Where is the IFB Sytematic Theology?

[Luke2427]

Think that main thing that I see regarding this discussion topic is that we have to make sure that we are "attacking" others based upon coressential Christian doctrines that are misintepreted in a heretical fashion, NOT based upon preferences/convictions, or areas can disagree on, such as Modes baptism/second coming etc!

That's not what the text say, JF.

I don't think we have to condemn every difference of belief we find.

But I do think we are obligated to cast down EVERY pretense that sets itself up against the knowledge of God.

That is not restricted just to heresy.

For example, when a man preaches a doctrine that is not heresy but dampens evangelistic zeal- that man is to be resisted and his ideals he promotes are to be demolished.

 

[seekingthetruth]

Is this a real question?

You can't be serious, right?

How can I believe ANY of Spurgeon's theology if I don't believe this one remark?

You really need a response to this question?

Is it your contention that one must believe every statement a man speaks if he believes ANYTHING else the man says?????

Madness...

It makes more sense than your goofy attack on IFB in the OP

John

 

[matt wade]

Is this a real question?

You can't be serious, right?

How can I believe ANY of Spurgeon's theology if I don't believe this one remark?

You really need a response to this question?

Is it your contention that one must believe every statement a man speaks if he believes ANYTHING else the man says?????

Madness...

What's madness is that he answered your OP, even though I don't think either you or him realize it. In your OP, you posed questions such as:

"But how do those that believe they go all the way back to John the Baptist (or wherever they think they start) having never been a part of the "catholic" or Protestant churches- how do they justify utilizing our terms and our doctrines that we hammered out?"

"Shouldn't they have their OWN theologians in history who worked these things out rather than leaning almost fully on OURS?"

The answer is that WE (those that believe as Spurgeon does in the quote) have Spurgeon! He's one of OUR theologians you are asking for.

Now the question is, how do YOU justify utilize HIS works, when he is one of US?

:tongue3:

 

[Luke2427]

What's madness is that he answered your OP, even though I don't think either you or him realize it. In your OP, you posed questions such as:

"But how do those that believe they go all the way back to John the Baptist (or wherever they think they start) having never been a part of the "catholic" or Protestant churches- how do they justify utilizing our terms and our doctrines that we hammered out?"

"Shouldn't they have their OWN theologians in history who worked these things out rather than leaning almost fully on OURS?"

The answer is that WE (those that believe as Spurgeon does in the quote) have Spurgeon! He's one of OUR theologians you are asking for.

Now the question is, how do YOU justify utilize HIS works, when he is one of US?

:tongue3:

No. All you do here is call for another question.

How does Spurgeon justify using our terms and our doctrines.

Whoever does this is beside the point.

The point is that your entire theology you got from the Historic Christian Faith.

These mythical baptists who are supposed to go back all the way to the Apostles- they did not hammer out the Trinity.
They did not work out the incarnation.

They HAVE NO DOCTRINE. They borrow it ALL from others.

What makes Baptists unique is not this myth that they extend all the way back to the NT.

What makes them unique is that they do not hammer out their own doctrines- they wait for others to do it for them and then pick and choose from those doctrines what they accept and what they reject.

Now if a Baptist will recognize that he is not special; that he does not have some line of his people all the way back to the NT, but that he came about the same way every other truly Christian movement came about- through Rome and Protestantism- then he can justify his ecclectic choosing among orthodox beliefs. Why? Because he is ONE OF US.

But if he is going to say, "My kind have NEVER been a part of the Historic Faith!!", then it is trashy for him to borrow EVERYTHING he believes from the Historic Faith.

If he admits he is part of the Historic Faith- then he gets to use it because it is his as much as it is the Presbyterians'.

But if he denies it, then he's trashy to deny it and at the same time use it's doctrines- so much so that he HAS NONE OF HIS OWN!

That goes for Spurgeon or anyone else.

Spurgeon was off in numerous areas, but most of us are more than willing to forgive him because of how solid he was in so many more areas.

 

[Jerome]

Is Elder Hassell "trashy" too?

"these people, as Baptists, had a noble origin. They never belonged to Babylon—they did not come out of her. Their predecessors from the beginning fought against and denounced Antichrist as the great spiritual evil in the world, that was poisoning the minds of men with false doctrine and destroying hecatombs of victims from generation to generation. They denounced her till the Reformation, so-called, under Luther and Melancton, Zuinglius and Calvin; they denounced her since the Reformation; they denounced her daughters, the Established "Churches" of Germany, Switzerland and England, whose hierarchies hated and persecuted Baptists as they hated and threatened Rome. Baptists stood independent of all other religious organizations" —History of the church of God: from the creation to A. D. 1885; including especially the history of the Kehukee Primitive Baptist Association

 

[matt wade]

They HAVE NO DOCTRINE. They borrow it ALL from others.

So Spurgeon has no doctrine? If that's the case then Calvin has no doctrine. Augustine has no doctrine. They all borrowed it from others as well. Everyone borrowed from everyone else and no one has any doctrine. I think we have a bit of a problem here...how can we have doctrine if nobody has any doctrine and they all had to borrow it from someone else?

Why do you get to pick and choose who has doctrine and who has none? Why do you get to say who borrowed all their doctrine and who didn't borrow?

 

[Don]

Ephesians 5:11 And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.

The word reprove (elegchō) :

1) to convict, refute, confute

a) generally with a suggestion of shame of the person convicted

b) by conviction to bring to the light, to expose

2) to find fault with, correct

a) by word

1) to reprehend severely, chide, admonish, reprove

2) to call to account, show one his fault, demand an explanation

b) by deed

1) to chasten, to punish

The underlined phrases provide definitions which best match the natural reading of the text in context.

So out of curiosity, I checked the John Calvin commentary for Ephesians 5:11 (available at ccel.org):

...The word ἐλέγχειν, which is translated reprove, answers to the metaphor of darkness; for it literally signifies to drag forth to the light what was formerly unknown. As ungodly men flatter themselves in their vices, (Psalm 36:2,) and wish their crimes to be concealed, or to be reckoned virtues, Paul enjoins that they shall be reproved. He calls them unfruitful; because they not only do no good, but are absolutely hurtful.

(side note: “Most expositors supply αὐτοὺς, meaning the doers of the works; and they render ἐλέγχετε, reprove, viz., by wholesome correction. This, however, is so harsh, that it is better (with Theodoret, the Pesch. Syr., Wakefield, Schleusner, Photius, and Wahl) to supply αὐτὰ, that is, ἔργα τοῦ σκότους, and to interpret ἐλέγχετε ‘bring to the light, and evince their evil nature,’ namely, by shewing in contrast the opposite virtues. This sense is required by verse 13, with which the present closely connects; and so ἐλέγχω is used both in the Scriptural and Classical writers.” — Bloomfield.)

Further, Calvin says this about verse 13, which also uses the word "reprove":

...The context appears to me to shew clearly that this is Paul’s meaning. He had exhorted them to reprove the evil works of unbelievers, and thus to drag them out of darkness; and he now adds, that what he enjoins upon them is the proper business of light — to make manifest It is Light, he says, which makes all things manifest; and hence it followed that they were unworthy of the name, if they did not bring to light what was involved in darkness.

It was stated that the underlined words (shame, reprehend severely, punish--all intended to support a philosophy of "demolish") were the best match to the context of the passage.

By his own words, Calvin seems to have believed that definitions 1.b. and 2.a.2. were the best matches for the context of the passage.

 

[Luke2427]

So Spurgeon has no doctrine?

No. these mystical baptists that are unconnected to Rome and Protestantism- they have no doctrines of their own. They just borrow them from the historic Faith.

If that's the case then Calvin has no doctrine.

He was PART of the historic Faith. He did not purport some silly notion that his people were never part of Rome; were always separate from the RCC.

Augustine has no doctrine.

He was PART of the historic Faith. He did not purport some silly notion that his people were never part of Rome; were always separate from the RCC.

They all borrowed it from others as well.

That would be like saying my children BORROW food, clothing and shelter from me.

That would be stupid.

They are my progeny. What is mine is theirs.

But your mythical line of baptists are bastards, so far as the Historic Faith is concerned, are they not? I mean really- they are fatherless. Calvin has a forefathers- real ones; not made up ones like you claim.

But your mythical line of baptists have no forefathers.

They live off of our doctrines but they claim no lineage and spit on our name.

They have us to thank for their very existence but they (you) spit in our eye.

Everyone borrowed from everyone else and no one has any doctrine.

You can't borrow from that which is yours.

The Historic Christian Faith is what GAVE us our understanding of the great doctrines of the Faith like hypostasis and the Trinity.

What I believe was passed down to me by my spiritual forefathers, just as it was to Calvin. I am not borrowing from them. I am their progeny. They left it to me. It is my inheritance as a son of the Historic Christian Faith- the faith once delivered to the saints and passed down- the faith concerning which our understanding was wonderfully refined over the history of the Christian Church.

Your forefathers left you nothing (mainly because they never existed).

Instead, you steal our doctrines and spit on us.

That's what you do when you say, "We baptists did not come from the Historic Church!" and then use ALL of our doctrines because you have none of your own.



Get your own doctrines. Call the godhead something else besides the Trinity. That term and understanding belongs to us.

If you have such a rich history, you should not need to lean FULLY upon us for your existence.

Stop freeloading.

If you are not a son, then you are a thief.

 

[Don]

Get your own doctrines. Call the godhead something else besides the Trinity. That term and understanding belongs to us.

If you have such a rich history, you should not need to lean FULLY upon us for your existence.

Stop freeloading.

If you are not a son, then you are a thief.

Luke, just looking for clarification: Are you saying that IFBers in general, or only the hyper-IFBers (KJV-above all else, all our women wear skirts, etc.), are "false" baptists? (which would beg the question, who are the "true" baptists?) Or that they're cultic false Christians?

 

[Luke2427]

So out of curiosity, I checked the John Calvin commentary for Ephesians 5:11 (available at ccel.org):


Further, Calvin says this about verse 13, which also uses the word "reprove":


It was stated that the underlined words (shame, reprehend severely, punish--all intended to support a philosophy of "demolish") were the best match to the context of the passage.

By his own words, Calvin seems to have believed that definitions 1.b. and 2.a.2. were the best matches for the context of the passage.

And?

If Calvin is right about that, it is still the same thing.

DRAG to the light is not sweet language.

You're wrong, Don, and you are too proud to admit it.

All you are doing at this point, it seems to me, is DESPERATELY trying to keep from everybody seeing you drown in this debate.

There is nothing in the BIBLE more clear than how God expects us to deal with darkness.

You DEMOLISH it.

You REPROVE it.

You WITHSTAND it to the face.

You HATE it.

NO WHERE does the Bible ever say to speak softly and sweetly about evil.

You can gingerly bring a confused brother around, but in doing so you still DEMOLISH his thinking and if he bucks against it, you don't even have to handle him gingerly.

Our first resort is tenderness in handling the one in the dark, but we are plain about the darkness which engulfs him.

You probably ascribe to this bumper sticker theology that says, "Hate the sin, love the sinner."

Well DO IT. HATE the sin. HATE the sin. Hate it. HATE it and don't hide your hatred for it.

HATE darkness and don't pretend to feel otherwise about it or you are a fake.

Love the sinner. And love ON the sinner so long as there is humility. But when there is pride, you still love the sinner, but you stop loving ON him until his arrogance is broken.

Paul did not stroke Peter's brow sweetly and say, "Hey Peter... I understand why you did what you did. And I'm not saying it was terrible. But would you please consider considering that maybe you might ought to have stayed with the Gentiles- I mean, I could be wrong and I'm not judging you, mind you, but I just wanted to run it by you, my dear sweet brother."

No. The text says he got up in Peter's FACE and set him straight.

If you don't want to do that, fine. If you don't want to do what God said you are supposed to do- fine. But for heaven's sake, don't weaken the hands of those that do it.

Read Luther's Bondage of the Will some time. Read how Luther OBLITERATED Erasmus.

And Luther had little societal automatons who love to go with the flow of whatever is popular in religion at the time who would say, "Luther is a BULLY!"

But people like that do not change the world. Luther changed the world.

Have you ever read Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God?

Or better yet, have you ever read Edwards' book The Surprising Work of God wherein Edwards lays out the kind of preaching God blessed in the Great Awakening?

You ought to. It would do you a world of good on your thinking here.

I honestly believe handling darkness sweetly is as bad as the darkness itself.

We could run darkness out of this culture, if Christians were not so brainwashed by this tolerance obsessed society.

I'll just say it- if Christians had a back bone- like that which the Apostles and Prophets and godly kings and Patriarchs had- like that which the heroes of the Christian faith had.

You want me to be like everybody else in this religious culture. People who are like everybody else NEVER do great things.

The EVERYBODY ELSE is USUALLY the problem, not the answer. Doing things DIFFERENTLY from the status quo is what God requires of you, Don.

Because God does not care if people like you. God does not care if people think you are being too hard. Those same stupid automatons often think GOD is too hard. God doesn't care what they think. And God expects you not to care too. He expects you to care about proclaiming his truth the WAY he said to proclaim it.

THAT'S what ought to matter to you.

Not that I am not doing it the AVERAGE way. God HELP us when we let the average way people do things be our guide!!

I am calling on able folks in bb to STOP addressing darkness like the rest of this Christian culture expects you to address it! Who CARES if it is popular to speak softly about darkness???

DEMOLISH it! Or we perish.

Look at Europe. Compromise with darkness led to the APOSTASY of the continent.

 

[seekingthetruth]

Luke

You must have bumped your head really hard, because you have lost your mind.

I haven't heard this much hogwash come from a preacher since Rev Ike was selling "Good luck coins"

I called my pastor and some others today from church and told them to go to the board and read your rants, and now my phone is ringing off the hook with them calling and laughing.

My pastor doesnt even believe you are really a pastor.

You sure are gonna be lonely up there in heaven all by yourself

ROTFL I am crying here from laughing so much.

John

 

[Earth Wind and Fire]

Certainly.

But I am addressing people who think their heritage is totally separate from Protestantism and Catholicism.

I am addressing people who think there was this line of baptistic forefathers who were never in the RCC in their whole history and that they are separate from Augutine and Athanasias and basically ALL the church fathers of the second and third century.

I am trying to figure out how they justify getting MOST, and I mean the VAST majority of what they believe from US- the Historic Christian Faith.

ya know, those are pretty good questions!:thumbsup:

 

[matt wade]

No. these mystical baptists that are unconnected to Rome and Protestantism- they have no doctrines of their own. They just borrow them from the historic Faith.



He was PART of the historic Faith. He did not purport some silly notion that his people were never part of Rome; were always separate from the RCC.




He was PART of the historic Faith. He did not purport some silly notion that his people were never part of Rome; were always separate from the RCC.



That would be like saying my children BORROW food, clothing and shelter from me.

That would be stupid.

They are my progeny. What is mine is theirs.

But your mythical line of baptists are bastards, so far as the Historic Faith is concerned, are they not? I mean really- they are fatherless. Calvin has a forefathers- real ones; not made up ones like you claim.

But your mythical line of baptists have no forefathers.

They live off of our doctrines but they claim no lineage and spit on our name.

They have us to thank for their very existence but they (you) spit in our eye.




You can't borrow from that which is yours.

The Historic Christian Faith is what GAVE us our understanding of the great doctrines of the Faith like hypostasis and the Trinity.

What I believe was passed down to me by my spiritual forefathers, just as it was to Calvin. I am not borrowing from them. I am their progeny. They left it to me. It is my inheritance as a son of the Historic Christian Faith- the faith once delivered to the saints and passed down- the faith concerning which our understanding was wonderfully refined over the history of the Christian Church.

Your forefathers left you nothing (mainly because they never existed).

Instead, you steal our doctrines and spit on us.

That's what you do when you say, "We baptists did not come from the Historic Church!" and then use ALL of our doctrines because you have none of your own.



Get your own doctrines. Call the godhead something else besides the Trinity. That term and understanding belongs to us.

If you have such a rich history, you should not need to lean FULLY upon us for your existence.

Stop freeloading.

If you are not a son, then you are a thief.

All I can say is it is no wonder everyone on this board (except your little band of personal cheerleaders...) considers you an arrogant blow hard. This is probably the most hilarious diatribe I have read in a long time, so thanks for making me laugh. You rail against those evil fundamental IFB preachers, but you are the biggest caricature of them.

 

[seekingthetruth]

Did Luke just call us bastards?

 

[seekingthetruth]

Did Luke just call us thieves?

 

[Luke2427]

Luke, just looking for clarification: Are you saying that IFBers in general, or only the hyper-IFBers (KJV-above all else, all our women wear skirts, etc.), are "false" baptists? (which would beg the question, who are the "true" baptists?) Or that they're cultic false Christians?

I am speaking about baptists who say that they never had anything to do with the RCC and Protestantism.

I am taking about these baptists who create pseudo-history and spit on their REAL heritage.

I am talking about baptists who think that THEIR PEOPLE were never IN the Historic Christian Faith- and yet these same baptists look FULLY- I mean absolutely FULLY- to those of us who DID come from the Historic Christian Faith for their doctrines.

Our heritage is not good enough for them- but they don't mind stealing our doctrines that OUR spiritual forefathers bled over to pass down to us.

They are like orphans who move in uninvited, make a mess of our home, abuse our kids and yet eat our food, drink our water, wear our kids' clothes and insult our kids and us and our grandparents and their parents and their parents all the way back!

So I say, Produce your heroes who worked out your version of the Trinity. Athanasias was no baptist!
Why call what you believe the Trinity???

Because you NEED us to exist and spit on us while feeding off of our blood, sweat and tears.


That's not all Baptists, Don. I AM BAPTIST. But I am part of a movement that has sense enough to KNOW it is PROTESTANT.

The SBC claims to the the largest Protestant denomination in America.

We recognize our heritage.

We recognize that what we have we got from 2,000 years of Christians who sacrificed greatly to give us the understanding of the doctrines we cherish- Christians who did suffer under Rome.

So these are not the baptists to which I am referring.

Just these Baptists, yes, these TRINITARIAN baptists, who say they did not come from the Historic Christian Faith.

 

[Luke2427]

Luke

You must have bumped your head really hard, because you have lost your mind.

I haven't heard this much hogwash come from a preacher since Rev Ike was selling "Good luck coins"

I called my pastor and some others today from church and told them to go to the board and read your rants, and now my phone is ringing off the hook with them calling and laughing.

My pastor doesnt even believe you are really a pastor.

You sure are gonna be lonely up there in heaven all by yourself

ROTFL I am crying here from laughing so much.

John

Sadly, they are probably no better informed than you.

 

[seekingthetruth]

I am speaking about baptists who say that they never had anything to do with the RCC and Protestantism.

I am taking about these baptists who create pseudo-history and spit on their REAL heritage.

I am talking about baptists who think that THEIR PEOPLE were never IN the Historic Christian Faith- and yet these same baptists look FULLY- I mean absolutely FULLY- to those of us who DID come from the Historic Christian Faith for their doctrines.

Our heritage is not good enough for them- but they don't mind stealing our doctrines that OUR spiritual forefathers bled over to pass down to us.

They are like orphans who move in uninvited, make a mess of our home, abuse our kids and yet eat our food, drink our water, wear our kids' clothes and insult our kids and us and our grandparents and their parents and their parents all the way back!

So I say, Produce your heroes who worked out your version of the Trinity. Athanasias was no baptist!
Why call what you believe the Trinity???

Because you NEED us to exist and spit on us while feeding off of our blood, sweat and tears.


That's not all Baptists, Don. I AM BAPTIST. But I am part of a movement that has sense enough to KNOW it is PROTESTANT.

The SBC claims to the the largest Protestant denomination in America.

We recognize our heritage.

We recognize that what we have we got from 2,000 years of Christians who sacrificed greatly to give us the understanding of the doctrines we cherish- Christians who did suffer under Rome.

So these are not the baptists to which I am referring.

Just these Baptists, yes, these TRINITARIAN baptists, who say they did not come from the Historic Christian Faith.

That has got to be the dumbest thing I have ever seen anybody get furious over, especially a pastor.

What does this issue have to do with salvation, or evangelism, or anything else that is REALLY important?

Why does this make you so mad?

Why is it your job to tell IFB what to believe about their heritage? Why do you care?

It doesn't make us heretic, it doesn't hurt your church.

If you don't like it then just put the mouse down and slowly walk away from the keyboard.

Sorry, Luke but you have got to be the silliest most hilarious pastor I have ever heard of.

You are a real comedian.

John

PS....i seriously doubt that this issue, even if we are wrong, qualifies for what Paul meant as "in darkness"

Get a grip man.

 

[seekingthetruth]

Sadly, they are probably no better informed than you.

That's what I figured you would say.

Ahhhh help me, I have laughed so much my chest is hurting.

Give us some more Luke

John

 

[seekingthetruth]

Hey Luke

My pastor just called and wants to know if you are available to do a comedy show at our church on Saturday, Jan 14?

And, can you send us a tape of your routine?

John