What does believe mean?

No people understand what the "translators" say He said, but that doesn't make the "translators" right. Unless you want to say that the translators were guided by the Spirit from error, which that's going to be an awful difficult position to defend.

 

J.J.,

OH COME ON!!

In Christ
Rev. 22:20 -Amen!

 

That's about the best response you can give when dealing with someone who has "secret knowledge" that the rest of us don't have. Maybe they can come up with their own translation of the Bible and enlighten us all.

 

James,

The gospel is 1Cor 15:3-4 -- "By which also ye are saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you,... For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; 4 And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures:"

Do you see whose sin Jesus died for? Do you see what first Paul did and then the Cornithians themselves did about it ("received")?

skypair

 

JJ,

I agree. An example of this (IMO) is congregations that meet every week and, in place of inviting anyone to receive Christ as Savior, they recite the "Apostle's Creed" of their BELIEF'S. That, to me, is an example of "believing in vain." The result of believing without receiving is condemnation.

skypair

 

That is not believing in vain. That is believing the wrong thing. Of course no one gets born again that way.

But what we are discussing is the question of whether or not good works, fruit, and holiness are explicitly part of the biblical definition of "believe".

I say believe means believe.

Lacy

 

Short and sweet!! And dead center, to boot! Preach on, Bro.! :thumbsup: :thumbs:

Ed

 

Don't forget the gospel of the Kingdom:

Matthew 4:23: And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people.

Matthew 9:35: And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

Matthew 24:14: And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

Mark 1:14 Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God,

 

Waht "secret" knowledge? It's pretty simply laid out. However, the Catholic church muddied it all up, and the KJV helped perpetuate that fallacy.

There are plenty of Bibles, translations, and translators who realize that this word cannot mean "everlasting". Some of them simply transliterate it to avoid being attacked. Many commentaries say something along the lines of, "This word means age-lasting, which obviously means 'eternal'..."

 

That's just a masquerade for not wanting to study something out for fear that tradition may indeed be wrong. If you and deafposttrib and others want to hold onto traditional church teachings without actually studying them out then that's fine, but you don't have to put people down that are not buying into tradition, becuase the Bible actually tells us something that is quite different.

There is nothing secret about this. Anyone that has eyes to see and hears to hear is capable of seeing these Truths. God tells us in Romans that it's not that they haven't heard, but they dont' want to hear. And unfortunately that is the attitude of much of Christendom today. Revelation 3 backs that up as well. People don't want to hear from God, because they are perfectly happy with where they are and if God actually spoke Truth to them it would mess things up

 

Yeah, I know I, as well as most of us, really hate it when the Bible interferes with our theology! :tongue3: :smilewinkgrin:

Ed

 

First, I wasn't discussing Mark 10, I was discussing I John 5. To answer your question directly, because it doesn't say "kingdom age", it says "eternal life". No need to read into the passage any sort of dispensation. Just plain words, spoken plainly.

peace to youraying:

 

The problem is your "spoken plainly," is spoken plainly by man. Those are translated words. The question is okay does the original language used there really mean everlasting?

It can't mean eternal, becuase eternal means without beginning and without end. Our life has a beginning point and that's when we have believed, so eternal isn't the right translation anyway. But does the Greek adjective really mean everlasting and does that translation fit with the rest of scripture.

And the answer to that question if we take an honest look at it is no it does not. The reason being that if everlasting is the correct translation then we put a great number of contradictions on Scripture that can't be there.

 

OK, so in 1 John 1:2, what does "τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον" mean? (Hint: It's the same thing being spoken of in Mark 10.)

 

Touche'. BUT there are people that believe that AND they also believe the gospel of 1Cor 15:3-4. They believe right but they have not taken the right way of receiving salvation.

No. Is that the answer you are looking for? Works, fruit, holiness have no effect on salvation. They add to sanctification. There is only one point of obedience that matters once one knows the truth -- repentance toward God in Christ.

Great! Goes without saying, doesn't it. Brilliant deduction, Einstein! :laugh:

skypair

 

IOW, if a word in Scripture doesn't fit your systematic theology, you re-interpret the word to solve all the apparent contradictions you see in the Bible. Huh, I though it was only us Calvinists that did that! Who would thunk it - you guys do it too!

 

It's not about a word fitting a systematic theology. See you don't even start at the right point. It's letting the Bible say what the Bible says in ALL places, not just some places. And when we do that the Bible WILL NOT contradict Itself. It is impossible.

But when we as humans insert our own defintions and ideas into the text that's when we go wrong.

If "everlasting" is the correct term there are numbers of contradictions that are placed upon the text. Just because you or someone else is not willing to address them and/or choose to ignore or overlook them does not mean they don't exist.

I'm not trying to make the Bible fit my theology. I'm trying to fit my theology around what Scripture says. I've spent way too many years doing the other thing and it left more questions than answers. We will ONLY find Truth when we allow Scripture to say what Scripture says, not what translators say the text says, or what church father's say the text says, or commentaries, or theologians, or traditions, etc.

 

J. Jump, in case you missed it, you are now being called an Arminian, or at least a non-Calvinist!

 

Well, that's just it. They are contradictions within your own systematic theology. The term "everlasting" poses a problem with your own views on soteriology, therefore you conjur up this vast conspiracy of how the Catholic church, church fathers, reformers, translators, publishers - you name it - have kept us from this special knowledge that us plain ole Christians have been missing all these years. Can anyone say 'gnostic'?

 

No, that was not what I meant. I see the Big Five Enlightened Ones ("BFEO") bashing Calvies (and Arminians) for their "systematic" theologies and how they bring their own presuppositions to Scripture. I'm just pointing out that the BFEO do the same exact thing.