tom55 said:
Lets start that discussion by you answering my question in my last post:
How about if you quote the entire passage instead of 8 words of 2 Corinthians 3:6 to fit your agenda?
What is a Western Christian?
Paul was suicidal and craved death to be with Jesus? Who teaches that?
You accuse me of quoting that passage to fit an agenda, when i would just ask you to read It, and apply It where you see fit. If you don't think that that is talking about religious people, who have accepted a model wherein Paul desires to be "absent from his actual physical body (death, wants death, craves death, is suicidal, iow, waiting to "go") to be present with the Lord"
after he dies, and who put Jesus in the streets (19
He will not argue or shout, and no one will hear His voice in the streets) then fine, go with that.
I would welcome your exegesis of the passage, wherein those "who ate and drank in His presence" are disconnected from people who accept and practice ritual communion, and those who proselytize, door-to-door even, are
oblivious, sorry, but just plain oblivious to who "taught in our streets." Not meaning to put anyone down, ok, but we are talking completely oblivious, go ask the next hundred proselytizers, and if one of them associates themselves with this passage, i would like to know.
So, these are Western Christians, as opposed to the tiny little sects of Eastern Christians or other Christians, the
remnants, one might say. Western Christianity, as descended from the RCC, iow. The Big Dogs on the Block, the Builders of Empire, the Pledgers of Allegiance, who don't blink twice at "service" in the military. Who of course must have a model that assures them "to be absent from their own bodies is to be present with the Lord," and disregards that "You do not know where you come from, or where you are going," and about half of the rest of Scripture, too. Completely death-centered model, Jesus saves from a fear of hell--which also cannot be supported in Scripture, without mythological references and mis-translation, all known, the path to making Gehenna in
Erets into a literally fiery "hell" somewhen and where else (to assure people that they know where some "other" people are going, with confidence, and a completely straight face) is very clear, to the briefest seeker--and life starts after you die? And you even have Paul quoted as saying that he cannot wait to
die and go be with the Lord?
So, if i have an agenda, then expose it, by all means. I understand this up there might be kind of hard to read, maybe? depending upon one's sensibilities or what-have-you, defense mechanisms, because of course we don't like to contemplate that "change your mind" actually means what i am implying here, that virtually every premise we hold dear is fodder, and one's spiritual model is manifesting it, their reality, physical from spiritual, is being accomplished today, and the sickle is being put in today, and we are reaping, today, what we have sown yesterday (and that God calls one to be an Anarchist, which of course that has been made into a bad word now, right, that is a Chaos agent, now, and you're supposed to pray for your leaders, which by extension means get invested in that system, and vote for them, and pledge allegiance to them lol. Never mind all that 1Sam8 jazz, who is going to protect us and fight all our battles if we follow what God wants, right).
Of course, if you are confident that you
know where you are going when you die, you don't even have to read this, none of this applies to you, ok, i am talking to someone else anyway, but still it would be interesting to see the...alternate exegesis posted here, just for comparison.
May as well fix "to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord" for me too, while you're at it.
Ty, and HNY btw.