nary a word about faith. The words “***faith alone” ***occur in the NT only once. James 2:24: “You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.” So Luther declared that James was “flatly against the rest of Scripture in ascribing justification to works . . . therefore I cannot include him among the chief books [of Scripture] . . .”

Even our greatest works are but filthy rags to God

Scripture citation, please? I don’t think so.

Matthew 5:16; Colossians 1:10; Acts 9:36; 1 Timothy 3:16-17; Hebrews 10:24; James 2:14-26.

Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world" James 1:27. No wonder Luther rejected James as Scripture. It is the very antithesis of Sola Fide.

Of course God calls us to do good works and guides us with the Holy Spirit. If one denies every aspect of this then one most likely has denied God which is a lack of faith and subject to damnation.

God calls us to do good works, but considers them filthy rags?

The "works’ of an unredeemed man will not get him into heaven, but, “God is not unjust; he will not forget your good work and the love you have shown him as you have helped his people and continue to help them” Hebrews 6:10.

JMJ Jay

 

[Katholikos]

Uncle Abee wrote:

Therefore the altar serves no purpose in NT worship

The ancient Catholic and Orthodox Churches have altars of sacrifice where Jesus the Chirst, the unblemished Lamb of God, whose once-for-all sacrifice of Himself transcends time and space, is perpetually re-presented and applied to the souls of the faithful. We have literally been kneeling at the foot of the cross at Calvary for 21 centuries.

Protestantism, which has been been around for only 487years, doesn’t get it.

JMJ Jay

 

[Shibboleth]

Katholikos:

Part 2 of 2
Reply to Shibboleth

Scripture citation, please? I don’t think so.

It is said in Isaiah because of our fallen and unclean nature.

Isaiah 64:5 - 6

5
You meet him who rejoices in (8) doing righteousness,
Who remembers You in Your ways.
Behold, You were angry, for we sinned,
We continued in them a long time;
And shall we be saved?

6 . But we are all as an unclean [thing], and all our righteousnesses [are] as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.

 

[Katholikos]

Uncle Albee wrote:

Give a bible answer for a bible question.

May we know how you define “the Bible”?

JMJ Jay