Universal church

[The Biblicist]

IMHO the vast majority of RC's are not saved, .

Your admission here destroys your whole argument. The fact that the "vast majority" are not saved does not mean NONE are saved and they are part of your universal invisible church and their doctrine is Catholic Doctrine. There are saved in the SDA, pentecostal, Methodist, Lutheran, etc. This destroys your whole argument about unity in essentials. The facts simply do not support your position at all.

 

[The Biblicist]

This is entirely not true. I mean, if you're just gonna make stuff up then fine, let us know. But this is entirely not true.

You make an accusation without any evidence to support it. If you think I "just gonna make stuff up" then back up that charge with evidence.

The problem is that the earliest Christians were just as informed by literature of their era as they were from the Septuagint. If we look closely at Graeco-Roman literature we see a variety of usages from prior to and within the context of the earliest Christian communities. As it is used ἐκκλησία usually denotes an assembly or group of some kind, however, it is also used in a global, or macro perspective as well. It is not as fixed as you're suggesting.

I have studied pre-New Testament and New Testament literature extensively and I challenge you to provide one example where ekklessia is ever once used in current New Testament literature to mean anything other than a local visible congregation. I have "A Greek English Lexicon of the New Testament and other early Christian literature" by Buer, Arndt and Gingrich (among other Lexicons dealing with that era) and there is no such evidence. You cannot take post-new testament Christian literature and READ IT back into the New Testament era.

No, Acts 19:39 disproves your point.

Don't make an accusation if you are not willing to provide evidence to back your argument up. The term ekklesia refers to a local visible deliberative body that can and does assemble and Acts 19:39 does not dispute that at all. Acts 19:39 simply asserts that the visible local assembly was not lawfully called. A "lawful" assembly is one that is called and made up of qualified citizens. This one simply was not legally called but it nevertheless was a visible congregational deliberative body.