Biblical instruction vs personal opinion

[freeatlast]

If that was aimed at me, I never said anything about middle ground. I am as anti-compromise as it gets. I will not compromise my beliefs (however, if I am found to be in error, and this is proven to me, I will change them to accurately reflect God's word). However, I think the difference we are having here is that once my stance is known to the person in error, I feel that I have lived up to my side of God's command. I have done my part by explaining to the person why I believe they are wrong. It is up to God to convict them and up to them to listen to God.



Again, I think we are now saying the same thing, only differing on what we consider to be compromise.

My apology on the middle ground. I read what you said incorrectly. About compromising I know of no way to understand it except to lower or change a standard or truth.
In this discussion on biblical instruction or personal interpretation most do the latter. They compromise the truth for their personal values by personal interpretations. For instance.
They want to see the person who murders someone to be put to death as the bible calls for, but if it is their own child they will do everything they can to get them off. That is compromise.
Or they will agree that a divorced person is not to re-marry, but if it happens to them they change their view, again compromise. Or a person rejects scripture that no one continues to practice sin because they have a loved one who once claimed to be a Christian and now is not waliking with the Lord so they call them a saved backslider which the bible denies can happen.
So how should we understand the bible? By what it says no matter how it effects us. That means no personal interpretations.
We adopt little sayings like well we agree that we disagree, again compromise as there is no virtue in disagreeing since the bible says can two walk together less they agree. If we are to hold to truth then we should hold to it no matter what effects it has on us.

 

[JesusFan]

How do we discern between true biblical instruction and simple personal opinion? It is easy to take our own doctrinal beliefs and state them as fact, even to the point that we rebuke and condemn anyone that disagrees with us. The Cal/non-cal argument is a prime example. Both sides have very strong beliefs that their doctrine is the correct one. It is obvious that only one side can truly be right, but how can man come to a final decision on this that is actually God's doctrine and not man's? I don't think we can.

Which brings me to the question here. How much should we trust our own personal opinion when dealing with fellow Christians that we differ in doctrine with?

Luke2427 on another thread wrote this to me:

"The issue has to do with the arguments not the person. I am fine with respecting the person. I refuse, absolutely refuse, to offer respect to arguments that I feel undermined the faith. You should also refuse to render respect to arguments that undermine the faith. in fact you have no option in this but to confront such arguments. And not to do so lightly or sweetly. The Bible has told us how we are to confront darkness. You don't get to improve upon the word of God, or do it some other way. You must do It the way god says to do it. We do not look to Dale Carnegie for our methodology. We look to the word of God. We believe God knows better than Dale Carnegie. We believe God knows better than our current culture. So we look to God to tell us how to confront darkness. Add God said that we are to demolish such arguments as those that seeking the truth and those like him promote"

Who decides what undermines the faith? Some may say that the doctrine of freewill undermines the faith, others may say that DoG undermines the faith. Some say that using the KJV exclusively undermines the faith, while others say that some modern versions undermine the faith. Get my point? It boils down to personal opinion in how the scriptues are interpreted.

Is there really biblical instructions to rebuke fellow Christians because of differences in doctrine? Aren't our differences really based on our personal opinion of the interpretation of scripture? How can we be sure that our interpretation/opinion is the correct one? And just what does God say about "demolishing" the beliefs of fellow Christians?

Once again, this is opinion, but it's my opinion. None us have the mind of God, so none of us interprets scripture 100% correctly. For one of us to take the stand that he is 100% correct, and that everyone that disagrees with him is in "darkness" is the epitome of arrogance, and attacking fellow Christians is uncalled for.

John

make sure that our PERSONAL preferences/convictions are NOT elevated to the position whewre they become ONLY way to see and apply Biblical doctrines!

Think that we need to understand that some issues such as Sotierology need to be seen that Calvinism would be the BEST model to explain that, but that other viewpoints would be seen as being valid, just not the closest to the Biblical model!
Areas such as eschatology would best be seen as can hold to varying viewpoints, just need to make sure STILL hold to a lirtal second coming!

Bible versions discussions would be left to personal prefeences...

 

[MB]

As long as He speaks what is written you are fine. If you start hearing things that disagree with scripture you are not hearing from God.

You're right;
The Bible says;
Joh 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
I not only know His voice but if for some reason what I hear doesn't line up with scripture. I know what to do with it. God hasn't ever told me a thing contrary to His Word. Yet this doesn't mean I believe Satan and his angles can read my mind or can speak to my heart or even hear my prayers. I do not believe he can place thoughts in my mind either.
MB

 

[nodak]

You know, there was a time Baptists really believed the Bible.

Like, when it said that some would esteem every day the same and some would hold some as special.

Or some would eat meat and some would not.

We were told in the Bible to let each be fully convinced in his own mind, for whatever is not of faith is sin.

We were told in the Bible not to judge another man's servant, but to his own Master he would stand or fall, and stand he would, as God was able to make him stand.

We are also told the legalists among us are actually the weaker brothers.

And then a sort of hyperfundamentalism came in. Not the old one of clinging to the fundamentals of the faith and then letting the Holy Spirit guide others in their understanding.

No, this new hyperfundamentalism screams and hollers and chews out everyone that disagrees with them on one iota, calls them heretics, and just generally

ACTS IN A MOST HISTORICALLY UNBAPTIST WAY.

The Jesuits are among us. Only thing is this time they claim to be Baptists rather than RC.

 

[freeatlast]

You're right;
The Bible says;
Joh 10:27 My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me:
I not only know His voice but if for some reason what I hear doesn't line up with scripture. I know what to do with it. God hasn't ever told me a thing contrary to His Word. Yet this doesn't mean I believe Satan and his angles can read my mind or can speak to my heart or even hear my prayers. I do not believe he can place thoughts in my mind either.
MB

I am not sure why you think satan cannot hear your prayers or put thoughts into your mind. As to reading your mind I agree he most likely cannot do that but scripture is not clear on it. However my guess is that he does not need to read our minds as there is nothing new under the sun and satan knows man so he can guess how and what they are going to do very closely.

 

[12strings]

You know, there was a time Baptists really believed the Bible.

Like, when it said that some would esteem every day the same and some would hold some as special.

Or some would eat meat and some would not.

We were told in the Bible to let each be fully convinced in his own mind, for whatever is not of faith is sin.

We were told in the Bible not to judge another man's servant, but to his own Master he would stand or fall, and stand he would, as God was able to make him stand.

We are also told the legalists among us are actually the weaker brothers.

And then a sort of hyperfundamentalism came in. Not the old one of clinging to the fundamentals of the faith and then letting the Holy Spirit guide others in their understanding.

No, this new hyperfundamentalism screams and hollers and chews out everyone that disagrees with them on one iota, calls them heretics, and just generally

ACTS IN A MOST HISTORICALLY UNBAPTIST WAY.

The Jesuits are among us. Only thing is this time they claim to be Baptists rather than RC.

All of this may be true, but I think there is a danger in only remembering the good times of the past, thinking there were no problems then.

Nearly everyone will say, "we didn't used to have these problems."
But the baptists of the past had different problems, and Christians have always had to deal with both legalsim and libralism. There have always been those who try to add to what the bible requires, and also those who want to disregard what the bible clearly DOES require.

There has NEVER been a golden-age of Baptist, or Christian life...and there won't be until Jesus returns to set us all right.

 

[freeatlast]

All of this may be true, but I think there is a danger in only remembering the good times of the past, thinking there were no problems then.

Nearly everyone will say, "we didn't used to have these problems."
But the baptists of the past had different problems, and Christians have always had to deal with both legalsim and libralism. There have always been those who try to add to what the bible requires, and also those who want to disregard what the bible clearly DOES require.

There has NEVER been a golden-age of Baptist, or Christian life...and there won't be until Jesus returns to set us all right.

Now that be a fact, :thumbs: The only thing I would add is just because there has always been some failures we need to be careful we do not bask in them but continue to seek to correct them.

 

[Amy.G]

All of this may be true, but I think there is a danger in only remembering the good times of the past, thinking there were no problems then.

Nearly everyone will say, "we didn't used to have these problems."
But the baptists of the past had different problems, and Christians have always had to deal with both legalsim and libralism. There have always been those who try to add to what the bible requires, and also those who want to disregard what the bible clearly DOES require.

There has NEVER been a golden-age of Baptist, or Christian life...and there won't be until Jesus returns to set us all right.

That's the truth. We forget about those first Baptists..er...Christians :laugh: that were tortured and killed for their faith. Now that's what I call problems.

 

[Arbo]

That's the truth. We forget about those first Baptists..er...Christians :laugh: that were tortured and killed for their faith. Now that's what I call problems.

Foxes Book of Martyrs. An eye-opening read.

 

[Amy.G]

Foxes Book of Martyrs. An eye-opening read.

If you can get through it. The Inquisition was horrible.

 

[Arbo]

If you can get through it. The Inquisition was horrible.

Definitely not what the western church is used to in this era.