We all say we are here to follow Jesus Christ to the reward of eternal life. Many have varying opinions on how to reach that goal, but I believe that is the goal of all of us.
Good news is that God loves us all, as He wants all men to be saved. Bad news is that we are still human and our flesh is at war with our spirit. We say we want to follow Jesus, but what do we do?
We all think we know the right way, but do we really? How do we find out? As fallen humans, we tend to believe what makes us feel good and helps us feel exalted.
If we follow that way, we become as sheep that go astray and each follows his own way. We go back to the original scriptures to try and avoid that, but the evidence is that way is incomplete. The original scriptures are subject to human interpretation, and their intended message becomes unclear.
Another way is to look at the Apostles and what they taught, but their records are incomplete from original manuscripts.
Some light can be shed by looking at the writings of those directly taught by the Apostles and see how the Gospel was being transmitted to future generations. Some say those generations apostacized and are not scripture so therefore unreliable. Did God really abandon His Church so quickly as to have it become publicly unstable in the second and third generations? I think that is a bit of a stretch in reason. I can perhaps see when secular authorities influenced the Church that argument can be made, although not necessarily true, but those taught directly by the Apostles and the generation that followed them?
What happened to the promise of the gates of hell shall not prevail?
Polycarp was taught directly by John the Apostle. He has one surviving writing in his letter to the Philippians, although not scripture, it gives us insight as to how the scripture was being taught.
Then we have Iraneus, who was taught by Polycarp. We have one of his writings intact called Demonstration of the Apostolic preaching.
Iraneus was also famous for a work called against heresies, which was written as a rebuke against the gnostics.
When we read the Demonstration of the Apostolic preaching, we get an idea of what was preached by those very close in time to Apostolic teaching. It is worth the read to see if what is taught today lines up with original Christian thought. Reading Agaisnt Heresies would give us an idea of what was taught by heretics contemporary to the Apostles.
I believe these works are worth reviewing and would be interested in others opinions on them, whether agree or disagree and why?
Peace be with you all. May Christ bless you and keep you and bring you to everlasting life
