Looking at your book, some of your basic premises are false, in my opinion, based on Scripture. First of all, you are using a man-generated, man-centered approach to interpreting the gospel message. You mention the science of complexity theory, which is primarily based on mathematics & probability theory--what would mathematically be the most probable solution.
I Cor 2:4,14 And my speech & my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit & of power. And this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words.
That is antithetical to understanding the Bible. The Bible cannot be understood apart from receiving revelation from the Lord & being guided by the Holy Spirit into all the truth. It is the Holy Spirit that brings to our remembrance what Christ has taught & opens our minds to understand the Scriptures.
Luke 24:25-27 Then Jesus said to them, “O foolish ones, how slow are your hearts to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary for the Christ to suffer these things & then to enter His glory?” And beginning with Moses & all the Prophets, He explained to them what was written in all the Scriptures about Himself.
Luke 24:44-49 Jesus said to them, “These are the words I spoke to you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about Me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets & the Psalms.” Then He OPENED THEIR MINDS TO UNDERSTAND THE SCRIPTURE.
And He told them, “This is what is written: The Christ will suffer & rise from the dead on the third day & in His name repentance & forgiveness of sins will be proclaimed to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.
And behold, I am sending the promise of My Father on you. But remain in the city until you've been clothed with power from on high.”
Even a new believer in the Lord Jesus Christ can understand this simple gospel message & be able to be a witness to it. I know. I was one many years ago & was able to share this simple gospel message right away.
Have you not read the early church fathers & their teaching on the prophesies from the OT? You realize, I'm sure, that the gospel message preached by the apostles came from the OT as they did not have the NT yet, except for the doctrine of Christ & what He taught.
Third, you ASSUME that most Christians don't agree. That is a serious error. The basic message & understanding of the gospel is fully understood across Christiandom. The basic creeds are agreed upon 99% by every major branch of Christiandom (filoque being one exception or the very end of the Athanasian Creed).
This is the error you have made. The gospel message hasn't changed for 2000 years. It was hammered out due to the prolific amount of heretical teaching that sought to distort the gospel. That is the main butterfly effect: heretical false teaching that results in chaos of the one true gospel message & leads people astray.
Where disagreement comes in is usually in some minor issues like speaking in tongues or whether one can have assurance of salvation or not or the timing of Christ's return to earth (pre- post- trib, etc.) Those don't affect the basic gospel message.
I have been involved with many denominations over 40 years of being a spiritually born again follower of the Lord Jesus Christ & have not found a difference in understanding of the basic gospel--except for one thing--those who deviate from this message, the butterfly effect--are cults & false, heretical Christian systems.
The Apostle Peter gives a primary reason why people may have errors in interpreting the Bible, especially with difficult passages.
2 Pet 3:15-18 Consider also that our Lord’s patience brings salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom God gave him. He writes this way in all his letters, speaking in them about such matters. Some parts of his letters are hard to understand, WHICH IGNORANT & UNSTABLE PEOPLE DISTORT, as they do to the rest of the Scriptures, to their own destruction.
Therefore, beloved, since you ALREADY KNOW THESE THINGS, be on your guard so that you will not be CARRIED AWAY BY THE ERROR OF THE LAWLESS & fall from your secure standing. But grow in the grace & knowledge of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory both now & to the day of eternity. Amen.
One of the major issues of errors in Bible interpretation is not distinguishing between those who need milk & those who are tested & mature & can eat meat. Those who are infants & need milk are ignorant & unstable, just like an infant trying to learn how to walk.
I Cor 3:1-9 Brothers, I could not address you AS SPIRITUAL, but as worldly—as INFANTS IN CHRIST. I gave you MILK, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for solid food. In fact, you are still not ready, for you are still worldly. For since there is jealousy & dissension among you, are you not worldly? Are you not walking in the way of man? For when one of you says, “I follow Paul” & another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere men?
What then is Apollos? And what is Paul? They are servants through whom you believed, as the Lord has assigned to each his role. I planted the seed & Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. He who plants & he who waters are one in purpose & each will be rewarded according to his own labor. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building.
Infants in Christ often walk in the flesh & are carnal, demanding & selfish like little children. That is why Christ has gifted people of the five fold ministry to help the body of Christ be mature & not tossed about by every wind of doctrine. God has given elders/overseer/presbyters & deacons to serve in giving oversight & shepherding & feeding the flock.
I Tim 3:6-10 He must NOT be a recent convert, or he may become conceited & fall under the same condemnation as the devil. Furthermore, he must have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace & into the snare of the devil.
Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued or given to much wine or greedy for money. They must hold to the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. Additionally, THEY MUST FIRST BE TESTED. Then, if they are ABOVE REPROACH, let them serve as deacons.
Heb 5:11-14 We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain, because you are DULL OF HEARING. Although by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to reteach you the BASIC PRINCIPLES OF GOD'S WORD. You need MILK NOT SOLID FOOD! For everyone who lives on milk is STILL AN INFANT, INEXPERIENCED in the message of righteousness. But solid food is for THE MATURE who by constant use have trained their senses to distinguish good from evil.
The basic principles of God's Word are then outlined in Heb 6:1-3. These are some of the basic tenets found in the Creeds. Another essential list is found in Ephesians 4:1-6.
Eph 4:11-16 And 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 equip the saints for works of ministry, to build up the body of Christ, until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God, as we MATURE to the full measure of the stature of Christ.
THEN WE WILL NO LONGER BE INFANTS, tossed about by the waves and CARRIED AROUND BY EVERY WIND OF DOCTRINE & by the clever cunning of men in their DECEITFUL SCHEMING. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into Christ Himself, who is the head. From Him the whole body is fitted & held together by every supporting ligament & as each individual part does its work, the body grows and builds itself up in love.
God has given safeguards.
Thus the Bible is NOT identified as a chaos system. The Bible is identified by God as His 'breathed out' Scripture, His direct revelation to mankind, which is the truth. People by the billions have come to know Christ as their personal Lord & Savior & had no problem understanding the gospel message as brought about by God granting people repentance that leads to the acknowledging of the gospel truth & in faith turning to Christ to be saved & to follow Him as His disciple.
The problem of the butterfly effect, as you call it, is primarily heretical teaching, not basic Christian doctrine that has been affirmed for almost two millenia.
The illustration of the ant is a matter of eisogetic study not exegetical study. First, the ant (there are over 20,000 varieties of ants in the world) receives its designed functions from God. Just as birds & other creatures migrate & some mammals hibernate, God has uniquely designed them to function that way. It is not by change that they do what they do.
Some ant species have older ants teach younger ants how to gather food.
Second, the verse you quote has to do with teaching about slothfulness. The ant is given as an illustration to not be lazy but to work the crop & to harvest it at the time that it is ready to be harvested or its too late & the crop is lost.
And that is basic Bible study principles of context & what the Scripture actually says. Most of the time it isn't hard to understand because the Lord makes most of the Bible understandable for those who have spiritual discernment by the Holy Spirit.
The problem comes in making errors because of what you are doing: eisogetical study (taking a premise from outside Scripture & re-defining how to study it apart from how God revealed how to do it) that takes something outside of Scripture, then goes to try & find correlation & connection from isolating verses out of context like I showed above & using humanistic philosophy & mathematical analysis to arrive at your conclusions.
That is dangerous ground to be on.
Here is a prime example of how dangerous this theory is: "the gospel CANNOT BE UNDERSTOOD from INDIVIDUAL SCRIPTURE."
Of course it can & should be. One simple example is I Cor 15:1-5.
Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received & in which you stand firm. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that He was buried, that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures & that He appeared to Cephas & then to the Twelve.
What is of first importance that Paul Himself received, that his readers & we are to understand concerning the gospel preached & the gospel received & the gospel firmly held onto? If one doesn't hold this simple truth, one can believe in vain.
Not hard to understand. Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, Christ was buried. Christ was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures. Christ appeared to others verifying His resurrection & were eye witnesses of it.
The simple gospel people receive & believe in & hold onto firmly is just what is said in that individual Scripture. Paul received it as of first importance. Who did he receive his gospel message from that he preached? He received it from Jesus Christ Himself.
I quoted Jesus in Luke 24 as to what He said was the gospel to be preached to the whole world. ("These are the words I spoke to you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is WRITTEN about Me IN the Law of Moses, the Prophets & the Psalms.” Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures.This is what is written: The Christ will suffer & rise from the dead on the third day & in His name repentance & forgiveness of sins will be proclaimed to all nations, beginning in Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things.")
Looks like indeed that is what Paul received from Christ as well as the other Apostles.
The Creeds say the same thing: 'suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died & was buried...On the third day He arose again from the dead.
All according to the Scriptures, from Moses forward. This is what the prophets preached. This is what Jesus preached. This is what all the apostles preached. This is what the church of Jesus Christ has preached for 2000 millenia. This is what the church around the world preaches today still.
Same gospel message to be received & believed in & held onto firmly. What is the church's firm foundation? Jesus Christ, as the cornerstone & the prophets & the apostles.
Not hard to figure out. Even a four year old can figure it out & that is verifiable too. Not complex. Not chaos. Not in error. Simple Scripture.
You should try it & not abandon it. You should abandon your man-made & scientific mathematics to try & explain REVELATION. That is what it is: God's truth revealed to us by the illumination of the power of the Holy Spirit. The gospel is SPIRITUALLY DISCERNED & not from persuasive word's of man's wisdom.
The gospel message is simple that most common people can understand as the Holy Spirit reveals it to their hearts & minds.
You are the one that is complicating it & making it complex & chaotic. This persuasion does not come from above.
Matt 11:25 At that time Jesus answering said, 'I do confess to Thee, Father, Lord of the heavens & of the earth, that thou didst hide these things from wise & understanding ones & did reveal them to babes.
Acts 4:10-13 Let this be known to all of you & to all the people of Israel: It is by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom you crucified but whom God raised from the dead, that this man stands before you healed. He is ‘the stone you builders rejected, which has become the cornerstone.’
Salvation exists in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved.” When they saw the boldness of Peter & John & realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they marveled & took note that these men had been with Jesus.
They turned the world upside down.
Unschooled, ordinary fishermen, preaching the simple gospel message learned from Christ--before the highly educated, that put Christ to death--who rejected this simple gospel message.
That is what it has been, for the most part, all down through history.
I Cor 1:18-21,26-28 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written: “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise; the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.”
Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not know Him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.
Brothers, consider the time of your calling: Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were powerful; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly & despised things of the world & the things that are not, to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast in His presence.
I Cor 2:13-16 And this is what we speak, not in words taught us by human wisdom, but in words taught by the Spirit, expressing spiritual truths in spiritual words. The natural man does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God. For they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man judges all things, but he himself is not subject to anyone’s judgment. “For who has known the mind of the Lord, so as to instruct Him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
I am an ordinary man & I will firmly hold onto the simple gospel message that was preached to me, that I received & that changed my life. I am a witness of what Christ taught, the prophets taught, the apostles taught. It is all according to the Scriptures.
It is the same message I have heard repeated in various Baptist sects, in various reformed churches, in the Brethren, in various Lutheran sects, in the Catholic church, in the Coptic church, in the Orthodox sects, in independent churches, in nondenominational home church fellowships.
It hasn't changed. The fundamental simple truths remain the same & continue to change lives all over the world today.
An uneducated native man was sitting under a tree reading the Bible. A sociologist studying this tribe saw it & said that the book he was reading was myth & fairy tale. The man looked up & said that if it wasn't for this supposed fairy tale that had transformed his life, he would have killed & eaten this man as his former way of life.
Thanks for making your book available for these three days. I hope you can see my points. I could go into much more detail but hope you see the truth in what I say. May the Lord give you understanding in the knowledge & grace that is found in Christ Jesus.
This saying comes from an otherwise undistinguished German Lutheran theologian of the early seventeenth century, Rupertus Meldenius. The phrase occurs in a tract on Christian unity written (circa 1627) during the Thirty Years War (1618–1648), a bloody time in European history in which religious tensions played a significant role. The saying has found great favor among subsequent writers such as Richard Baxter & has since been adopted as a motto by the Moravian Church of North America & the Evangelical Presbyterian Church. Might it serve us well as a motto for every church & for every denomination today?
“In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity.”
I think I have seen how ones can tend to honor the scholars who are saying what they already believe in.
