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IMO what David Miller does do on TT is superb. IMO
what he does badly is speak for himself. One gets the sense that David uses
others as a ventriliquist would use a dummy to 'test the waters'. His ability to
research, employ language tools and his knowledge of history are almost
intimidating. One would have thought that after decades (I'm only guessing) he
would have come to a clearer understanding of the gospel's most central
question: 'Who is Jesus Christ'.
This reflects 'my addendum'.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: January 16, 2005 19:31
Subject: [TruthTalk] The Nicene Creed and
Truthtalk Members
Welcome to the forum
Gregory. You should know that Judy denies the Nicene Creed mostly based
on bad exegesis on her part and a huge misunderstanding of the history behind
the creed of all creeds. Judy is also an Arian with a subtle split
between God and Jesus. She is vehement in denying the eternal Sonship of
Christ (as are Terry, DavidM and sometimes Izzy) and also/therefore denies the
Trinity – she does have some concept of the Godhead but not in the classical
sense that Christians have believed as delivered by the apostles and church
fathers. In other words, Judy believes and practices many of the
heresies that the Nicene Creed was developed for. Although she has been
asked three times for the statement of faith from her place of worship she
refuses to send it (this is probably because of one or two reasons: one she
may not attend a local assembly or two she knows that she is in deep conflict
with it). It is very difficult to get a hold of her theology and learn
where it has been developed from. Much of it is Calvinist (although she
is completely unaware of this and has deep disdain for Calvin himself) and
there are strains of covenant theology as well. There is a deep hatred
towards the Catholic Church which in her mind includes the church from the
2nd century forwards (in opposition to the church catholic).
She (as well as others on this forum) are against learning the Bible in the
original languages and prefer the King James version. Attempts are finding out
what the writer was trying to convey in the original languages are usually met
with scorn. She believes that humankind are mostly spirit beings and is
deeply convinced that the Greek view (read non-Hebraic, non-biblical) of body,
soul and spirit is Christian as well. That being said, Judy knows her
Bible better than most on this forum and will converse with you at length
about almost anything; she will do her research. She is also always
sincere even when we sense that her tone is not. Perhaps she is like the
rest of us with our massive hodgepodge of beliefs. If you check the
archives there are a lot of posts on this matter of a number of people on this
forum being outside of historical orthodoxy. Those that are outside are
awfully proud of it, wearing it as a badge of honor. They will tell you
that they put scripture first and in a way they do. Unfortunately they
put the Bible before Jesus Christ. Without a proper hermeneutic (taking
all things and subjecting them to the Person of Jesus Christ [including the
scriptures]) they end up practicing religion instead of a
relationship.
Let us note that by
accuracy or precision in knowledge is not meant some narrow Biblicist way of
thinking and speaking about God. Accurate or precise knowledge of God is
not gained by stringing together biblical statements but by allowing our
thought to be informed and determined by the truth of God to which they direct
us. To regard biblical statements as divine assertions does not mean
that they are immediately intelligible, for they have to be interpreted in the
light of the truth to which they refer, and in accordance with which our
interpretations of them must be tested. Hence we have to think out for
ourselves what they mean in the light of that reference. This does not
mean that we have to leave behind the guidance of the Holy Scriptures through
which alone God’s revelation is mediated to us, but that we refuse to be
content with reproducing the mere letter of the biblical statements in our
determination to rest our thinking and speaking upon the truth of God himself
who addresses us through those biblical statements. This means that we
have to decide what we ourselves say of the truth under the direction of the
biblical statements, and how we are to formulate our statements in such a way
that they are established as true through their adequacy to the truth
itself. This involves what Athanasius called a ‘freedom of religious
discourse’ on the basis of the Holy Scriptures when we pass beyond what they
literally say to the truth of God which they convey, and seek to express that
as accurately and precisely as we can. And we dare not do that except in
the most cautious and reverent way and with much prayer. (T.F. Torrance, The
Trinitarian Faith, pg. 57)
I have read your
posts with interest Gregory. You are a welcome addition to this
dysfunctional family. I do not post much anymore but hope to converse
with you in the future. One easy way to get me out of the woodwork is to
mention the Nicene Creed J
Jonathan
From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
On Behalf Of Gregory A. Hession
J.D.
Sent: Sunday, January
16, 2005 5:03 PM
To:
[email protected]
Subject: Re: [TruthTalk] Good
News!
The council of Nicea was a
multiyear assembly of nearly every bishop in the church, bathed in prayer, and
intent on dealing with heresy which had attempted to demean the nature of
Christ. I assume they got it right. Do you have some specific
disagreements with some of its precepts? It isn't scripture, so I can
understand your impulse to be wary.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Sunday,
January 16, 2005 4:38 PM
Subject: Re:
[TruthTalk] Good News!
Can you be sure the Jesus of the
apostles is the same Jesus as the Nicene Creed? jht
On Sun, 16 Jan 2005 16:28:27 -0500 "Gregory A.
Hession J.D." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
writes:
Judy: I agree that we
cannot have a mealy-mouthed, squishy, Barney the Dinosaur,
We-are-the-World, Everything-Is-Beautiful Jesus. Let's assume
that I am referring to the full-orbed Jesus of the Scriptures, the Jesus
of the Nicene Creed, begotten before all ages, God of God, light of true
light, The Jesus testified to by the Apostles, martyrs, and
saints in the church through the ages, and the Jesus who is coming again
in glory to judge the living and the dead, and to whom every knee will bow
and every tongue confess he is Lord. Good
enuf?
On Sun, 16 Jan 2005 13:47:19 -0500 "Gregory A.
Hession J.D." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
writes:
Unity
is the show of love DESPITE not saying the same thing in the
theological details, because
on the main issue of following Christ we are saying the same
thing. It is not a rational or scriptural
goal to aspire to get everyone to agree with ones self.
The goal, rather, should be to live a life of grace and mercy in
Christ: that is what is required. Then, it won't matter if a
brother disagrees, because we won't be in the frame of mind to be
disagreeable about it.
I don't know that
this is true Gregory; the question I have is "who is this Christ,
who is Jesus?" He appears to be chameleon like amongst those who
profess to be His disciples, and He is the main issue - would you
agree?
He is the Truth
and on this list there is little agreement about what truth consists
of. He is the Way, you will hear all kinds of different ways on
TT. He is the Life, what kind of life? Physical or spiritual,
sometimes it's hard to tell. The apostle Paul wrote to the church at
Philippi "let us walk by the same rule, let us mind the same thing" -
this is the kind of unity we need - right now we are not all saying
the same thing. jht
In a
message dated 1/15/2005 2:54:46 PM Pacific Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
writes:
jt:
Three hits Gregory - Unity will happen when we are all saying the
same thing which unfortunately is not a reality right now. We
used to sing Ps 133 at a Church I went to.. Behold how good and how
pleasant it is, for brethren to dwell together in unity...
Amen!! judyt
Huh???
We will
never have unity based upon "all saying the same
thing
...." Unity is based upon each recognizing the
servant/Master
relationship and
giving honor and space to that circumstance. A practice of the
principles of Romans 14 (esp. v 4) would solve nearly all of
the ranker problems on this forum.. But that ain't going
to happen either. I could be wrong
--- but probably not. Jd
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