Can you be a Christian and reject certain parts of the Bible?

[SkyWriting]

How one wants to treat all people as you suggest is OFTEN contrary to the thinking of the Father.

Let me cover what scripture requires of us to consider:

Matthew 7:12
“So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

Luke 6:31
And as you wish that others would do to you, do so to them.

Galatians 5:14
For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

James 2:8
If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well.

Mark 12:31
The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”

1 Peter 3:9
Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing.

James 1:19-20
Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God.

Matthew 7:1-5
“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.

Matthew 5:43-48
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.

 

[SkyWriting]

Sometimes it's not about what a person wants. Often, there's a factor of authority to figure in. If a supervisor at your job tells you to do something, it doesn't always apply to himself as well. He's an authority figure over you. Same with Paul, who was an authority figure over the church he was writing to.

Some of "Paul's writings" were likely not written by him and are in error.
And no, Paul had no authority outside of knowledge.

Mark 9:35
And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.

John 15:13
Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

Leviticus 19:18
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.

Romans 13:9
For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word:
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

1 Peter 3:10
For “Whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit;

Colossians 3:12-14 ... And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

Ephesians 4:31-32
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Romans 13:8-10
Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word:
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

 

[SkyWriting]

Even in America, the woman's place used to be in the home raising the children, while the man's place was in the workplace providing for his family.

Only on TV.

 

[Theo Book]

Can you be a Christian and only believe some parts of the Bible? For example, can you reject a global Noah's Flood, a six-day creation, a literal exodus, etc.? Could you reject other parts as well, like Christ walking on water? Discuss.

If I had just learned there is someone known as God, superior in every way to Man, and interested in giving me gifts and salvation, why would I even consider dismissing a letter from His hand?

 

[Aldebaran]

Some of "Paul's writings" were likely not written by him and are in error.
And no, Paul had no authority outside of knowledge.

Mark 9:35
And he sat down and called the twelve. And he said to them, “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.

John 15:13
Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.

Leviticus 19:18
You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.

Romans 13:9
For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word:
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

1 Peter 3:10
For “Whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit;

Colossians 3:12-14 ... And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

Ephesians 4:31-32
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Romans 13:8-10
Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,” and any other commandment, are summed up in this word:
“You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Among all those verses you just quoted, show me how Paul violated or contradicted any of them.

 

[HighwayMan]

Wrong. If the bible is fallible, then I can not trust it to be truth. If it is fallible then I can not trust the accounts in it. Meaning, I can not trust that Messiah was born of a virgin. Nor can I trust that Messiah was raised from the dead. Nor can I trust his appearances to the 500 or the Apostles account that he ascended into heaven.

That's a strange position to take. By "trust," do you mean faith? At the end, all we have is faith. And faith in one thing, like Jesus rising from the dead, does not necessitate that other interpretations of the written Bible are correct. But I have heard plenty of creationists ask how can they trust the whole Jesus account, if the Earth is indeed billions years old and dinosaurs existed before humankind. Trusting in Jesus should not necessitate the denial of very hard scientific evidence on other topics.

 

[Aseyesee]

Dont

Can you be a Christian and only believe some parts of the Bible? For example, can you reject a global Noah's Flood, a six-day creation, a literal exodus, etc.? Could you reject other parts as well, like Christ walking on water? Discuss.

Don't see why not, Christians believe in a God that there is no, hey look there he is kind of way.

 

[Greg Merrill]

Can you be a Christian and only believe some parts of the Bible? For example, can you reject a global Noah's Flood, a six-day creation, a literal exodus, etc.? Could you reject other parts as well, like Christ walking on water? Discuss.

Absolutely, you can be a Christian, you are just a Christian that is wrong in not believing these things.

 

[BukiRob]

That's a strange position to take. By "trust," do you mean faith? At the end, all we have is faith. And faith in one thing, like Jesus rising from the dead, does not necessitate that other interpretations of the written Bible are correct. But I have heard plenty of creationists ask how can they trust the whole Jesus account, if the Earth is indeed billions years old and dinosaurs existed before humankind. Trusting in Jesus should not necessitate the denial of very hard scientific evidence on other topics.

So faith comes from hearing and hearing by the word [a]of Christ.

a. concerning Messiah

I have also learned over many years walking with Messiah many people have only the Peshat (פְּשָׁט) — “plain” (simple) or the direct meaning. The literal principal. Grammatical-historical sense.

Proverbs tells us that a word well spoken is like golden apples in a bowl of silver.

The Peshat understanding is simple and obvious but there are deeper meanings in that proverb.

Remez (רֶמֶז) — “hints” or the deep (allegoric: hidden or symbolic) meaning beyond just the literal sense.

The symbolic meaning here is also somewhat apparent. Golden apples are more valuable than the silver bowl as gold is more precious than silver. Furthermore, the Silver bowl hides the golden apples and it is only when you are directly in front of the bowl that you can see the hidden apples within the bowl.

Derash (דְּרַשׁ) — from Hebrew darash: “inquire” (seek) — the comparative (midrashic) meaning, as given through similar occurrences.

It is only when we actively SEEK the bowl that we can even see the comparative meaning that is, the comparative meaning can only be seen when we seek earnestly for it.

Sod (סוֹד) (pronounced with a long o as in ‘bone’) — “secret” (mystery) or the mystical meaning, as given through inspiration or revelation.

As the apple is fruit that is good for sustaining it is to be sought over the silver bowl which is materialistic. The silver bowl is formed by a man and is inferior to the creative work of G-d which is evidenced in the apple which is continually brought forth year after year as fruit. The fruit of G-d (himself revealed through the word) is far more valued than the greatest works of man.

 

[S.O.J.I.A.]

That's true if your faith in in a book rather than in God. Trust only in Jesus Christ, not any translation of any book. Trust only in Christ.

If one has no knowledge of Christ except for the Bible, my suggestion for future meditation, prayer, and growth would be to develop that kind of personal relationship with Jesus, not with any book.

What did God say?

 

[Aldebaran]

Only on TV.

And in almost every home I encountered during my younger years, including my own.

 

[drjean]

Bless your hearts! There are so many strawmen in this thread you'll never find those needles for which you are searching!

You are not the first, nor will you be the last to ask this question: Can you be a Christian and reject certain parts of the Bible?

First, there are differences in the terms and meanings of "Christian" versus "born again believer". Christian definitely means a follower of Jesus, so certainly you cannot do that if you do not believe all the verses that point to Him and His work... which technically are all of them, even the Torah! Jesus IS the WORD (In the beginning was the WORD and the WORD was with God and the WORD was God!)

With that aside, these arguments were fierce long ago. In order for believer's differences to not stand in the way of fellowship, an agreement was made. Surely you have heard of and read about the Five Fundamentals of the Faith? This is why the statement was made!

It was decided ---agreed to--- that one would accept another as a "Christian" if they accepted these 5 doctrines, regardless of their other beliefs:


FIVE FUNDAMENTALS OF THE FAITH
There are five fundamentals of the faith which are essential for Christianity, and
upon which we agree:

1. The Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ
(John 1:1; John 20:28;
Hebrews 1:8-9).
2. The Virgin Birth (Isaiah
7:14; Matthew 1:23; Luke 1:27).
3. The Blood Atonement (A
cts 20:28; Romans 3:25, 5:9; Ephesians 1:7;
Hebrews 9:12-14).
4. The Bodily Resurrection (Luke 24:
36-46; 1 Corinthians
15:1-4, 15:14-15).
5. The inerrancy of the scriptures themselves (Psalms 12:6-7; Romans 15:4;
2 Timothy 3:16-17; 2 Peter 1:20).


There are other lists of say 12 tenets that some have...but basically, these 5 are musts.

One needs to fully know the "original" languages to even begin to be able to understand everything about God's Word but we will not know all until His return for us. Each translation and version (there are differences in those terms too) keeps the Spirit of His Word but are not fully accurate verbatim (others have shown this, such as the naming of the Book of James, written by Jacob?)... but each one done in earnest of serving God shows the path of salvation and then the believer, having found THE WORD (Jesus Himself is the WORD of God) can then be guided by the Spirit to all truth. Any "translation" from say the Greek to English is going to be lacking: Greek has a different word for each nuance of an emotion or description whereas English barely has two on some things! We do lose things "in the translation"!

Rather than say that you reject part of the written Word of God, may I suggest you accept that you do not fully understand it, or it's connection to God's master plan (Jesus' atonement for sinners)? It's fascinating to see how it all does connect and all the innuendoes contained (God is quite clever and deep btw)...once one does study well with knowledgeable scholars!

The main question, the one you simply must answer is, Whom do you believe is Jesus? Before you can understand anything else, you must have this correct!

"For the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God for they are foolishness to him, neither can he know them for they are spiritually discerned." First Corinthians 2:14.

 

[DennisTate]

Can you be a Christian and only believe some parts of the Bible? For example, can you reject a global Noah's Flood, a six-day creation, a literal exodus, etc.? Could you reject other parts as well, like Christ walking on water? Discuss.

Good question.....
when we are a mere babe in Christ we will obviously have lots, and lots of
wrong ideas that we need to work on over time.

 

[IAMABELIEVER1979]

Can you be a Christian and only believe some parts of the Bible? For example, can you reject a global Noah's Flood, a six-day creation, a literal exodus, etc.? Could you reject other parts as well, like Christ walking on water? Discuss.

In my opinion, which doesn't count for anything, if you believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God and you follow his ways, then you are a true Christian.

 

[SkyWriting]

And in almost every home I encountered during my younger years, including my own.

That is normal for people to clump together in the same social standing.
Likely you don't remember the single moms, or the working moms
who did not invite you over for fresh baked cookies.

Theses were the misfits and troubled kids who had no parents
around the house when they got home. They usually got into
more trouble than you, but they might still have been there in
class.....or they stayed home more to work or care for the other
kids in the family. But they were there. I remember a kid in 5th
grade with a "hit pipe" smoking weed during recess.

 

[SkyWriting]

If I had just learned there is someone known as God, superior in every way to Man, and interested in giving me gifts and salvation, why would I even consider dismissing a letter from His hand?

God is Spirit and has no hands to speak of. Jesus is known to have written in the sand
but nothing on paper. I've heard that some of "Paul's letters" were added years after his death.

In particular, the parts about the role of women. But also the singling out
of certain sins, which really only belongs in the OT.

 

[Aldebaran]

That is normal for people to clump together in the same social standing.
Likely you don't remember the single moms, or the working moms
who did not invite you over for fresh baked cookies.

Theses were the misfits and troubled kids who had no parents
around the house when they got home. They usually got into
more trouble than you, but they might still have been there in
class.....or they stayed home more to work or care for the other
kids in the family. But they were there. I remember a kid in 5th
grade with a "hit pipe" smoking weed during recess.

The conditions you describe weren't nearly as "normal" as they are now. When I spoke of my "younger years", I was referring to the 1970s.

 

[Aldebaran]

God is Spirit and has no hands to speak of. Jesus is known to have written in the sand
but nothing on paper. I've heard that some of "Paul's letters" were added years after his death.

In particular, the parts about the role of women. But also the singling out
of certain sins, which really only belongs in the OT.

Even if they were "added" years after Paul's death, it doesn't make them any less true or inspired than the fact that they were written thousands of years ago just like the rest of scripture was.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Earlier than that, long before the crucifixion and resurrection and ascension of Y'SHUA MESSIAH KING SAVIOR HEALER,
YHWH
wrote HIS WORD.

 

[yeshuaslavejeff]

Good question.....
when we are a mere babe in Christ we will obviously have lots, and lots of
wrong ideas that we need to work on over time.

Yes, just like the grown up disciples of Jesus in the New Testament,
and
the 'adults' (grown men and women) of YHWH in the TORAH and OLD TESTAMENT , PROPHETS and PSALMS.

In each and every case, YHWH and Y'SHUA showed the WAY to go, showed what to do.