Who made you a judge over me? You don't know me and you ought to answer my question on Mark 16:17 rather than act as my eternal judge, that's Christ's job, not you Oscarr. Oh and by the way, nobody is "saved" by attaching some label or identification to themselves, sadly the people who seem to most zealously deny the new covenant are people claiming to be born again Christians. I will; repeat my post on Mark 16:17 please reply.
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Oscarr, the word ‘believe’ or ‘have believed’ (NASV) at
Mark 16:17is an aorist participle, which can only refer to the office of the 12 apostles, who numbered eleven at that particular moment! A contrast in these verses is also made between two groups of believers, firstly the singular ‘he’ at
Mark 16:16 who will come to believe, with the plural ‘them’ of verses 14, 16 and 20. In verse 17 John quoting Christ does not use two future tenses, to imply that these miraculous gifts will continue for the entire church age even into our own day. If he had wished to imply this, then he would have said: ‘these signs will follow those who
WILL believe.’ But instead, the linking of the aorist participle ‘have believed’ with the future tense; ‘will follow,’ implies that those who’ll work these miracles, will receive their faith before they come exercise these miraculous gifts. This limits the recipients to the apostles but not to the 3,000 who came to faith after the exercise of the mighty spiritual gifts at
Acts 2:41.
This interpretation is confirmed in Acts chapter two, where we read that only the 12 apostles spoke in tongues. The 3,000 men who were converted on this day (
Acts 2:41), did not work any miracles. Because
Acts 2:43 says that these signs were done by the apostles. Now obviously later on in the book of Acts, other people also worked miracles, through the laying on of the apostles hands, and sometimes God will occasionally even heal or even work a miracle today. Elsewhere in Acts chapters 10, 19 and possible 8, other people also spoke in “other languages.” But this was hardly a common event, as
Acts 19 is some twenty years after Pentecost, and 2 or 3 occurrences of tongues over a 20 year period, hardly describes a common Christian activity. Now if Jesus had wished to indicate to us today, that the 3,000 who were saved on the day of Pentecost (
Acts 2:41) would also come to speak in tongues, then he would have used two future tenses in his prophecy at
Mark 16:17:
‘these signs WILL follow those who WILL believe.’
Because nobody today, not even Oscarr can meet the apostolic requirements of having seen the risen Christ (
Acts 1:22). This is why Paul saw the risen Christ “last of all,” (1st Corinthians 15:8), and the office of the 12 ceased with him. With this apostles office closed, God is not today confirming the oral word with the sign gifts of
Mark 16:17-18. But if he were we would not have an AID’s crisis, for the Apostles could heal
all who came to them (
Acts 5:16). This inability to duplicate the book of Acts in our day, and especially the miraculous sign gifts of
Mark 16:17-18, proves that today’s apostles are rather undermining the finished authority of Scripture.