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When you put Matthew 24 next to Revelations you can see why I am a mid-tribulationistWe will experience the first 3 1/2 years of the tribulation.The first half shows man's wrath being poured out on man, the second half shows God's wrath being poured out on man. We are not appointed unto wrath.Its an interesting study we should go over brv

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We tell time by the earth's rotation and revolution around the sun.EDIT: And according to some very quick research, dividing the day into 24 hours and the hour into 60 minutes (etc) was devised in ancient Sumeria, Babylon, and/or Egypt.
Interestingly the days being divided like this resulted in their being off that 1/4 day per year that gave us leap year.In the book of Daniel there is a specific amount of time given for the time between the order to rebuild the Jewish Temple and the coming of the Messiah.Because of the wrong calculations of how long a year was, this number comes out perfectly with the year Christ was crucified.Sorry, just an aside about how cool the prophecies of the Bible are and how a nearly 500 year prediction came true to help you understand that the Bible is the inspired work of God.
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And to save a little time for the future 'contradiction' and difficult parts of the OT;the OT was written for the instruction of a large group of nomadic people and how they were to conduct themselves as a people.The NT is written for the individual and how he is to conduct his life.Therefore when the OT tells us an eye for an eye and the NT tells us to turn the other cheek, they are not contradicting themselves, just showing two different truths that are harmonious.

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Interestingly the days being divided like this resulted in their being off that 1/4 day per year that gave us leap year.
That makes no sense whatsoever.
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Doesn't the moon still give off light though? I'm not totally sure that he needed to get into the science of what he saw happening in his dream. is going to happen.
I think that's fair.
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Interestingly the days being divided like this resulted in their being off that 1/4 day per year that gave us leap year.
Still not making sense.It doesn't matter how many subdivisions of days we count, a year is not an even number of days. Try redefining hours to mean something different.A year is about 365 1/4 24-hour days.A year is about 365 1/4 2-hour days.A year is about 365 1/4 100-hour days.See what I mean?
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Still not making sense.It doesn't matter how many subdivisions of days we count, a year is not an even number of days. Try redefining hours to mean something different.A year is about 365 1/4 24-hour days.A year is about 365 1/4 2-hour days.A year is about 365 1/4 100-hour days.See what I mean?
Not really,
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That verse hasn't happened yet, it's the future.
Jesus says:
Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place.
So it's not just a matter of trivia which book this passage appears in.
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Jesus says:So it's not just a matter of trivia which book this passage appears in.
But he was answering a question posed to Him: What will be the signs of the end times?So it is in effect just a reflection on Revelations.
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But he was answering a question posed to Him: What will be the signs of the end times?So it is in effect just a reflection on Revelations.
We've already sooo had this argument. "This generation shall not pass" is not a description of what the end times will look like, it's a prediction of when they will occur -- a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
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We've already sooo had this argument. "This generation shall not pass" is not a description of what the end times will look like, it's a prediction of when they will occur -- a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
YepI thought it might be fun to see how much weight Brvheart gives to its predictive power, while BG argues that it has already occurred.
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It's all about perspective SB. Christianity is a term I use to mean Christ follower, whereas the far majority of the general populace equates Christianity with a wide range of Christian denominations and beliefs. In this case, one word has two different meanings. But, I'm guessing you already knew that, and just enjoy the opportunity to say that you don't like the logic and critical thinking skills of people that believe in God.I should probably just stop using the word Christian or Christianity to describe my faith, since it seems to confuse everyone.I think almost all religions and religious sects are worthless, although the general public would define me as religious AND belonging to a religion. Also, I dare you to find something in the Bible that I disagree with. (I'm talking about doctrine here, not whether or not there was a fish that swallowed Noah, since that is unprovable.)
I won't bother with the challenge, because it always turns into well, you have to interpret X/Y/Z verse just right, and "just right" always turns out to be the meaning the person saying that takes from X/Y/Z. In other words, it's only the right interpretation if you agree with me. It always winds up being a circular argument where the believer is right by virtue of his interpretation and the interpretation is right by virtue of the believer agreeing with it.But the wider point is the one I think we both find of interest, although from opposite grounds, and that is defining the terms. It's not at all a small matter to know what "Christian" really means, is it? Not at all a small matter.I don't agree that the word can have two meanings, especially when in context it would be absolutely impossible for anyone to make clear which one they meant. I could see that you were talking about two different things, but it was not even a little bit clear when, why, or how you were switching meanings while continuing to use the same word, sometimes in the same sentence, or how anyone was supposed to follow you, unless they already agreed with you and were sharing your code-switching patterns.What you're saying is perfectly clear in one sense: there are followers of Christ who, like me, dislike many forms of organized religion, including Christianity.Fine. But yes, you should certainly use a different terminology for that group than "Christian," which does include the organized religion by anyone's definition (including yours). How about FoC? Well, yeah, because of the jokes...However, I also see one huge implication of your statement: only those who are true "Followers of Christ" will get into heaven. Because being a follower of Christ is pretty much the gold standard for heaven, right?In another thread, I posed the question to BG, who ducked it (in his own charming way). Do you want to take a shot?
Do fundamentalists see themselves as the only true Christians, or do they see themselves as one viewpoint neither more or less correct than any other Christian viewpoint and part of a large, varied family including Catholics, liberation theologists, and others?
You may or may not define yourself as a fundamentalist, but you do (apparently -- not to speak for you) define yourself as a true Follower of Christ, whereas you define other Christians (and maybe even Christianity: The Religion! in general) as not being that. So do you believe that only the people you identify as being like yourself will get into heaven, or do you believe that others will as well? Because here's how that shakes out for me:Option 1: Only the People Who Are Followers of Christ Will Get Into HeavenWell, then, literally billions of people who believe quite deeply in their hearts that Jesus is the Son of God and that He is their Savior from sin will be going to hell, because they are part of that "wide range of denominations and beliefs" that you say are wrong and should be hated. If your understanding of how to correctly follow Christ is correct, then theirs is wrong (because, after all, your positions and theirs often do disagree). And if theirs is wrong, then they are not truly following Christ, and off to hell they go, despite the fact that they have done exactly what the bible and you say they need to do in order to go to heaven -- believe genuinely in Jesus.Option 2: You Only Have to Believe, and the Method of Following Him Doesn't MatterIn that case, you are neither more right nor more wrong than anyone else. Your interpretation of Christianity stuff is equal to theirs, therefore theirs deserves just as much respect and just as much acceptance as yours does, no less.EDIT: I suppose you could try a BG and go for Option 3, which is "they're wrong but will get into heaven anyway because God is just so loving that way." But functionally, that really only takes you back to #2, since it will have worked out the same.
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OK, suppose you divide the day "correctly". How many days is a year?
365.242374
How many days is a year if we divide a day into 10 thingers?
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Interestingly the days being divided like this resulted in their being off that 1/4 day per year that gave us leap year.In the book of Daniel there is a specific amount of time given for the time between the order to rebuild the Jewish Temple and the coming of the Messiah.Because of the wrong calculations of how long a year was, this number comes out perfectly with the year Christ was crucified.Sorry, just an aside about how cool the prophecies of the Bible are and how a nearly 500 year prediction came true to help you understand that the Bible is the inspired work of God.
The seventy weeks prediction of Daniel 9:25-27? Well, except it works a little more like this:"Weeks" actually means "years times 7," not, you know, weeks or anything crazy like that.Anyway, that seventy "weeks" prediction works out to 69 "weeks" (also known as 483 years in the world of real math) up to Jesus. Do you literally believe that 69 weeks is exactly the same period of time as 483 years? Can I borrow a hundred grand, if I promise to pay you back in 52 weeks?As for the 70th week, well, apparently there was a verse left out:Daniel 9:26 1/2: And then two thousand years (er, 285 "weeks") go by...
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Also, I dare you to find something in the Bible that I disagree with.
I fully agree that if you kill someone, you should surely be punished, although I'm not sure why it's so hard to you to understand that I'm not Jewish. These rules haven't applied to non-Jews for 2,000 years.
Well, that was easy.
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We've already sooo had this argument. "This generation shall not pass" is not a description of what the end times will look like, it's a prediction of when they will occur -- a prediction that turned out to be wrong.
34. This generation shall not pass away. Though Christ employs a general expression, yet he does not extend the discourses to all the miseries which would befall the Church, but merely informs them, that before a single generation shall have been completed, they will learn by experience the truth of what he has said. For within fifty years the city was destroyed and the temple was razed, the whole country was reduced to a hideous desert, and the obstinacy of the world rose up against God. Nay more, their rage was inflamed to exterminate the doctrine of salvation, false teachers arose to corrupt the pure gospel by their impostures, religion sustained amazing shocks, and the whole company of the godly was miserably distressed. Now though the same evils were perpetrated in uninterrupted succession for many ages afterwards, yet what Christ said was true, that, before the close of a single generation, believers would feel in reality, and by undoubted experience, the truth of his prediction; for the apostles endured the same things which we see in the present day. 155 And yet it was not the design of Christ to promise to his followers that their calamities would be terminated within a short time, (for then he would have contradicted himself, having previously warned them that the end was not yet;) but, in order to encourage them to perseverance, he expressly foretold that those things related to their own age. The meaning therefore is: “This prophecy does not relate to evils that are distant, and which posterity will see after the lapse of many centuries, but which are now hanging over you, and ready to fall in one mass, so that there is no part of it which the present generation will not experience.” So then, while our Lord heaps upon a, single generation every kind of calamities, he does not by any means exempt future ages from the same kind of sufferings, but only enjoins the disciples to be prepared for enduring them all with firmness.-John Calvin
I won't bother with the challenge, because it always turns into well, you have to interpret X/Y/Z verse just right, and "just right" always turns out to be the meaning the person saying that takes from X/Y/Z. In other words, it's only the right interpretation if you agree with me. It always winds up being a circular argument where the believer is right by virtue of his interpretation and the interpretation is right by virtue of the believer agreeing with it.But the wider point is the one I think we both find of interest, although from opposite grounds, and that is defining the terms. It's not at all a small matter to know what "Christian" really means, is it? Not at all a small matter.I don't agree that the word can have two meanings, especially when in context it would be absolutely impossible for anyone to make clear which one they meant. I could see that you were talking about two different things, but it was not even a little bit clear when, why, or how you were switching meanings while continuing to use the same word, sometimes in the same sentence, or how anyone was supposed to follow you, unless they already agreed with you and were sharing your code-switching patterns.What you're saying is perfectly clear in one sense: there are followers of Christ who, like me, dislike many forms of organized religion, including Christianity.Fine. But yes, you should certainly use a different terminology for that group than "Christian," which does include the organized religion by anyone's definition (including yours). How about FoC? Well, yeah, because of the jokes...However, I also see one huge implication of your statement: only those who are true "Followers of Christ" will get into heaven. Because being a follower of Christ is pretty much the gold standard for heaven, right?In another thread, I posed the question to BG, who ducked it (in his own charming way). Do you want to take a shot?
Sorry I'm a terrible writer. I really wish I was better. I've definitely improved since I joined FCP in 2005, but I still suck.I definitely believe that only followers of Christ will go to heaven, but that's isn't groundbreaking. That's Biblical. You must believe that Jesus came to Earth to die for your sin. The problem lies in the fact that there are so many people that are Christians in name only. People that don't follow Christ, but identify themselves as Christians. The good thing, from the point of a Biblical standard, is that if you ask 1,000 "Christians" across the country if Jesus is the only way to heaven, I would guess in the range of 80% would say no. I hope I'm wrong on that number, but I would guess that I'm close. I think that shows a simple lack of understanding the gospel and I think those people still need to be saved.
You may or may not define yourself as a fundamentalist, but you do (apparently -- not to speak for you) define yourself as a true Follower of Christ, whereas you define other Christians (and maybe even Christianity: The Religion! in general) as not being that. So do you believe that only the people you identify as being like yourself will get into heaven, or do you believe that others will as well? Because here's how that shakes out for me:Option 1: Only the People Who Are Followers of Christ Will Get Into HeavenWell, then, literally billions of people who believe quite deeply in their hearts that Jesus is the Son of God and that He is their Savior from sin will be going to hell, because they are part of that "wide range of denominations and beliefs" that you say are wrong and should be hated. If your understanding of how to correctly follow Christ is correct, then theirs is wrong (because, after all, your positions and theirs often do disagree). And if theirs is wrong, then they are not truly following Christ, and off to hell they go, despite the fact that they have done exactly what the bible and you say they need to do in order to go to heaven -- believe genuinely in Jesus.Option 2: You Only Have to Believe, and the Method of Following Him Doesn't MatterIn that case, you are neither more right nor more wrong than anyone else. Your interpretation of Christianity stuff is equal to theirs, therefore theirs deserves just as much respect and just as much acceptance as yours does, no less.EDIT: I suppose you could try a BG and go for Option 3, which is "they're wrong but will get into heaven anyway because God is just so loving that way." But functionally, that really only takes you back to #2, since it will have worked out the same.
It's hard to define based on these choices. I think that if you're a part of option 2, and you disagree with me on a wide range of doctrines, that's fine, as long as we agree that Jesus is the only path to salvation. If we agree there, it's ok if you think that infants should be baptized (like my brother-in-law), or if you're a 6,000 year young earther, like BG.My main issue with religion is that they add so many things that aren't in the Bible. Catholics identify much more with their weekly kneelings and chants than they do with the Bible. I've talked with many Catholic priests who are painfully unaware of the gospel... but they have all the Catholic chants memorized. I have a major problem with that.There are many Baptist churches that would fall all over themselves to judge BG for his smoking cigars and gambling. (Let's not even get into his voting for Obama) The problem is, that smoking and responsible gambling are not forbidden by the Bible. I think stuff like this leads people away from the truth of Christ. Who wants to be judged by sinners? Not me. I believe in the Man/God who hung out with prostitutes and criminals, without judgment, to tell them that He loved them.
Well, that was easy.
Doesn't count. OT.
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Sorry I'm a terrible writer. I really wish I was better. I've definitely improved since I joined FCP in 2005, but I still suck.I definitely believe that only followers of Christ will go to heaven, but that's isn't groundbreaking. That's Biblical. You must believe that Jesus came to Earth to die for your sin. The problem lies in the fact that there are so many people that are Christians in name only. People that don't follow Christ, but identify themselves as Christians. The good thing, from the point of a Biblical standard, is that if you ask 1,000 "Christians" across the country if Jesus is the only way to heaven, I would guess in the range of 80% would say no. I hope I'm wrong on that number, but I would guess that I'm close. I think that shows a simple lack of understanding the gospel and I think those people still need to be saved.
I definitely wasn't criticizing your writing. You were using the terms in exactly the way millions of conservative US Christians use them. I just wanted to point out how slippery and flip-floppy that sounds to people outside the magic circle who are trying to figure out what all of you mean when you call yourselves Christian but then criticize everything you don't like as "religion."So it sounds like you're taking door number 2. Which is a perfectly reasonable path (I really didn't know which one most conservative Christians would take), but then you have to admit that the only criterion is what is in a person's heart, not what their church does or doesn't do. While you may fear their church is leading them astray, your own interpretations and rules are pretty moot, since the nun praying to Mary with her rosary may have "Jesus died for my salvation" just as deeply in her heart as you do in yours.
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I definitely wasn't criticizing your writing. You were using the terms in exactly the way millions of conservative US Christians use them. I just wanted to point out how slippery and flip-floppy that sounds to people outside the magic circle who are trying to figure out what all of you mean when you call yourselves Christian but then criticize everything you don't like as "religion."So it sounds like you're taking door number 2. Which is a perfectly reasonable path (I really didn't know which one most conservative Christians would take), but then you have to admit that the only criterion is what is in a person's heart, not what their church does or doesn't do. While you may fear their church is leading them astray, your own interpretations and rules are pretty moot, since the nun praying to Mary with her rosary may have "Jesus died for my salvation" just as deeply in her heart as you do in yours.
Correct. I have no problem believing that some Catholics could in fact be saved, even though their church, throughout history, has done everything it could to point people in another direction.
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