By whose interpretation of "clearly established?" All reading is interpretation.
What doesn't contradict scripture.
That doesn't change the fact of syntax. Parables, as a subset of fables, are so because they meet a literary criteria that defines them.
Foxes don't eat lettuce. If Aesop were to have his Fox eat lettuce, his disciples would be confounded. He had his Fox try to get to grapes because foxes do eat them. That way, his students and we the reader won't get hung up on "foxes don't eat lettuce" and go directly to the point.
I see. I still hold to the parable being a parable and not being an actual account of life after death, but I get what you're saying.
Remember also that it was Abraham who bargained with God in chapter 18 to have increasing pity on Sodom and Gomorrah. It doesn't matter if we or God had the idea in the first place; what matters is that God uses it.
Two different scenarios. We're talking about statues, not supplication. You think God didn't already have the idea to spare Sodom should He have been able to have found x amount of righteous there?
Go ask those healed. Go asked those cured. Go asked those whose senses have been restored. Go ask those whose eyes shed copious tears and turned their lives around.
As for your last sentence that I bolded, that's nothing more than a contradiction and you very well know it. Stop being so doggedly iconoclastic and investigate for yourself the lives of those touched by God's Grace through their experience with holy statuary, iconography, relics, and other sacred items.
I didn't say they didn't have a genuine belief in God. The point I was trying to make is that emotion does not equate conversion. And quite simply that goes for everyone. I know two young ladies that came to my church and were so touched by the word that they decided to join. They sang, they jumped, they praised, they cried, etc...than shortly there after they disappeared. Every time I think of them i pray for them.
OT. Jesus happened and tore the gates of death to pieces. Not proof.
Jesus happened? At what time did Jesus not happen? He's the God of the OT, the same one that said that He doesn't change. OT/NT makes no difference to Him. Death had no hold over Elijah, the son of the widow of Zarephath, or Moses.
In the sense of eternity, there is only God, who alone has immortality since the beginning. No question.
That's not what it says.
BTW, this was a verse utilized by the Arians to provide proof of their ideas of God and Christ.
Not familiar with that situation, but as already stated, it's about the proper application of scripture. Christ is God thus the scripture applies to Him the Father and the Spirit.
Living in the sense of complete. Again, the Jews and Early Christians disagree with your interpretation here.
Again that's not what the scripture says. And only some disagree, and quite frankly it doesn't matter because they're not disagreeing with me, they're disagreeing with scripture. Man became a soul, he didn't receive one.
Your interpretation is modern, not ancient.
My interpretation is ancient because that's what they believed when the book was written.
Let's be honest here. We all know that is absolutely untrue. At least certain groups like the WELS Lutherans own up to the fact that their denomination still officially proclaims what it does about the Pope. I can respect that much of them; I would like to give the same for you.
It's not untrue, but I guess that depends on what you mean by anti-papal. If you mean that I disagree with their teachings and system, and that I believe the bible identifies the papal system as the beast of Daniel and Revelation, than yeah I am anti-papal.
That is chiliasm, not orthodoxy. Long condemned by Ecumenical Council.
Chiliasm: The doctrine stating that Jesus will reign on earth for 1,000 years.
Is that what you're talking about because if it is I don't believe that, and I'm not sure what that has to do with our discussion.
No, I look at historic fact.
I look at the bible.
False prophecy, just like the Great Disappointment. The only change is that it was twisted by an admittedly intelligent person to continue the same falsehood.
What false prophecy? What's false, where's the error. The great disappointment wasn't a false prophecy, it was a misunderstanding. The prophecy was on point. It's interpretation was incorrect. The mistake was admitted to, and we've moved forward.
Rome had its dark point. No Vatican Catholic would disagree that Trent and Vatican II were necessary. Trent did a fantastic job reforming that particular church. The papacy is not corrupt anymore, despite its new role as of Vatican I. I disagree with it, but I'm not going to dwell on the past, which is what you are doing, not on the future.
It's interesting that you'll agree that Rome had it's dark point which was prophesied, but you turn on the other hand and say that it was a false prophecy. The church still considers the pope the Vicar of Christ. The church still elevates it's commandments above God's commandments. It isn't reformed. It may have been muzzled, but it hasn't been changed.
(again, and I know this is going to be overlooked, but it's not the people, but the system that is at fault. God has children everywhere and I believe that)
It isn't just quite possible; it is absolutely historically factual. Furthermore, if it died out, then either we must come to the conclusion that
A. God failed to preserve the Church, in which case we come to the logical conclusion that God can fail which leads to nothing more than Christianity being a false religion.
or
B. God, being God, cannot fail to preserve the Church and as such, if a group dies out, then the distinctive traits that made that group particular obviously wasn't orthodoxy, otherwise God would have preserved it.
Logic can be cold, but it proves us with the tools we need.
Not at all. It didn't die out, it simply became unpopular. Compromise set in and the "church" changed from what God had made it into what man wanted it to be. Fortunately, God winked at the ignorance of men and for those who were living up to the light they had, they were part of the true church of God.
Council of Jerusalem ended that.
No remnant. The Hebrew disciples themselves ended it.
God didn't. You assume because their isn't historical documentation, or because those who kept the sabbath weren't popular, or because their numbers weren't large like others, then they must not have been in existence.
God's eye was upon them and that is what matters.
