continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. (2 Tim 3:14-15)Catch that, then. "Times are going to go bad," he warned. "People will be evil. You will be persecuted by evil people. But you ... continue in what you have learned and believed." What was that? "The sacred writings." These "sacred writings" are "able to make you wise."
We generally quote the next two verses completely out of context. We leave them standing on their own. I think this context adds support. You know the next two.
All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. (2 Tim 3:16-17)I harp on that all the time. Many self-professed Christians disagree. Paul said it was essential and sufficient, but I'm warned not to rely too heavily on those Scriptures. Peter said that Paul's writings were Scripture (2 Peter 3:14-16), but I'm told not to rely too heavily on those Scriptures. Jesus said God's Word is truth (John 17:17), but I'm told not to rely too heavily on those Scriptures.
They tell me it's a matter of interpretation and theirs is right and mine is not. They tell me our Scriptures are not "God's Word," but some man-made thing that may contain "God's Word." Clearly Paul disagreed. Seems obvious to me that Jesus disagreed. And Paul here suggests that the way we believers are going to survive the "last days" that Paul is warning about (which, by the way, sounds like something out of today's news media) is to continue in ... the sacred writings. So, who am I going to believe? Those who are emulating what Paul is warning about in the last days or the Scriptures that we are told are sufficient?
9 comments:
"They tell me it's a matter of interpretation and theirs is right and mine is not."
You sort of glossed over this...
what of it?
What if we're not disagreeing with scripture but with your interpretation and your interpretation is not so good?
It has never been a simple matter of questionable interpretation in these cases. I lay out the Scriptures -- the texts, the contexts -- and demonstrate what it means based on the Scriptures. They say, "Your interpretation is wrong" without texts or contexts to show why my interpretation is wrong and theirs is right. And I didn't gloss over it. The last paragraph hit it head on. You can't tell me "Scripture is not God's Word" without ignoring Scripture ... without ignoring Jesus.
The accusation is that I take my understanding of Scripture from my "tradition." I take my understanding from what it says. Sometimes that agrees with my "tradition." I've gone against my "tradition" many times because what it says seems to disagree with it. I do not interpret Scripture by how I feel about the texts. I'm pretty sure my feelings will likely lead me astray. I am not superior to the Word. My experiences, social awareness, observation of society and practices, knowledge of science, or personal preferences are not my best means of understanding God's Word. I may be wrong in some of my interpretation -- certainly am in places -- but in order to change my own interpretation I need Scripture and logic, not simple disagreement. "You're wrong" is no more of an argument than "You're a hater" or whatever other current labels those opposed to God's Word these days prefer to apply.
The point you're missing is that, so do we. That is, many of us who disagree with your interpretations and opinions about scripture are also taking scripture for what it literally clearly obviously says. We just disagree with what you think it says. At the very least can you acknowledge that people of good faith can disagree?
Yes, Dan, people of good faith can disagree. I know lots of people with whom I disagree in good faith. But interpreting "being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith" (Rom 3:24-25) to mean "There was no redemption or no propitiation and blood played no part" is not "good faith." Further, almost without exception the fact remains that "You're wrong" is all I get. No text. No context. No attempt. I do get "It doesn't mean that because it violates science or my perspective." Not a good approach.
People of good faith can and will disagree. They shouldn't be doing it by attacking. And there must be significant agreement because most of Scripture is significantly clear. Beyond that, "people of good faith" don't sneak in with an alias of "anonymous" knowing that "Dan Trabue" comments get deleted out of hand because he has made a practice of being too heated and too abusive in violation of the clearly stated rules. When a commenter regularly makes comments that my mother can't read when she looks at my blog, the commenter doesn't get to come back here. You've made that your modus operandi. Not bad arguments; bad mode of interaction with people like me with whom you disagree.
End of story.
Stan,
I'd argue that you consistently take scripture for what it says, and no more. It doesn't take any interpretation to be able to glean that "Jesus wept" literally means what it says. What I see is people who will be quick to tell you what scripture doesn't mean, but not interested in telling you what it does mean. They'll tell you that you are wrong, but not specifically why or what you're wrong about. I'm always (as I assume you are) open to correction. My problem is that I expect that correction comes with direct, unambiguous, scriptural support.
I agree, Craig. I have often (and happily) been corrected by people using clear and reasonable Scripture. I'm not impressed with people who deny it and then tell me my interpretation is wrong.
You know, Dan, you speak of love and respect, as if they are the highest good, but you can't show the slightest respect to even the most anonymous of people, some guy on the internet. You were told you aren't allowed to post here. Instead of showing respect and not posting, you continued to send comments. Then, to worsen your hypocrisy, you tried to deceive Stan by posting as anonymous. Is that really the Christian thing to do? Nag and fight abnoxiously? You claim your anti-biblical positions are all about loving and respecting others, but you refuse to even live by those principles online. If you can't even abide by them on the internet, how could you possibly be living by them in your daily life? You are the worst of hypocrites.
Stan,
Especially when they say they've made a biblical case for something without using any scripture, or when they argue that the scripture they've cherry picked means something other than what the text says, but are unable to explain what or why that is.
David,
It's almost like Dan missed the entire list of fruits of the Spirit. Unless love means hectoring, joy means vitriol, peace means conflict, patience means impatience, kindness means personal attacks, goodness means license, faithfulness is divorced from any standard, gentleness means filled with expletives, and self control means controlled by feelings and passions. I agree that if Dan treats people IRL like he does here, that it's a wonder that anyone would be friends with him. If he does acts differently IRL, then one wonders what would make him think that he can get away with treating people like he does on line.
Dan has stated that he has had trouble commenting from his phone and that's why it shows up as "anonymous". I can take him at his word on this for no other reason than I am not the most computer literate person in the world. He doesn't really need to identify himself for us to know it's him. The comments are to familiar for them to be from anyone else.
But as has been said, Dan doesn't do a whole lot of "hard data" from Scripture which results in any degree of questioning on our parts for that which we feel certain is a correct interpretation of the text. It's just not his thing. As he is keen on listing posts he's presented to prove how he uses Scripture to arrive at his beliefs, he fails in responding to serious and direct questions about how that which he provides is supposed to be taken as serious arguments in favor of his positions. For example, at least half the verses and passages he uses in his tiresome analysis of the Bible and economics are not truly supportive. I would suggest my objections still remain unanswered. Worse, his defense of SSM not only provides far less, but relies on that which requires a false understanding in order to regarded as remotely intelligent.
So it works both ways with him. He can't provide any Scriptural evidence to counter what we present, and he does no better to support what he so desperately needs to be true.
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