Evangelical Christians?

[Freamon]

It depends what you count as "a Christian". I would agree with you, but many people who would describe themselves as Christian do not fit my definition, which in my eyes is the biblical definition. And others have their own "biblical definition", from mainstream churches to radical groups who think their little group are the only ones doing it right.

For instance don't they act like everyone is going to Heaven in a C of E funeral? I can't imagine them doing otherwise somehow, they'd lose a lot of business!

That's not because they believe everyone is going to heaven, it's because they're hypocrites!

[d000hg]

Jesus gave St Peter the job of running the Church, if you want to follow the teachings of Jesus follow the direct lineage of that Church.

The growth of the infant Christian church, involving Peter, Paul, Barnabus et al is told in the book of Acts primarily, and is heavily characterised by public evangelism and adult conversion/baptism. The letters of Paul continue the theme.
Were you hinting at the whole "Peter was the pope" thing?

[EternalOptimist]

Alpha course... apparently the messianic Jews have their own. It's called the Aleph course.

thats nothing. the church of the FSM have the aplphabeti spaghetti for the first course

[NickFitz]

Even if one accepts that scripture is the True Word of God, one is left with the fact that meaning can only be derived from said scripture - or any verbal communication - by interpretation of the linguistic structures with which such truth is represented. (You're doing that kind of interpretation as you read these words of mine - it's how language works.)

As any person doing such interpretation is subject to all the failings consequent on their limited capacity for understanding, and as most of us aren't likely to be smart enough to understand great wisdom no matter how simply it is expressed, it stands to reason that any interpretation of scripture on which a large number of people agree is almost certainly wrong. Even if one really wise person understands it correctly and tries to explain it in a different way ("exegesis" is the technical term) it would still be the case that the majority of people wouldn't be able to properly understand that explanation either, even though they might think they can, or have.

Therefore, even if it is the case that God has revealed the Absolute Truth to us through scripture, it is also the case that we can only claim to understand such scripture if we assume that we are as smart as God. I seem to recall a story about some cocky angel getting punished for that kind of attitude: "How art thou fallen O Lucifer, Son of the Morning!"

I reckon we'd be better off trying to persuade each other to be good people for the purpose of making things better down here, rather than for the sake of getting a promotion up there.

[NotAllThere]

Jesus gave St Peter the job of running the Church, if you want to follow the teachings of Jesus follow the direct lineage of that Church.

Oh look. A Catholic.

As any person doing such interpretation is subject to all the failings consequent on their limited capacity for understanding, and as most of us aren't likely to be smart enough to understand great wisdom no matter how simply it is expressed, it stands to reason that any interpretation of scripture on which a large number of people agree is almost certainly wrong...

OTOH, if God inspired the scripture, and given that he desires that no-one perish (2 Peter 3:9) , he'd make it understandable to the majority, not an elite of intelligentsia. From 1 Corinthians 1:18-25, it seems that God isn't that impressed with the wisdom of men."Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles". And Jesus said "I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 18:3).

Having read the bible several times, I can say that there are parts that are quite hard to understand. But the vast majority is entirely straightforward.

As far as doing good to get promotion up there, I'm with you on that: Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. (James 1:27) This is what the LORD Almighty said: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other. (Zechariah 7:9-10).

I've not yet tackled the theological immensity of "The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster", nor "The Loose Canon". But it's on my reading list.

[EternalOptimist]

Even if one accepts that scripture .....
exegesis....

If I were God, I would have my word revealed, via prophets, in some mysterious way. Then, knowing that all of my people were not capable of grasping the great wisdom, I would alter the program, so that , for this one exception, they were all capable of grasping my wise words.
I would give it a name - I would call it a miracle


Dont bandy legs with your LORD mr fitz

[d000hg]

The belief that all non-christians will go to hell kind of suggests so, I guess.

Many would say Christianity doesn't claim that either of course.

Many? Not many Christians would say that.

Just returning to this, Roman Catholicism teaches "salvation through works" or in English "get to heaven by being nice/good". This is to my knowledge the biggest difference between R.C and protestantism.

[d000hg]

thats nothing. the church of the FSM have the aplphabeti spaghetti for the first course

Thanks EO. It's nice to be reminded we can make fun in a non-offensive way.

[d000hg]

Even if one accepts that scripture is the True Word of God, one is left with the fact that meaning can only be derived from said scripture - or any verbal communication - by interpretation of the linguistic structures with which such truth is represented. (You're doing that kind of interpretation as you read these words of mine - it's how language works.)

As any person doing such interpretation is subject to all the failings consequent on their limited capacity for understanding, and as most of us aren't likely to be smart enough to understand great wisdom no matter how simply it is expressed, it stands to reason that any interpretation of scripture on which a large number of people agree is almost certainly wrong. Even if one really wise person understands it correctly and tries to explain it in a different way ("exegesis" is the technical term) it would still be the case that the majority of people wouldn't be able to properly understand that explanation either, even though they might think they can, or have.

Therefore, even if it is the case that God has revealed the Absolute Truth to us through scripture, it is also the case that we can only claim to understand such scripture if we assume that we are as smart as God. I seem to recall a story about some cocky angel getting punished for that kind of attitude: "How art thou fallen O Lucifer, Son of the Morning!"

I reckon we'd be better off trying to persuade each other to be good people for the purpose of making things better down here, rather than for the sake of getting a promotion up there.

It's a good argument, but Nick how would you reveal Absolute Truth in a way that doesn't suffer from human interpretation "signal degradation", when everything we perceive in any way comes through our sensory & mental filters?

[NotAllThere]

Gödel said that while we can not comprehend the totality of the ultimate infinite without ourselves being infinite, we can definitely (!) understand aspects of it.