The N.T. is Jewish...Pharisees part three

Bob corrigan

Active Member
May 3, 2022
181
89
64
San Antonio
✟30,376.00
Country
United States
Faith
Calvinist
Marital Status
Divorced
Mat 23:8-11. The words of Jesus in these three verses are some of the most ignored, almost to the point that it is as if they are not even in Scripture. How many of you have ever heard this addressed while sitting in a church building, watching TV, listening to the radio, or reading about it in a book or article? The command of Jesus here is ignored equally by Protestants, Evangelicals, Jews, the Catholic church, and the Eastern Orthodox church. The command of Jesus, (specifically for those who hold the position of one who teaches others Scripture, and as a result, who end up with some type of "leadership" position, {I cringe as I wrote the word "leadership"}, is not hard to understand or practice. Jesus was very clear about this. Anyone who teaches others is not to attach titles to their names. They are not to do this, seek it, or allow others to address them by a title.
In the Protestant/Evangelical world, one can be addressed as:
Pastor, Preacher, Brother, Elder, Apostle, Bishop, Prophet.
Among the Jews, "Rabbi."
In the Catholic church:
Father, Deacon, Bishop, Arch-Bishop, Monsignor, Cardinal, Reverend, Right Reverend. The pope can be addressed as "Your Holiness." (You are expected to kiss the pope's ring)
In the Eastern Orthodox church:
His All-Holiness, His Beatitude, His Eminence, His Excellency, Reverend Father, Right Reverend, The Very Reverend.
Why did Jesus command this? Because a title gives one status and creates separation between those with titles and those without. A title makes one superior over others. In the world of religion, a title says, "I have power and authority over others. I know more about the bible than you and you cannot question me or cast doubt upon what I say, (unless your title outranks me), I have a higher standing before God than you. I can tell you what to believe and why you should believe it."
In the ungodly world, titles are a part of that world and accepted. In some areas, titles are necessary to enforce the rules, establish who is in control, and designate who has the power. Many institutions of the world operate within a hierarchy, governments, courts, military, police, schools, companies, and families. Hierarchies are required in the ungodly world, due to the sinful, rebellious nature of people. Without a hierarchy, any institution would soon collapse into chaos. Those who use the title, "Reverend" should read Psalm 111:9
However, Jesus taught that among the congregations, (body of believers) vs 8..." for One is your teacher, and you are all brothers." This means you all have the same status! Not one of you has any higher standing above any other! There are different positions, but being in one of these positions, apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, or teacher, Eph 4:11, does not give one status or a superior position over any other. There are different gifts. But the gifts were/are given to serve other believers. Only one gift, tongues, was used to reach unbelievers. The reason there are different positions and gifts is due to necessity, not because of preference, special favor, or rewarding certain individuals. Having a position or particular gift does mean that one is superior in that particular arena over others, but it doesn't mean that that individual is a superior person compared to others. Tom Brady will always be known as a great quarterback. I've never played quarterback at any level. Tom Brady is superior at being a quarterback compared to me. But in no way does that mean or prove that Tom Brady is a superior person to me. You may have a man in a congregation, 68 years old, who has memorized the entire bible and is an excellent teacher. In no way is he a superior person to a 17-year-old youth who has just started to learn about what Scripture teaches, 1Cor, chapter 12, 1Cor 4:7-10, 1Pet 4:5-7.
By the way, none of the following, singing, playing an instrument, dancing, ability to act, being an artist, being a comedian, being able to write, being a "communicator" or telling your "story" are Spiritual gifts! Yet, are not the people who do these things treated as if they are special, above the rest of us, wonderful "Christians"? Let's also include the wives, offspring, and grandchildren of "Pastors," especially if the "Pastor" is famous, of those who are given special recognition and honor, recognition and honor not earned or deserved!
Do you see why I call priests and pastors Gentile Pharisees? They do the same exact things today as the Pharisees back then. Yes, there is a "church," but it is not a body of bible believers, a body that learns and obeys Scripture. The "church" is a world religion that operates under the guise of "following God." They use bibles and they use a made-up word, a word 5 not found in Scripture, "Christianity" to use as a facade to hide their evil nature. Have you ever noticed that when the "pastors" read the results of polls among "Christians," the percentage/statistics of evil practices and beliefs of the world are identical, or higher, than those of the secular world? The percentages of alcoholism, drunkenness, adultery, people being conned or scammed out of money, homosexuality, spousal abuse, child abuse, child molestation, sexual assault is the same percentages in the "church" as in the secular world. According to a survey done by the Gospel Coalition and posted as an article on Aug 9, 2020, The Majority of American Christians Don't Believe the Gospel. According to vox.com, on April 26, 2018, 20% of Christians don't believe in the God of the Bible. I don't know the statistics, but a large number of Christians believe in evolution. According to Newsweek, Aug 30, 2020, "Nearly one-third of evangelicals in the survey agreed that Jesus isn't God, compared to 65 percent who said "Jesus is the first and greatest being created by God." Aug 31, 2020, Pew Research Center, "Half of US Christians say casual sex sometimes or always acceptable." 41% of Protestant churchgoers consume alcohol, and 61% of Catholics consume alcohol.
Here is a statistic that may shock some. A statistic that is kept very hush-hush. According to Abortion Statistics put out by ww1.antiochian.org, " Women identifying themselves as Protestants obtain 37.4% of all abortions in the U.S. Catholic women account for 31.3%...18% of all abortions are performed on women who identify themselves as "Born-Again/Evangelical." mtv.com, Dec 3, 2015. "It Turns Out Christians Have More Abortions Than Any Other Religious Group." Lifeway Research, Dec 3, 2021-"7 in 10 Women Who have Had an Abortion Identify as a Christian. Hmm, 37.4% + 31.3% = 67.7%. One of the evilest and most wicked practices in the world today is abortion! It turns out that "Christian" women and Catholic women make up the majority of women who get abortions! These same women who attend church buildings, who claim to believe in Scripture, claim that abortion is murder, claim that all life has value, claim that children are a blessing, and endorse that a woman should put up a child for adoption rather than having an abortion is the biggest group of women who get abortions! How many pastors rail against abortion? How many preachers preach against abortion? Is not abortion a hot topic button that is brought up time and time again? How many protests have been held at abortion clinics? Many of these "Christain" protestors are mean, ugly, and insulting. Rather than speaking to the women entering the clinics, they yell at them! True biblical behavior, right? Years ago, there were "Christian" extremists who went so far as to blow up clinics or set them on fire! But it is not just "Christian" women who are involved in abortion. There are "Christian" doctors who perform abortions and "Christian" nurses who assist with abortions. From wbur.org, Sep 18, 2017, "Dr Willie Parker writes in his book: "I am a follower of Jesus, and I believe that as an abortion provider, I am doing God's work." From the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Mar 30, 2019- "I'm a Christian doctor and I help women have abortions..." Over the years I have sent dozens and dozens of emails to "big-name" ministries, ministries that are on hundreds or more TV or radio channels to point this out and to urge them to discuss this subject on their shows, and not only did this not happen, but I also didn't even get the courtesy of a reply. I was completely ignored! I am pretty sure they blocked me.
Two other crimes committed by "Christians/Evangelicals" that are kept hush-hush are wife abuse and child molestation! You can research these topics yourself. From The Guardian, June 12, 2022, as reported by Edward Helmore. "US Southern Baptist churches facing 'apocalypse' over sexual abuse scandal." "A report named hundreds of church leaders accused or found guilty of abusing children and says survivors were mistreated. "... The issue at hand is the release by the SBC of a 205-page document naming hundreds (did you get that, hundreds!) of Baptist leaders and members accused or found guilty of sexual abuse of children. The list, which includes 700 entries on cases between 2000 and 2019, was released after a bombshell investigation by Guidepost Solutions said the convention's leaders in its executive committee failed the public and its community by mishandling sexual abuse cases and mistreating victims and survivors...It said that the SBC's general counsel and spokesman had kept their own private list of abusive ministers and that leaders of SBC's executive committee had focused for decades on trying to protect the SBC from liability for abuse in local churches." (Notice, rather than exposing the abusive pastors or staff members, they focused on protecting themselves from being sued!) "In service of this goal (covering their ass instead of taking action), survivors and others who reported the abuse were ignored, disbelieved or met with the constant refrain that the SBC could take no action due to its policy regarding church autonomy-even if it meant that convicted molesters continued in ministry with no notice or warning to their current church or congregation." If you look this up for yourself and push the red letters that read The list, you will be able to see the report for yourself.
I wasn't able to find statistics for the amount of physical abuse towards wives and children in the "Christian/Evangelical church world," but there is a lot of it. Besides these men not being reported to the Law and kicked out of their churches or fired from their positions, the biggest crime is that the women who report the abuse to the staff are either disbelieved or more heinous than that, are told that they should submit to it and "try to get married couples counseling" or "pray to God to change their husband" Type in your browser, "The John MacArthur scandal" and read that! In all of these horrendous examples, the "Christians" act just like the unbelievers, ignore it, deny it, don't report it, and blame the victims! Everything I have shown here can be looked up on the web. Why is it that scandals involving politicians or celebrities always make the news, just recently the Jhonny Deep trial, but you never hear a peep about all of the "Christian" scandals, unless it is a very big name? I have no doubt that if the F.B.I. really investigated preachers, a lot of dirt and law-breaking would be discovered. It would be the bigger the name, the bigger the dirt and crime.
I want the reader to understand that there is no biblical church! There is a "church of the world" that is made up of worldly people! A church that has nothing to do with God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, or Scripture! The "church" is not filled with true believers, its membership rolls list millions and millions of pseudo believers! Chaff and tares, not wheat! Goats, not sheep! Children of the devil, not children of God! Wolves, not shepherds! Just because most of these live a moral life, doesn't make them believers. There are plenty of non-Christians, the unchurched, who live moral lives. I don't talk about these things to point out the "moral failures" of certain individuals or "churches," I am talking about these things to show you how corrupt and perverted the "church" is! By the way, a number of preachers and priests who were caught, tried, and convicted of child molestation, admitted that they took that career path as a means to be around children. Other molesters say that a "church" is the easiest place to commit their horrible crimes and they have a good chance of not being reported to the authorities. On average, a child molester working in a church will end up molesting three or more children before being caught! What do you expect when you create an atmosphere of love, love, love, forgive, forgive, forgive, and don't judge?

When I started writing today, I did not plan on talking about the "church." But when I type, I usually listen to something on the radio, and today I put on a "Christian" radio station. I listen to "Christian" radio for two reasons, one to see if I am hearing any new lies, and two, once in a while I will actually get a nugget of truth, we all make mistakes, right? I mean a Christian/Evangelical speaker speaking a little truth has got to be an accident and unintentional. But I heard three things in a row, from three different programs, that set me off! The first was a call-in show and the host was asked about the tithe. He replied," In the Bible, ' Moses said we tithe that we may learn to revere God." LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! LIAR! MOSES NEVER SAID THAT! IT IS NOT FOUND IN SCRIPTURE! Just another classic example of a "bible teacher saying, 'The bible says..." where the bible doesn't say! Lying to a person to keep promoting the false teaching that Gentile believers are required, yea commanded to "tithe"! According to most "pastors," if you are not giving at least 15% of your income to your church, you're really not a believer, you are disobedient, and you are robbing God and under a curse or you have a "spirit of greed" Jesus never asked or begged for money, Paul refused to take money from the Corinthians and the Thessalonians! John, Peter, James, or Jude never ever mention anything about "believers giving money" nor is it found in the book of Hebrews! In every church service, on every TV or radio show, you won't hear the truth, but you will hear begging for money! Many times, you will hear about it more than once during the same service or program! For as much is heard about "people giving money," you would think that it would be found all over the N.T., in every book!
The second was yet again another "pastor" teaching from the book of Revelation and talking about the "antichrist," (the word antichrist or Anti-Christ is not found in the book of Revelation), the "new world order," the "mark of the best" and a cashless society.
But the one that irked the most was a big-name preacher, found on CSN, TBN, and YouTube, who was teaching about, get ready for it, "Church hopping"! Yes, that very important subject that needs to be addressed! Out of all of the things found in Scripture that could be taught, he not only ignores all of what is available to be taught from Scripture, but he has to go so far as to make something up! What arrogance! What a lack of knowledge! What a false teacher! This clown has also said that The Holy Spirit gives spiritual gifts so that people can volunteer at church! How many times have you heard, "Forsake not the assembling together..." Heb 10:25? For the number of times, it is talked about or sermons are given on it, you would think it was one of the main themes in the N.T. and a big problem, right? Do you know how many times it is mentioned in all of Scripture? ONCE! One solitary time! Yet it is treated as if it is a super important topic that needs to be covered over and over! This is one of the clown's favorite subjects! And this man is considered a great "pastor," called by God to study and teach His Word to the sheep? Didn't Jesus say something about, "Blessed are those who don't church hop"? Didn't Paul devote an entire chapter for Jews and Gentiles about not hopping churches? Didn't James, right after talking about the tongue, talk about not to church hop? Didn't Jude say the fallen angels were also guilty of church-hopping? Do you see how absurd this man is? Yet, he is extremely popular in the "church world"
 
  • Like
Reactions: SkyWriting