Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The Methodist Church and the LGBTQ question

Bristoe - our church these days is not Lutheran, but we have a bunch of experience from the past. Your comments about the variants (synods) seem to be right on the mark.

If we go back to Jesus, he was a Jew. The first Christians were Jews and did not think they were leaving Judaism. So I am going to have to believe we have converted to Judaism and believe Jesus is who he claimed to be. The rest of the unbelieving Jews (and Moslems, and wayward Christians) will believe before long.

Isn't the foundation of the reformation church the Roman Catholic church? Luther and other reformers identified with it, came from within it, and attempted to reform it. It was certain doctrines within the Roman Catholic church that they protested. How can this agree with the principle of Solus Christus? "For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ."

Was the Roman Catholic church God's institution on earth? Did it simply have some errors that needed to be reformed? Or had the Catholic church in Luther's time originated as the State Church of the Roman Empire through Constantine I's Edict of Milan and Edict of Thessalonica? With a Protestant and Reformed identity, isn't the history and origin of a Lutheran identity inextricably linked to the Roman Catholic institution?

Is the Roman Catholic church the great whore that sitteth upon many waters, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication, with the name written upon her forehead, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH? I'm not asserting that these are one and the same, but there is a lot of evidence that causes me concern. I can certainly see protesting something like Romanism and Papism, but why would I want to identify with something that only tried to fix a few things with it? The history has something to learn from, but what value is that identity offering the people of God?

Can you condense this down to a few key points?

At the same time, it's necessary that they never be told that their sin is acceptable. The idea is to bring them to repentance. That's how Jesus did it. He came for the sinners and he cured them. At no time did he tell them that they could continue sinning and be ok.

Apostle Peter clearly disagreed with you. He made this issue crystal clear at the First Jerusalem Council when he said that it is through the grace of Jesus that Jews are saved, just as the Gentiles are. Grace…not the Mosaic Law.

And James (Jesus’ own brother) clearly disagreed with you. He also made this issue crystal clear at this same Council when he said that the early church should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God by requiring them to convert to Judaism.

The implication of both Peter and James (both Jews, and both leaders in the early Jesus movement) is that Jesus-following Jews must move in the same direction as the Gentiles and stop expecting the Gentiles to move in the direction of the Jews.

Grace…not the Mosaic Law.
NEW Covenant…not the old covenant.

Sure. If the Catholic church is the great whore, then the Lutheran church is a harlot and abomination of the earth because she is its mother.

And is the mother of every Protestant Church ever conceived,...including the snake handling Pentecostals.

But I'm not in agreement with your take on the book of Revelations.

LIQUOR GUNS BACON & TITS

Not every church is Catholic or Protestant though.

To be sure, it was a suppositional 'take.' If you don't agree with it, how certain are you?

Bristoe...wtf are you doing?


Dawg!

Need some Nuns and a Monsignor to come in and give these folks some Catechism lessons, eh?

So you're,....like,..a Buddhist or somethin'?

Gonna be a great multitude of people expecting a front row seat finding out they are not invited to the party.

In your opinion, who will be invited?

The thief hanging next to Jesus had the right attitude. He knew he did not live right and was getting what he deserved. A person that is really saved never loses that attitude. They know what they are and have been and that of themselves will never reach the mark. They know they can have life but not of themselves.

There isn’t a church denomination in America that can avoid the Catholic Church in its lineage. Please don’t trot out the pathetic book “Trail of Blood”. They guy tried to make his point and was well intended. I’ve read the book, considered his hypothesis and discussed the issue with people well studied in church history. Baptist doctrine doesn’t have a straight line forward from the NT.

It seems to me that the idea of infidelity is carried through scripture from the beginning of Genesis. God’s people are always unfaithful. The example is always there. It seems to me that we should consider ourselves no better. Redeemed but unfaithful and sinners.

LCMS is definitely not large C catholic. I started studying their doctrine about 7? years ago. Definitely not Catholic. Truth be told, modern Catholic doctrine doesn’t vary much from modern American Evangelical doctrine.

The devil is in charge of just about all mainline denominations, now.

I think that the ELCA jumped the shark decades ago. We’ve never attended one. Several years ago when I lived in Columbia we would drive over to Bowling Green and visit the LCMS there. I’m attending one in Florence now. They are almost identical if not identical in order of service.

From what I’ve studied up on the church has been pretty much unchanged. I think that there are some churches that have moved to a little more modern music but not the praise and worship junk that almost every church out there has adopted.