Was the Transfiguration a vision, or an actual appearance of Moses and Elijah?
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Wick Stick
Well-Known Member
It's likely that 1st century Jews viewed it literally. In the Book of 1Enoch, Enoch is shown a place where the deceased martyrs dwell, awaiting their resurrection. Enoch sees them crying out to God for justice for their murders, and in particular the voice of Abel cries out.
The 5th seal in Revelation seems to be a reference to this bit of Enoch.
Wick Stick
Well-Known Member
His argument seems to be founded on grammar, rather than a source.
If it was as he says, the verb should be in the middle voice, rather than active.
LESSON V: Verbs—Introductory.
daedalus.umkc.edu
Wick Stick
Well-Known Member
Others don't necessarily have to reject Damnationism (real word?) or Annihilationism to hear. They just need to not be dogmatically entrenched in one of those positions.
Personally, I find Universalism attractive, and Damnationism repugnant-but-defensible. The most likely position IMO is a combination of Annihilationism and Damnationism, where some few truly wicked souls are damned, but the vast majority of those who were neither particularly good or bad simply cease to exist.
Satan LOVES Universalism and when his messengers attack the clear Bible doctrine of 'burning in FIRE FOREVER'!
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Scripture does present one view….God’s view.
If “all Scripture is inspired of God and beneficial for teaching for reproving, for setting things straight, for disciplining in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be fully competent, completely equipped for every good work”. (2 Tim 3:16-17)….then what happened to undermine our confidence in that?
Interpretation came to divide what was at first, indivisible…..humans put meaning into Scripture to support their own ideas about what it said. Each split off, and denominations, or those who followed the ideas that certain men were promoting, separated “Christians” into what today, has become a joke!
How many truths are there?
I once heard an illustration that I have never forgotten….
The speaker asked…”how can you hide a 40 ft tree out in the middle of a cleared field?”
The answer is…you cannot…..BUT….if you have time up your sleeve, and you plant a whole forest of similar looking trees all around it, in time it will become almost impossible to find the original tree….especially if you never saw the original, but only had it described by various people, who never saw it either.
This, so well describes what happened to Christianity. Jesus told us that the devil would do exactly that.
In his parable of the wheat and the weeds, he said that the devil would sow a counterfeit form of the Christian faith, but that the identity of the weeds would not be obvious right away.
The plant he referred to was believed to be “bearded darnel”…a common weed in the Middle East that was the blight of wheat farmers because in the early growing period, you couldn’t tell the difference…..it came to be called “wheat’s evil twin”…..only once the root systems were established did it become obvious, which by then was too late….the roots of both plants were so entwined that it was impossible to uproot the weeds without taking the wheat with them. An enemy would often oversow his neighbors crop with this weed to ruin his harvest.
Only at the harvest time was the entire crop taken out and the weeds separated out and burned. Then the wheat was harvested and put into the farmer’s storehouse. It made the harvest way more labor intensive than it needed to be….and the weeds took nutrients from the soil that deprived the wheat of what it needed to grow as it should. Even though the harvest was diminished, the farmer still reaped a crop.
Once you become aware of what Jesus warned about, you see Christendom for what she is….counterfeit “Christianity”.…a divided and disunited mess.
“By their fruits” Jesus said we would recognize his true disciples…..so what is Christendom’ “fruitage”?
What are the traits seen in genuine disciples of Christ, as compared to those who use the Scriptures to justify their beliefs and practices that are in direct opposition to what Christ taught?
It’s good to compare, if you’d like to do so.
Like when you proclaimed Jesus' and CYB Statement of Faith warnings of the EVERLASTING FIRE to be Satanic?
amigo de christo
Well-Known Member
Satan has always desired the death of humanity
and thus the sepent decieved eve and adam ate of her hand and so death came upon all .
GOD so loved the world that HE sent the ONLY begotten SON
so that all WHO DO BELIEVE IN HIM , would not perish .
AND yet again came the sepent and spues out
SURELY ye shall not perish , ye shall not be damned if ye beleive not . BUT THE SHEEP DONT HEED that voice .
In fact the sheep heed
THE LORD , HIS TRUTH
which do include the warning to NOT ADD TOO or take FROM that HOLY REVELATION . whcih i might add
says THE LAKE OF FIRE and i might add says UNBLEIVERS go . SO i suggest folks stop with the inclusive univerlalism
and actually start REMINDING of THE DIRE NEED TO BELIEVE ON JESUS and TO learn that bible well for themselves .
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Its marketing really….you have to tear down the other fellows product to sell your own….
What does the Bible really teach…..the truth?.…or someone’s more convenient version of it?
That made me laugh….from whom did the word of God come? And do we think that the one whose power created all things cannot put his instruction manual into the hands of humans and preserve its meaning in spite of what biased translators try to imply?
What kind of powerless god do you worship? Does he bow to the will of men, or do men need to bow to the will of the author of the most powerful book in existence?
Heb 4:12-13…
”For the word of God is alive and exerts power and is sharper than any two-edged sword and pierces even to the dividing of soul and spirit, and of joints from the marrow, and is able to discern thoughts and intentions of the heart. 13 And there is not a creation that is hidden from his sight, but all things are naked and openly exposed to the eyes of the one to whom we must give an account.”
Sobering words when you understand what they mean…..the words of the Bible itself have transforming power, and when we read God’s word and ask for his guidance to understand what we read…..an open heart does not read with an established bias…..when we do that, we tell God about the “thoughts and intentions of our heart”. We want God’s word to say what we want to believe….
Who has to change….us or God? What does John 6:65 actually mean?
Jesus “went on to say: “This is why I have said to you, no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.”
Who is choosing who? Who alone can reveal the truth to one whose heart is open to it?
Matt 25:46…what is the word translated “age-during” here?
”aiōnios”in Greek is translated as “eternal” in most Bibles.
According to Strongs, it means…
- “without beginning and end, that which always has been and always will be
- without beginning
- without end, never to cease, everlasting”
With the separating of the “sheep from the goats”, what leads to everlasting life for one and everlasting death for another? This is what the Bible teaches….opposites are always contrasted.
With the adoption of belief in immortal souls, everlasting life became contrasted with everlasting torture, when the Bible does not teach that at all.
Universalism is not supported in Scripture because the contrast is between life and death…this is the cold hard truth that Universalists cannot accept. God is the Creator of life and has the right to terminate that life if humans or angels fail to obey him. He did not have to give his children free will, but he did and it is this very quality that will divide humanity at the end of the day. By what we accept as truth, we determine our own future. We either fit in with God’s agenda, or we don’t fit in at all.
It’s really that simple.
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Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Does this mean that all the scholars who translated the Bible had no knowledge of this fact?His argument seems to be founded on grammar, rather than a source.
If it was as he says, the verb should be in the middle voice, rather than active.
LESSON V: Verbs—Introductory.
Is it grammar that determines truth, or is knowledge of the whole Bible all we need to determine it?
Readers of God’s word are not all Bible scholars or linguistics experts but they rely on those who study these things to get it right…..how did they all get it wrong? Or is there a bit of tap dancing going on to make a clear and simple statement seem to mean something else? Whose tactic is that?
Indeed!
Thus we see the problem with man's textual criticism laid out before us. Many believe that God inspired men to write God's words and, therefore, 'we better make certain we have “scholars” and “credentialed” “EXPERTS” doing the writing.'
This is why there is the push for 'bigger and better bibles,' that appear "pleasing to the eyes" and "to make one wise," that come with the highest recommendations of the 'scholars' who offer periodic "updates" of their findings to their yes-men and other subscribers. It also explains why those modern versions of the Holy Bible must be copyrighted -- they are not an inspired work of God but works of men who claim owner$hip of them.
We will speak casually for a moment. Let’s take a look at the relevant passage:
And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works. 2 Tim. 3:15-17 AV
Notice that even a child understands the holy scriptures -- no middlemen wanna-be ‘scholars’ required!
Notice that it is God who gives scripture -- not man. Man does not even feature in this verse.
Notice that the purpose of God, giving to man, God’s inspired scripture is so “that the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.”
Notice how God gives scripture -- by inspiration. Nowhere does it say that God inspired men! “All scripture is given by inspiration of God.” God’s Spirit (i.e. inspiration) is the vehicle through which God ‘gives all scripture’ -- God does not give scripture via any man, or by inspiring any man, or by any other means. Thus, God’s scripture has life -- it is alive, it is the living Spirit-filled words of God. Conversely, man does not have life; outside of God, man is dead. Yes, man has breath, but mere breath is not life; whereas God’s Spirit is life. The words of men are mere breaths; whereas God’s word is Life itself. The reality of the inspiration of scripture has no connection with any efforts of man.
This living quality of scripture puzzles those who are not born again. It even puzzles those who are born again but who have had their thought processes impaired by spiritual deception.
It's never been about any "translation" per se. But if wannabe scholars could shift their burden from God's "inspired," "pure" and "preserved" word to man's intellect, then they could proceed to build their ivory towers. Don’t let the wanna-be scholars deceive you by their attempts to shift the inspiration of God’s living Spirit-filled words to man’s mere breath. So the next time you hear, “only the ‘Hebrew and Greek’ is the inspired text,” you’ll know the truth of the matter.
God's pattern has always been the same: He gives the COMMON man the COMMON bible in the COMMON language of the day, to do one thing -- evangelize the world. Acts 2:6 says, "Every man heard them speak in his own language." God has spoken to men around the world through the Majority Text in the English KJ Bible, the German Tepl Bible, the Italian Diodati Bible, the French Olivetan Bible, the Hungarian Erdosi Bible, the Spanish Valera Bible, the Polish Visoly Bible, the De Grave Bible in Holland, the Russian Holy Synodal Bible, the German Luther Bible, and the Gottshcalkson Bible of Iceland.
And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that endureth to the end shall be saved. Mat. 10:22
And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake: but he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. Mark 13:13
And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake. Luke 21:17
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Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Copyrighting God’s word???? This proves that it isn’t God’s word. Charging big dollars for the privilege of owning a Bible? That in itself is a red flag right there. There can be no profit in providing God’s word to the people. Jesus said…”you received free, give free”.
Today there is endless access to any number of Bible translations online for no cost apart from your internet provider’s fee. Therefore there is no excuse for those with internet access to remain in ignorance.
Timothy was raised in a divided home with a Greek father and Jewish mother and grandmother. This proves that even in those circumstances where parents do not share a faith in common, children can still be taught by the believing parent and blessed by God for their adherence to it. Paul praised Timothy for his disposition…he was raised with the reality of Jehovah, and was obedient and compliant….he proved to be a real asset to Paul’s ministry.
Yes, the Bible does not give conflicting advice, nor does it promote conflicting doctrines. We are urged by Jesus to “seek” the truth…and to “keep seeking” it. God knows when someone is a genuine seeker rather than someone who is simply looking to confirm what they already believe by twisting what God’s word says. This is why these forums are good for us….we can examine what we believe and what others believe and search the Scriptures for ourselves to see what resonates in our heart. God is watching.
The truth will not sit well in a hardened heart and nothing will penetrate it. We have those here who are like mindless parrots who ignore whatever does not agree with what they choose to believe…condemning with blood chilling glee, the eternal roasting in hellfire for those who don’t uphold the lies they have been indoctrinated with. Their minds have been corrupted away from the God that Jesus loved and served.
A God of love cannot be a sadist. He has no desire or need to punish the wicked with anything but eternal death. Justice does not demand torture.
Even in the gospel accounts, God did not inspire every word, but allowed the writer to express the truth in his own words...otherwise all the gospels would read the same.
Yes, I agree.
The idea of being “born again” is also a puzzle to many people who are convinced that they are. But so much is based on emotion, not knowledge. Jesus was a teacher and he imparted knowledge so that people could make informed choices about who and what to believe. The knowledge had to come first so that a decision could be made, and confirmed by water baptism….baptism with the holy spirit came after that.
This was very important…..it is called “the language of the heart”….to hear God’s truth in one’s native tongue carries so much more weight of comprehension, and the language barrier is often the cause of many misunderstandings. The disciples who had the gift of speaking in languages they had never learned to preach to the people who had come to Jerusalem from other nations for the festival of Pentecost, were privileged to hear the “good news” in their own language. They then took that good news back with them to their own neighbors and friends.
John 15:18-21….
”If the world hates you, you know that it has hated me before it hated you. 19 If you were part of the world, the world would be fond of what is its own. Now because you are no part of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, for this reason the world hates you. 20 Keep in mind the word I said to you: A slave is not greater than his master. If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you; if they have observed my word, they will also observe yours. 21 But they will do all these things against you on account of my name, because they do not know the One who sent me.”
Powerful words and a warning that ‘the cramped and narrow road’ is a difficult one…..(Matt 7:13-14)
I'm not convinced that God wanted us to have a Bible. It gets in the way of a personal relationship with Him.
[
So, which "God" are you referring to? Don't know?
Totally unBiblical! No surprise!
Wick Stick
Well-Known Member
They didn't get it wrong here. The translation is correct - the English active voice is used to translate Greek active voice.
The issue is just that English is less precise than Greek. It doesn't have a middle voice for its verbs like Greek. So it's impossible to tell by looking at English whether the original is active or middle voice. You can only see that in Greek.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Satan has not really desired the death of humanity…..or he would never achieve his aim to be the god and ruler of this world. He doesn’t care that humans die as a result of his lies, because he and his minions are always out there recruiting replacements.
Yes, and right away God implemented a rescue mission so that Satan’s plans would be undone….but his battle with the devil is fought in universal time, not in earth time…..which is the reason why it seems to be taking so longer to achieve the desired result.
Yes, “PERISH”….to perish means to “destroy something utterly”. “Destroy” is not torture….it’s simply the death penalty, which is what Adam received. No mention was made to him about heaven or hell….just death and a return to the dust.
John 10:28….
”And do not become fearful of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, fear him who can destroy both soul and body in Ge·henʹna.”
“Destroy” is again the operative word. Body and soul are “destroyed” in Gehenna, erroneously translated as “hell”.
There is no “damnation” ever stated in the Bible.
There was a sentence when one was convicted of a crime under Gods law, but the penalty was always in line with the severity of the crime. Sin is inborn in us, so for God to punish us for something that is not our fault, is hardly fair. Isn’t this why Jesus came to make forgiveness possible?
Yes, the sheep do hear the voice of the shepherd….but there are lots of false shepherds out there impersonating the real shepherd…..and they like what they hear, and don’t want to listen.
“The lake of fire” is also called “the second death”…..so what do you think this “lake of fire” is? A torture chamber for the wicked? Is that what God does to his opposers? Or is it a very large recepticle where the wicked sleep, without ever seeing life again? Does Gods justice demand more?
Thats it…learn the truth as taught by Jesus Christ…..stick to what he said and to what he taught his apostles…and you can’t go wrong.
Aunty Jane
Well-Known Member
Is that why he has preserved it for thousands of years, despite many attempts to destroy it and to misrepresent its author? The message is the same as it was when it was written.
How on earth would it prevent having a person relationship with the one who created us and gave us his instructions for a great life? If Adam had followed God’s instructions, we wouldn’t be having this conversation…
“an unlovable tyrant? “Bad news”? good grief! It is not God who is an unlovable tyrant….it is the false religious teachings about God that paint him as an unlovable tyrant. “God is love” remember?
If you were a Landlord and the tenants you allowed to rent your property, completely trashed it, would it be unloving to evict them, and ask for compensation to have the place cleaned and repaired….then once you had it all nice again, and those same tenants applied to rent off you again, would you allow them on your property to do it again?
God is our Landlord and this earth is his property….he sets the rules for tenancy….but this is the only property he owns at present that is fit for human habitation. If we humans have trashed this earth and made war with our neighbors…..what kind of eviction is God entitled to perform…..he has no place to put wicked people and no need to keep them in existence especially if they have no intention of changing their behavior. Why is God not entitled to take away the gift of life…..they do not value it or respect the owner’s property.
Universalism made sure that God was their version of what they thought he should be…..modeled no doubt, after themselves…..
King David knew that his Heavenly Father wanted only the best for him….all of his problems were caused by his own bad decisions……if he had followed God’s advice through his prophets and through his word…..nothing bad would have befallen him…..but God allowed the consequences of his actions to be experienced as a lesson. They are still teaching us today.
So why is it that you always seem to want to find fault with the way God handles himself……why do you have to twist Scripture to make him more…’palatable’ for yourselves?
JW's will learn:
Hebrews 10:31
31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
Everyone will learn, now or in the Fire.
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