----- Original Message -----

From: Mike Schroeder

To: Robert Powell ; Alan Couchman ; Arthur Clarke ; Chris Stevens ; Chuck Burnett ; Daniel New ; Dave Lescalleet ; David Lewis ; David Martinez ; Don BeBee ; Jeremiah Patoka ; John Bryant ; John Otis ; Mitch Friedman ; Nathan Shaver ; Pat Hastings ; Rick Mata ; Ron Avery ; Ryan Bebee ; Steve Phillips ; Terry Burnett

Sent: Sunday, July 20, 2008 7:06 AM

Subject: RE: The Truth Of The Gospel

Robert,
 
Here is where I must disagree with Pastor Stam. As much as I respect Pastor Stam's ministry, this tract muddies the water by implying that Peter should have been preaching Paul's gospel.  
 
Peter's first and second letters do not support this position. In 1 Peter 1, he makes it very clear that those Jews he was writing to, "the strangers scattered" (Ref. Acts 8) were not saved by grace.  This is substantiated by the language of verses 5,9 and 13: You make a large error immediately upon interpreting who Peter was writing to:

"1 Peter 1:1-2  Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,
2  Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied."

 

It is the strangers of the common wealth of Israel that Peter was talking to in these areas, not to Jews. He wrote to the same church that Paul had started in Galatia to back his message up. Paul also calls Gentiles strangers and aliens to the covenants and promises to Israel in Eph 2:12:

 

"Ephesians 2:12  That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:"

I would have to deny reason and logic to conclude that Peter was speaking of some unique gospel only applicable to Jews upon reading the whole first chapter of 1st Peter. The first chapter of Peter is an exact duplicate of that which Paul was preaching.

 

You argument is destroyed on the reading of 1 Peter 1 upon finding any one of the following from same:

1. If we find that Peter was speaking to the Gentiles your argument is destroyed because you say he was speaking only to Jews.
2. If Peter was speaking to the Jews your argument is destroyed because he told the Jews the same gospel message that Paul was telling the Gentiles and the Jews as well.

 

1 Pet 1:5,9,13
"....who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time....Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.....Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ"
 
This is not the gospel of the grace of God. First, the power that they are kept by, given to them (Ref. John 1:12) upon confessing (1 John 1:9), repenting, and being baptized (Acts 2:38), is the "gift of the Holy Ghost", "the anointing "(1 John 2:27) that enables them to be faithful unto the end (ref. Matt. 24:13).  I now see what you are trying to do and how you are trying to cover yourself with a cloak. You are saying that the mere receiving if the "Holy Ghost" is the end of the "grace of God" which you say elsewhere is the "gospel of Christ" which you say you are a part of. This is error. And this error permits you to be unsaved, and unborn again because all you have learned that you need is the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit and this is all and the end of Christianity for Christians. This is as false as believing in Athena. 
 
Briefly, salvation comes to them at the end of a faithfully lived life. Salvation comes to us (the body of Christ) at the beginning of our life of faith (Rom. 5:11) 

 

That statement is like saying the principles of electricity are of one type for Gentiles and they are of another type for Jews. This is non-sense. Jews better apply the same principles are they will be electricuted and the same goes for Gentiles. It is impossible for salvation to come to anyone in the beginning of their "life of faith" because faith is finished at our salvation. Therefore, the "life of faith" which leads to salvation by our surrender to the operation of God in Christ by our death, resurrection and ascension in the body of Christ which is also the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of Heaven end upon that experience. This is true for any body including the Jew and Gentile.
 
When Peter says, in Acts 15:11, "we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they," is he saying that they (the kingdom saints) are saved by grace through faith, as in Eph. 2:8? Hardly. They are saved by the blood atonement, just as the body of Christ is, but the blood is not applied at the same time. According to what Peter writes in those verses quoted above, for them it is clearly at the end, at the appearing of Jesus Christ. Romans 5:11 just as clearly says it is at the beginning for those in the body of Christ. They get the "power to become the sons of God," we get the seal of the Holy Spirit (Eph. 1:14), which bears witness with our spirit that we "are the children of God." (Romans 8:16). We are identified by our testimony (i.e., verbal confession-Romans 10:10; 1 Tim. 6:13) of salvation; they by the fruit they bear (Matt. 7:20)

 

How can anyone arrive at your conclusions from reading the following?

 

"Acts 15:4-20  And when they were come to Jerusalem, they were received of the church, and of the apostles and elders, and they declared all things that God had done with them.
5  But there rose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which believed, saying, That it was needful to circumcise them, and to command them to keep the law of Moses.
6  And the apostles and elders came together for to consider of this matter.
7  And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe.
8  And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us;
9  And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.
10  Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?
11  But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they.
12  Then all the multitude kept silence, and gave audience to Barnabas and Paul, declaring what miracles and wonders God had wrought among the Gentiles by them.
13  And after they had held their peace, James answered, saying, Men and brethren, hearken unto me:
14  Simeon hath declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name.
15  And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written,
16  After this I will return, and will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up:
17  That the residue of men might seek after the Lord, and all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called, saith the Lord, who doeth all these things.
18  Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.
19  Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them, which from among the Gentiles are turned to God:
20  But that we write unto them, that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood."

Peter in verse 7 above states that "God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe." This shoots all your doctrine down as Peter himself says God told him to preach to the Gentiles and that they should believe the same thing regarding the gospel of Christ. Where is your double gospel now?

 

Peter says in verses 8-11 just the opposite of what you claim and those whom you follow that God bore witness giving the Gentiles the Holy Ghost the same as the Jew and put no difference between the Jew and the Gentile purifying their hearts by faith. He goes on to say, why tempt God to put a yoke upon the Gentiles that we or our fathers could keep. Then Peter said the direct opposite of what you conclude that the Jewish Christian church in Jerusalem believes they (the Jew) will be saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ even as the Gentile. Where is your double gospel here? Why should we go on and on with your slaughter of the word which you call "rightly dividing?"

 

My friend Mike, I know why you are doing this and why you are so persistent in your misreadings of the gospel. You have not been born again or saved and you know it and you are trying to avoid the need for it by constructing another gospel that does not require a rebirth. The receipt of the Holy Ghost is not rebirth. The receipt of the Holy Spirit is not salvation. The creation of the "gospel of Christ" as opposed to some kind of "gospel of the Kingdom" is not obtaining eternal life which you should really seek instead of spending hours and hours blocking up the entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven by creating false hyper distinctions which you and your cohorts call "rightly dividing the word." You and your friends have not rightly divided or deducted anything from scripture except an excuse for your failure to enter the Kingdom of Heaven and/or God by the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ. You have not trusted in the works of Christ nor his word and you do not know the scriptures nor the power of them. And unless you be born again you will never rightly divide the word of God or Christ.

Also, chapter 2, verse 9, which referes to them as a "royal priesthood, an holy nation," identifies them as the fulfillment of Exodus 19:6, and matches the "kings and priests" designation in Rev. 1:6; 5:10. Where does Paul ever refer to the body of Christ as a royal priesthood, or a nation?

 

More dribble my good friend. I am in the royal priesthood and I am part of a holy nation and I am a King and a Priest made so by the death, resurrection and ascension of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And I see no point in trying to straighten any more of your deceptions out because you will simply make more. Because you are afraid to face the fact that you know in your heart. You must continue to create an excuse so that you can avoid the cross. But you cannot and will not. You will never be complete or fulfilled until you die on the cross with Christ and be resurrected with him and ascend with him. And the same goes for Terry Burnett.

Moreover, in his second letter to these folks, Peter tells them the things Paul writes of are "hard to by understood."(2 Pet. 3:16)  If Paul's gospel is being preached by Peter, then why doesn't he, in his letters, simply explain it to them, and admonish them that this is now the gospel which they are to be following?

Mike, Peter did that very thing but you cannot discern it. So the things Paul writes of are "hard to be understood" as you certainly missed it as well. Just because something is hard to understand does not mean there was a difference between what Peter was talking about and what Paul was talking about.

 

Why is all this important anyway Mike? Do you really care how many gospels there are or who is supposed to have what? No! Your whole motive here is to avoid the salvation that is required via the cross. And you know this. You have already admitted in another email that you quit trying to be what you never will be. And I have found out what that is you have been striving for and never obtained. That is the born again experience which have not ever said you have experienced.

Finally, how is it that Peter, James and John can be members of the body of Christ, yet still inherit the kingdom of heaven, and sit on "twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel" (Matt. 19:28) in that earthly kingdom?

 

Again Mike you will never put this all together properly until after you have been born again. You are trying to determine correct theology as one who has not experienced what Christ has provided for you and your solution is to theologically excuse yourself rather than continue to try and obtain the crown of life. Peter, James, John and Paul and I are members of the body of Christ and we have inherited the Kingdom of Heaven which is the cosmos and the first twelve apostles sit presently on twelve thrones over the house of Israel where as Paul is the great apostle to the Gentiles and I am a King and a Priest made so by the same operation of God in Christ.
 
Conclusion
 
I think the point of all this should be that, whatever happened during the Acts transition, at the end of it one gospel emerged, and that is Paul's gospel, "the gospel of the grace of God," which is now to be preached to "all nations for the obedience of faith." (Romans 16:26)  It is absolutely not to be mixed with the other gospel, the "gospel of the kingdom," preached by Peter, James and John to the "circumcision," which paralleled it during the Acts. By doing this, as most of Christian theology does, you adulterate the grace gospel with works, which is clearly forbidden
 

 
Rom 11:6
6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.  

Mike, What has this doctrine got to do with all that above? Not a single thing. The Jews need to be saved by the operation of God in Christ or by the works of Christ which are his death, resurrection and ascension and so do the Gentiles. Works have no place with the Jews or the Gentiles.

Eph 2:8,9
For by grace are ye saved, through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, Not of works, lest any man should boast.   (KJV)

Again this has nothing to do with your argument! We are all saved by the same operation. We are saved by being in the body of Christ in his death, resurrection and ascension and we are lead to trust this operation by our faith that Christ did indeed do all of that and that we are in him when he did it. But our faith is finished when we experience the operation and go through the door he made into heaven by that operation and we then have the keys to the Kingdom and the gates of hell cannot prevail against them and those we save by this gospel are saved and those who ignore it, cover it up, reject it, do not trust it, cannot see it will be lost forever. The gateway to heaven and eternal life and salvation is on this side of the grave. Those that enter the grave prior to this experience are by definition lost.

 

Titus 3:5
5 Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost;   (KJV)

And you know not what this means either. The washing of regeneration is not the mere experience of the Holy Ghost or Spirit. The regeneration is when you are regenerated by the death resurrection and ascension of Christ. Otherwise you are unregenerated and in the old body with the unforgiven sins which only the cross removes. It is a washing in the blood of Christ and its effect is a renewing of the Holy Ghost which we sense on both sides of the cross. This Holy Ghost leads us to the Cross and takes us through the door of Christ to the eternal life in the Kingdom and renews our body to contain the new life we receive and the Holy Ghost is renewed in the process and is continually renewed afterward. This doctrine has nothing to do with what you claim.
 
Mike

 

I say once again Mike, my friend, give these vain doctrines up for they do nothing for you or for anyone else. They do not lead to salvation but are a detour and an excuse to avoid what Christ has for you in him. Don't miss the big issue by striving so hard to perfect false doctrines. I pray that the Holy Ghost will lead you to the experience of eternal life and salvation and your entry into the Kingdom of Heaven upon Earth and throughout the galaxies via the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ Jesus prior to the grave.

No one can slaughter the scriptures as you and your cohorts have obviously done in the light for all to see unless you be blind yourself to what you are doing and why. I pray that you leave these false doctrines and seek regeneration now before it is too late.

Sincerely,

 

Ronald F. Avery

www.AlienPhysics.com