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Romulus, You are facing a fundamentalist operating on unreasoning credulity, not rationality or reason. You can NOT make any headway with such people. There is no there there.
I know. But I live in hopes.
Actually, I had the feeling that Rbbi1 hadn't quite graduated to the 'fundie' stage of Christianity yet based on some of his/her other posts on the forum. Not that I've read many of them. H/she comes across as being a tad more reasonable than some. Maybe not.
All I want with these folks is a discussion based on the scriptures that have somehow led them to believe that homosexuality is condemned in the Bible. There are only perhaps less than a half-dozen of these so-called 'clobber texts' in the entire Bible that have, unbelievably, caused so much division within the ranks of the mainstream Christian Church. In truth, I don't think the majority of Christians would have the Bible savvy to discuss these issues. This is why most of them go coy when confronted with a challenge to discuss them. Most are like sponges that have just soaked up what they've been indoctrinated with. If my pastor says that the Bible condemns gay people then, by golly, the Bible condemns gay people! And, those who question this mindset are usually considered to be in league with the devil and deserving of the same contempt aimed at gay people.
As far as I know, there are presently no gay people in my life (but, who knows?) although I did share accommodation some years ago with a young Christian guy who was, at the time, 'battling' with his (then) unwanted 'gay' orientation. I was with him during some of his rough patches and I was aware that he just about wore out his knees praying to God to help him deal with it or to make him 'straight'. These people who say (in their sheer ignorance of the subject) that being gay is a choice have evidently never gotten to know a gay person. Well, I DID get to know and to befriend a gay person. And he was a wonderful human being (just 19 at the time) who truly loved his God. To their credit, as his peers at the local church learned of his being gay not one, to my knowledge, made him feel unwelcome to the youth group. To them it didn't make any difference ...it wasn't even an issue. It's as though these young people had not yet been indoctrinated with the condemning side of the adult church-goers. This comes later, apparently.
My friend later accepted his homosexuality and, after graduating from med school, he left the area. He also left the Church (SDA) of which he'd been a member all his life. He knew that 'homosexuality and the Church' was not a good mix and so he felt that there was no other option. While I haven't heard from him in a while I do believe that he's been in a long-term relationship with someone ...a male. He always wanted a serious relationship and was not interested in one night stands.
So, thanks to my relationship with my friend I set out to learn as much as I could about 'THOSE passages of scripture'. I then decided that I would fight the bigots to the best of my ability with the very scriptures that they use to condemn gay people. But, as you say, this is nigh impossible since indoctrination is so often too deeply rooted on some people that a stick of dynamite wouldn't uproot it.
Last edited by RomulusXXV; 03-14-2016 at 01:27 AM..
Very good. Thanks for the link. What a brave man to, probably, now face the ire of (perhaps) many of his congregation. I guess this man is, to many, now <sigh> in league with the devil.
You've no doubt heard the old expression, if ignorance were bliss? Well the writer of this letter, is surely in a blissful state, the Lord have mercy. This problem arises, when man thinks he's smarter than G-d.
Once again, make it according to the pattern. We have a natural pattern (2 in fact, the creation we see is one also, and part of the Word made flesh) by which we can obtain spiritual knowledge in conjunction and COOPERATION with His Spirit. It MAY or MAY NOT, require us to follow it to the letter since the natural temple was destroyed, and because HE is the Lord of the harvest, not us. We can, because creation IS part of the Word, learn spiritual things by comparing natural things HE created, to spiritual principles.
There is wisdom there for the taking in each one of those and the truly wise will search them out. For instance, I'll put the celestial (Spirit) flesh on one of them for you, to help you see Him as He is and always has been. In the eating of shellfish, there is a natural reason for the prohibition against it being given for food. That is, it can make us sick, or depending upon the pathogens in it, kill us.
Aside from that, we are not to partake of it's NATURE, ie. be a bottom feeder who only consumes dead things (and that includes specifically the WORD WITHOUT THE LIFE OF THE SPIRIT IN IT) and is a scavenger. We're not called to be scavengers of any kind, whether they be in the water or on land (unclean animals), or in the air (unclean birds), we're called to be kings who search out a matter and have an abundance of CLEAN MEAT to eat (and to offer) at the table(s) of our heart.
PS. See, you THINK because of what I write, you're railing against a fundamentalist, but what I am is someone who was never joined with them to begin with, never accepted their doctrines that didn't line up, and LEFT very early on in the process because He told me to. So what you see is what happens when someone seeks His FACE (nature) in the Word, WITH THE SPIRIT, and because you hear the Word coming out of my mouth, you assume the death of fundamental error comes with it. Peace
When something goes to the same watering hole as horses, eats from the same trough, leaves the same droppings--why wouldn't it be seen as a horse--maybe a pinto instead of a palomino, but living, feeding with and being nurtured by other horses of the same species--it's hard to see where you could be possibly anything BUT a fundamentalist.
However, you may certainly clarify by providing us with some ideas that don't fit in with the fundamental persuasion. Of the latter, I am an expert, I lived it a long time.
Your support of the "holiness" laws of the Hebrews is quite interesting. Do you think you should kill your children if they curse you? Or do you have an explanation on how that was once a really good thing but now God has discarded it for something "better?" What kind of God changes His mind over that kind of moral issue--acceptance and rejection--and the holiness code was considered all moral issue that separated people into two groups.
I have no doubt men wrote a lot of things in the Bible that were justification for their own sinfulness. They put it onto God--just like you do with your thoughts about gays--it's not you, of course, it's God doing it, you're just the one repeating it. Why is it that when we have a prejudice it is always GOD that backs US up? You have all of christian history to see that is exactly what has happened--with blacks, with women, with people of other religions and even of other faiths within christianity.
Beyond the Sacred Page I seek thee Lord.
People stuck in the sacred pages just haven't had any spiritual growth to open their eyes to God all around them.
No one has rejected God. We have rejected your limited view of God. Your God isn't big enough to escape the pages of your bible. People who see the multitude of flaws in the Scripture have far greater faith than people who see it as a golden calf. We see all the weaknesses, the shortcomings, the sinfulness in it (with God's "blessing" to commit genocide) and yet we continue to believe and to read the Scripture without being drowned in it as is TwinSpin.
I'm not interested in what you believe about the Bible. I'm interested in how you interact with all those "bad" people out there. The ones who are sinners and don't know it. The ones who are homosexuals that believe in God, have trusted their lives to God, and struggled to stay hidden from your condemnation. That's what interests me. Based on the fact that you see me as an outcast for not having your view of the bible says a whole lot about the fundamentalism that you are mired in.
Watch the link in post #521. I put it on another thread a year or so ago. It's by a Southern Baptist pastor who explains why he changed his spiritual views on homosexuality--and, along with his church, were promptly kicked out of the SBC.
And in so doing, apply attributes to Him that are conveniently vague and harmlessly accommodating. Rather than changing and regenerating sinners to the image of Christ, you re-image Christ to fit into a fallen, sinful, and hurting world. The supremacy of Christ also offers the sufficiency of Christ. If repentance and turning from my sin would be painful or inconvenient to me, it's okay, because His grace and mercy is sufficient. Claiming to have a more enlightened view of God because you can carefully wordsmith your false accusations is ludicrous. You can read the Bible continuously for the rest of your life and only begin to discover the treasure that is His sovereignty.
Romulus, You are facing a fundamentalist operating on unreasoning credulity, not rationality or reason. You can NOT make any headway with such people. There is no there there.
And you don't know what a fundamentalist is, if you think I'm one. Peace
When something goes to the same watering hole as horses, eats from the same trough, leaves the same droppings--why wouldn't it be seen as a horse--maybe a pinto instead of a palomino, but living, feeding with and being nurtured by other horses of the same species--it's hard to see where you could be possibly anything BUT a fundamentalist.
However, you may certainly clarify by providing us with some ideas that don't fit in with the fundamental persuasion. Of the latter, I am an expert, I lived it a long time.
Your support of the "holiness" laws of the Hebrews is quite interesting. Do you think you should kill your children if they curse you? Or do you have an explanation on how that was once a really good thing but now God has discarded it for something "better?" What kind of God changes His mind over that kind of moral issue--acceptance and rejection--and the holiness code was considered all moral issue that separated people into two groups.
I have no doubt men wrote a lot of things in the Bible that were justification for their own sinfulness. They put it onto God--just like you do with your thoughts about gays--it's not you, of course, it's God doing it, you're just the one repeating it. Why is it that when we have a prejudice it is always GOD that backs US up? You have all of christian history to see that is exactly what has happened--with blacks, with women, with people of other religions and even of other faiths within christianity.
Beyond the Sacred Page I seek thee Lord.
People stuck in the sacred pages just haven't had any spiritual growth to open their eyes to God all around them.
No one has rejected God. We have rejected your limited view of God. Your God isn't big enough to escape the pages of your bible. People who see the multitude of flaws in the Scripture have far greater faith than people who see it as a golden calf. We see all the weaknesses, the shortcomings, the sinfulness in it (with God's "blessing" to commit genocide) and yet we continue to believe and to read the Scripture without being drowned in it as is TwinSpin.
I'm not interested in what you believe about the Bible. I'm interested in how you interact with all those "bad" people out there. The ones who are sinners and don't know it. The ones who are homosexuals that believe in God, have trusted their lives to God, and struggled to stay hidden from your condemnation. That's what interests me. Based on the fact that you see me as an outcast for not having your view of the bible says a whole lot about the fundamentalism that you are mired in.
Watch the link in post #521. I put it on another thread a year or so ago. It's by a Southern Baptist pastor who explains why he changed his spiritual views on homosexuality--and, along with his church, were promptly kicked out of the SBC.
I already shared with you about the shellfish. Did you receive from it? Did it make you pause and think outside your current box or at least the box you say you crawled out of? Doesn't look like it, because here you are again trying to defend the indefensible, which is man's objection to what G-d wrote.
There's a name for that, and it's called rebellion, plain and simple. But you being a fundie and all at some point, and since "we're" all alike, you'd think you'd know these things already, wouldn't you? Peace
I have read every word and NO WHERE is gay mentioned here. PLEASE HIGHLIGHT IT and actually read the text before cut and pasting it. You can do a search for gay on the bible gateway website.
This reads homosexual, not gay. I will leap to assume you think they are synonymous when this is not true, it is a LIE.
A homosexual is someone involved in a homosexual act, a sex act with someone of the same gender.
This act, in and of itself, is sin. I can be a homosexual if i choose to be, anyone can.
lol! If you can "choose" to be attracted to and fall in love with someone of the same sex, then you're not heterosexual. Which would explain the obsession with gay people.
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Peace