Should I eat breakfast or not?

Byfaithalone1 said:

I'm curious. If only the "moral law" is eternal, do you conclude that the dietary laws are moral laws?

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I don't recall saying "only the moral law is eternal".

StormyOne said:

so then God also knew all those babies who would be aborted, miscarried, or born dead? Interesting indeed...

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The Scripture that I mentioned from Isaiah before tells us that God knows the end from the beginning. And other Scriptures tell us that God is omniscient; that God is all-knowing.

So, if God knows everything, how could He not know that some babies would be abortedm still-born, miscarried, etc?

sentipente said:

What makes you so certain that it is complete? Didn't the Jews of Jesus' day believe their Scriptures were complete?

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There is at least one passage in the New Testament that tells us that the Bible is complete. In Revelation 22:18-20, John tells us that we are forbidden to either add to or take away from the Scriptures. As a matter of fact, he pronounces some pretty strong curses on anyone doing so!

If we are not now allowed to add to the Scriptures, then -- logically -- the Bible is now complete!

sentipente said:

If you truly believe that why do you believe He will burn some of His children in hell? Surely, you don't think anyone is going to walk voluntarily into a lake of fire.

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I am not saying, one way or the other, that God will or will not burn some of His children in a literal, physical hell of fire or lake of fire. Some believe that this fire is a literal fire, and some beleive that it is a symbolic fire. And some believe that hell is only the grave.

Whether hell is a literal fire, a sybolic fire, or only the grave, whether the temperature of hell is two thousand degrees, or it is colder than the South Pole in the middle of their winter, this much we know: Hell is the result of a life of sin; a life that has rejected Jesus Christ. So, for any of you reading this posting who have rejected Christ up to this point, I ask you this question: Why don't you quit rejecting Him?

AzA said:

It is unfortunate that predestination has come to connote force.
There is nothing that God does not know; He is not constrained by time; and there is no will of His that does not come to pass.

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I agree with everything you have said in this particular posting, one hundred per cent!

For the purposes of clarification, in case anything I said in the past has been misinterpreted, it was never my intention to say or imply that predestination connotes force. I did say that God could, theoretically, force salvation upon people. But I also qualified that by saying that He doesn't.

While I do not believe that God forces anybody to be saved, I do believe in the Irresistibilty of the Grace of God. That is to say, once a person has heard the Gospel of Jesus Christ and truly understood it, then -- I beleive -- that person cannot help but become born-again; he or she cannot help but be saved!

I hope I have done an okay job of clarifying where I stand!

MRHarvey said:

So, for any of you reading this posting who have rejected Christ up to this point, I ask you this question: Why don't you quit rejecting Him?

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How do you know that someone has rejected Christ? Are you suggesting that what you present as Christ is the absolute truth so that to reject your view is to reject Christ?

MRHarvey said:

There is at least one passage in the New Testament that tells us that the Bible is complete. In Revelation 22:18-20, John tells us that we are forbidden to either add to or take away from the Scriptures. As a matter of fact, he pronounces some pretty strong curses on anyone doing so!

If we are not now allowed to add to the Scriptures, then -- logically -- the Bible is now complete!

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You misunderstood the text. The text you quoted was speaking about the book of revelation; it is presumptuous to try to apply it to any other book. Don't forget that the book you call the Bible did not exist when that text was written.

sentipente said:

You misunderstood the text. The text you quoted was speaking about the book of revelation; it is presumptuous to try to apply it to any other book. Don't forget that the book you call the Bible did not exist when that text was written.

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some people don't let the facts get in the way of their dogma.....

sentipente said:

How do you know that someone has rejected Christ?...

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I don't know for sure. Nor have I ever (as far as I can recall) claimed to know for sure that this person or that person has accepted or rejected Christ. But God knows!

Are you suggesting that what you present as Christ is the absolute truth so that to reject your view is to reject Christ?

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Senti, this isn't about what "I" present as Christ! This isn't about what Mr. Harvey presents as Christ! I am talking about what THE BIBLE presents as Christ!

*I* could be just as wrong as anybody else. Don't believe me ... Believe THE BIBLE!

With Love in Christ,

MRHarvey

MRHarvey said:

I don't know for sure. Nor have I ever (as far as I can recall) claimed to know for sure that this person or that person has accepted or rejected Christ. But God knows!

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Which means you may not know whether you have rejected Christ either. So, why did you try to plant that seed?

MRHarvey said:

Senti, this isn't about what "I" present as Christ! This isn't about what Mr. Harvey presents as Christ! I am talking about what THE BIBLE presents as Christ!

*I* could be just as wrong as anybody else. Don't believe me ... Believe THE BIBLE!

With Love in Christ,

MRHarvey

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What does the Bible say? You have no idea concerning all the conditions under which the Bible was written so your conclusions regarding what it says may be entirely wrong. If you really want to know about the Creator your best bet is to study what he created instead of something that his creatures produced. Whom do you trust the more?

sentipente said:

You misunderstood the text. The text you quoted was speaking about the book of revelation....

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Maybe! Maybe I misunderstood the text, or maybe you did. The Scripture passage to which I was referring can be interpreted either way. So, maybe I'm right and you're wrong. Or maybe you're right and I'm wrong. Or maybe we are both wrong?

... it is presumptuous to try to apply it to any other book.

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It is also presumptuous to to presume that God intended it to be applied only to the Book of Revelation. Even if -- for the sake of argument -- we say that John did not know that those words would one day be included in what we now call the Holy Bible, GOD did!

Here is the bottom line: Whichever way you interpret that particular Scripture passage, you are being presumptuous.

Don't forget that the book you call the Bible did not exist when that text was written.

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That depends on how you define the word, "exist". It is pretty well universally accepted by all the real, genuine Bible scholars that the Book of Revelation was not only the last book of the Bible in which the books appear, but it was also the last book in the order in which they were written. And that all of the books of the Bible were written by the end of first century A.D.!

So, if when you say, "the Bible did not exist [at that time]", you mean that the Church had not yet established a formal cannon for what we now call the New Testament, then you have a point there! However, once the writing of the Book of Revelation was completed, the Bible did exist in the sense that each and every one of the books of what we now call the Bible existed!

Harvey, "the words of this book" could only refer to the book of Revelations because the Bible did not exist as a book when John wrote his book.

Harvey, you really believe that God planned this book and forgot to preserve the original manuscripts or even complete copies of the copies, leaving it to men to fill in many of the blanks? Is your dogma that strong that you rather make god look like a complete idiot?

sentipente said:

Which means you may not know whether you have rejected Christ either. So, why did you try to plant that seed?

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No, I know that I have accepted Christ. Neither you nor I can know for sure about anybody else's salvation. But you can know for sure about your own salvation. And I can know for sure about mine.

If you do not know for sure about your own salvation at the present time, but you would like to, send me a private message about the subject! (And the same goes for anyone else reading this message!) I assure you that anything you say to me in a private message will be kept confidential (as long as you do not say anything inappropriate, and I am sure you would not do that). I believe that a discussion about how you can know for sure about your own salvation -- and how I can be so sure about mine -- is best carried on privately, rather than in a public forum such as this one!

What does the Bible say? You have no idea concerning all the conditions under which the Bible was written....

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And neither do you. Therefore, a better choice of words, on your part, would have been, We have no idea concerning all of the conditions under which the Bible was written...."

In posting number 106 (in this thread), I give a number of proofs that the Bible contains within it a series of supernatural revelations from God. To put it another way, the authors of the books of the Bible knew a number of things (including prophecies that were later fulfilled) that they could have known -- at that time -- only if those things were revealed to them by special revelation from God!

Of course, I cannot spend the rest of my life proving that all of the Bible is absolutely true. I wish I could, but I can't. But, as I pointed out in posting #106, you can prove parts of the Bible, at the very least!

Perhaps even more importantly then that, I would submit this to you. If you can accept the first four words of the Bible -- namely, "In the beginning, God ..." -- then all the rest is a piece of cake. That being the case, we don't have to know all of the conditions under which the Bible was written, as long as we can accept those first four words! So, why not choose to believe that the Bible is the Word of God? Why not choose to believe that all of the Bible is absolutely true?

...so your conclusions regarding what it [the Bible] says may be entirely wrong.

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I agree with you on the point that many, many Scriptures have more than one possible interpertation. And I have never insisted that "my" interpretation of the Scriptures is always right. That said, have you not heard of the phrase, "The Perspicuity of the Scriptures"? What that phrase means is, there are certain doctrines that are so plainly taught in the Bible, that they are beyond dispute!

If you really want to know about the Creator your best bet is to study what he created instead of something that his creatures produced. Whom do you trust the more?

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First of all, the Bible isn't something that God's creatures produced; it is something that GOD produced through His creatues! And I don't think it has to be a case of one or the other. (Studying the Bible or studying God's creation.) For most of my life, but especially for the past eleven years, I have been trying to do both! And as I have said before, you really need to study both of then together to properly understand either one!

I have acknowledged that certain Scrpitures can be misinterpreted. But if you try to learn about God through the study of creation alone, without the aid of the Bible, there is also the danger of misinterpreting creation. At best, you will be inclined too much to succumb to popular opinion of how to interpet creation. And what did Paul say about that?

Ultimately, you really have only two choices. You can either choose to believe the Bible, or you can choose to be "...tossed here and there by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine!" Whatever choice you make is up to you, but I have chosen to believe the Bible!

StormyOne said:

some people don't let the facts get in the way of their dogma.....

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Stormy, I am not sure what you meant by that statement. I hope that you weren't trying to imply that I don't believe the proven facts. I hope even more that that statement wasn't meant to be a cheap insult directed at me. For the moment, I will presume that that was not your intention.

But it is important for you and me -- for all of us -- to ask the question, what are the facts? We have been deceived. You would be surprised to find out that so much of what we have been taught to believe as "fact" is not, in reality, proven fact. There are so many unproven theories that we have been taught to believe as fact.

As for what you call a "dogma", I don't believe that my personal dogma conflicts, in any way, with any of the proven facts.

Just to give you a little bit of friendly caution about confusing the facts with unproven theories, please remember the following Scripture...

That is why we must be on our guards about not allowing people to pass unproven theories off on us as "facts"!

sentipente said:

Harvey, "the words of this book" could only refer to the book of Revelations because the Bible did not exist as a book when John wrote his book.

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From our human standpoint, the Bible did not exist as book yet at that point! (I'll give you that.) But from GOD's viewpoint, it already did!

Why do you have such a problem with just accepting that GOD knew what He was doing when He inspired John to use the phrase, "the words of this book"?

MRHarvey said:

Stormy, I am not sure what you meant by that statement. I hope that you weren't trying to imply that I don't believe the proven facts. I hope even more that that statement wasn't meant to be a cheap insult directed at me. For the moment, I will presume that that was not your intention.

But it is important for you and me -- for all of us -- to ask the question, what are the facts? We have been deceived. You would be surprised to find out that so much of what we have been taught to believe as "fact" is not, in reality, proven fact. There are so many unproven theories that we have been taught to believe as fact.

As for what you call a "dogma", I don't believe that my personal dogma conflicts, in any way, with any of the proven facts.

Just to give you a little bit of friendly caution about confusing the facts with unproven theories, please remember the following Scripture...

As a result, we are no longer to be children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming; (Ephesians 4:14, New American Standard Bible)
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That is why we must be on our guards about not allowing people to pass unproven theories off on us as "facts"!

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exactly.... which is why I am taking what you have posted thus far with a grain of salt..... not insulting just not buying what you are selling at the moment.... let me return the favor and share some friendly advice... just because you believe it does not make it true.... we are all on a journey.... while I have not experienced everything you have on your journey, I understand what you are saying even though I don't share your beliefs about the bible..... perhaps there is some common ground we share, we just haven't reached it yet....

sentipente said:

Harvey, you really believe that God planned this book and forgot to preserve the original manuscripts...?

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Of course not! I believe that God had His reasons for not preserving the original, autograph manuscripts. And I can think of at least two reasons, off the top of my head...

On the one hand, even though I said that you can prove parts of the Bible, God still wants us to have a certain measure of faith. If He miraculously preserved the original manuscripts, we would not need to have any faith at all. But because you can prove quite a lot of the Bible to be true, we do not need to merely accept the Bible on "blind" faith!

On the other hand, if the original, autograph manuscripts of the books of the Bible were still extant today, then people would put them in glass cases, and bow down to them, and worship them. And God does not want people to do that!

... or even complete copies of the copies, leaving it to men to fill in many of the blanks? Is your dogma that strong that you rather make god look like a complete idiot?

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That is where you are wrong. While it is true that God did not preserve the original, autograph manuscripts (you got that right), He did preserve complete copies of copies.

On the one hand, the Dead Sea Scrolls have proven that the Hebrew ("Old Testament") Scriptures have remained intact today. On the other hand, the huge number of hand-written copies of the books of the New Testament, and the fact that these copies were made so soon after the originals were written, prove that the New Testament Scriptures have remained intact today!

Senti, if you deny that God has kept the books of His Word, the Bible, intact to the present day, then you are the one who is making God out to be either a deceiver, or an idiot, not I!

MRHarvey said:

From our human standpoint, the Bible did not exist as book yet at that point! (I'll give you that.) But from GOD's viewpoint, it already did!

Why do you have such a problem with just accepting that GOD knew what He was doing when He inspired John to use the phrase, "the words of this book"?

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Why don't you accept Jesus' words that when Lazarus died he went into Abraham's bosom and listened in while Abraham had a "short distance" conversation with the people in the other place?