Biblical Baptist

[Abel]

[Tim Bonney]

[Abel]

I don't believe I am misusing the word at all Tim. If you had to choose between the two, would you suggest God is perfect or God is good? (Don't tell me He is perfectly good...I got that) I believe God to be perfect. I also believe God created a perfect man when He took the time to kneel in the dust and form man and breath life into him.

I believe Adam was perfect. He was created without sin, correct? Being without sin is what makes a man perfect. To say he was created less than perfect is to say he was created with sin and thereby attributing his sin to God.

I do agree with you that the word perfect as used in the scriptures implies completeness, such as used to describe Job: Job 1:1, 8. However, the Bible does not say Adam was created perfect (complete), but in the image of God. How could Adam have been created in the image of God if he had been less than perfect (with sin)?

BTW, there's no "h" in Scofield.

[Tim Bonney]

[Ed Pettibone]

Ed: Abel where do you get the idea that God knelt in the dust in order to form man? And how significant was the time involved when in 2nd Peter we read "But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day" ? For me you concept of the creator God, is much too anthropomorphic.

As Tim Bonney says above "The Church was the first witness to the saving gospel of Christ and not the New Testament. The Church was preaching the gospel before the authors penned the New Testament, before the church began using the books of the New Testament, before the Church decided the doctrines and creeds upon which the Church would choose which books were to be in the Bible".

This should remind us that none of the writers of Scripture ever saw a completed Bible of 66 books, (0r 83 if you are Catholic) let alone having a bound one volume edition of all scripture in their hands. They didn't even have a copy of the OT to carry with them.

[Abel]

I agree 100% with you Tim. Neither man, nor creation is perfect...now. Both man as well as creation suffer as a result of sin. However, nothing in the Bible indicates man nor God's creation being created with sin. The curse was placed on man, woman, earth, as well as the rest of creation after sin. Because of the sin nature we have inherited, mankind is completely helpless. We most definitely need Jesus' sacrifice. Without Him, we are doomed.

Man was originally created in the image and likeness of God. Likeness in the Hebrew means resemblance or similitude. If Adam was created less than perfect he would have borne a resemblance of a less than perfect God, correct? I believe here we can see man's sinless perfection at creation, but not now. Mankind really does not display God's likeness at all today.

I'm really not trying to preserve the Bible perfectly, because I believe God already has. I would once again agree with you concerning the fact that people were being saved prior to the close of canon. However, during that time Jesus' apostles were still alive and giving eyewitness testimony to the truth of the Gospel. After their death, the scriptures of the N.T. gave validity to the witness of later believers. It is the Bible that gives witness today, and I fail to see God's written witness being in error. It's not the only guarantee I have of God's perfection, but it is used by the Holy Spirit to confirm everything I believe about God. The Bible is God's revelation of Himself to man, how or why would God distort that revelation?

Again, I ask...who decides what is error and what is truth in the Bible? One man is sure God teaches one thing and another is confident God is teaching the exact opposite, and both men claim God is guiding them...who is right if the scriptures are wrong?

[Tim Bonney]

[Abel]

[Haruo]

[Haruo]

[Tim Bonney]

[Haruo]

[Tim Bonney]

Yes Hauro, most things are open to interpretation. That is one of the reason for so many denominations, churches, theories, etc.

[Abel]

Why is it I am the one assumed to have a problem? I have no problem at all with my Biblical beliefs.

[Tim Bonney]

[Abel]

[David Flick]

[Abel]

[Dave Roberts]

As I recall Genesis 1, God called the creation "good" and at the end of the sixth day pronouced it "very good." From what scripture does your idea come that man was made perfect?

[Haruo]

My guess would be that Abel leans upon his own understanding and make the leap from "God is perfect" and "God said it was very good" to "Because God is perfect, when he says something is very good, that must mean it is perfect."

[Hal Eaton]

OlDad's 'puter has been "down" (in several ways) (for several days), so I've (thankfully) missed the bulk of the discussion on this topic.

Methinks Abel entered the fray herein to shore up his chosen arguments for certainty concerning his faith. I think he needs a good shot of OlDad's references to the inability of words (their uses, sources, translations) to settle forever the basics of the 'faith."

He believes God spoke authoritatively to mankind, without ever a hitch in the process from God to man (and thence to us). Our unchanging God must have spoken Hebrew in the OT, and Greek in NT times, and English never. Most every question of theology, practice, godliness, and acceptability to God (Jehovah?) was reduced to the mechanisms of fallible, misused, abused WORDS.

The search for certainty suddenly relies on the quest for perfection - - - using imperfect words, languages, messengers, copiests, translators, interpreters, all aided, of course, by Scofiled, M. Henry, J. Falwelll, Pat Robertson, OlDad, and Abel.

Let the games continue.

[Haruo]

[Abel]

[Dave Roberts]

[Tim Bonney]