Continuing the Endless Discussion between GDR and traditional Protestantism

How can it say something that was never intended when it clearly says what it clearly says? There's some kind of crazy convoluted thinking going on here that makes no sense. It describes a cloud, that means a cloud was actually seen. It may MEAN heaven but it's still a visible CLOUD. How do YOU know something ELSE was "intended." That makes no sense.

You don't understand how prophecy works. The prophecy of the future Day of the Lord is expressed in the context of the destruction of Babylon in that passage but it's still a prophecy of the much future event. And if you search for Day of the Lord you will find many references that point to that much future event even when couched in a present context, which changes from prophet to prophet.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Again you are reading it with a 21st century mind set. If I write in a book that it was raining cats and dogs you would know that I meant that it was a very heavy rainfall. Maybe 2000 years from now somebody might read that I think that a tornado had picked up our pets and started dropping them on us. That is exactly what you're doing. You are reading something in into it that was never intended.

No it isn't. In that passage it is all about the destruction of Babylon. The Gospels don't use that term but references it in other ways to talk about the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple by the Romans. The early Christians understood that the Israel hope for the day of the Lord had taken place in Jesus although not in the way that had been anticipated. Jesus had come and faced the ultimate great evil which is death, and through the cross and resurrection death was defeated. It wasn't the ultimate end of life.After that however the early Christians co-opted the term and started using it to refer to the time when God would renew all things, with Jesus' return being part of that, what ever that was going to look like.Edited by GDR, : typo

There are at least a dozen uses of "Day of the Lord" in scripture and they ALL refer to the day of great wrath from God, ALL OF THEM. There is no other meaning in the OLD Testament than the one I'm talking about, it's the Day of Wrath and never meant anything else. I don't know where you are getting your odd outlier version of the term but it has nothing to do with this subject. And yes you are wrong about prophecy, it often occurs within a contemporary context but also reaches into the future. That is STANDARD theology GDR. And again there are a LOT of uses of that term, it isn't as if we're stuck with the Babylonian context. ALL OF THEM describe a great day of destruction, and they do fit with the Great Tribulation Jesus talks about.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Oh for pete's sake GDR. "Raining cats and dogs" is obviously metaphorical. Sheesh. "Up" and "Clouds" are simple understandable descriptive terms, not metaphors. Sheesh.

Thread moved here from the Coffee House forum.

It is hard to reply to this as I'm not at all sure what it is that you are saying. The quote that you used was clearly about the Israeli prayer for the return of Yahweh to lead them in defeat of the Babylonians. They were in exile and that was their hope. It is your standard theology and presumably that of the church you belong to. Actually there is no such thing as standard theology anyway. It is your desire to turn the Bible into something like yesterday’s newspaper and then be able to give absolute answers to all questions. It freezes your mind to anything that God might actually have for you when you read your Bible.Your Christian belief in many ways seems to be so much like the ancient Jews. They desperately wanted Yahweh to destroy their enemies. You seem to be so often fixated on a wrathful god, very unlike the god as embodied by Jesus in the Gospels. I don't actually believe you are like this, but your postings make it sound like you are craving vengeance on those who don't subscribe to your fundamentalist beliefs. Firstly "Raining cats and dogs" isn’t a metaphor it is an idiom. You are reading the Bible like a 21st century newspaper account of the event. The important thing is to understand what they literally meant, not what they literally said.

Idiom, fine, who cares, the point is that we all know it's not literal. BUT CLOUDS ARE, "UP" IS.When I say my theology is standard what I have in mind is the Protestant churches in general that derive from the Reformation. Where a church deviates from that I'm not including it. It's Reformed theology mostly but conservative Lutheran theology holds to the same basic understanding. It's a broad swath of Christendom. There are plenty of apostate churches these days of course and perhaps you wouldn't knolw one from the orthodox, but I'm only talking about the orthodox. I can go into MOST churches in my area and expect to find the same basic theology. I'd have to look far and wide to find a church with the oddball theology you hold to.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Maybe it's because your own theology is derived so much from your own feelings and preferences you think that's how I derive mine too but I don't, I'm writing what I believe is the standarad traditional theology. Nothing to do with me personally. I don't "crave" anything in the theology, I simply present what I understand to be true. And if you're talking about my emphasis here on the Day of the Lord that's because we are talking about the Rapture, or I thought we were, and we got stuck on the part that follows the Rapture, known as the Great Tribulation, which is understood in standard theology to be the fulfillment of the Day oif the LORD which is a Day of Wrath, found throughout scripture. You have some other interpretation of that term and that's requiring me to keep the standard meaning on the table. Nothing to do with my preferences, all to do with trying to keep the meaning of the topic alive.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Yes if that is what they meant but it clearly isn't. Have you ever heard the expression that someone head is the clouds. It isn'[t a literal cloud and you understand that it because it's a current idiom.You are trying to understand it in a simplistic factual sense that that wasn't intended, but meant something far more profound.I've shown you numerous contradictions in the Bible and your only explanation is that are no contradictions. You are going to believe what you are going to believe.

That is more than fair, but please accept that I too am posting what I believe to be true. Also I wasn't saying that you crave anything in your theology, but what I am saying is that sometimes your posts come across that way.I know you believe that you are portraying standard orthodox, theology, but to be honest Faith pretty much every Christian believes that their specific beliefs are orthodox. Frankly I believe that my views are pretty orthodox and in my Anglican circles I'm pretty much down the middle on what would generally be considered orthodoxy. I understand why you see it that way. The problem is that it is my belief that your detailed concept of rapture is not what is meant by what is in the Bible. The resurrection of Jesus is a foretaste, (with Jesus as the new Adam), of what is ultimately to come. Ultimately God will do for all of His creation what He did for Jesus in the renewal of that creation. As Ephesians 1 puts it:

quote:

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9 he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, 10 to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillmentto bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.

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Our job as Christians, and for all humanity, is to follow the so called Golden Rule in Matthew 7:12 or in the quote from Micah that I use as a signature.

No GDR, I know it's a literal cloud because the context makes it a literal cloud.

I'm going to have to give this up to save my sanity. Tyhere is nothing in anything I've said that says anything else. Good grief man. I'm following up on how things are to play out historically, you are just talking about the end result. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Wouldn't want that to happen. Guess I wasn't clear on the point. What God did in response to the evil of mankind in crucifying Jesus was the loving act of resurrection. As you agree that this was a foretaste of what is to come then we should look forward to the loving act, not a wrathful act, that God will ultimately do for all creation as it says in Ephesians 1.