Utterly, Completely, Overwhelmingly Confused

[magisterfaust]

When I chat with some of my christian friends I am very quickly confused by some of their allegiances. Catholic, baptist, anglican, protestant, mormonism, bretheren... I could go on to more obscure organisations..Mennonites, Nontrinitarian Surely they cant all be right when they say their belief is the way to Gods love and mercy!!

Why Is the Catholic Church the most powerful in the world..?

Surely if there is a god he would have settled the argument by now?

 

[fm107]

Actually God knew before hand that there would be divisions.

Matthew 7:15
"Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves."


There are different beliefs on certain issues in Christianity however the bulk of them have the basis correct which is how you become saved:

John 3:16-21
16“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. 21But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.”

If your unsure about certain viewpoints, simply check what the bible says on the issue - that is the best way to keep right on issues you are unsure of.

 

[Jpark]

When I chat with some of my christian friends I am very quickly confused by some of their allegiances. Catholic, baptist, anglican, protestant, mormonism, bretheren... I could go on to more obscure organisations..Mennonites, Nontrinitarian Surely they cant all be right when they say their belief is the way to Gods love and mercy!!

Why Is the Catholic Church the most powerful in the world..?

Surely if there is a god he would have settled the argument by now?

They (the true denominations) will surely be united eventually. My father tells me that I will do it. I will unite the true denominations into one faith.

 

[drich0150]

When I chat with some of my christian friends I am very quickly confused by some of their allegiances. Catholic, baptist, anglican, protestant, mormonism, bretheren... I could go on to more obscure organisations..Mennonites, Nontrinitarian Surely they cant all be right when they say their belief is the way to Gods love and mercy!!

Why Is the Catholic Church the most powerful in the world..?

Surely if there is a god he would have settled the argument by now?

This question has been ask many times over the last month or so, did all of you guys come out of the same meeting or something?

I'll paste a few of my responses here. They do not directly address your exact phrasing, but the meat of the message does speak directly to your question:

Man has never been able to sustain one united system of faith, without it falling to corruption.. Christianity and Judaism are not immune. Having power centralized only seems to produce corruption and abuse of power. Here I have to agree with BroSam, because it is better for us to have the freedom to split from our original organized faith if that faith strays from the truth, or if we can simply worship more effectively by changing some of our "disputable" traditions.

I maintain if God wanted us to follow a strict regiment of faith, then as with the old testament He would have instituted one with rule and law and mandated adherence to it.

Although, You are correct, an unfortunate side effect is the constant bickering and foolish arguments. I have recently discovered a possible reason for that, and that is one's very own pride of life, coupled with a deep sense of personal righteousness that can be loosely affiliated with a very particular interpretation of scripture.

In other words if what i do is right, and what you do is done differently, then you must be wrong. It is this sense of personal righteousness, and personal pride that will not allow us to see past our own traditions and rituals. I believe that this combination of sin would exist even in a unified church as well. we can look to the Pharisees and how they were trying to one up each other by their ornate displays of personal righteousness, even under one common religion.

The problem is not the many churches, (This is the symptom) the problem lies in the heart of the man/men that make it necessary to have to break off from an established religion so the one or a group of people can more completely worship God with all of their Hearts, Mind, Spirit and Strength. Even if you could eliminate the symptom, the problem would still remain.

Fix the problem and the symptoms will go away on their own.

In response Some one asked:

How do you see your scenario playing out?

​

I believe that the divisions we place on ourselves have little to nothing to do with our collective role as the church. Just because a hand or a foot maybe located in different parts of the body, and just because they may have different functions on the body,it doesn't mean they are any less important to the body. That is so long as that member of the body responds to the Head (Jesus Christ) That specific member can actively work independently of the other members and still be considered apart of the body of Christ. (The true Church)

The only way to reunite the Church can be found in the Lord's prayer: Your Kingdom come, and your will be done as it is in Heaven. We are effectively praying for the end of man's reign, and the completion of the new heaven and the new earth. Even this doesn't guarantee one church order, we may still retain our independent member of the body status, it's just after our transformation we will be more aware of the inner workings of the body and may be able to see the different members of the body working together.. Rather than only being able to see the divisions.

 

[ephraimanesti]

When I chat with some of my christian friends I am very quickly confused by some of their allegiances. Catholic, baptist, anglican, protestant, mormonism, bretheren... I could go on to more obscure organisations..Mennonites, Nontrinitarian Surely they cant all be right when they say their belief is the way to Gods love and mercy!!

Why Is the Catholic Church the most powerful in the world..?

Surely if there is a god he would have settled the argument by now?

MY DEAR BROTHER,

"The way to God's love" lies in the hearts of individuals who Love the Lord their God with all their hearts and their neighbors as themselves.

Denominational affiliation is generally irrelevant to this process unless it somehow guides, supports, and strengthens this critical Love of God and Neighbor.

"BY THEIR FRUITS YOU WILL KNOW THEM." (Matthew 7:16)

ABBA'S FOOL,
ephraim

 

[Pure760]

Religeons are varying usually fictional storys of the truth, like whisper down the alley. There is only 1 truth.

 

[Pure760]

"The truth remains the truth regardless of what you or those around you choose to believe." -The angel known to christians as the burning bush.

 

[childofGod31]

Many denominations came because the verses from the Bible can be understood many different ways. And only God can reveal the right way. And I guess people have not been asking God to reveal the true way. God won't reveal the true way unless people are willing to live it. The Bible is for living, not for just forming theological doctrines.

You have to read it yourself and you have to want to find God. And you have to be willing to diligently try to keep searching for Him. And you have to talk to Him in your thoughts and ask Him to guide you to the truth. And if you really want that, He will.

Truth is personal. It is not corporate. Therefore, individuals, who are ready to serve God and put Him first get to the truth. And the rest don't really get it. You cannot know truth just by reading. You have to experience it. You have to live it. Once you live the lower truth, God will reveal more and more to you, so you can live in higher truth. What I mean is that you won't really undersatand it until you experience it. You won't understand what God's grace is until you feel it in your own experience. The Bible is for LIVING it out.

The very basic and overall message of the Bible is simply this: love God and love people and do good.

But a little more detailed message is this:

The evil in men (aka sin) has made them unable to be good. And because we are evil and do evil (in God's eyes), we are subject to His judgement, condemnation.

God has found a way to free us from evil. He did this by sending Jesus to die on the cross for our sins.

Having done that, Jesus is able to set us free from sin/evil. But He has to live in us in order to do that.

So that's why we have to repent from our sins and ask Jesus to come into our heart, so that by His power, He would help us to overcome sin in our life.

We won't perfectly do that. We will still sin in different ways. But as long as we are doing our best to put God first in our life, to love God and to love others, God overlooks our imperfections and sees us as sinless if Jesus Christ lives in us. But it's very important to try to live as God says in the Bible. God sees the heart. He judges according to our attitudes and our efforts.

So as an illustration: God is going to send fire to earth and it will burn everything. And Jesus Christ is like a fireproof vest. If you put Him on yourself, you will be saved from the fire.

 

[Celticflower]

You could look at it this way - the basics of Christianity (those things we have in common) are like the basic recipe for ice cream. Each denomination is just a different flavor and we each have our favorite.