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Pastimes : Ask God -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Emile Vidrine who wrote (21951)	11/15/1998 4:07:00 PM
From: mark silvers	Respond to of 39621

Emile, Okay, I admit to a severe lack of discipline and am posting to you again:-) If the bible is not God's exact words, and is instead parable as you say, then it is open to intepretation. all parable is subject to interpretation. Now you must ask yourself, Why did God give his message in a forum that is 100% open to interpretation, and can therefore have no uniformly 100% correct or incorrect meaning? Remember the bible must be equally for all people, and there can be no uniform or 100% answer to so many people from so many diverse backgrounds.God, more than anyone must know that everyone will hve different answers and different interpretations. Is it because we must all look within ourselves for the answers? answers and paths that are as individualistic as we all are? Emile, I think I would like to be the first to say welcome to the new Agers of America, as it appears to be the logical conclusion of your journey. Congrats, I'll have Shirley Maclaine fix you a plate, just take a seat in the corner, buddy. mark

To: Emile Vidrine who wrote (21951)	11/15/1998 5:26:00 PM
From: Emile Vidrine	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 39621

Let us continue Sam. What is the relationship of my faith and all of this discussion on the credibility of the Gospels. It is true that my faith does not hang on the demonstrable credibility of these documents in every detail. It does, however, hang on their overal essential credibility. The Jesu that lives in my heart cannot not be completely different than the Jesus of these dcouments, otherwise the Jesus in my heart would be different than I think he is. So, the certitude of my faith is established both by both my experience with Christ in worship and living as well as my examination of Christ in the Gospels which are in essential agreement. The Christian faith is, at the bottom, a loving trusting relationship with Christ and his Body, a relationship that goes far beyond a hypothetical assessment of the New Testament documents. At the same time, my faith is definitely not divorced from these essential and fundamental documents in the New Testament. A good analogy would be our relationship to our brothers and sisters. We have our baptismal documents and the marriage documents of our parents to establish our relationship but our relationship goes way beyone these documents because it is a living relationship. The same holds for our relationship to Christ. The New Testament documents are essential and form a firm foundation but are not all inclusive of the life in Christ. Let us now look at the constgruction and consistency of the Gospels. We can begin with Luke since he was probably not one of the original disciples. Is it possible to know with any certitude that the words of Jesus recorded in the Gospels are accurate? Most scholare believe that the writters used both oral and written sources to compile the Gospels. (This includes both liberal and conservative scholars.) I think the evidence for this is very strong. But so what. Luke tells us himself that he utilized the sources available to him(Luke1:1-4) Do you think that this dimnishes the credibility of Luke? I think this actually strengthens Luke's credibility since it ties his account more closely with the origian events they are telling us about. When the Apostles composed their Gospels( from 50-7- A.D), research shows that they utilized both written and oral materials that had been circulating for several years before they actually completed their Gospels. The closed these materials are to the evenst of which they speak, the more solid are the claims (historically speaking) that the material is accurate and reliable. The order of the events in all the Gospels varies a great deal but this does not diminish their credibility but rather establishes the fact that the documents are not meant to be technically without error. The Gospel writiers are not trying to give a precise biographical account of the life of Jesus but rather the essential points necessary for salvation. They were written to save people by bringing them into a reltionship with Jesus and not to puff up minds with historical facts. They each paint an historical impressionistic portrait of Jesus and arrange the details to satisfy the essetial points. The Gospels are like songs which are trying to communicate information in lyrics that depend more on the tranformation of the heart than mere mental communication. Does this diminish the Gospels reliability? All the historical works of that time were written in the same fashion. It only means we cant know for sure the exact order in which the events of Jesus life took place but the essential and general order is estblished to communicate the central points. The words of Jesus vary significantly from Gospel to Gospel but this does not mean that they are, in essence, accurate. This only shows that the writers are not twentieth centurey writers obsssessed with irrelevant details while missing the essential points. They paraphrase Jesus in their own words to capture the essence of his words. This all shows just how rich the teachings of Jesus really were. The writers bring out the fundamental theological and personal significance of His life and teachings. They were not interested in producing a tape recording according of all his words but the essence of his words. Only the Holy Spirit could achieve this task through the writiers. The words that they record serve to bring men into a knowledg and personal relationship with Christ. The attempt by modern scholars to arrive at the exat words of Jesus, by vote, is silly, futile and absurd. It is just as absurd for fundamentalist to pretend that their are no contradictions in the bible. Are the Gospels full of essential contradictions as hold? Most of the alleged contradictions are the result of people misusing the Gospels-that is treating them like twentieth century works which work under the tape recording theory of truth rather the the essence of truth. If the Gospels are read in their first century context and the purpose for which they are written, the contradictions disappear. Not because they disappear but because they become instantly irrelevant. The Gospels are trustworthy. There's a lot they don't tell us which, perpshaps, our historical curiosity would like to know. They do tell us, however, all that we need to know and thus force us to answer an all-important question: was Jesus a lunatic, was He a liar, or was He the Lord His followers proclaimed Him to be? The evidence which addreses the mind, and the Spirit of God whicfh adresses the heart, both point to Jesus as our Lord, creator and SAviour.

To: Emile Vidrine who wrote (21951)	11/15/1998 7:41:00 PM
From: Sam Ferguson	Respond to of 39621

I could answer you best if you would number the questions, however, I will attempt to answer a few. No I do not consider the words sacred because they are in the bible. There is reasonable evidence that will demonstrate it was an edition created by the Roman government for their own use in creating a religion to sell the Jews in order to control them. The Romans were well educated in the mythos and where myth is similar to the parable to demonstrate a precept the Romans rewrote them with historical characters. Since they knew past history it was a simple task to rewrite the old testament with prophecies that were already a matter of fact. Mitrhaism was the current religion of the area so they copied most of its teaching to make an easier sell. Some of the principles of the ancients was left intact so all is neither false or true but the bible contains both. The Apostles were not what the name implies but part of the elite who guarded him from the crowds. The Apostle Paul was not an apostle but a master with an entirely Gnostic group and taught the gnostic Christ. The Romans edited his works to agree with theirs and canonized them as their own. Jesus and peter taught Jesus as the historical son, savior and Paul had no use for the apostles or their teaching. Instead he persecuted them until he died and 100 years after his death his gospel was changed and the word Jesus added to his descriptive word of Christos, which was a gnostic spiritual Christ. The Christ of Paul is the true Christos and is the savior that comes to each human individually in the spirit. That is the Christos that dwells in me. No the bible was not written by Jewish zealots it was by Romans. The jews did not buy it and are still being punished today for failure to accept. Hitler was a descendant of Caesar and the Jewish Holacaust was a prime example of that family "getting even." The Romans were clever and used reverse psychology to promote their religion. They wrote the scriptures condemning the Pharisees because the Pharisees were highly religious people teaching humanism and protesting the slavery and taxes. Emile I have tried my best to answer you truthfully. If I missed a question it was not intentional. The general understanding of the Christos in me is always misunderstood. I am not God. I am a dual person consisting of God, and mind and a physical body that is united in the trinity. I am not sinless, I am not perfect. I cannot perform deeds contrary to natural law. I am able to use spiritual powers in me to help me perfect the material body. The truth is "NEITHER COULD JESUS." The parable of the seed illustrates the gospel of humanity better than all the rest of the bible put together. Just dwell on what happens to the seed and ask the God of your heart to help you understand how it demonstrates creation.