Does your scruple handicap your usefulness?
Matthine
Just met this Church of Christ man in Tesco Extra who approached me and told me this.-- Church of Christ invitation to a special program.
-- The bible teaches baptism saved eternally.
-- I have been reading NIV from cover to cover and cannot find any contradiction with what Jesus Christ said.
Sing F Lau
I heard the same way back in 1987 from the same group of people.
If you want to be of service to him, tell him how baptism saves, and how baptism does not save.
Don't quarrel with him over NIV yet! Else you will choke him to death! Give him some light porridge first!
Matthine
He uses cm and I am using inch. Cannot service him unless he understand the cm is man made.
[Is the 'imperial system' divine made???
Sing F Lau
Matthine , your FIXATION with KJ is not a virtue, but a HANDICAP, and it renders you unserviceable to non-KJ users. It is a tragedy.
Learn from APOSTLE PAUL...
"1Co 9:22 To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some." And this is from KJV toooooooooooooo!
My issue is not with KJ.
My issue is with your FIXATION with KJ that renders your useless in helping others.
Your fixation DISTRACTED you from helping him to know the truth... how baptism doesn't save and how baptism saves! Agree with him that baptism does save, but not in the way that he thinks...
You can show from the NIV too that someone who believes DOES SO because he has been born again. John 3:3-5. Only those whom God has saved with eternal salvation is able to believe. And baptism saves in the temporal sense because it is obedience to God's command...
But you are toooooo stuck-up with your scruple!
It is a handicap by choice!
It is your way of doing thing... but it renders you unserviceable to non-kj users. Sad!
Matthine
You are right, I am not able to help them. Only the Holy Ghost with the Spirit of Truth is able to.
Sing F Lau
Matthine , you do sound like you couldn't care less whether you are of help to them or not!!! The Lord gave you an opportunity to minister, you squandered it!!!
Why don't you admit that your fixation with KJ hinders your usefulness in ministering to others? Why give a cop out answer like that - the Holy Spirit is able to.
Your answer betrays a misunderstanding!
Conversion to the truth comes through the means of instruction. Faith cometh by hearing... no hearing of the truth, no conversion to the truth... see Rom 10.
If the Holy Spirit is able to convert him to the truth without you speaking the truth to them, then why waste time hammering them on the KJ issue? Why don't you just leave it to the Holy Spirit?
Aren't you not selectively inconsistent!
Then why talk so much all the time??? Aren't you wasting your breath if all your talking is not the appointed intended to instruct and edify?
Matthine
Dear Sing, remember the conceal and the reveal truth preached by pastor Jonathan. Unless they even have an open eye, it is impossible to have a different baseline and because Jesus Christ preached about it in the parable of the sower.
One baseline devalue the personhood of Jesus Christ and price He paid.
1John 2:21 I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that *no lie is of the truth.* --------------------- How to agree with anything that is a lie as a christian?
Unless you are able to demonstrate that to me, I cannot understand how that can be done. The very simple case of Stevie, he is still in his corruption.
Sing F Lau
Dear Sing, remember the conceal and the reveal truth preached by pastor Jonathan. Unless they even have an open eye, it is impossible to have a different baseline and because Jesus Christ preached about it in the parable of the sower.
Matthine, to conceal or reveal is God's prerogative alone.
Your duty and mine, Matthine , is to show them the truth, i.e. how baptism saves, and how it doesn't save. That is the issue I am dealing with.
How do you even know that they don't have an open eye?
You acted completely CONTRARY to what the parable of the sower teaches... SOW even on the wayside and stony ground and thorny ground... but you would only sow when you see someone carries and thumbs a KJB... hallucinating that those who carry KJV are the good ground!
God did have mercy on you in your pre-KJV days, didn't He??? You did have a different baseline then, didn't you? Just remember that why you are dealing with those who are not using KJV yet!
You have SQUANDERED an opportunity God had sent your way. An opportunity missed is a STRING of opportunities missed. You should grieved over the missed opportunity instead of justifying your little scruple!
Matthine
Based on what I was preached to and believed, God shown me general longsuffering via his providence in creations. Those that worked the corruption to my understanding, are NOT from God. Yes, I had a different baseline, but deep within me, there are something like what you have preached the contradiction, the so call blessed inconsistency, and the inability to clarify my understanding of clear doctrine. I am not saying they, non king james holy bible user, are all not eternally saved, some (perhaps larger than half) might be. So far, I can only work with the ability that the Lord provided for me. Beyond that, I am neither given any special wisdom of natural man languages from my many circular miseducation. You know my personal malaysia chinese kampung boy education background. Stating this as mere facts.
BTW, The posting I had "You are right, I am not able to help them. Only the Holy Ghost with the Spirit of Truth is able to.", this is a statement of faith. I give this not to condemn them.
Matthine
Joh 16:13 "Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come."
This is the verse whereby I am claiming that as a statement of faith for all His elected that I encountered.
Sing F Lau
Matthine , it has nothing to do with your chinese kampong boy education. You know enough to engage in debate which translation is superior (I hope you have jettisoned your idea of 'INSPIRED' translation!!!) - so you are not deficiently educated.
It is your fixation with KJV that cripples and severely limits your usefulness to non-kjv folks. And you are quite proud of it, instead of being sadden. And in your pride, you keep justifying your foolish antics!
Sing F Lau
And you have misunderstood John 16:13.
That is addressed to the Apostles, who were indeed shown and guided into ALL TRUTH, who in turn gave the full revelation of God in the NT Scriptures.
No, no, no.... that statement DOES NOT apply to ALL God's elect. It applies specifically and particularly to the Apostles. They were DIRECTLY and IMMEDIATELY taught and guided by the Spirit of Christ... into ALL truth.
The rest of us is taught through means, and need great effort and humility to learn some measure of the truth.
So, if you really want to help that Church of Christ man, you must know the truth and tell him the truth about baptism.
And if he asks you about a reliable translation, tell him that also!
That's all I wish to say!
Matthine
@Sing: See, I was trying to agree with you that I am not skilled.
So far, I can only work with the ability that the Lord provided for me.
I am not trying to make excuses here. I am trying to be as precise as I can be. Which is why I never try to use any greek or hebrew and ask others to step in.
If I cannot even properly claim verses in KJT which has already been shown to me as the word of God, how can I be possibly expected to argue using any other english version that has over 400 versions and multiple edition. I have only 24 hours a day and my like to invest more time in the right version.
How to remember which of those 'versions has' or does not have the important Gal 2:16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might *be justified by the faith of Christ*, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.
Sing F Lau
Matthine , you still don't get the point!
You have made a deliberate choice - unless someone uses KJT, you are not WILLING to assist the person! [It is not because you are not skilled! You are skilled enough to debate all sort of subjects!]
That's not a virtue. That a handicap by choice. Thanks.
That is my point all along. You can justify all you want.
Such mind set cripples your usefulness.
Matthine is Matthew Ong, aka Matthew Dosolatite on Facebook!
