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NASB | 2 Timothy 2:25 with gentleness correcting those who are in opposition, if perhaps God may grant them repentance leading to the knowledge of the truth, |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | 2 Timothy 2:25 He must correct those who are in opposition with courtesy and gentleness in the hope that God may grant that they will repent and be led to the knowledge of the truth [accurately understanding and welcoming it], |
Subject: SEARCHING FOR THE TRUTH |
Bible Note: I'm sorry - your term "hyper-individualistic" is completely foreign to me. My understanding of Christianity is just that - completely individualist and very personal. Do we repent as a group? Are we baptised as a group? Are we presented to The Throne at Judgement as a group? Is our name in The Book of Life as a group? When Peter asked to join Jesus walking on the water - why didn't all the guys get out of the boat? I would certainly consider that to be a "hyper-individualistic" experience! In John 21:15-17 Jesus is speaking to Peter and asking him if he loves Jesus more than these others. Not to negate the group. Community is what it's all about "Love each other as I have loved you". But even that does not put the group above the individual. In in-dwelling of the Spirit, joy, peace, love - exist in the individual. I may recognize Him in you - and thereby join with you to share Him - but I cannot acquire those things simply because I am part of a group. It never occured to me that my relationship with Him wasn't personal. When I first read the Bible, to prove to a Christian friend all the contradictions it contained, He convicted me in the first chapters of Matthew - I don't understand how that could be anything but personal. How could that experience be a group issue? Community is vital to the Believer. One of my fondest wishes is to belong to a First Century type of community. To live with and be surrounded by people who know Him and love Him as I do - would be . . . heaven. But I have yet to find a "church" of any orthodoxy that satisfies my hunger for community. In that first year that I read the Bible - I had many, many personal experiences. When He said be not concerned for what you eat - I quit eating - said "okay, you feed me". I fasted (not knowing it was fasting) for three days (not knowing there was any significance to three-days) and had the most incredible "experience" while reading Hebrews, for the first time, that I have ever had. How could that have been a group experience? My life's purpose since first reading the Bible - Philippians "My determined purpose is that I may know Him". Is that the corporate "I"? I had the experience of leading a friend to believe - once she was baptised, I asked my Pastor where new Believers go to learn the rules. He told me, it was one on one - my job to teach her the rules. I know now that is not Biblical - but there is still no place in the modern church (as there was in the First Century Church) where the experienced mentor to the new borns. Every Scripture that comes to mind - leaving the flock to find the one stray sheep, the white stone with my new name - known only to Him, letting Thomas place his hand in the wound in His side . . . hyper-individualistic understandings? |