What is the essence of Christianity?

[david shelby]

How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

I don't think the passage about women submitting to their husbands has anything to do with theology having to be mediated by a male authority in the sense in which you are framing it. Basically it means don't commit adultery. If your husband doesn't want you going out drinking at the club with the girls for a girls night out because he doesn't trust them, or you when drunk and with them, then submit to that and don't go. If your husband doesn't want you going out in that slootty dress, don't do it. That's how I see the notion of submission talked about there. (It could also have to do with money, like if your husband says don't blow $500 on that gucci purse, we can't afford it, then don't do it. These are the sorts of things I think the author has in mind.) I don't think it is trying to say women must set aside their own common sense and embrace every wind of doctrine being taught by a pastor because he's a man, or whatever you seem to be making it mean here.

But in any case, it would be a travesty I think if everyone ignored what I wrote about the essence of Christianity on the previous page and focused only on this post that deals with the last paragraph of what you wrote. But that's typically what happens on forums, making me wish I had made it all one post.

 

[hedrick]

I think Christianity is actually about the Christian life: following Jesus: faith, love, prayer, the Holy Spirit, unexciting things like that that all mainstream Christians understand.

Doctrine, in my view, is important mostly as protection. Calvin thought predestination helped us understand that we can live confidently because everything comes to us from God. Lutherans' dialectic between Law and grace is a way to save us from legalism without abandoning the idea that what we do is important. But these things aren't the essence of Christianity.

 

[Maria Billingsley]

What is the essence of Christianity?

A relationship with Jesus Christ of Nazareth so He can give you His Holy Spirit.
Blessings

 

[Gregory Thompson]

What is the essence of Christianity? What theological hills are the ones I must die on?

I'm in my mid-thirties, and I'm at a tough point in the faith. I've dealt with doubt before, eventually broke through it and rejected all forms of agnosticism and atheism, found other religions lacking as well -- and yet I still haven't figured out everything about Christianity, either.

I was raised in something of a generic, and yet very unstructured, American Protestant Christian home. However, there were a few theological quirks: my mother basically reduced everything in the Bible to Micah 6:8, my father told me hell isn't eternal and that people can be saved after they die (he vigorously maintains this belief to this day -- it's his own theological hill that he chooses to die on), and most emphasis was placed on endless End Times speculations rather than morality, even though both my parents identified as conservative Christians. (They remained outsiders in the faith, and few followed their highly idiosyncratic theology. As I've gotten older, I totally understand why few people followed them, despite my love for them -- they were very inconsistent theologically, and took a lot of the Bible grossly out of context, and could never admit or discuss their hermeneutical errors well with others.)

In my young adult years, I was exposed to the conservative Calvinist/Reformed, Vision Forum, somewhat famous/infamous "Brain Type" patriarchal Christianity of the Niednagel family, which holds that most people are Myers-Briggs ENTPs/FCIRs and cannot discern truth and reality well. True Biblical Christianity, according to them, is following rules and regulations to the utmost, and following the Bible according to black-and-white, linear left brain context, best exemplified in rigid Reformed Calvinism and ISFJ or ISTJ BEAL and BEIL Brain Types. My parents were believed to be generic ENTP FCIR right brain thinkers who took the Bible too creatively and didn't spend enough time on law, righteousness, and the like, which would explain their obsession with doomsday thinking, and the lack of emphasis on law/morality, and why my family never gave into the very different thinking of the Niednagel Brain Typists.

I also have been exposed to Calvary Chapel, which holds that Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and that God can be attained through ecstatic emotional spontaneous Pentecostal worship, coupled with a somewhat conservative theological bent. The Niednagels would dismiss this as right brain extroversion emotionalism, and to me, it seems offensively feminine instead of male patriarchal. God is not a woman -- He is a MALE, so why treat him so emotionally and reduce His holiness to a girly RUH-LAY-SHUN-SHIP? Men are systems thinkers, thus so should a male God be, not a "relationship."

I now think, and have thought for over a year, that conservative Lutherans have the best balance of all these matters, theological and otherwise -- but it's alienated my family and all my former Calvinist and Calvary Chapel friends, who would wish to persuade me back to 'their' ways.

Even so, I find myself fighting: is conservative Lutheranism just my own preference, or is it absolute truth? If it's absolute truth, how do I -- as a woman and descendant of Eve -- practice it best? Women aren't supposed to hold Scriptural authority in the Bible, and yet the men in my life have had such differing views on how the Bible should be interpreted, so it's hard to figure out who to submit to. They are all over the place! Where is the consistency in Protestant Christianity? I outlined what my parents, the Niednagel Brain Typist Calvinists, and the Calvary Chapelists believe -- and none of it is internally consistent or co-existent. What a mess!

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

[Edit] The first question: the essence of Christianity is trust, or faith. Without the faith part, the seed ideas never come alive.

I tend to look at the bible using foundational patterns that repeat within it. (Seven days of creation for an overall frame of the bible story, the history of Israel is similar to church history in some ways, etc)

One foundation that Jesus provided was mutual love, (no greater love has a human than this) and Godly love. (while we were his enemies, Christ died for us)

I tend to perceive the born again experience as being in a body, but being so much more than it's appearance. I find comparing the "rib" part of Genesis, and the "taking out of wisdom" in God of Proverbs Chapter 8 a good starting point regarding the image and likeness of God in women.

In terms of a hill to die on, I find 1st John having many helpful passages including:

Herein is our love made mature, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. (1 John 4:17)

This is the only passage that talks about any basis for boldness, and when you're dead all that matters is what God thinks anyway.

 

[derpytia]

What is the essence of Christianity? What theological hills are the ones I must die on?

I'm in my mid-thirties, and I'm at a tough point in the faith. I've dealt with doubt before, eventually broke through it and rejected all forms of agnosticism and atheism, found other religions lacking as well -- and yet I still haven't figured out everything about Christianity, either.

I was raised in something of a generic, and yet very unstructured, American Protestant Christian home. However, there were a few theological quirks: my mother basically reduced everything in the Bible to Micah 6:8, my father told me hell isn't eternal and that people can be saved after they die (he vigorously maintains this belief to this day -- it's his own theological hill that he chooses to die on), and most emphasis was placed on endless End Times speculations rather than morality, even though both my parents identified as conservative Christians. (They remained outsiders in the faith, and few followed their highly idiosyncratic theology. As I've gotten older, I totally understand why few people followed them, despite my love for them -- they were very inconsistent theologically, and took a lot of the Bible grossly out of context, and could never admit or discuss their hermeneutical errors well with others.)

In my young adult years, I was exposed to the conservative Calvinist/Reformed, Vision Forum, somewhat famous/infamous "Brain Type" patriarchal Christianity of the Niednagel family, which holds that most people are Myers-Briggs ENTPs/FCIRs and cannot discern truth and reality well. True Biblical Christianity, according to them, is following rules and regulations to the utmost, and following the Bible according to black-and-white, linear left brain context, best exemplified in rigid Reformed Calvinism and ISFJ or ISTJ BEAL and BEIL Brain Types. My parents were believed to be generic ENTP FCIR right brain thinkers who took the Bible too creatively and didn't spend enough time on law, righteousness, and the like, which would explain their obsession with doomsday thinking, and the lack of emphasis on law/morality, and why my family never gave into the very different thinking of the Niednagel Brain Typists.

I also have been exposed to Calvary Chapel, which holds that Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and that God can be attained through ecstatic emotional spontaneous Pentecostal worship, coupled with a somewhat conservative theological bent. The Niednagels would dismiss this as right brain extroversion emotionalism, and to me, it seems offensively feminine instead of male patriarchal. God is not a woman -- He is a MALE, so why treat him so emotionally and reduce His holiness to a girly RUH-LAY-SHUN-SHIP? Men are systems thinkers, thus so should a male God be, not a "relationship."

I now think, and have thought for over a year, that conservative Lutherans have the best balance of all these matters, theological and otherwise -- but it's alienated my family and all my former Calvinist and Calvary Chapel friends, who would wish to persuade me back to 'their' ways.

Even so, I find myself fighting: is conservative Lutheranism just my own preference, or is it absolute truth? If it's absolute truth, how do I -- as a woman and descendant of Eve -- practice it best? Women aren't supposed to hold Scriptural authority in the Bible, and yet the men in my life have had such differing views on how the Bible should be interpreted, so it's hard to figure out who to submit to. They are all over the place! Where is the consistency in Protestant Christianity? I outlined what my parents, the Niednagel Brain Typist Calvinists, and the Calvary Chapelists believe -- and none of it is internally consistent or co-existent. What a mess!

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

I think the one big thing you're missing out on is mere faith.

I think the essence of Christianity is faith because faith makes you come to a fork in the road where you are forced to choose. Every human being has to make this choice and some do it consciously or unconsciously but the choice is made either way. We can come to this fork in the road many times in life. What matters is what choice is made at the very end.

We can choose to accept that there are some things in this life that we will not physically see (Christ, God in the flesh, some past miracles, etc) and things that we will not fully understand (why the wicked prosper and the righteous suffer, why some suffer more than others, the reason for individual suffering, etc) and to trust that God's hand is in it all and that He means everything for our own good.

Or we can choose to not accept the unknown and unseen and never trust God ever again.

Another choice that is unique to Christianity is the choice to accept all the above AND Christ as the redeemer of the world or to reject Christ. Again, in the end, every human has to choose to either accept or reject Christ. But to accept Christ, you also must make the choice to trust God at the same time.

You cannot be double minded about any of these choices even if you try to be. I've found that, no matter what, life has a way of forcing you to choose one or the other.

Also, for what it's worth -- I am a woman. I have never been married. I was raised by a single mother in a house with no men. I am a believer and a follower of Christ and I needed no man to lead me to Him. In fact, I think it was God who was the one who, through lots of circumstances both painful and good, came and got me Himself.

 

[Josephus]

What is the essence of Christianity? What theological hills are the ones I must die on?

I'm in my mid-thirties, and I'm at a tough point in the faith. I've dealt with doubt before, eventually broke through it and rejected all forms of agnosticism and atheism, found other religions lacking as well -- and yet I still haven't figured out everything about Christianity, either.

I was raised in something of a generic, and yet very unstructured, American Protestant Christian home. However, there were a few theological quirks: my mother basically reduced everything in the Bible to Micah 6:8, my father told me hell isn't eternal and that people can be saved after they die (he vigorously maintains this belief to this day -- it's his own theological hill that he chooses to die on), and most emphasis was placed on endless End Times speculations rather than morality, even though both my parents identified as conservative Christians. (They remained outsiders in the faith, and few followed their highly idiosyncratic theology. As I've gotten older, I totally understand why few people followed them, despite my love for them -- they were very inconsistent theologically, and took a lot of the Bible grossly out of context, and could never admit or discuss their hermeneutical errors well with others.)

In my young adult years, I was exposed to the conservative Calvinist/Reformed, Vision Forum, somewhat famous/infamous "Brain Type" patriarchal Christianity of the Niednagel family, which holds that most people are Myers-Briggs ENTPs/FCIRs and cannot discern truth and reality well. True Biblical Christianity, according to them, is following rules and regulations to the utmost, and following the Bible according to black-and-white, linear left brain context, best exemplified in rigid Reformed Calvinism and ISFJ or ISTJ BEAL and BEIL Brain Types. My parents were believed to be generic ENTP FCIR right brain thinkers who took the Bible too creatively and didn't spend enough time on law, righteousness, and the like, which would explain their obsession with doomsday thinking, and the lack of emphasis on law/morality, and why my family never gave into the very different thinking of the Niednagel Brain Typists.

I also have been exposed to Calvary Chapel, which holds that Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and that God can be attained through ecstatic emotional spontaneous Pentecostal worship, coupled with a somewhat conservative theological bent. The Niednagels would dismiss this as right brain extroversion emotionalism, and to me, it seems offensively feminine instead of male patriarchal. God is not a woman -- He is a MALE, so why treat him so emotionally and reduce His holiness to a girly RUH-LAY-SHUN-SHIP? Men are systems thinkers, thus so should a male God be, not a "relationship."

I now think, and have thought for over a year, that conservative Lutherans have the best balance of all these matters, theological and otherwise -- but it's alienated my family and all my former Calvinist and Calvary Chapel friends, who would wish to persuade me back to 'their' ways.

Even so, I find myself fighting: is conservative Lutheranism just my own preference, or is it absolute truth? If it's absolute truth, how do I -- as a woman and descendant of Eve -- practice it best? Women aren't supposed to hold Scriptural authority in the Bible, and yet the men in my life have had such differing views on how the Bible should be interpreted, so it's hard to figure out who to submit to. They are all over the place! Where is the consistency in Protestant Christianity? I outlined what my parents, the Niednagel Brain Typist Calvinists, and the Calvary Chapelists believe -- and none of it is internally consistent or co-existent. What a mess!

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

To find truth, you must always go back to its root. Torah. Specifically the Hebrew Torah as G-d spoke to Moses, as was written down, as was lived among us, and desires to live through us. Want to know more? Feel free to reply.

 

[SoldierOfTheKing]

Women aren't supposed to hold Scriptural authority in the Bible, and yet the men in my life have had such differing views on how the Bible should be interpreted, so it's hard to figure out who to submit to.

Your husband and nobody else.

 

[Presbyterian Continuist]

What is the essence of Christianity? What theological hills are the ones I must die on?

I'm in my mid-thirties, and I'm at a tough point in the faith. I've dealt with doubt before, eventually broke through it and rejected all forms of agnosticism and atheism, found other religions lacking as well -- and yet I still haven't figured out everything about Christianity, either.

I was raised in something of a generic, and yet very unstructured, American Protestant Christian home. However, there were a few theological quirks: my mother basically reduced everything in the Bible to Micah 6:8, my father told me hell isn't eternal and that people can be saved after they die (he vigorously maintains this belief to this day -- it's his own theological hill that he chooses to die on), and most emphasis was placed on endless End Times speculations rather than morality, even though both my parents identified as conservative Christians. (They remained outsiders in the faith, and few followed their highly idiosyncratic theology. As I've gotten older, I totally understand why few people followed them, despite my love for them -- they were very inconsistent theologically, and took a lot of the Bible grossly out of context, and could never admit or discuss their hermeneutical errors well with others.)

In my young adult years, I was exposed to the conservative Calvinist/Reformed, Vision Forum, somewhat famous/infamous "Brain Type" patriarchal Christianity of the Niednagel family, which holds that most people are Myers-Briggs ENTPs/FCIRs and cannot discern truth and reality well. True Biblical Christianity, according to them, is following rules and regulations to the utmost, and following the Bible according to black-and-white, linear left brain context, best exemplified in rigid Reformed Calvinism and ISFJ or ISTJ BEAL and BEIL Brain Types. My parents were believed to be generic ENTP FCIR right brain thinkers who took the Bible too creatively and didn't spend enough time on law, righteousness, and the like, which would explain their obsession with doomsday thinking, and the lack of emphasis on law/morality, and why my family never gave into the very different thinking of the Niednagel Brain Typists.

I also have been exposed to Calvary Chapel, which holds that Christianity is a relationship, not a religion, and that God can be attained through ecstatic emotional spontaneous Pentecostal worship, coupled with a somewhat conservative theological bent. The Niednagels would dismiss this as right brain extroversion emotionalism, and to me, it seems offensively feminine instead of male patriarchal. God is not a woman -- He is a MALE, so why treat him so emotionally and reduce His holiness to a girly RUH-LAY-SHUN-SHIP? Men are systems thinkers, thus so should a male God be, not a "relationship."

I now think, and have thought for over a year, that conservative Lutherans have the best balance of all these matters, theological and otherwise -- but it's alienated my family and all my former Calvinist and Calvary Chapel friends, who would wish to persuade me back to 'their' ways.

Even so, I find myself fighting: is conservative Lutheranism just my own preference, or is it absolute truth? If it's absolute truth, how do I -- as a woman and descendant of Eve -- practice it best? Women aren't supposed to hold Scriptural authority in the Bible, and yet the men in my life have had such differing views on how the Bible should be interpreted, so it's hard to figure out who to submit to. They are all over the place! Where is the consistency in Protestant Christianity? I outlined what my parents, the Niednagel Brain Typist Calvinists, and the Calvary Chapelists believe -- and none of it is internally consistent or co-existent. What a mess!

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

There is a lot of truth in what Jesus said about coming to God as a little child and just accepting the gospel as it is set down - that Jesus did not come to condemn the world but to save sinners, and that because we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, we need to turn to Jesus as our Saviour and Lord.

Once we get rid of all the theological gobbledygook and get right down to the simple principles of the gospel:
1. We are all sinners deserving of hell.
2. Jesus died on the cross as us so that we can be declared righteous
3. He rose again from the dead to show that He has power over death and hell and given us eternal life.
4. If we turn to Christ and put our faith and trust in Him, He will not reject us but will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
5. He will baptise us with the Holy Spirit to give us the power to live a sanctified life and to take the good news to others who need Christ.

This is the essence of Christianity. The emotional and ecstatic ways that some worship God is the way their soul attempts to reach out to God to get some sort of sensory experience. What many of these do not realise is that they don't have to do that, because they already have the Holy Spirit in them. A lot of the emotional and sensory hoo hah is the steam going out through the whistle of the locomotive instead of through the driving wheels of Christian service and evangelism.

The church and theological doctrinal stuff is not God. It is man's attempts to try and understand Him and His ways. Put 10 Christians into one room and you will have 10 different theological stances.

The thing about a child is that he does not understand the finer points of life, the universe and everything. He just enjoys the simple pleasures that come with being a child. He does not try and complicate things.

If you read the gospel of John with a child-like attitude and not try to extract "deeper" spiritual stuff out of it, the message that Jesus came to give us became quite clear and simple. "I am the way, the truth and the life, and no person comes to the Father but by Me". And, "God so loved the world that He gave His only Son so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life."

The trouble is that the theological "gurus" complicate the way to Christ by adding a whole lot of religious twaddle and theological theories to something that, in essence, is quite simple really.

 

[Ing Bee]

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Hi kdm-
I'm going to try to address what I think is at the heart of your questions: the essence of Christianity along with key passages for you to look at and fact-check me. Although I am sure you've come across this before in other forms, I'm being deliberate on how I present the details to highlight the essence for you.

1) At the core of the biblical message, Genesis through Revelation, is a community of agape. The Father and Son loving one another through the Spirit. So the first thing to recognize is that before anything else even existed, self-giving, other-focused love was going on. According to 1 John 4:8 , God IS agape, he doesn't just have or give it. Yahweh is a divine community of love so love has always existed.

Key passages: Genesis 1:1-2, John 1:1-3 & 14, John 17:5, John 5:20, 1 John 5:1, Matthew 28:19, 2 Corinthians 3:18, John 14:26.​

2) Out of the overflow of that love (not out of need or of lack), Yahweh (the Divine community of three persons) created everything in order to pour out more love. Creation is portrayed as a joint work, but also as was a gift from the Father to the Son. Yahweh loves his creation and called it very good.

Key passage: Colossians 1:16 (esp. 16b), John 3:16, Genesis 1:31​

3) God created humanity (male and female) as his counterparts on earth to extend the goodness of the Garden, his good, creative rule beyond the garden. A solitary being could not "image" Yahweh , because The Father, Son and Spirit have always existed together. Therefore Humanity was created as a two-fold, complimentary unity of man and woman. Each one unique from but also like the other. Each is indispensable within the community of love that generates new life (new human families and new human culture), just like Yahweh.

Key passages: Genesis 1:26-28, Genesis 2:18-24, Galatians 3:28, 1 Peter 3:7​

4) Sin is anti-agape, the taking from others to enlarge the self. When humanity chose to distrust the Creator who made them in favor of a deceiver's words, they ceased to receive God's love and goodness as a gift and began to redefine good and evil to suit ourselves. Disconnected from the only source of life (Yahweh), we are doomed to death-producing thoughts, desires, and actions. We turn people into objects for our pleasure or into obstacles to our happiness. Sin always kills people and destroys relationships. Men abuse women, women manipulate men, the strong enslave the weak, the weak pass the buck on to those who are weaker. Death and other-destroying, self-focusedness is antithetical to Yahweh and cannot be with Him.

Key passages: Genesis 3, Genesis 4, Genesis 6:5, Romans 1:18-32, Titus 3:3, 1 Cor. 6:9-10​

5) But Yahweh is the Faithful God who has persistent, loyal agape-love toward's his rebellious creatures. Yahweh always takes the initiative in love. He entered into a relational covenant of loyal love with a particular line of humans. Through them, he promised to send a rescuer and bless all the people of the earth, drawing them back into relationship with himself. As a highly relational being, he talks to some of them, shows them his faithful love in mighty acts, has them record his words, and continues to make and keep promises pointing to a coming Divine King who will destroy sin and death by taking the consequences of sin on himself.

Key passages: Genesis 12:2-3, Psalm 2:1-8, Psalm 22, Isaiah 53, 1 Corinthians 13, Hebrews 1:1-2, Romans 3:21-26, Hebrews 2:9​

6) At the right time, the Father sent the Son into the world, empowered by the Spirit to accomplish this reconciliation and renewal, the final word on God's deep self-giving love through his death on the cross.
Key Passages: Romans 5:8, Galatians 4:4, Philippians 2:5-11,

7) All who reverse the disloyalty in the garden by once again trusting that God has reconciled humanity to him in Christ are adopted into God's Divine family. We receive the Holy Spirit as a seal guaranteeing eternal life and empowering a new life of agape love within a community of love, the church. We love others because we have been loved already. We can even live to benefit our enemies, just like Jesus.

Key Passages: John 5:39-40, Jon 6:35-40, Ephesians 1:3-14, Ephesians 4:20-24, Titus 3:4-7, 1 Peter 1:3-5, 2 Peter 1:3-4, John 13:34, Romans 12:10, Philippians 2:1-4, 1 John 4:19​

To summarize: the center of the whole biblical narrative is agape, interpersonal self-giving, other-focused active love. The tri-personal Divine community delighted in agape love before anything existed, created out of that agape in order to share more love with more persons. Now, in Christ, we are reconciled back to interpersonal relationship in which we are loved and we live empowered by that love with the assurance that this will continue beyond the grave. The two big commands Jesus emphasized are : agape Yahweh with everything you have, and agape your neighbor as if they were you! (Matthew 22:37)

 

[Ttalkkugjil]

To be Lord, equal with God, and yet to be David's Son, according to the flesh, to have divinity and humanity combined in one person, that's prophecy's Messiah.

And what the Jews couldn't grasp, which made them speechless, is our comfort.

That's appreciating Jesus' person and knowing whose Son he is, namely, David's Son; for he's a man, and also David's Lord, as he that's sitting at God's right hand and has his enemies, death, hell and sin, as a footstool.

So, we who are in salvation's need, let us seek it with David's Son and Lord, there we'll find it.

It's impossible to know God unless we know Christ.

Here we see God's mercy, that God delivers God's Son into the cross' death for us, so that we, through him, should live.

That's a love, which no one can know unless they know Jesus.

 

[PaulCyp1]

You have discovered the inadequacy of several versions of Protestantism to provide the answers you need. Since you undoubtedly read the Bible, you must know that Protestantism exists in direct contradiction to the stated will of Jesus Christ concerning His followers - "that they all may be ONE, even as I and my heavenly Father are ONE". You know that Jesus founded ONE Church, said it was to remain ONE, and promised that ONE Church that it would teach the fullness of God's truth until the end of time. He told its leadership "The Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth", and "Whatsoever you bind upon Earth is bound in Heaven", and "He who hears you hears Me". So why haven't you done the obvious? Leave unauthorized conflicting manmade denominational religion behind, and go to the one source of truth Jesus Christ provided for us - the one Church He founded, which remains one in belief, one in teaching, one in worship, one in biblical understanding throughout the world after 2,000 years, with no conflicting denominations.

 

[bbbbbbb]

You have discovered the inadequacy of several versions of Protestantism to provide the answers you need. Since you undoubtedly read the Bible, you must know that Protestantism exists in direct contradiction to the stated will of Jesus Christ concerning His followers - "that they all may be ONE, even as I and my heavenly Father are ONE". You know that Jesus founded ONE Church, said it was to remain ONE, and promised that ONE Church that it would teach the fullness of God's truth until the end of time. He told its leadership "The Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth", and "Whatsoever you bind upon Earth is bound in Heaven", and "He who hears you hears Me". So why haven't you done the obvious? Leave unauthorized conflicting manmade denominational religion behind, and go to the one source of truth Jesus Christ provided for us - the one Church He founded, which remains one in belief, one in teaching, one in worship, one in biblical understanding throughout the world after 2,000 years, with no conflicting denominations.

It really saddens me to know that you and your denomination have separated yourselves from the ONE Church when you walked away from that church in the Great Schism. When do you (personally) plan to repent and join the ONE Church?

 

[Unnamed Guy]

We have been given a book to explain everything we need to know, but people firmly insist on making up their own doctrines. It is not reliable to let people tell you what the bible says. Many people will make up stuff because they don't know what it says, and many will make up stuff because they wish it would not say what it says. You just have to read it for yourself.

Read a chapter of Proverbs every day. Proverbs has 31 chapters so you can keep your place by just looking at a calendar. There is no religion or nothing in Proverbs and you don't have to believe anything. Just read to find wisdom. When you are comfortable with that, then read the bible from Romans to 2 Thessalonians over and over until you start to remember what it says. That is the part that applies to Christians.

Here is the answer to your question:

Romans 10:9-10 King James Version (KJV)
9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.

Nothing there about repenting, or doing good deeds, or sexism, ... It says the same to you as it says to anybody else.

 

[Unnamed Guy]

And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

To understand the bible, the first thing you have to get straight is TO WHOM IT IS ADDRESSED. Some people think the whole bible is addressed to everybody everywhere. Not so. Portions of the bible are addressed to Jews, gentiles, the church, and other groups. If you look up the verses that people quote about women in the church you will find that they are addressed to prophets, bishops, and teachers, instructing them to tell their wives to mind their manners and don't interrupt services. In other verses you learn that lots of women were highly respected leaders and teachers in the early Christian church. (Search "Priscilla".)

Tell your male intermediaries to read their bibles and stop bugging you.

 

[Monk Brendan]

Its surprising that so many people who talk this way do not realize the most obvious fact about it--IT IS POSSIBLE THAT ONE OR MORE OF THEM DO HAVE IT RIGHT.

True, Albion. And the Pre-Reformation Churches have it right.

 

[bbbbbbb]

True, Albion. And the Pre-Reformation Churches have it right.

I suppose that would include the Oriental Orthodox, the Nestorians, the Copts, and the Mar Thoma churches, to name just a few.

 

[Jonaitis]

What is the essence of Christianity?

The person and work of Jesus Christ on behalf of sinners.

 

[aiki]

It got me thinking, even back to the bigger picture -- what, then, IS the essence of Christianity, and what does Christianity offer that other world views or religions don't? Why is there such division in Christianity when the Apostle Paul told us not to have all these divisions? And as a woman, how especially do I deal with all of this, when Eve's curse is upon me? How can I figure out the truth when I'm supposed to have a male intermediary to decide my beliefs for me (women must submit to men authorities, and cannot come to Christ on their own), and yet all my male intermediaries would war over very different theological views, coming to completely logically contradictory conclusions?

Seems madness to me...

It seems to me that the simplest way you could cut through all the doctrinal nonsense that has crowded into your life is to become a careful student of Scripture for yourself. It doesn't matter what Lutherans, or Calvinists, or Pentecostals say; what matters is what the Bible says. Read 2 Timothy 3:16-17, Psalms 1, Psalms 119:105 and Matthew 4:4.

The essence of Christianity is a Person: Jesus Christ. As Paul wrote, "For to me to live is Christ..." (Philippians 1:21) Jesus himself said, "For without me you can do nothing." (John 15:5) At the very core of Christianity stands the Saviour. There is no Christianity without him.

Christianity offers to the World the truth about God and Man and the relationship between the two. All other religions offer counterfeits of this truth.

The divisions within evangelical Christianity are not nearly as profound as some try to make them seem. Many of the evangelical Protestant churches in my home city preach the same Gospel, hold to the same Trinitarian view of God, and preach the same virtues of holiness, love, faith, grace and peace. They may differ on peripherals - church governance, eschatology, worship style, etc - but the core truths of Christianity are held in common by a wide spectrum of evangelical Protestant denominations where I live.

Where is it written in Scripture that the only way you may learn the truth of God's word is by way of a male intermediary? I know Scripture pretty well and I have never read any such thing in it. Certainly, there is no command whatsoever in the Bible about women coming to faith in Christ only with the assistance of a man.

 

[bbbbbbb]

What is the essence of Christianity?

The person and work of Jesus Christ on behalf of sinners.

Bingo!!!

 

[david shelby]

Since you undoubtedly read the Bible, you must know that Protestantism exists in direct contradiction to the stated will of Jesus Christ concerning His followers - "that they all may be ONE, even as I and my heavenly Father are ONE".

According to John, Jesus wants us all to be one. According to Matthew (10:34-36), he wants us divided: "Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household."

John in a variety of ways comes off as the least realistic of the gospels, and this is just another one, because the historical reality throughout all time has been division. Even at times when the Catholic church created the perception of being the only church by using the power of the Roman Empire to kill and persecute competing denominations, there were deep philosophical and theological divisions in the Catholic church itself with bishops exiling each other in succession (like Arius and Athanasius) and many other bishops who in turn exiled each other from a particular city by using the power of the governmental arm of the Catholic church. (Not to mention the divisions between the bishops of the current pope over divorce and so on right now.) There has always been division and always will be, so Matthew's quotation of Jesus as saying it is his will for us to be divided is more believable than John's purported quote that Jesus wants us united.