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No worries. Just trying to understand . . . God's name isn't something I ever tend to use. Here is a slightly tongue-in-cheek version of Exodus 3:13-14: But Moses said to God, ‘If I come to the Israelites and say to them, “The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,” and they ask me, “What...

Then stop engaging me if you feel that way.

Not at all the same thing. If I tell you "don't swing at a pitch in the dirt" -- a matter the Bible is silent on (baseball wasn't invented yet) -- are you going to swing away at such pitches because of lack of a Biblical command to not do so?

I won't be offended by an answer which is "unBiblical" in the sense of not being found in the Bible. If his answer is "unBiblical" in the sense of being contradicted by the Bible, that's a different matter.

Yes I am serious. I really want to know why @MatthewG prefers "Yahavah" to "God." Do you have some objection to my asking him this?

OK, don't answer my question. That's fine.

Do you have some objection to using "God" instead of "Yahavah" when you post?

Thanks. Can you answer my question now? Did God dictate every word, or were the writers free to exercise discretion on how they expressed their revelations?

@Jack, I am curious to know your view on this: Is the Bible the word of God in the sense of God telling the writers each word to write? Or did they exercise their own discretion in choosing those words?

I don't do that. The theological message of the gospel is what I embrace. And that does not require me to agree that every word written in the Bible is literally the word of God.

I wasn't in Thessalonika 2,000 years ago when Paul transmitted "the word of God which you heard from us" to those Thessalonians a year or so before he penned this letter, but I am happy to assume that whatever he told those Thessalonians was -- exactly as he writes a year or so later -- "in...

My definition of inspired writings is akin to Paul's in 2 Tim. 3:16: "God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness."

I am not saying that at all.

I didn't say "inspired by men." I said "by inspired men." The burden of proof is on those who claim that the Bible is the literal Word of God rather than the words of men inspired by God to write what they wrote. But I can point you to inconsistencies and errors in the Bible, if that helps to...

In my estimation Jesus is God (I am a Trinitarian). And in my estimation the Bible is a collection of inspired writings written by inspired men, but it is a mistake to treat them the same as through they were handed down on stone tablets from Mount Sinai. The sense in which these inspired...

JESUS said this? Silly me, all these years I thought JUDE said this!

Let me propose a different conclusion: "Your view that Eph. 2:8 supports the notion that faith is a gift is simply wrong." No need to go further and conclude that if Eph. 2:8 doesn't say faith is a gift, then faith can't be a gift.

Plenty of them are here, myself included. (I am Episcopalian, although raised Roman Catholic.)

Oh, the irony! You've just furnished proof of being a babe in Christ with this very comment. Ponder a bit on Philippians 2:3, learn some humility, and grow in Christ.

I sure don't want to see any babies killed, unless necessary to save the life of the mother or in the case of rape.