ME (Millennial Exclusion) Posts

This is really off-topic but you brought it up by questioning the accuracy of God's word as revealed in the King James Bible. So here goes:

1. Neither you nor anyone else has even a level of mastery of those old languages equal to that of the average poster on this board's knowledge of English (And that is not a very high standard).

2. No cult survives by basing their doctrines on the bible. They always must disregard the bible or subjugate it to some perceived higher authority (e.g. the Pope, the book of mormon, etc.)

3. I suspect you are really some kind of onlyist. Are you a 66 books in the canon onlyist, or do you suppose that the Gospel of Thomas or the Catholic canon are scripture? Is it proper to contend for which books are in the canon, but not for the actual verses and words that compose those books?

4. So any "scripture" you quote, being translated by yourself or some other fallible man, might be erroneous?

 

Seems that would keep the saved from committing Adultery, to me.

 

It would certainly bring conviction and repentance.

 

What are the MEers trying to prove? That if there may be exceptions to "appointed once to die", there may also be exceptions to "not appointed to wrath"?

Since exceptions to a rule constitute a minority of special cases (rather than the ME's expected number of Christians whose works fall short), what special exceptions to this particular rule of "not appointed to wrath" are they proposing? Do they suppose maybe there's a special place in hell for those who preach another gospel, which is not a gospel at all?

 

We have both made our points. God bless.

 

Jesus preached the everlasting kingdom of God, not the so-called Millennial kingdom.

 

TC, I have to pretty much agree with you, except on number 2, but depending upon the way in which you are an onlyist would also dictate whether being an onlyist is a doctrine, or simply a preference.

Based upon my study of cults, a lot of them are based on the KJV, but I would say that more of them are based on other works that had to be added to it. Of course, there is that one Baptist group that bases its core doctrine upon the difference between the Holy Spirit and the Holy Ghost...

 

If I am reading this right you said the warnings are figurative. But a little while later you said hell is 'real' as opposed to cutting off the hand which was more of a 'figurative expression'. And you said that "the teaching is that it is better that you would cut off your hand or pluck out your eye if it is going to cause you to stumble, or cause others to stumble and go to hell." I assume you must have meant some sort of literal hell with this statement.

It is interesting that you applied stumbling to oneself but stumbling and going to hell to others. What in this "parable" leads you to believe that someone else can stumble and go to a "real" hell whereas the man himself could only stumble? And where do you get the idea that the cutting off your hand (figuratively) is going to prevent others from stumbling and going to hell? The passage, (or parable for argument's sake), clearly talks about the man himself either stumbling or entering into life; it says nothing about someone else stumbling.

Even if the passage is a parable, that does not mean you can just disregard the wording and make it say whatever you want. Just because v 42 talks about offending someone else doesn't mean you can just change the wording in 43ff from saying that the man will stumble into hell, to someone else will stumble into hell because the man didn't cut off his hand.

And since you admit hell is "real" in this passage (although you think aspects of it like "the worm dieth not" are figurative), why would you think the Kingdom of God here is figurative? It is directly contrasted with hell.

And what about this quote:

"The teaching is that a person should do the right thing that he does not go to hell. "

This point itself bears witness to the truth of millennial exclusion and its associated doctrines. The only "right thing" a person can do to be saved in eternity and raised up at the last day is trust in the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, by grace through faith alone. But in this "parable" the right thing a man has to do to avoid hell is to cut off things that would cause him to stumble. The reason is that this kingdom is a prize, not a gift. Simply believing on the Lord Jesus Christ, is enough for your sin debt to be paid in eternity, but it is not enough to avoid temporal consequences, both in this world, and the world to come. For that, we must seek his mercy, confess and forsake our sins, and run the race that is before us.

I am glad for DHK's postings as he is one of the few that actually makes a somewhat rational attempt to answer the OPs.

 

Actually Revelation just says "two witnesses". I think it is LaHaye and Jenkins that say it's Moses and Elijah.

Les

 

Thank you for your reply, Accountable. I tried to find the relevant issue of "Sword and Trowel" in the online archive at: http://www.godrules.net/library/spurgeon/spurgeon.htm
but this only includes the March, May, July, August and October issues for 1881 - perhaps the quote about Robert Govett is in the edition for a "missing" month.

When you say that many baptist men .... have qouted Robert Govett and have found his writtings helpful, have they quoted him and agreed with him on the particular doctrine under discussion here? Did Spurgeon say he agreed with it? It is possible to quote a Christian writer enthusiastically, without agreeing with all of his theology. For example, I have read books by J.C. Ryle, an evangelical Anglican bishop of the 19th century, and gained much from them, particularly his book Holiness. I could, I hope, recommend that book without anyone thinking that by doing so I was endorsing Ryle's paedobaptist beliefs. Could it not be the same with these quoters of Govett?

 

Now this is putting a balance spin on things. Nicely done. :thumbs:

 

It would be strange to think that a man could disagree over a doctrine and yet still praise his writings on the many things they did agree on, wouldn't it? Spurgeon should have put Govett on 'ignore' and then led a crusade against him and his 'grace denying'. :thumbs: I don't think that anyone here is saying that Spurgeon believed in ME, but he certainly didn't find it to be the heretical teaching that some folks try to make it out to be.

 

If Spurgeon did not speak out and deny the ME doctrine as heretical, it was probably just an oversight on his part.

 

Maybe he wasn't wearing spiritual glasses like yours.

 

If not, he should have been.

 

Well, I hear tell that he liked cigars. Probably wasn't really a Christian.

 

Ol' Spurgeon was so voluminous that if he supported Me or anything close to it, such should have been treated by him. At the moment, we are grasping at straws.

 

From Clarence Larkin's "Rightly Dividing The Word"

I agree with Larkin's explanation given here concerning the judgment of the Believer at the JSoC.