Roman Catholicism , cult or not? Part II

[Chemnitz]

We didn't event the allegroization of Scripture: Augustine did. Obviously then Peter and Paul did not allegorize their own Scriptures which Aurgustine

Actually Origen is the one to blame for allegorical interpretation.

We take literally the the teachings of Peter and Paul and the rest of the Apostles as they were meant to.

Except when the literal interpretation is inconvenient for baptist pressupositions.

 

[Eliyahu]

Originally posted by stray bullet:
The Catholics were the true Christians and ONLY Christians until the 5th Century when the Coptics in North Africa broke away, then the Orthodox in the 11th and protestants in the 16th.
[/QB]

Do you know that Catholics claim strongly they all should go to Purgatory with extremely rare exceptions of Saints?

How long do you expect you will spend time at Purgatory? Your destiny is depending neither on your own effort there in Purgatory nor on the mercy of God, but on the prayers of others, your relatives after your death, right?
How many million years or how many billion years at Purgatory can purify your sins?

Do you know that the Robber at the cross could go to Paradise immediately, without going to Purgatory? How much Catholics are more miserable than the Robber?
How many RC are on this earth today? How many among them can go to Heaven directly without going to Purgatory, having been canonized as Saints?

Catholics strongly deny that their churches are built upon Jesus Christ, by strongly insisting that their church is built upon Peter even though Peter never heard about Roman Catholics.

Catholics strongly deny that God is their Holy Father, by calling corruptible human being Popes as their Holy Father.
They cried their Holy Father died !
Our True Holy Father never dies !

Catholics strongly deny that one should not make Idols, by excusing the idols for Mary!, then create fables that the idols of Mary bleed from the eyes!

Should we submit to human beings like this?

Benedict IX (1033-1045), was made Pope as a boy 12 years old, through a money bargain with the powerful families that ruled Rome. "Surpassed John XII in wickedness; committed murders and adulteries in broad daylight; robbed pilgrims on the graves of martyrs a hideous criminal, the people drove him out of Rome." Some call him the Worst of all the Popes


http://biblestudysite.com/history.htm


Roman Catholic strongly confess that they don't believe the blood of Jesus Christ and His death cleansed all sins away but left the future sins unforgiven, by conducting Mass every week where Priests ask for the forgiveness all the time, never bringing the answer from God about how God answered their prayers.

 

[Bro. James]

Reformed? What?

To say that the Lord's Churches need reforming is to say that He has left Her and forsaken Her; and that the Holy Spirit has not been leading in all Truth.

Jesus said He would never leave--He sent another Comforter. He has abided--through the gates of hell--just like He said. God is faithful--man is not. Man is depraved.

The remnant has been preserved--through the Grace and Power of God. All man can do is make yokes of bondage and stop up the gates of heaven.

The Bride remains--undefiled. Reformations are of men--can the apostate be reformed?. God has no difficulty revealing nor enforcing His Word. The First Assembly had all the necessary equipment to carry out the commission. And so did every New Testament Assembly thereafter for the past 1900 years.

Selah,

Bro. James

 

[Doubting Thomas]

Originally posted by DHK:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Doubting Thomas:
[qb] There was no final consensus regarding the NT canon until well after Constantine allegedly brought all those corrupting influences into the Church.

This is unverifiable opinion and the Catholic standard lie which they would have you believe. Even the Bible itself teaches us otherwise. Peter verifies the inspiration of the epistles of Paul. </font>[/QUOTE]The key phrase is "the epistles of Paul". These were indeed the earliest to have widespread recognition as being authoritative among the Church, and it's not at all surprising that the folks to whom Peter was writing his second epistle were familiar with them. Somewhat later (in terms of widespread recognition) was the quartet of Holy Gospels. Later still were the general epistles--these were disputed for a long time in areas of the Church as I mentioned above. Ironically, the book (Second Peter) in which Peter equates Paul's writings with scripture was among the books in that disputed category. And this is not "unverified opinion". These are facts that can be found in any standard academic (and non-Roman Catholic) book on the formation of the NT canon.

Peter also states that it is the writings of the Apostles that the believers were to take heed to, just as they valued the writings of the prophets of the Old Testament.

But he didn't state it was to "only" their writings that believers were to take heed. On the other hand, Paul commands the Thessalonians to follow the traditions handed down whether delivered orally or by epistle. (2 Thess 2:15)

Jude, one of the last books to be written, tells us to "contend to the faith" the faith being that body of doctrinne already in existence through the original written manuscripts.

But that body of doctrine was handed down primarily orally. This was exclusively the case for about the first two decades of the Churches existence, as no NT writings were penned until approximately 50 AD. It remained practically the case for at least the next several decades as the other NT writings were gradually written and more slowly began to circulate to varying extents around the Mediterranean. In fact, it was the oral teachings--the oral tradition--that helped the Church determine which writings that claimed apostolic authorship were authentic and which (like the Gospel of Thomas, etc) were not.

The Catholic Church would have one to believe that the early believers were too ignorant and not intelligent enough to know which books were inspired and which were not, even though they were the ones that had the Apostles living among them.

And yet historically their was no indication of a canon, "fixed" or otherwise, which exactly matches our 27 book NT until AD 367 at the earliest. You can verify this through non-RCC sources. (F.F Bruce's book on the Canon is a good one). Before this time period, although there was a general agreement about the Pauline corpus and the four gospels (and perhaps 1 John and 1 Peter) there was no universal consensus about the exact limits of the canon. Hebrews, James, Jude, 2 Peter, 2 & 3 John, and Revelation were disputed in various regions for a long time. (And, books such as 1 Clement, Barnabas, Shepherd of Hermas, and the Didache were considered to be Scripture for a while in various locales). We forget that that there was no printing press back then and that transportation was more difficult, so that there were much fewer copies of Scriptures (than we have now) and it took much longer for letters to circulate around. By the time certain letters (ie many of the general epistles) starting circulating out of their initial area of reception, so too were spurious pseudo-"apostolic" works making many to be very hesitant in accepting books that they previously were unaware of (ie like 2 Peter, etc). Sorry if these facts bother you, but they are the facts.

The Catholic Church had nothing to do with the preservation of the Word of God. It was the early churches.

The early church was the catholic church. Ignatius, at the beginning of the second century, even referred to the Church as being the "catholic" church.

The Catholic Church never came into existence until the fourth century and the canon of Scripture was well established before that time.

Nope, the catholic church existed from the beginning and referred to itself as "catholic" long before the fourth century. The canon wasn't finalized until the end of the 4th or beginning of the 5th century. Sorry if this doesn't sit well with you, but, again, these are the historical facts.

Those things which you have mentioned are not taught in the Bible (baptismal regeneration, (the new Eve, etc.) were never taught by the Apostles, were unknown to the early churches, have no foundation in Scripture and are found only after the paganized Catholic Church started in the fourth century.

Actually, you are again displaying your ignorance of early church writings (and Scripture too, for that matter). All these beliefs were expressed long before the fourth century. For example, we have documentation from the second century about belief in Mary as "the New Eve" (Justin and Irenaeus). As far as baptism is concerned, it was the consensus of the early Church that regeneration occured by the Holy Spirit in the baptismal waters. There are no writings that teach a merely symbolic view of water baptism in the ante-Nicene period. And both of these things were regarded by early Christians as having apostolic and Scriptural support (the first being more implicit, and the latter more explicit)--they would just disagree with your interpretations of the relevent Scriptures.

What Baptists believe today has been taught since the days of the Apostles since we teach what the Bible teaches. If Peter taught it we teach it. If Paul taught it we teach it.

Not even close.
(Well, maybe a little close...Baptists to their credit at least generally acknowlege the Trinity and the Deity and Incarnation of Christ, and I'm grateful for learning these two great truths in my 33+ year stint as a Southern Baptist

)

And I think many of us are still waiting for evidence of the existence of these proto-Baptists from the ante-Nicene period.

 

[Doubting Thomas]

Originally posted by Bro. James:
Reformed? What?

To say that the Lord's Churches need reforming is to say that He has left Her and forsaken Her; and that the Holy Spirit has not been leading in all Truth.

AMEN

Jesus said He would never leave--He sent another Comforter. He has abided--through the gates of hell--just like He said.

AMEN

The remnant has been preserved--through the Grace and Power of God.

AMEN

The Bride remains--undefiled.

AMEN

Reformations are of men--can the apostate be reformed?. God has no difficulty revealing nor enforcing His Word. The First Assembly had all the necessary equipment to carry out the commission. And so did every New Testament Assembly thereafter for the past 1900 years.

Yes, praise God He has preserved the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church.

(But I don't think you and I are talking about the same thing. )

 

[Doubting Thomas]

Originally posted by Chemnitz:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />DHK: We take literally the the teachings of Peter and Paul and the rest of the Apostles as they were meant to.

Except when the literal interpretation is inconvenient for baptist pressupositions. </font>[/QUOTE]So true, as I discovered all too well during my lifetime as a Southern Baptist.

 

[nate]

Originally posted by Eliyahu:
Catholics strongly deny that God is their Holy Father, by calling corruptible human being Popes as their Holy Father.
They cried their Holy Father died !

You are wrong here. They do not deny that God is their Father by calling the earthly head of their church Pope or Father. Their earthly spiritual head (similar to your pastor) died. Is that not reason to weep? (Please see the other thread I started about this very topic)

Our True Holy [Heavenly] Father never dies !

(Brackets mine)

AMEN and AMEN!!!
In Christ,
Nathan

"Eccere nullus-a-um salus-utis externus Christus!"

 

[D28guy]

Matt...

"Yes, but DT's point was that Christians didn't know what books actually constituted the NT until the 4th century."

I was going to respond but DHK beat me to it. And he usually responds to "canonicity" questions better than I do anyway.

God bless,

Mike

 

[D28guy]

Chemnitz,

It was posted...

Not some brainwashing cult...

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..

And on and on and on--I was brainwashed by age 6. I am now 60, and still remember the programming. The Lord led me out of it a long time age.

It is a cult--the oldest in the world--it goes back to the days of Nimrod and Astoreth etal. Most of Christendom will be celebrating them soon--they call it Easter.

New Testament churches do not celebrate such things, but rather consider such to be pagan idolatry"

And you responded...

"Apparently memory work is now the mark of a cult,..."

Only when mindless repetition is used to indoctrinate people to be a goddess worshipper, or anything else that blatantly idolatrous or blasphemous.

"...so I guess all the churches running AWANA or similar programs are cults.

Is AWANA something that promotes goddess worship or something equally hidious?

Mike

 

[Chemnitz]

Is AWANA something that promotes goddess worship or something equally hidious?

Yes mindless repetition for the purposes of indoctrinating in baptist teaching.

 

[nate]

Originally posted by Chemnitz:
Yes mindless repetition for the purposes of indoctrinating in baptist teaching.

 

[DHK]

Originally posted by Bro. James:
Not some brainwashing cult...

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee..

And on and on and on--I was brainwashed by age 6. I am now 60, and still remember the programming. The Lord led me out of it a long time age.

How I can relate:

Dominus vobiscum!
Et tum spirit tu tuo........................

Along with all the other latin: etc., etc., etc.,
DHK

 

[Matt Black]

Originally posted by D28guy:
Matt...

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />"Yes, but DT's point was that Christians didn't know what books actually constituted the NT until the 4th century."

I was going to respond but DHK beat me to it. And he usually responds to "canonicity" questions better than I do anyway.

God bless,

Mike </font>[/QUOTE]And DT has shot his argument down as usual better than I can!

 

[DHK]

Originally posted by Doubting Thomas:
The key phrase is "the epistles of Paul". These were indeed the earliest to have widespread recognition as being authoritative among the Church, and it's not at all surprising that the folks to whom Peter was writing his second epistle were familiar with them. Somewhat later (in terms of widespread recognition) was the quartet of Holy Gospels. Later still were the general epistles--these were disputed for a long time in areas of the Church as I mentioned above. Ironically, the book (Second Peter) in which Peter equates Paul's writings with scripture was among the books in that disputed category. And this is not "unverified opinion". These are facts that can be found in any standard academic (and non-Roman Catholic) book on the formation of the NT canon.

I realize it is only natural that you take the word of modernistic unbelieving critical scholars over that of believing conservative scholars. There are obvious reasons for that.

John 8:45 And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not.

Peter epistles (both of them) were always accepted as inspired among the true believers, taught by the Apostles and their followers and so on. Error entered in when gnostics and other false teachers tried to lead others astray. Paul in both 1 and 2 Corinthians warned of these false teachers. Even at that time they were among the Corinthian Church demanding epistles of recommendation of Paul, though he had started the church at Corinth. Unbelievable!!
And you still hold to your "truth" that the believers could not separate the inspired books from the fake, gnostic forgeries. I know that the RCC today is unable to do this. But I know that I can tell that Bel and the Dragon is a fake and forgery as compared to the rest of the 66 books of the Bible. The canon of Scripture has cetain evidences and qualities that are not found in forgeries such as that fable. The early believers knew the same.

The books that make up the canon of our Scripture today were recognized as canon as they were written. Paul knew when he was writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Many times he uses statements such as: "It is not I, but the Lord that commands:" emphasizing that this indeed is the Word of God. It was obvious that Peter and others knew that his writings were inspired and recobnized them as Scripture by the words that they wrote.

But he didn't state it was to "only" their writings that believers were to take heed. On the other hand, Paul commands the Thessalonians to follow the traditions handed down whether delivered orally or by epistle. (2 Thess 2:15)

[/quote
This is one of the Catholics favorite verses, taken away out of context, the word "tradition" redefined, and the verse made to mean something different than it was intended to mean. Typical Catholicism!
Consider the Catholic definition of "tradition." It is accumulated stories that have been passed down from generation to generaton over a long period of time, usually centuries. Christ died in 29 A.D. Thessalonians was written in the early 60's In the space of 30 years what could be gained that could be rightly defined as "tradition?" Absolutely nothing! In thirty years there was no tradition. You can't get tradition in 30 years, at least no according to the Catholic definition definition of tradtion. They misuse and mistranslate this verse on purpose.
Ye do err not knowing the Scripture neither the power of God."
The word tradition in that verse simply means "truth." Paul was admonishing them to keep in rembrance the truth that he had taught them. Whether you claim it is oral or written it doesn't matter, for all truth came from the Word of God. If I teach a person the gospel, I don't need to carry a Bible with me. I have the Scriptures memorized. I am perfectly capable of explaining the gospel orally, without a written copy of the Scripture, and yet the gospel still coming fron the Scripture. Paul was teaching them the truth.

But that body of doctrine was handed down primarily orally.

What proof do you have of that? That is just your opinion. Jude was written 70 A.D. The only books written after that time were the writings of John. Most of the New Testament had therefore all been written. Paul in the last epistle that he wrote, the Second Epistle of Timothy, writes to Timothy from prison and asks for the parchments to be sent to him. It was the one thing he valued above all others--the inspired Word of God.

2 Timothy 4:13 The cloke that I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest, bring with thee, and the books, but especially the parchments.

"the books"-- biblion--the word from which our word Bible comes from.
--Paul desired above all things the Bible, at least as much of it was in existence at that time, and that was most of it.

This was exclusively the case for about the first two decades of the Churches existence, as no NT writings were penned until approximately 50 AD.

What has that got to do with the price of tea in China. They didn't have to rely on tradition, nor on anything else. They had the aposltes themselves right up until the end of the first century. John didn't til about 98 A.D. The first epistles to be written were as you say, written about 50 A.D. But all the apostles were still around at that time also. Read the book of Acts. The disciples taught them.

It remained practically the case for at least the next several decades as the other NT writings were gradually written and more slowly began to circulate to varying extents around the Mediterranean. In fact, it was the oral teachings--the oral tradition--that helped the Church determine which writings that claimed apostolic authorship were authentic and which (like the Gospel of Thomas, etc) were not.

Tradition had nothing to do with this. This is the revised history of the Catholic Church. The apostle's teaching were taught by the early disciples from the writings of the disciples, whose copies began to be spread far and wide. Why are you so adamantly opposed to the truth? God's Word is preserved in the early believers, not in the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church has no monopoly over the Word of God.

And yet historically their was no indication of a canon, "fixed" or otherwise, which exactly matches our 27 book NT until AD 367 at the earliest.

Check other translations. Check the Itala.

You can verify this through non-RCC sources. (F.F Bruce's book on the Canon is a good one). Before this time period, although there was a general agreement about the Pauline corpus and the four gospels (and perhaps 1 John and 1 Peter) there was no universal consensus about the exact limits of the canon. Hebrews, James, Jude, 2 Peter, 2 & 3 John, and Revelation were disputed in various regions for a long time. (And, books such as 1 Clement, Barnabas, Shepherd of Hermas, and the Didache were considered to be Scripture for a while in various locales). We forget that that there was no printing press back then and that transportation was more difficult, so that there were much fewer copies of Scriptures (than we have now) and it took much longer for letters to circulate around. By the time certain letters (ie many of the general epistles) starting circulating out of their initial area of reception, so too were spurious pseudo-"apostolic" works making many to be very hesitant in accepting books that they previously were unaware of (ie like 2 Peter, etc). Sorry if these facts bother you, but they are the facts.

You read too much modernistic garbage; books that try to discredit not only the inspiration of the Bible, but also the supernatural events of the Bible. Why is it that you steer clear of conservative scholarship? Do you have an axe to grind?

The early church was the catholic church. Ignatius, at the beginning of the second century, even referred to the Church as being the "catholic" church.

It is a well known fact that the RCC had its origins in the fourth century with Constantine. That is fact. The earlier church fathers used Catholic in a much different sense. After all the word does mean universal. I don't agree with all the church fathers. There is much error to be found among them. In fact Origen was deemed to be a heretic even by Catholic standards.

Nope, the catholic church existed from the beginning and referred to itself as "catholic" long before the fourth century. The canon wasn't finalized until the end of the 4th or beginning of the 5th century. Sorry if this doesn't sit well with you, but, again, these are the historical facts.

This is your opinion only. They are not facts, and cannot be verified historically. The only historical evidence that you can bring forth is from Catholic websites which have already revised history.

Actually, you are again displaying your ignorance of early church writings (and Scripture too, for that matter). All these beliefs were expressed long before the fourth century. For example, we have documentation from the second century about belief in Mary as "the New Eve" (Justin and Irenaeus). As far as baptism is concerned, it was the consensus of the early Church that regeneration occured by the Holy Spirit in the baptismal waters. There are no writings that teach a merely symbolic view of water baptism in the ante-Nicene period. And both of these things were regarded by early Christians as having apostolic and Scriptural support (the first being more implicit, and the latter more explicit)--they would just disagree with your interpretations of the relevent Scriptures.

Is this like the assumption of Mary declared to be a doctrine of the RCC in 1950. The Catholic Church changes every year adding some doctrines and subtracting others; but thankfully the Word of God never changes because Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever.
That is one thing that the Catholic Church cannot lay claim to.
DHK

 

[Matt Black]

Originally posted by DHK:
Those things which you have mentioned are not taught in the Bible (baptismal regeneration, (the new Eve, etc.) were never taught by the Apostles, were unknown to the early churches, have no foundation in Scripture and are found only after the paganized Catholic Church started in the fourth century.

1. There's a strong argument for saying that baptismal regeneration is taught in the Bible - I Peter 3:21 springs to mind.

2. These matters to which you refer were taught by the early church; Irenaeus, for example, writes:

"He [Jesus] came to save all through himself; all, I say, who through him are reborn in God: infants, and children, and youths, and old men. Therefore he passed through every age, becoming an infant for infants, sanctifying infants; a child for children, sanctifying those who are of that age . . . [so that] he might be the perfect teacher in all things, perfect not only in respect to the setting forth of truth, perfect also in respect to relative age" (Against Heresies 2:22:4 [A.D. 189]). "‘And [Naaman] dipped himself . . . seven times in the Jordan’ [2 Kgs. 5:14]. It was not for nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon his being baptized, but [this served] as an indication to us. For as we are lepers in sin, we are made clean, by means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord, from our old transgressions, being spiritually regenerated as newborn babes, even as the Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’ [John 3:5]" (Fragment 34 [A.D. 190]).

Hyppolytus:

"Baptize first the children, and if they can speak for themselves let them do so. Otherwise, let their parents or other relatives speak for them" (The Apostolic Tradition 21:16 [A.D. 215]).

and Cyprian of Carthage:

"As to what pertains to the case of infants: You [Fidus] said that they ought not to be baptized within the second or third day after their birth, that the old law of circumcision must be taken into consideration, and that you did not think that one should be baptized and sanctified within the eighth day after his birth. In our council it seemed to us far otherwise. No one agreed to the course which you thought should be taken. Rather, we all judge that the mercy and grace of God ought to be denied to no man born" (Letters 64:2 [A.D. 253]).

"If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another" (ibid., 64:5).

These are all well before Constantine's Edict of Toleration of 313 when you state the Catholic Church began. Seems like these 'early Baptist churches' held some distinctly non-Baptist doctrines and interpretattions of Scripture...Hmmm...

What Baptists believe today has been taught since the days of the Apostles since we teach what the Bible teaches.

Um...no - see above. Believers' baptism alone has only been taught since the 1520s, beginning with the Anabaptists.

 

[Matt Black]

Originally posted by DHK:
What has that got to do with the price of tea in China. They didn't have to rely on tradition, nor on anything else. They had the aposltes themselves right up until the end of the first century. John didn't til about 98 A.D. The first epistles to be written were as you say, written about 50 A.D. But all the apostles were still around at that time also. Read the book of Acts. The disciples taught them.

So, these apostles were, er, omnipresent then?

 

[Matt Black]

Originally posted by Bro. James:
Reformed? What?

To say that the Lord's Churches need reforming is to say that He has left Her and forsaken Her; and that the Holy Spirit has not been leading in all Truth.

Jesus said He would never leave--He sent another Comforter. He has abided--through the gates of hell--just like He said. God is faithful--man is not. Man is depraved.

The remnant has been preserved--through the Grace and Power of God. All man can do is make yokes of bondage and stop up the gates of heaven.

The Bride remains--undefiled. Reformations are of men--can the apostate be reformed?. God has no difficulty revealing nor enforcing His Word. The First Assembly had all the necessary equipment to carry out the commission. And so did every New Testament Assembly thereafter for the past 1900 years.

Selah,

Bro. James

I'm confused - is that a response to my link to the article about the Waldenses?

And we're all still waiting for your evidence of these Christian groups prior to 1160....

 

[Bro. James]

"I'm confused", indeed, we are all confused--especially when we put more credence in the writings of men than the plain teaching of the Word of God. God is not the author of confusion.

Jesus said He would build His Church--and the gates of Hell would not prevail. He said He would send another Comforter, to lead in all Truth. Jesus has been faithful. Why do some not believe Him?

The true believers have been in every generation, preserved by God, kind of like Noah in the Ark. God preserved a remnant while He destroyed the world with water. He said the world will be destroyed again--this time with fire, melting with fervent heat. Are we ready? The NT gospel has been preached for over 1900 years. Satan has tried to thwart--he has failed. The remnant, The Bride of Christ, remains undefiled. Read about Her in the pages of secular history--She is usually called an heretic.

Not all heretics are true believers.

We seem to be having a dilemma of paradigms, Matthew. My first filter is: Sola Scriptura.

Selah,

Bro. James

 

[Chemnitz]

"I'm confused", indeed, we are all confused--especially when we put more credence in the writings of men than the plain teaching of the Word of God. God is not the author of confusion.

Translation- I have no proof

 

[Bro. James]

Have not seen the Ark either--God said it, that settles it. Whether we believe it or not is irrelevant in terms of Truth. The Word of God does not need a preponderance of evidence to make it so.

Do you believe man went to the moon and walked thereon and returned? Could it have been faked?

The fact that man has so utterly failed in his endeavors since Adam should indicate to us that depraved man cannot be trusted. Only the return of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords will make it right, that with a rod of iron.

How much more proof does one need?

Selah,

Bro. James