Results 201 - 220 of 464
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Results from: Notes Author: Sir Pent Ordered by Verse |
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Results | Verse | Author | ID# | |||
201 | Should Christians practice nonresistance | Lev 26:6 | Sir Pent | 15927 | ||
Could you make this a seperate thread? It seems to be veering off the original question, but it is of definate interest, and I think deserves its own thread. | ||||||
202 | Should Christians practice nonresistance | Lev 26:6 | Sir Pent | 15933 | ||
I must agree with Angie, I find it inconsistent to support the taking of human life for one reason (capital punishment), and oppose it for another (abortion). I also agree with Brian G. when he says, "When we begin accepting the destruction of life from one perspective, then it becomes easier to end life from other perspectives. The different acceptable reasons for destroying life begin to feed upon each other." Killing is desensitizing. In fact, a large part of military training is dedicated to that purpose. On the other hand, EdB makes the point there is no record of the martyred Christians using the argument that the death penalty is morally wrong to defend themselves. I would submit that none would be expected anyway. It is not logical that a person would use a defense, which is irrelevant to the authority over them. If the authorities were not Christians, then they would have no reason to care about what the Christian thing to do was. EdB also makes the point that there are many places where the "Bible clearly prescribes execution". I would submit that these are in the OT and that there has been a fundamental change since then (see "Death penalty in OT is good" post). There have also been people posting on both sides of whether the death penalty is an effective deterrant. That is to be expected, because there are experts on both sides of that as well. In fact, since that has not been conclusively shown either way, I don't think that it is a reasonable basis for deciding either direction. I understand where EdB and many others are comming from on this issue, but I believe that no matter how "right" our motivation is, it is still "wrong" to kill another human being whom God has created. |
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203 | Should Christians practice nonresistance | Lev 26:6 | Sir Pent | 16051 | ||
Dear EdB, I am also enorously saddened by the tragic events of yesturday (9-11-01). I pray that this will be one of those cases where our enemies meant it for bad, but that God will bring about good as a result. I pray that the families of those who were killed will be comforted, and have a greater sense of their need for God. I also pray for the people who orchestrated this outrageous violence, that there hearts will be changed as a result of all of the pain that they have caused. For if their hearts do not turn to God, then they await a punishment for eternity that is worse than anything which they can even imagine. As for the post which you are responding to, it seems that I must have been unclear in my message, for which I apologize. I BELIEVE GOD IS COMPLETELY CONSISTENT. This is a belief, which is of great importance to me, and I want to make sure that it is not misunderstood. God is the same yesturday, today, and tommorrow. "Every good endowment and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change." (James 1:17) There is also a second important belief which seems to have been unclear. I BELIEVE THAT THE OLD TESTAMENT IS STILL TRUE. I know that Jesus did not abolish the Old Testament, and I am not trying to say that at all. Nor am I saying that I am the authority to determine what part of scripture is true (please go back and read my post "May I share a simple story to help out", it is the one about the farmer and his 10 fields). I must admit that at first I was a little hurt by this last post of yours. But as I went back and looked at all of your posts to me in the past, I noticed that there aren't very many. You disliked my user id, which you mentioned a couple times, and you did like the farmer story mentioned above. Other than that, I saw very little interaction. I can only assume that you and I have somewhat different interests in threads. I therefore, am guessing that perhaps you have not read enough of my posts to get a clear picture of my beliefs. I would encourage you to take a look at some of them, to get a better idea of what my theology truly is, instead of making very large and incorrect assumptions and then posting them. I would particularly direct you to my thread "How inspired is the NASB" to see my high respect for the authority of scripture. Finally, I would like to point out that my views on capital punishment are based primarily in scripture, and only augmented by my own logic and feelings. My previous post "death penalty in OT is good" explains why I believe that a fundamental change has occurred (not in God, but in the world itself). In that post I refer to much scripture including: Exodus 19:10-13, 1 Samuel 15, 1 Peter 3:19, Hebrews 9:27, Acts 5:1-10, Acts 12:21-23. P.S. I regret that I felt compelled to continue posting to this thread after you attempted to close it, Nolan, but I wanted to clear up the confusion that EdB seemed to have about my position. |
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204 | Should Christians practice nonresistance | Lev 26:6 | Sir Pent | 16063 | ||
Dear EdB, There is a simple misunderstanding here. You believe that God's position is against abortion, and for the death penalty. Therefore, my statement that those positions are inconsistent implies to you that I believe God to be inconsistent. I can understand where you are coming from. The problem is that you don't seem to understand where I am coming from. I do not imply that God is inconsistent, because I do not believe that God is for the death penalty (at least to be carried out by humans) any more. Let me begin by granting that it is obviously scriptural that God supported the death penalty in the Old Testament (just like He supported the sacrifice system, and many dietary laws). We would all agree that after Christ the sacrifices of animals are no longer appropriate (not because God changed, but because the system changed). We would probably all agree that it is no longer a sin to eat pork (see Peter's vision of the sheet and animals in Acts). This also is not because God changed, but because the system changed. I tried to explain (in my post "death penalty in OT is good") that in a similar way, there has been a fundamental change in the system (not in God) that has caused the death penalty to no longer be appropriate for humans to commit. I think that this whole misunderstanding comes down to the fact that you are assuming (based on scripture of course) that God and you have the same view of capital punishment. What I am trying to communicate is that I believe this assumption to be incorrect, and I think that a good biblical case could be made that God is now against the death penalty. I have enjoyed many of your posts in the past (in fact I tried to keep your "using company computers" post alive). We seem to agree much more than we disagree (ie. the "who made God" thread and the "why is the word selah in the Bible" thread). I look forward to learning together with you on this forum in the future, with hopefully a greater understanding of each other. |
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205 | Should Christians practice nonresistance | Lev 26:6 | Sir Pent | 16076 | ||
Dear Tim, Since Nolan (who started this post) has tried to wrap it up, and since the original intent of this post was to discuss "nonresistance" (mainly along the lines of war as opposed to the death penalty), I would recommend that we start a seperate thread to discuss this topic further. Would that be alright? |
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206 | How do we respond to war as Christians? | Deut 7:2 | Sir Pent | 24101 | ||
Contrary View .................................... It is a rare occasion that I disagree with Tim Moran, however, this is one of those times. I believe that Christians should not directly support wars. For an extensive background on why, I would recommend doing a search for "killing OT good NT bad". Without going into all that here, let me just make one point about this whole defending rights and freedoms idea. I don't find much of a biblical mandate to kill people in order to keep our rights and freedoms. In fact, our example, Christ, gave up his rights and freedoms to come to Earth for us. He also taught such ideas as walking an extra mile (when they had a right to stop at one), turning the other cheek (when they had a right to strike back), and not casting stones (when they had the freedom to). The Bible seems to consistently say that we should trust God to take care of us and not depend on ourselves to protect our rights all the time. And as for freedom, Paul talked about how excersizing his freedoms wasn't even worth causing a brother to stumble in his faith. Do we honestly think that Paul would support it being worth killing someone to be able to excersize our freedom? Throughout history Christians killing people (crusades, inquisition, etc.) has been a huge stumbling block to the rest of the world. I just don't think that the response we are doing is the response that Jesus would do, or support, or want His followers to support. |
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207 | How do we respond to war as Christians? | Deut 7:2 | Sir Pent | 24367 | ||
Personal Note ................................... Dear Tim, Do you have any thoughts on my recent post regarding killing people to protect our "rights and freedoms"? |
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208 | How do we respond to war as Christians? | Deut 7:2 | Sir Pent | 24433 | ||
Contrary View ............................... Dear Tim, I know that we have discussed war in general at length previously on another thread. I don't want to repeat what is there already, but this whole idea of rights and freedoms is IMHO somewhat uncovered. It seems that you are saying that it is wrong for a Christian to kill someone to defend their own rights, but it is right for a Christian to kill someone to defend the rights of another person. However, in the garden, when Peter tried to defend Jesus, he was told to put away his sword. Also although I agree with your overall interpretation that killing is not always wrong (since God commanded it in the OT), I disagree with your burden of proof. Since there is a clear commandment to not kill, and since it is never condoned in the New Testament, I believe the burden of proof lies on those who believe that it is right to kill. As you know, I believe there is a biblical basis for why the killing in the Old Testament was an exception to the rule. I find it hard to imagine discovering a biblical basis for why killing is still appropriate. |
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209 | How do we open eyes to truth? | Deut 7:2 | Sir Pent | 24440 | ||
Contrary view ................................. Dear Hank, I don't want to pick on you, because it seems like many people are saying the same thing you are. I'm just responding to this post, because it's the last one I read. I'm a little tired of everybody talking so much about freedom. Yeah, it's great that we live in a country that has it, but is it really worth killing people over. I'm glad that I can say what I want, and go to a church building in broad daylight, and get as many groceries as I can afford at Wal-Mart. However, none of these things are really necessary. None of them are INHO worth killing someone to hold onto. If I were punished for my speaking, so be it. If I couldn't get anything at Wal-Mart, God would provide. And if I could go to a church building in broad daylight, I could meet in my house at night. If I was caught and killed, so be it. I do not fear those who can kill my body. What I'm trying to say is that in America, we have overvalued freedom and personal rights. This is partly to blame for why our society is so selfish and is falling apart. But it is also why so many good people are confused into thinking that they should kill people just to hold onto those things. It makes me a little upset, and I've been in kind of a bad mood today anyway. So I better leave things for today and come back tommorrow, when I can live up to my name and keep things "Pent" up better. |
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210 | How do we open eyes to truth? | Deut 7:2 | Sir Pent | 24622 | ||
Personal Note .................................. Dear Hank, I'm feeling better today, and want to once again say that I am not trying to pick on you. I know that you can handle it, and you consistently contribute excellently to this forum. I was a little testy yesturday, and that affected my outlook. As for this particular thread (by the way, why is it being blocked from appearing on the homepage?), I wholeheartedly agree with you that the spiritual lostness of our society is the root cause of all problems. At the same time, I think that individuals have demanded their personal rights and freedoms to the detriment of the society and world as a whole. Don't you agree my friend? |
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211 | The fruitlessness of fighting | 1 Sam 17:47 | Sir Pent | 121072 | ||
The fruitlessness of fighting......................................... I would like to share my personal experience with fighting during my youth and how I learned that this verse gives a better solution. When I was in 1st grade, I was on the playground one day, and Jason, the biggest kid in the class and I got into a fight. He hit me once, which knocked me down and skinned my knee. That ended the fight with him as the "winner". When I was in 2nd grade, I had a crush on a little girl in my class. One day a 6th grade kid took her ball and kicked it on the roof of the school. I challenged him to a fight, hit him once, and he ran away. That ended the fight with me as the "winner". When I was in 3rd grade, there was a classmate named Matt, who was much smaller than me, but who picked on me all the time. So one day, I hit him, knocking him down and tearing his jacket. I was caught fighting for the first time and punished by the school principal. When I was in 4th grade, two of my friends named Peter and David were fighting with each other. I tried to break it up, but ended up in the middle when the teacher walked in. We were all sent to the school principal and punished. When I was in 5th grade, there was a bully named Shane, who picked on everyone in the class. One day I decided to teach him a lesson. So when we were on the bus, I challenged him to a fight and hit him several times. I was again sent to the principal to be punished. When I was in 6th grade, there was a kid named Andrew, who tapped me on the shoulder during lunch. When I turned around, he hit me on the jaw and then took off before I could respond. So I finished my lunch and waited outside the door for him to come through. When he did, I hit him on the jaw and took off before he could respond. Later in the day, he found me in the hallway and hit me in the jaw again and took off before I could respond. Then I waited by his locker and hit him in the jaw again and took off before he could respond. After all of this, I was sitting in math class and thinking about my day up to that point. I imagined this pattern continuing for the rest of the day, and then for the rest of my life. Suddenly it occurred to me that violence is a never ending cycle. Fighting didn't really solve anything, it just caused a lot of pain in the jaw. So after class I talked with a couple of his friends in the bathroom and told them that I had decided to not fight anymore. I explained how I had realized that it wasn't going to resolve anything and would be stupid to continue. They were surprised of course, but had to admit that it made sense. Therefore, that little feud ended there, and although I had 10 more years of school, that was my last fight. Fear didn't stop my fighting after getting beat up in the 1st grade. Punishment didn't stop my fighting after getting caught in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades. But God stopped me by using that still, small voice inside to show me His perspective on fighting. God does not want us to depend on the sword to deliver us from our problems. The battle is the Lord's and He wants us to come to Him for the answers. |
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212 | murder ok for david but not others why ? | 2 Samuel | Sir Pent | 18581 | ||
Different Opinion ................................ Drummer, I also would like to welcome you to the forum. One of the great things about this forum is that there are many people here with different ideas. Through sharing them we are able to get a more complete picture of many important concepts. For instance, although Steve and I agree on most things, we have different perspectives on this issue. This concept that you have brought up is one that has been brought up before. I would encourage you to use the search box at the top right of the screen to find many posts dealing with capital punishment. To start you might want to search for "old new fundamental". This will take you to a post of mine that talks about what was different about King David's time and today. |
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213 | Advise on contradictions found in bible | Ps 25:4 | Sir Pent | 17554 | ||
Dear Charis, I just want to say that I really appreciate your answer to this question. I answered it from mainly a practical sense, but you went straight to the heart of the matter. I think that your approach is the wiser one, and commend you for it. |
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214 | Advise on contradictions found in bible | Ps 25:4 | Sir Pent | 17586 | ||
Dear Kalos, Thank you for this additional perspecitive. I think that this could quite possibly be correct. I would think that if one geneology is that of Joeseph and the other is of Mary, then it would be the other way around. I would think that Heli would be Joseph's father, and Jacob would be Joseph's father-in-law. My reasoning is that the geneology in Matthew, which includes Jacob, also includes several women. It mentions the names of Rahab (Salmon's wife), Ruth (Boaz' wife), and Mary (Joeseph's wife). I would assume that having a more feminine leaning, that this would be the geneology of Mary (or Joseph's in-laws). On the other hand the geneology in Luke (which includes Heli) only mentions Salmon, Boaz, and Joeseph. Therefore, I would think that it would make more sense that this would be Joeseph's direct lineage. As I said in my first response, I have not studied this in great length. This is just what seems to make the most sense to me based purely on the biblical passages in question. |
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215 | Advise on contradictions found in bible | Ps 25:4 | Sir Pent | 17662 | ||
I was wrong about one thing in that post about He'-li and Jacob. He'-li was definately NOT Joeseph's mother. He'-li must have been a man, because it says he was the "son" of Matthat (Luke 3:24). I just wanted to clarify my error so that people would not be confused. | ||||||
216 | Advise on contradictions found in bible | Ps 25:4 | Sir Pent | 17663 | ||
Dear Brian, I think this was purely accidental. I think what happened was that Benjibabs posted the primary question once, and Charis and I both answered it before realizing that the other had too. The problem arose because in our seperate answers we chose different scripture passages (Charis chose Ps 25:4, and I chose Bible General). This somehow split the thread in two. I agree that it is a bit confusing, and if the Lockman people could combine the thread again, I think it would be helpful. |
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217 | No Rules, Just Right! | Ps 34:8 | Sir Pent | 17473 | ||
Dear Lionstrong, I have been away for a while, and just came across this note of yours. The appearant contradiction that you refer to is caused only by your quoting of my previous post out of context. The first quote is correct. "it is impossible for there to be any laws which God MUST keep." However, the second quote has been lifted out of its paragraph in such a way that the meaning has been changed. I originally said, "Christians generally assume that God would not do any actions contrary to biblical precedents, based on the fact that God doesn't change. However, if for any reason, God did do something that seemed to go against even the Bible, then we would have to assume that we had misunderstood the Bible, not that God was "bad"." Read in context, I am clearly saying that God is the absolute authority, not some "law" that binds Him. Many other forum members have done a good job of also answering this question in much the same way. I hesitate to respond at all, but I want to caution you to be more careful when quoting others in the future. It is important to accurately represent their meanings when you chose specific parts of a post to quote. |
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218 | Could we get to know Peches better? | Ps 35:1 | Sir Pent | 16320 | ||
Dear Peches, Thank you for sharing a little more about yourself. I hope that some of this information will help people on this forum to be able to understand more where you are coming from. For instance, I think it is important that you do not claim to be a Christian. I think that some of the forum members assumed that you were. They responded to some of your posts as if you should know and believe certaing things, that is probably not the case. Hopefully, there will be more patience in the future. I have not heard of the Georgia Medical Institute. What exactly is that? As for being "not educated enough", I personally don't think that it is very important to God. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to be a Christian. The only problem that arises is that sometimes your posts are a little bit hard to understand. That is why I wondered if perhaps your native language was not English, and that you were having to translate. Lastly, I would like to say that I truly appreciate your spirit being "on fire" for God. I hope that you will use that motivation to really get to know who God is, and develop a stronger relationship with Him. I am concerned that you are not going to a church though. Of course, a person doesn't HAVE to go to church to get to know God, but in my opinion it is one of the very best places to do it. What do you think? |
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219 | How do you know there is a God? | Ps 46:10 | Sir Pent | 19430 | ||
Different Perspective............................. Dear Maryann, I would like to share with you an idea which has been very helpful for me when it comes to your question. I would like to turn the question around and ask, "How do you know that there is not a God?" You see, it is really a yes or no question. Either God exists or He does not, and you are always going to believe one or the other. This way it is more clear that it is not a question of proving either one (which IMHO is impossible), but rather just figuring out which is more likely. |
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220 | Are praise and worship different? | Ps 63:4 | Sir Pent | 14270 | ||
Nicodemus, I regret that you too are so offended by my chosen screen name. I have a three perspectives on this issue. 1. I believe that you are wrong to be so apperantly judgemental towards another person just because of a screen name. Especially when the name has been clearly defined in a biblical perspective in both the user profile, as well as by other forum members (thanks for your defense Joren). I would also submit that when God created the serpent or snake (as part of the overall creation), He said it was "good". And in the verse that I reference in my profile, Jesus encourages believers to emulate the positive attribute of wisdom modeled after the serpent. Besides this, my user name is not even Serpent, as such, emphasizing that side of things. But instead is Sir Pent, emphasizing the ideas of chivalry and knighthood. The combined word is only a secondary meaning. 2. My second perspective is this. You are a fellow believer in Christ. I know this from your postings, and from other knowledge which will at this time remain unspoken. Therefore, as a Christian, you must allow the Holy Spirit to guide your life. If just writing my user name in a post is somthing which the Spirit convicts you as being sinful, then I support your decision to refrain from doing that. 3. My final perspective is this. There is a biblical precedent for "judging a tree by its fruit". I would encourage you and all other members of this forum to read several of my responses to others questions. I believe this should give a much more accurate perspective on where I'm comming from than just deciding based on my screen name. |
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