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The spirit teaches
- Thread starter Vectorman
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hobbs27
Senior Member
Peter had a gift that no man has ever had since the first century...So far.. Anyone claiming to have the gift Peter was given has been a fraud...this does not happen today..
Acts 5:14 And believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, 15 so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them.
Acts 5:14 And believers were increasingly added to the Lord, multitudes of both men and women, 15 so that they brought the sick out into the streets and laid them on beds and couches, that at least the shadow of Peter passing by might fall on some of them.
Questions... how do you know the "leading" is from the Holy Spirit rather than from say... a conscience that's been trained by study of the Scriptures? How do you know the healings have been a result of the Holy Spirit and not by the Father's providential work?
I'm not disputing the fact that the Spirit leads us today nor that He is not active... but what Hobbs states above is true. People today who are not endowed to speak in languages they haven't previously studied... people today are not endowed to lay hands on someone and distribute the Holy Spirit... people today can't pray and then command dead people to arise.
Again, for anyone who believes otherwise, I offer you a challenge. Let's take the person who supposedly has the gift to raise people from the dead to a cemetery - I know of two recent sisters who died whose family would love to see them raised. Let's take the person who supposedly has the gift of tongues into an assembly of foreigners and see if a foreigner can understand his/her language. Then, let's see a person who supposedly can do what Paul did in Acts 19 - lay hands on someone and then watch the Holy Spirit endow them with the gifts of tongues/prophecy.
Like Thomas, when I witness these things I'll be more than happy to share the beliefs of many of you. Youtube videos, scam artists that deal in illusion, etc. are not proof... Jesus and 1st Century believers publicly performed miracles that could not be denied and they were plain to see. Show me the individuals who can do these things and I'll convert to your belief system.
Until then, though, I refuse to follow Scriptures that have been taken out of context. I've asked before and I'll ask again... does Jesus' statement to the rich young ruler in Matthew 19:21 apply to each of us today?
Respectfully, the "vagueness" you speak of is the belief you subscribe to. Jesus promised the Spirit would bring "all the truth" to the apostles (John 16:14)... and the apostles were commanded to proclaim this entire truth to all nations (Matthew 28:18-20). When this truth would come, early Christians could become complete and mature (Ephesians 4:11ff/2 Timothy 3:16-17).
Yet... you say more is needed. You say that more "truth" is yet to be revealed. If more truth is needed, sir, then Christ has been very inefficient over the years - because it's taken Him almost 2000 years to deliver it to mankind. Today, if we're still needing information from the Holy Spirit in order to live our lives pleasing to the Father, then Jesus lied to His apostles and passages like 2 Peter 1:3 are falsehoods.
The "vagueness" you subscribe to wasn't known in the 3rd and 4th centuries by the church. Church leaders in the 1st 400 years of church history testify to the fading of these miracles - even though many attested to their presence in the days of the apostles (and the generation that followed). The reason the view you espouse today is so widely accepted in Christian circles is because of the influence of people like Wesley and Calvin - who under the umbrella of Calvinism popularized the doctrine of "illumination". One denomination after another accepted this doctrine or some variation of it - and in our day of "relative truth", it's an easy answer to claim "everyone is right" (after all, if the Spirit has "led" someone to a certain belief, then how can others claim it's wrong?).
As a result of this doctrine today, people rely on feelings more than God's revealed word. Yet, never in Scripture were people told that assurance came through feelings - rather through tangible actions (see 1 John for example). I believe in the "leading" idea (apart from the word) today, but I disagree with the source of the leading. Paul told the Thessalonians in the second letter that God would allow people to believe delusions when they'd reject the truth... and we see that everywhere today when it comes to this subject.
Israel
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10-4.
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formula1
Daily Bible Verse Organizer
hobbs27
Senior Member
I had to go back several times in this thread to make sure... Because this was the basis of their argument. Unable to separate modern living in the New Testament with an active God leading us... And First century gifts of healing, tongues, and raising the dead.
Israel
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The getting from "one place" to another, if even seeking with what might be called...or seen as the deepest and most sincere motive, or presented even...a such, is, I am persuaded, always out of a man's hands.
A man knows his own desires, perhaps, or at least believes he does. If more firmly pressed he may come to the place where he touches need in whatever form and in some concluding believes this is the deepest he can ever go. It is mercy that never holds his blindness against him.
His believing is that there is nothing beyond his need as he perceives it, as he experiences it. Need defines, in whatever place he touches it, the limits to him of what he can accept...what is acceptable to be.
The place in which he cries the "Nooooo!" is appointed to each and every man. This "no" is no more summoned nor bidden, nor "thought out" and preconceived than the "ouch" or "Ohhhh" or "son of a ______" that follows a man whacking his thumb as he shingles a roof.
We are being made to utter from that same place a thing common to most all of us, that we more prefer to utter from easy chairs, pulpits, studies full of books and commentaries, before friendly faces and from computer desks and inside temple walls.
Jesus is Lord.
As surely as I do not get myself from any "one place" to another, I am totally unable to assist anyone with that, either.
But I can say that the faith of the Son of God is not a "belief system". But we'll all know one another even better, as we are learning to, even now, in the wine press.
What is inside...will come out. Whether whine or wine.
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As usual, you speak in riddles instead of plainly. However, I'll comment on what you plainly do say - "faith of the Son of God is not a 'belief system'."
Semantics aside, you can't support that statement when looking at passages such as Galatians 1:6-10 and Jude 3. "The gospel" and "the faith once and for all delivered to the saints" is obviously a set of beliefs that people hold. Call it what you will, but the gospel has certain parameters attached to it...
Just to clarify, I believe that the Spirit leads us today via the words that He inspired men to write. Not a leading that is independent from God's word...
I do believe the Spirit continues today to do "miraculous things", but not through people in the manner which was seen in NT days. I.e. while no one can pray/command a person to be healed, the hands of a doctor can be used by God in order to provide it.
Hope that helps...
hobbs27
Senior Member
I agree.
SemperFiDawg
Political Forum Arbiter of Truth (And Lies Too)
This is where I feel your fallacy lies. You freely attribute miracles to the apostles and state that individuals like that don't exist today. The flaw you make is it seems to me you feel the power resided in the men. It didn't. They were simply vessels for the spirit to work thru. Same as today. Sure there are charlatans out there, but that doesn't confine God from performing true BIG miracles thru faithful vessels today for HIS GLORY.
Respectfully, the fallacy isn't mine... it's your's. And... you don't know what you're asserting about what I believe.
The power was NEVER because of the man - it always came via the Holy Spirit. What I'm saying is the Spirit doesn't use "vessels" today in the way He did then - the supernatural gifts bestowed upon Christians in the 1st Century ceased.
In that day, people received these supernatural gifts by 2 ways - baptism of the Holy Spirit (seen in Acts 2/10) and by apostles laying hands upon people (seen in Acts 8/19). People receiving the Holy Spirit in this manner were able to do miraculous things (heal sick, raise dead, etc.). God does not operate in that manner today. THAT'S what I'm saying.
BTW, God IS confined by what His word reveals. IF God has said He doesn't lie, then He cannot lie. IF God has said He will condemn those who don't believe in Him, then He won't save those who disbelieve. And before you go and say "you're limiting God", let me stop you. No person has ability to limit God... but God CAN limit Himself and reveal (through His word) what those limits are.
