Snake-handling and Sola Scriptura

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JustaServant said:
The fundamentalists I hung around in those days believed there was “power” in quoting Scripture. “Scripture never goes away void” they would say. Almost as if there was a kind of magic in it.
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I certainly believe that faith comes by hearing, as scripture said, but there’s a necessity for a teaching presence. A joke I heard years ago goes something like this:

A man lived everyday of his life based on a Bible verse. Each morning he would grab his Bible, close his eyes, open the book randomly and point to a verse. That was the verse he would live by that day.
One morning, in his usual routine, he happened to point to the verse, “And Judas went out an hanged himself”. Confused as to how to live out this verse, he determined he was not concentrating, closed his bible and repeated the process, the resulting verse being, “Go thou and do likewise.”

Jon
 
JustaServant said:
Catholics can use Scripture as well:

I. Scripture Alone Disproves “Scripture Alone”
Gen. to Rev. - Scripture never says that Scripture is the sole infallible authority for God’s Word. Scripture also mandates the use of tradition. This fact alone disproves sola Scriptura.
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First of all, this is a straw man as sola scriptura doesn’t mean that scripture is the sole authority, but the highest authority over all other authorities.
Matt. 28:19; Mark 16:15 - those that preached the Gospel to all creation but did not write the Gospel were not less obedient to Jesus, or their teachings less important.
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How does that disprove sola scriptura?
Matt. 28:20 - “observe ALL I have commanded,” but, as we see in John 20:30; 21:25, not ALL Jesus taught is in Scripture. So there must be things outside of Scripture that we must observe. This disproves “Bible alone” theology.
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But we’re not talking about “Bible alone theology”, we’re talking about sola scriptura.
Mark 16:15 - Jesus commands the apostles to “preach,” not write, and only three apostles wrote. The others who did not write were not less faithful to Jesus, because Jesus gave them no directive to write. There is no evidence in the Bible or elsewhere that Jesus intended the Bible to be sole authority of the Christian faith.
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What does this have to do with sola scriptura?
Luke 1:1-4 - Luke acknowledges that the faithful have already received the teachings of Christ, and is writing his Gospel only so that they “realize the certainty of the teachings you have received.” Luke writes to verify the oral tradition they already received.
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So what does that have to do with sola scriptura?
John 20:30; 21:25 - Jesus did many other things not written in the Scriptures. These have been preserved through the oral apostolic tradition and they are equally a part of the Deposit of Faith.
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What does this have to do with sola scriptura? Sola scriptura doesn’t claim that everything Jesus did was recorded in scripture.
Acts 8:30-31; Heb. 5:12 - these verses show that we need help in interpreting the Scriptures. We cannot interpret them infallibly on our own. We need divinely appointed leadership within the Church to teach us.
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OK. So how does that disprove sola scriptura?
Acts 15:1-14 – Peter resolves the Church’s first doctrinal issue regarding circumcision without referring to Scriptures.
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Actually, the very first thing he doesin verse 1 is to refer to the law of Moses.
Acts 17:28 – Paul quotes the writings of the pagan poets when he taught at the Aeropagus. Thus, Paul appeals to sources outside of Scripture to teach about God.
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But that doesn’t negate sola scriptura. Sola scriptura never says you can’t use outside sources to illustrate a point. For that matter, it never said you can’t use outside sources. Remember, scripture isn’t our only source. We also have creeds, confessions, catechisms, the authority of the Church, etc.
1 Cor. 5:9-11 - this verse shows that a prior letter written to Corinth is equally authoritative but not part of the New Testament canon. Paul is again appealing to a source outside of Scripture to teach the Corinthians. This disproves Scripture alone.
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Sola scriptura doesn’t preclude other writings.
1 Cor. 11:2 - Paul commends the faithful to obey apostolic tradition, and not Scripture alone.
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No it doesn’t. It says: 1 Cor 11:2 says “Now I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I delivered them to you”.
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Phil. 4:9 - Paul says that what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, do. There is nothing ever about obeying Scripture alone.
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That’s right. There’s not. But as sola scriptura doesn’t teach that we’re to obey scripture alone, your point is moot.
Col. 4:16 - this verse shows that a prior letter written to Laodicea is equally authoritative but not part of the New Testament canon. Paul once again appeals to a source outside of the Bible to teach about the Word of God.
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Again, we sola scriptura doesn’t mean that one can’t use a source outside of the Bible to illustrate a point.

Anyway, since your argument is pretty much the same for every verse, I’m not going to bother responding to each straw man individually.

The bottom line is that sola scriptura doesn’t mean that we can’t use other sources. If it did, we could not have creeds, confessions, catechisms, the pastors, preachers, teachers, etc, given to us by God, or the authority of the Church and yet, these things are not only instructed in scripture, but are a crucial part of the Church.

Once again, sola scriptura only means tht of all of the authorities available to us, scripture is the highest and is the standard by which we judge all other authorities.
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JonNC said:
I certainly believe that faith comes by hearing, as scripture said, but there’s a necessity for a teaching presence. A joke I heard years ago goes something like this:

A man lived everyday of his life based on a Bible verse. Each morning he would grab his Bible, close his eyes, open the book randomly and point to a verse. That was the verse he would live by that day.
One morning, in his usual routine, he happened to point to the verse, “And Judas went out an hanged himself”. Confused as to how to live out this verse, he determined he was not concentrating, closed his bible and repeated the process, the resulting verse being, “Go thou and do likewise.”

Jon
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I thought the story started with Job 2:9 “curse God and die”. 😉
Real danger in using the Bible as a crystal ball. :eek:
 
Chuck_Finley said:
First of all, this is a straw man as sola scriptura doesn’t mean that scripture is the sole authority, but the highest authority over all other authorities.

Once again, sola scriptura only means tht of all of the authorities available to us, scripture is the highest and is the standard by which we judge all other authorities.
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And what are the “other authorities”?
 
JustaServant said:
And that authority comes from…?
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From God, as revealed in scripture.

Kind of odd that somebody who’s religion is constantly talking about its church’s authority doesn’t know where the Church’s authority comes from isn’t it?
 
Chuck_Finley said:
The bottom line is that sola scriptura doesn’t mean that we can’t use other sources. If it did, we could not have creeds, confessions, catechisms, the pastors, preachers, teachers, etc, given to us by God, or the authority of the Church and yet, these things are not only instructed in scripture, but are a crucial part of the Church.

Once again, sola scriptura only means tht of all of the authorities available to us, scripture is the highest and is the standard by which we judge all other authorities.
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But sola scriptura does mean that you do not need any other source. At Least by Luther.
 
Andre1000 said:
But sola scriptura does mean that you do not need any other source. At Least by Luther.
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While I am grateful to have Catholics tell us what we believe (while then insisting that we have no idea what they believe), you’re incorrect. If we didn’t believe in any other sources, we would not have creeds, confessions, catechisms, officers of the Church, Church authority, etc.
 
Two questions you haven’t answered yet:

How do they know that authority comes from God?

What Church or ecclestical community do you belong to?
 
JustaServant said:
So your argument is circular.
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No, an example of circular would be “The Catholic Church is infallible because Catholic tradition teaches that the Catholic Church is infallible”.

What I’m saying is that the Bible states that there are rules for the Church and one of those rules is that the Church has authority, that one of the ways this authority is expressed is through the creation of creeds, confessions, and catechisms, and that officers are given to the Church.
 
I would have thought you’d have gotten the message that I’m not going to answer that by now.
 
JustaServant said:
Why?
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For a couple of reasons. The first is that it’s not important. We’re discussing sola scriptura, not my denomination.

The second is that, based on previous interaction with Catholics, I believe you’ll use it to try to pit me against other denominations.

I’m a Protestant, Reformed Christian. That’s all you need to know and all I’m going to say.
The fact you won’t undercuts your intellectual integrity as you know our position but we do not know yours which you keep deliberately hidden.
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That you don’t know something has nothing to do with my integrity.

Except that we’re not debating my religious background. We’re talking about sola scriptura.
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justaservant:
You just refuted your own position on Sola Scriptura.
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How so?
 
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