Evangelical Support Group

Jar writes:Scripture is referring to ALL inspired writings, not to the Bible which just plain didn't exist.

Jar writes:So again, the question stands until answered, "How would I know it is GOD?"

Websters writes:know knew known know”ing 1 : to perceive directly : have understanding or direct cognition of; also : to recognize the nature of 2 : to be acquainted or familiar with 3 : to be aware of the truth of 4 : to have a practical understanding of ” know”able adj ” know”er n ” in the know : possessing confidential information

Jar writes:I said that Phat's source is likely lying.

Ringo writes:If you're choosing up spiritual sides, how do you know you're on the "right" side?

NIV writes:Rom 3:3-4--What if some did not have faith? Will their lack of faith nullify God's faithfulness? Not at all! Let God be true, and every man a liar.

Ringo writes:Have you really chosen a side? Does either side "need" you?

NIV writes:Acts 17:24-25-- "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else.

PaulK writes:It's those people who refuse to accept knowledge that contradicts their beliefs.

PaulK writes:What you really seem to mean is that you prefer believing that you are right over believing the truth.

Iano writes:This Gospel of Ignorance you refer to is commonly called the Gospel of Grace (as opposed to your Gospel of Works)

MacArthur writes: In the Jesus Movement of the 1960s and '70s, the "One Way" sign-the index finger held high-became a popular icon. "One Way" bumper stickers and lapel pins were everywhere, and the "One Way" slogan for a time became the identifying catchphrase of all evangelicalism.Evangelicalism in those days was an extremely diverse movement. (In some ways it was even more eclectic than it is today.) It encompassed everything from Jesus People, who were an integral part of that era's youth culture, to straight-line fundamentalists, who scorned everything contemporary. But all of them had at least one important thing in common: They knew that Jesus Christ is the only way to heaven. "One Way" seemed an unshakable belief that all evangelicals held in common.That is no longer the case. The evangelical movement of today is no longer unified on this issue. Some who call themselves evangelicals are openly insisting that faith alone in Jesus is not the only way to heaven. They are now convinced that people of all faiths will be in heaven. Others are simply cowardly, embarrassed, or hesitant to affirm the exclusivity of the gospel in an era when inclusivity, pluralism, and tolerance are deemed supreme virtues by the secular world. They imagine it would be a tremendous cultural faux pas to declare that Christianity is the truth and all other faiths are wrong. Apparently, the evangelical movement's biggest fear today is that Christians will be seen as out of harmony with the world.Postmodernism The dominant worldview in secular and academic circles today is called post-modernism. To the postmodernist, reality is whatever the individual imagines it to be. That means what is "true" is determined subjectively by each person, and there is no such thing as objective, authoritative truth that governs or applies to humanity universally. The postmodernist naturally believes it is pointless to argue whether opinion A is superior to opinion B. After all, if reality is merely a construct of the human mind, one person's perspective of truth is ultimately just as good as another's. "Truth" becomes nothing more than a personal opinion, usually best kept to oneself.We are not supposed to think we know any objective truth. Post-modernists often suggest that every opinion should be shown equal respect. And therefore, on the surface, post-modernism seems driven by a broad-minded concern for harmony and tolerance. It all sounds very charitable and altruistic. But what really underlies the postmodernist belief system is an utter intolerance for every worldview that makes any universal truth-claims-particularly biblical Christianity.Postmodernism and the ChurchThe church today is filled with people who are advocating postmodern ideas. Some of them do it self-consciously and deliberately, but most do it unwittingly. (Having imbibed too much of the spirit of the age, they are simply regurgitating worldly opinion.) The evangelical movement as a whole, still recovering from its long battle with modernism, is not prepared for a new and different adversary. Many Christians have therefore not yet recognized the extreme danger posed by postmodernist thought.Many shy away from stating unequivocally that the Bible is truth and all other religious systems and worldviews are false. Some who call themselves Christians have gone even further, purposefully denying the exclusivity of Christ and openly questioning His claim that He is the only way to God.The biblical message is clear. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me" (John 14:6). The apostle Peter proclaimed to a hostile audience, "Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved" (Acts 4:12). The apostle John wrote, "He who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him" (John 3:36).Again and again, Scripture stresses that Jesus Christ is the only hope of salvation for the world. "For there is on God and one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus" (1 Timothy 2:5). Only Christ can atone for sin, and therefore only Christ can provide salvation. "And this is the testimony: that God has given us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life" (1 John 5:11-12).Those truths are antithetical to the central tenet of postmodernism.

Theopedia writes:Inclusivism posits that even though the work of Christ is the only means of salvation, it does not follow that explicit knowledge of Christ is necessary in order for one to be saved. In contrast to pluralism, inclusivism agrees with exclusivism in affirming the particularity of salvation in Jesus Christ. But unlike exclusivism, inclusivism holds that an implicit faith response to general revelation can be salvific.

PaulK writes:The central point is that evangelicals routinely misrepresent the Bible - which they claim to be the Word of God - to prop up their beliefs. Are you going to discuss that or continue to bring up irrelevancies ?

Spongs Blog writes:Katherine Edman from Mason, Ohio, writes:
Thank you so much for your series on the rise of fundamental Christianity. I particularly enjoyed the essay that described the Five Fundamentals and the one on the First Fundamental - the inerrancy of the Bible. I have wondered whether the Bible itself ever claims to be the inerrant word of God.

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I recognize the difficulty of this question, since the Bible itself is a hodgepodge of many books that have been bundled together over the ages. What I have found, however, is that discussing biblical scholarship with fundamentalists usually gets me precisely nowhere. They are unwilling to recognize that Moses could not have written the Torah, or that the gospels were written years after Jesus' death. They continue to believe that the books of the Bible arose more or less intact in that particular order and mystically assembled themselves into a unit. They insist that the obvious contradictions or factual errors are just our misunderstanding of "the Word."

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They propose that the "texts of terror" have been misinterpreted to justify the social evils of slavery, racism, and sexism, or - worse - fundamentalists continue to quietly believe that these social evils are indeed ordained by God! So, I want to take the argument back into their court. I want to challenge the fundamentalists to prove to me, via the Bible, that the Bible actually claims to be the inerrant word of God. If the Bible itself doesn't claim it, why do they believe such an outlandish claim? And my question to you is: does the Bible anywhere make this claim?Spong Replies: Dear Katherine ,
The immediate and short answer is no, though fundamentalists will quote various texts (like II Timothy 3:16) to prove it does. The problem with that text is that when it was written there was no such thing as the Bible as we now know it. The New Testament had not yet come into being. The fact is that even to ask the question the way you did makes a presupposition that is quite fundamentalist and thus plays right into the hands of this absurdity - for even if a particular book of the Bible were to contain that claim, the author of that book would have had no idea that his work would someday be included in a book called the Bible.The various texts that together we Christians now call the Bible were written over more than a thousand years between about 1000 BCE and 135 CE. It was not a single book by a single author but rather 66 separate books (and even more if we count the Apocrypha), written by a variety of authors. None of these authors believed that someday their words would be invested with either holiness or inerrancy. When the authors of the books that we now call the New Testament referred to scripture (Matt 12:10, 15:2,3, Luke 4:21, 22:27 and John 2:22, 7:38, 3:42, 10:35, 12:18, 17:12, 19:24, 19:28, 19:36-37, 20:9, and even the author of II Timothy to which I referred to earlier), they are referring only to the Hebrew Scriptures, since at that time there was no New Testament.It is noteworthy that when the author of II Timothy wrote that all "scripture is given by inspiration of God," he was referring to the Old Testament since again, at that time, there was no such thing as the New Testament.So the claim that the Bible is the inerrant word of God is itself a non-scriptural term and indeed was imposed on the texts of the Bible at a much later time to meet the need of church leaders to have an ally in their struggles to clarify their authority. If the "Word of God" agrees with me then clearly my position is the correct one. There arose from that corruption of both truth and rationality the incredible number of abuses about which I have spoken so often in this column from biblically-endorsed racism, sexism and homophobia to biblically-endorsed war, persecution, and torture. Hope this clarifies your concern.-- John Shelby Spong

Nator writes:Integrity is doing what you say you will do, even when it isn't easy or convenient.Don't confuse integrity with charisma or conviction.

Nator writes:It is human nature to avoid uncertainty, but settling on an answer to a question merely to relieve our emotional discomfort seems a poor way to find truth.

truthlover writes:For ancient Christianity (for equinox' sake: the Pre-Nicene, "catholic" fathers and the churches they represent) truth resided in the church/churches, not in individuals.

Nator writes:But we will never find The Truth, Phat.None of us.