Help me out here!!!!

[Volksgrenadier]

.... wisdom

Live well, die well, and take your shot at Valhalla.

[billvau]

Whoa, Bill you got some strange theology there. Why would anyone need to make peace with a loving and nurturing God? You do believe in a God of Love don't you? So you maybe have some unresolved angry father issues? You spend far too much time with Paul and not nearly enough time with Jesus, but that is what most evangelicals do.

When one uses the Bible in context it is not "strange theology." You haven't shown any of the verses that I've used to to support my points to be wrong, so I have no "proof" from you that my theology is wrong. You haven't quoted Scripture in context, so you're the one without a biblical theology. So far, you're just giving us your opinions. I do believe in a God of Love who loved the world so much that He sent His Son to DIE for us? Why die? Because God ALSO is a God of Righteousness, Justice, and Wrath - a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29). Jesus spoke more about hell, eternal fire, damnation, etc. than ALL the other authors of Scripture put together! It was He who told us: Matt.10:28 Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." I'd suggest that you stop personally attacking me and fear God. If all you see is the love of Christ, you're selectively reading the Gospels.

I love your phrase "not to offend you". Do you really believe that if you add that phrase to an insult you make it OK? Where did you learn that? Certainly not from Jesus. But hey, tell me by whose or what authority do you get to decide whose theology is or is not a Christian? Do you have an actual degree from a seminary or are you one of those self proclaimed/self ordained pastors? I notice you are no longer calling yourself "Pastor Bill". Is there a reason for that?

In answer to your question:

I actually have many answers but the simplest one is that I would tell God "Because I am your beloved, child."

How does the Bible tell you to answer that question?

God bless,
Bill, Pastor Bill, Servant of Christ, Man in Christ, Slave of Christ, Undeserving Sinner saved by Christ.

[RozaShanina]

Amen.

He's just plain wrong. Jesus Christ is the easy answer (Ephesians 1:3). The mystery has been revealed (Eph. 3:1-10; Colossians 1:25-27) through Paul.

God is not the object of our knowledge. He's the source of our knowledge through Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 1:30; Col. 2:2-3) and the object of our worship (Rom 11:36).

God is not the cause of our wonder because He is not a God of confusion (1 Cor. 14:33). He has given us everything pertaining to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3).

Sorry, but this guy is putting forth spiritual jibberish and nonsense. Jesus Christ is all (Col. 3:11) and He's all you need.

Bill

Bill you seem pretty confused here. On the one hand you say I have not given you my biblical theology and on the other hand you say my theology is unbiblical and hence unChristian. Bill, you know nothing of my theology or my belief.

Your theology from what I have seen here seems to focus pretty much on appeasing an angry and wrathful God. You seem to focus on hell and judgement which leads me to believe that you have angry father issues. A good therapist can probably help you with that. I want you to know the wonderful deep and wide love of God for you and for all humanity.

You ask why I have not posted my bible verses. As I patiently explained to you, Bill. Ripping verses out of context and stringing them together is really a terrible way to interpret scripture. Let me give you an example. What I said in my original post is the "God is not so much the object of our knowledge as the cause of our wonder" A reasonable definition of wonder would be:

noun
1.
a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable.
"he had stood in front of it, observing the intricacy of the ironwork with the wonder of a child"
synonyms: awe, admiration, wonderment, fascination;
verb
1.
desire or be curious to know something.
"how many times have I written that, I wonder?"
synonyms: ponder, think about, meditate on, reflect on, muse on, puzzle over, speculate about, conjecture; be curious about
"I wondered what was on her mind"
2.
feel admiration and amazement; marvel.
"people stood by and wondered at such bravery"
synonyms: marvel, be amazed, be astonished, stand in awe, be dumbfounded, gape, goggle; informalbe flabbergasted
"people wondered at such bravery"

That pretty much describes our feelings toward the God who is all in all and above all and created the heavens and the earth. But you took great offense to that. You called it "wrong" and "gibberish" and "nonsense". You based your claim on Paul's first letter to the church in Corinth. You said:

God is not the cause of our wonder because He is not a God of confusion (1 Cor. 14:33).

Now I assume your point is that God has revealed Himself fully in Jesus Christ and hence there is no mystery and no wonder. But you misuse badly that passage from Corinthians. Putting it in context Paul was writing to the church in Corinth because it was a morass of conflict and strife. And the context of that specific passage you cited was that people who were prophesying were not waiting for others to finish before they began with their own prophesy and so everyone was speaking at once and there was mass confusion (pun intended). What Paul is telling them in this passage is wait for the other guy to finish before you start, because God is a God of peace not confusion. In other word Paul is primarily referring to the behavior of the people not to the attributes of God. This verse simply does not mean or say what you claim is says or stands for. By the way Bill, are women allowed to speak in your church? Because the next verse says this:

women should be silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as the law also says. If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.

I would love to see how you handle that one.

You see Bill, we humans must always approach God with wonder and awe because we can never fully know God this side of the Jordan. As God tells the prophet Isaiah:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8-9

Even your beloved Paul admits he does not fully know God:

For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.
-- 1 Corinthians 13:12

I hope this if helpful for you, Bill and good luck with your journey.

[RAMCLAP]

Luke 13:1
Call to Repent

1Now on the same occasion there were some present who reported to Him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mixed with their sacrifices. 2And Jesus said to them, “Do you suppose that these Galileans were greater sinners than all other Galileans because they suffered this fate? 3“I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish. 4“Or do you suppose that those eighteen on whom the tower in Siloam fell and killed them were worse culprits than all the men who live in Jerusalem? 5“I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will all likewise perish.”
6And He began telling this parable: “A man had a fig tree which had been planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and did not find any. 7“And he said to the vineyard-keeper, ‘Behold, for three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree without finding any. Cut it down! Why does it even use up the ground?’ 8“And he answered and said to him, ‘Let it alone, sir, for this year too, until I dig around it and put in fertilizer; 9and if it bears fruit next year, fine; but if not, cut it down.’”

So, yes He is a very wrathful God. Christ is the only thing between that wrathful God and all people going to Hell. That friends is the Gospel. The good news that there is a way to Salvation and His name is Jesus. Otherwise it is Hell for all. This is the message of the Bible. It is not another message. To be SAVED means to be SAVED FROM HELL. Again, context is king. Pulling out passages to suit your own version of salvation is no salvation at all. Repentance is required.

[RozaShanina]

So sad that you know so much about the Bible and so little about God.

Blessings.

[RAMCLAP]

Yes. I'm deprived.

[billvau]

Bill you seem pretty confused here. On the one hand you say I have not given you my biblical theology and on the other hand you say my theology is unbiblical and hence unChristian. Bill, you know nothing of my theology or my belief.

Not confused at all. 1. You have not given me any Biblically-based theology. That means you have not quoted Scripture in your arguments. 2. But, you have made arguments/reasonings and I've pointed out that they disagree with what the Bible teaches, in context. Hence, unbiblical. 3.Yes, I do know some of your theology because of what I just said in #2. Your arguments and reasonings tell me that. That's the point of Romans 2:1-4. When people say/write things they give away their standards/beliefs. If I say my 5'1" wife is short, then you know something, but not everything about my standard of tallness. If I say my 5'9" brother is short, then you know more about my standard. On and on. Our comments, arguments, reasonings, criticisms given away what we believe. Not entirely, but in your case, as well as all the rest of us, we learn a lot about a person's theology during these discussions.

Your theology from what I have seen here seems to focus pretty much on appeasing an angry and wrathful God. You seem to focus on hell and judgement which leads me to believe that you have angry father issues. A good therapist can probably help you with that. I want you to know the wonderful deep and wide love of God for you and for all humanity.

I know what I've written and why. You may a strong statement about God being a God of love. He is, but I RESPONDED just to point out that God is also a God of righteousness, justice, wrath, etc. All things God has directly revealed in Scripture about Himself. You have a partial, biased view. So, your conclusion is wrong.

You ask why I have not posted my bible verses. As I patiently explained to you, Bill. Ripping verses out of context and stringing them together is really a terrible way to interpret scripture. Let me give you an example. What I said in my original post is the "God is not so much the object of our knowledge as the cause of our wonder"

I haven't asked you to use verses that are ripped out of context, etc. BUT, when you don't refer to objective knowledge outside of yourself as reference, you are merely stating your opinion. I've asked that you use Scripture - in context and properly interpreted. AND, show me where my use of Scripture is wrong.

A reasonable definition of wonder would be:

That pretty much describes our feelings toward the God who is all in all and above all and created the heavens and the earth. But you took great offense to that. You called it "wrong" and "gibberish" and "nonsense".

Go back to my post, I called that guy's WHOLE statement wrong, spiritual gibberish and nonsense. Specifically, the point about wonder, this guy contrasted wonder to God being the object of our knowledge. I wrote, "God is not the cause of our wonder because He is not a God of confusion (1 Cor. 14:33). He has given us everything pertaining to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3)." If you want to use "wonder" in the sense of "awe," then we can say we are in "awe" of God BECAUSE OF His revealed KNOWLEDGE to us about who He is and how omnipotent/omniscient He is. Because He is the object and source of our knowledge (Epistemology), we can be in awe of Him. This guy was contrasting these, which is not biblical.

You based your claim on Paul's first letter to the church in Corinth. You said:

Now I assume your point is that God has revealed Himself fully in Jesus Christ and hence there is no mystery and no wonder. But you misuse badly that passage from Corinthians. Putting it in context Paul was writing to the church in Corinth because it was a morass of conflict and strife. And the context of that specific passage you cited was that people who were prophesying were not waiting for others to finish before they began with their own prophesy and so everyone was speaking at once and there was mass confusion (pun intended). What Paul is telling them in this passage is wait for the other guy to finish before you start, because God is a God of peace not confusion. In other word Paul is primarily referring to the behavior of the people not to the attributes of God. This verse simply does not mean or say what you claim is says or stands for. By the way Bill, are women allowed to speak in your church? Because the next verse says this: I would love to see how you handle that one.

NO, I never said God has revealed Himself "fully" in Christ. God is infinite and we can never know Him fully. He is God and we are not. You've put in "fully" several places and that's not what I've stated about us knowing Him.

Do the exegesis of 1 Cor. 14:33. What's the first word of the verse? A: "for." What you have here is a situation described in the verses before v.33 - WITH Paul's solution. Then, Paul puts forth the theological basis for his solution. The theological basis is independent of the situation. It was the doctrine that Paul used to reach his solution. So, the fact that God is not a God of confusion can be applied to other places too.

You see Bill, we humans must always approach God with wonder and awe because we can never fully know God this side of the Jordan. As God tells the prophet Isaiah:

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
nor are your ways my ways, says the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts. Isaiah 55:8-9

Even your beloved Paul admits he does not fully know God:

For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.
-- 1 Corinthians 13:12

This fits with my previous response. Never said we "fully" know God. We cannot. But, even Paul's use of "fully" in v.12 does not mean that we will know everything there is to know about God. Knowing God is not the context. What is?

I hope this if helpful for you, Bill and good luck with your journey.

Sorry, but there is no such thing as luck (Prov. 16:33). He who began a good work me will complete it (Phil. 1:6) but I also am expected to work out my sanctification with fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12).

I hope that my Biblical response have been helpful to you. It's been helpful to me to bring all this back to mind and write it.

I've enjoyed the discussion. Thanks. I've to got go and haven't done a thorough review. Sorry. I leave out words often. let me know if something isn't clear. Thanks.

Bill

[RozaShanina]

Pretty much the kind of word salad I expected from you, Bill. If you believe that a robust faith consists of how many ways you can parse the word "for" and telling others they are not Christian -- go for it if it works for you.

As for me I will continue to use the Bible to inform and deepen my rich relationship with God especially as God is revealed in Jesus Christ and focus on God's goodness and blessing. It works for me, so toodles.

[billvau]

Pretty much the kind of word salad I expected from you, Bill. If you believe that a robust faith consists of how many ways you can parse the word "for" and telling others they are not Christian -- go for it if it works for you.

As for me I will continue to use the Bible to inform and deepen my rich relationship with God especially as God is revealed in Jesus Christ and focus on God's goodness and blessing. It works for me, so toodles.

Thanks for the insults and attacks. Your approach may work for you but, unfortunately, it doesn't work for God. Those "for" references are important so that we don't make up our own interpretation of Scripture. But, since you want to do that, you don't like Biblically-based, exegetical responses.

So be it. Your responses stand as a testimony to what's in your heart, so I'll just leave it for others to see vs. the Word of our Lord.

In Christ,
Pastor Bill

[RozaShanina]

Thanks for the insults and attacks. Your approach may work for you but, unfortunately, it doesn't work for God. Those "for" references are important so that we don't make up our own interpretation of Scripture. But, since you want to do that, you don't like Biblically-based, exegetical responses.

So be it. Your responses stand as a testimony to what's in your heart, so I'll just leave it for others to see vs. the Word of our Lord.

In Christ,
Pastor Bill

John 5:39-40 Pretty much says it all.