I am a bit perplexed at why folks on this forum--including yourself--presume that people like myself, and Robert, who believe that dispensationalizing the Bible is the best way--indeed the Biblically prescribed way--to profit from it's eternal truths, completely ignore everything in scripture save for Paul's epistles; or that we don't care a whit about church tradition or orthodoxy.

In your book, the title says it all: 85 Pages in the Bible are the Key ... which 85 pages happen to be all about Paul, and that "Only through Paul's "mystery" can we gain an understanding of the whole book ..."(pg6) And you yourself said in your book that you are not looking to the church fathers, but the book itself. As a matter of fact, you said "I will be making reference to only these 66 books,"(pg.3), yet you go on to quote lots of other extra-biblical sources, complete with footnotes and a bibliography. But through it all, the 85 KJV large print pages "the epistles of the Apostle Paul, Romans through Philemon" are written for us.

You make the inference that we are 'fools' for 'building an entire belief system on one verse of scripture.'

I said that cults arose from fools making this mistake. I did not say you were a fool. It was a warning.

This is patent nonsense. 2 Timothy 2:15 is, no doubt, a key verse in the Bible regarding the way we should approach our study of it, and why, but to contend that we've built a theology solely upon this, or that we disregard everything in the Bible but what Paul wrote, is completely out of school.

In your book you say that, "... according to this verse - we must, in order to have God's approval ... study the Bible by dividing it as God commands us. Reading or studying the Bible ... will not reveal the truth that is vital to us unless we employ this method." In other words, you have taken ONE verse, and created an entire system of doctrine from it.

Let us not forget that you have also badly misread the verse, and mistranslated "dividing." The term, in the Greek, for you non-greek readers, is orthotomeo, which means, "to cut a straight line, to lay down a straight way, to build a road." For us mountain folk, it means to bulldoze through the mountains to make a cart path. If you read the entire passage in 2 Timothy, what is he saying? He says,
14-16: "Of these things put them in remembrance, charging them before the Lord that they strive not about words to no profit, but to the subverting of the hearers. Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness. And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymenaeus and Philetus; Who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some."

In other words, teach the truth plainly and clearly, to shut up the baabblers and set folks straight, and keep them from fools like Hymenaeus and Philetus.

Make the word clear, not cut it up.

Another verse that you took out of context, mistranslated and built a whole doctrine out of was Paul's statement in 1 Cor. 9:17. Here, you even went so far as to leave out half the verse, which on its own would have changed the meaning of what you cut out. You quoted him saying "a dispensation of the gospel has been given to me." (pg.38). You say that this is a new dispensation that began at some earlier point. The whole verse reads, "For if I do this thing willingly, I have a reward: but if against my will, a dispensation of the gospel is committed unto me." If you read this into the rest of the passage, as you should, Paul is explaining his duty to preach the gospel, whether willingly or unwillingly, and here, to use your translation, he has to do so because "I have been given a new dispensation, a new revelation to pass along." It makes no sense, given the context of this passage. The term "dispensation," (oikonomia) while meaning "economy" or "administration," also means "stewardship." In this passage, it makes far more sense for Paul to say, "I have been entrusted with this stewardship (care of) the gospel, and it is my duty to preach it, whether willingly or unwillingly." Also, you conveniently, in your definition of dispensation (pg 6.), left out the definition "stewardship." You mentioned steward by trying to say that "every dispensation there is a 'dispenser' or 'steward.'" You acknowledge steward, but why did you leave out "stewardship"?

And I know you don't care for the church fathers, or what anybody else says about this or the previous verse, but the majority of commentaries and those folk who know what they are talking about agree with this interpretation. I know you said in your book that seminaries and scholars scoffed at simple folk who came with a new idea, and sometimes you can be right. But when a child comes to an adult and says that he thinks that "truck" means "a thing that flies in the sky," he should not scoff because the learned adult tells him he's wrong. To bring it home, Greek scholars all agree with the interpretation I present to you. You are not a Greek scholar (by your own admission). Wisdom would dictate deferring to the authorities on this.

Speaking of mistranslating a word. The Jehovah's Witnesses all retranslated the Bible so that Jesus is not God. They even took the passages where people fell at Jesus' feet to worship Him and translated the Greek for worship,"proskyneo" to mean obeisance, because it can also mean that, although it is never used in that way in the Bible. So, based on one mistranslation, they stripped Jesus of His deity.

I have attached herewith a book I published three years ago. Do me a favor. Open the pdf, and read my testimony. Then scroll back and survey my Bibliography. After doing this you will know that I didn't (nor do I believe has Robert) just 'jump on in' to believing what I now believe to be the truth.

I understand that you have not jumped into this. This is years of learning based on misunderstanding the scripture. You believed the church fathers you liked, and they were wrong. And I don't expect you to just roll over and admit defeat. For one, I don't think myself highly enough to think that I could have that sort of effect. Second, pride. You have a lot of time and effort put into this. You, like most of us sinners, are too proud to admit you were wrong and that you wasted years on this.

Now, I have just skimmed over parts of your book, and already I have found dozens of mistakes. I could spend quite a bit of time correcting your assumptions of Calvinists alone. You even said, on pg.191, "here is what I believe Calvin and his followers present," not "this is a correct understanding of them." And you go on to make several errors in your summary. One example. You said God "arbitrarily" selects. You are either trying to poison the well, or, you don't understand. God does nothing arbitrarily.

Also, you stated in the beginning of your book that you use scripture extensively. Conveniently, regarding Calvinism (probably elsewhere, I haven't gotten that far), you neglect to use any scripture, save that which is quoted by Calvin and the Westminster Confession in your quotes of them. I want to see you deal with Calvinism from the sccriptures, and deal with Romans Chapter 9 and Ephesians Chapter 1 in regard to Calvinism. Explain it away. No one can. Every person I challenged with this gave a thousand excuses for why they can't, but no one wanted to touch either. But I digress.

And speaking of challenges, you did what I expected. You gave me a red herring with this book. I told you to "give me ONE verse that says, 'This no longer applies.'"

I'm still waiting.

- Hide quoted text -

Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 22:47:19 -0400
From: dante.hsc@gmail.com
To: schroeder456@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: Paul el supremo

On 8/7/08, Mike Schroeder <schroeder456@hotmail.com> wrote:

'All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto good works.' 2 Timothy 3:16-17

True, but it isn't all for our obedience, is it. This should be obvious to the most unlearned Bible student. I bet you haven't made any animal sacrifices lately, have you.

I was referring to the fact that scripture applies to all of life, not that we are called to obey every last command given.

Jesus became for us the final sacrifice, fulfilling all the sacrificial laws. He made the last sacrifice. That we don't sacrifice any more is not because it not for us, but because very plainly, it was fulfilled and finished in Christ. That is plain throughout the scriptures.

As for dietary laws, God told Peter, 'Kill and eat,' clearly telling him that the laws of separation are over. In those cases, we have clear instruction from the Word for what to do.

So in one sense, accepted by both dispensationalists as well as covenantalists, there are commands that we no longer have to obey, because Jesus took care of that. But all of it applies, in one way or another. And I hold that the cases where we are no longer called to obey are 99% of the time clearly stated in scripture. That other 1% is in regard to much smaller issues, such as head coverings.

And again, read the verse. It says ALL of it is for reproof, correction, for instruction. You seem to trying to say that some of the scripture is not for ANY of the above. Tell me if I'm wrong here.

Second, when Paul was teaching this to Timothy, he was not referring to the NT. The only scriptures around then were the OT. In other words, 'All of the Old Testament is profitable ...' which makes it a little more troublesome for dispys, because they want to throw that out all together. (If you're not, then great, but I am referring to a very widely held practice amongst dispensationalists.)

So, how do we know what is for your obedience? Someone said in an earlier post that (or course) water baptism is to practiced in the church today because the Lord ordained it, and so did Peter, James and John. The Lord also made some other commands to his disciples, e.g., selling everything you have, (Matt. 19); not having any money in your possession, having only one change of clothes (Matt. 10); taking no thought for what you will wear or eat (Matt. 7); etc. Should we be in conformity with these commands also?

When Jesus told the disciples to cast their nets on the right side of the boat, should we assume that that means that we should always cast our nets on the right side of the boat? Did they obey? Yes. Should we? If Jesus told me to, yes. Each case you pointed to above were places where Jesus was talking to one or more of the disciples, giving commands to them, in a direct conversation. Tjese were not commands to the church in general, but to disciples in particular. We do, however, need to look at what He was telling them and ask how that applies to us, but those were not universal absolute commands. That should be plain. Now, when He gave the sermon on the mount, that was for everyone. 'This should be obvious to the most unlearned Bible student.' You don't look at where Jesus tells John, 'Behold your mother,' and say that that was a command, and should we obey it?

Forget that poor example. You mention baptism. Okay. I can give you 100 verses (more or less) that command or give reason for baptism, both from Jesus and the apostles. You give me ONE verse that says, 'This no longer applies.' You can go all day with verses that seem to say that what the apostles were doing with the gentiles was different than what they were to do with the Jews, but you won't find one verse that says, 'Gentiles don't have to baptize. When Jesus said, 'Go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit,' He didn't mean all the nations, just the nation of the Jews.' And don't try saying that He didn't mean to use water, because then you have to prove that Jesus didn't mean what He said.

Did Phillip make a mistake when he baptized the Ethiopian in Acts? Or did Paul make a mistake when he baptized Crispus and Gaius, or when he oversaw the baptism of the Philippian jailer's household or, in Acts 18, the many Corinthians who heard Paul, believed and were baptized? All those Gentiles. Was he mistaken? Did he change his mind?

You said in an earlier post that we ought to look to church tradition (the church 'fathers') for direction. Which one? Which tradition should we follow concerning
how water baptism or the Lord's supper are to be practiced, or for which of the sign gifts are still effectual? Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, Pentecostal, ad infinitum?

Let us first start here. When there arises a command or practice in the Bible, specifically the NT, where we are not sure what the practice is, we look to the earliest writings of the church, to see how they continued what was taught to them. Polycarp, for instance, was around at the time of Paul. Josephus, a Jew was also around during the inception of the church. Both these men wrote about what was going on in those days. And they say, Gentiles are being baptized as Jesus, Paul, and the other apostles commanded. They are not giving commands, just commenting on what the widespread practice of the church was. Why do I care? Simple. If this was not what Jesus or the apostles commanded, then first, there surely shouldn't be this kind of thing going on, so widespread. And second, talk about failure on a massive scale. This would be news even today. But it is not. Not only did the church (Gentile and Jewish Christians) practice it then, but as church history progressed, it continued and sustained. And no one, not for 1900 years, ever really questioned it.

Do we look to any one church father? No. We look to the church fathers, plural, and the whole of church history. We see where new, or newly framed, doctrines arise and how they were dealt with. We see where the church failed and why. And throughout, we see the patterns, the threads, the stuff that sustained and was never questioned throughout all history, as well as those things that failed.

But we are myopic now. A new theology arises, and folks just jump on in, thinking, 'This is it,' never once looking back to church history and asking, 'Did anything like this ever happen before? And if so, what was the result?' No one says, 'All the giants of the faith for 1900 years never thought of this. I wonder why?'

Clue: 'Consider what I (Paul) say, and the Lord give thee understanding in all things' (2 Tim. 2:7) Another clue: 2 Tim. 3:16 is qualified by 2 Tim. 2:15

Many cults arise from some fool taking one verse and building an entire belief system around it. Which is why we should ask, 'Why this new thing? All the giants of the faith for 1900 years never thought of this. I wonder why?'

Mike Schroeder

Date: Thu, 7 Aug 2008 11:25:24 -0400
From: dante.hsc@gmail.com
To: custodisvigilo@gmail.com
Subject: Re: Paul el supremo
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'All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: that the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto good works.' 2 Timothy 3:16-17

Are you now saying that these verses are not true? Or are you saying that, thanks to your new method of cutting out unwelcome passages of scripture, this no longer applies?

If the former, you might as well throw out the Bible, for if one verse can be doubted, they all can.

If the latter, you might as well throw out the Bible, for if you can pick and choose what verse applies to you and which verses don't, then you can make it say whatever you want, so it doesn't even matter any more. Just cut at will.

Dante