i don't understand scripture, but...that's ok

[pennyjane]

i think we study what interests us, what causes us to want the answer to the question posed in the answer to the last question.  in another forum just recently people got to talking about math.  there was some passion included.  now, for me, many of the things they were discussing in some detail i couldn't even pronounce the names.  but for some, it was interesting, they wanted to know...their curiostiy was peaked.  i think some of these people will be able to study math for all their lives and just keep learning more and more...but the really good ones will always be aware of the fact that what they know is but a tiny speck of what is to be known.  some others will just become pompous and austentacious...they will reach the limit of what they are capable of learning and then will sit on the hill and desiminate knowledge without wisdom from then on.

i think the study of scripture can be a lot like that.  though i have been studying scripture for some years now and in some depth, i am contantly being reminded that what i know is but a tiny speck of what is to be known.  i apprciate that God keeps me in this state.  last night in an on line bible study class this was brought to the surface for me.  while the question we were looking at was the specific reasons why God destroyed sadom, a part of the text took us into the gospel according to matthew.  it's was the story from Jesus' own mouth where he seperates people out as sheep and goats.  according to this text Jesus will place the "sheep" on His right side and the "goats" to the left.  the "sheep" Jesus explains are the ones who have clothed and fed and housed the earthy representation of Himself while the goats are those who deny hospitality...the ones so full of pride and self-worth that they don't even see the need to care for the less fortunate.  Jesus says he will send the sheep on to the Father while the goats will go the way of the dead.

from this scripture, and it seemed in pretty simple language and quite straight forward...Jesus was pointing to works as the path to salvation.  now, i have always held that salvation is a matter or grace and grace alone.  i also know that works are a demonstration of faith, without works faith is dead and all that...but i can't get past this straight forward language from Jesus about works.  perhaps i'm simple minded, unable to understand the depth of meaning here, unable to put it together in a simple and understandable way for myself.  that can be a pretty good thing...with this doubt i don't think i'll ever be able to put the whole thing to bed, the relationship between grace and works.  perhaps it's a relationship i'll aways have to examine in myself and have to revisit consciously from time to time...just to see where i am in it all.

i think it's good, that i understand so little about scripture.  i hope i never get very good with it.  for my lack of understanding now becomes hope...hope that someday i will.  hope is a wonderful gift.





Posted on: October 20, 2008, 09:16:30 ami have no idea why that line runs through everything, i didn't put it there <intentionally> so please disregard.



Removed line through text

[Kimberly]

To be illustrative rather than explain:

Expressed like this: math will result in strike through. (It's what you are TELLING it to do.)

Code Select Expand

Expressed like this: math[s] will result in strike through. (It's what you are TELLING it to do.)
However,
Expressed like this: math(s) will do what you would expect.

Code Select Expand

Expressed like this: math(s) will do what you would expect.

Note how "math(s)" is written above.

In short, math[ s ] (without spaces) is BAD; math(s) is fine.

[pennyjane]

thanks kimberly!  i guess there is somebody here willing to help!

[Sarah Louise]

I removed the line from the post.  It was a matter of removing a bracketed "s" from two places.


Sarah L.

[soldierjane]

But goats are such cute animals....

[pennyjane]

thank you sarah.

[jainie marlena]

what works or which works? Keeping the old law or telling all these fine folk about Jesus? what is works? you show that you have faith by doing what your doing in this forum.

If we are in Christ, we are resting in Christ through his death. Christ is the sabbath that we are to inter in. Keep it holy let Jesus pick the corn (do the work for you)and hand it to you because he is Lord off the sabbath. Labour not for things that perish, but for things that endour unto life everlasting. THIS IS (eternal life) = that they may know thee the one and only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. I John
Exo 20:8  Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.
Exo 20:9  Six days shalt thou labour, and do (all thy work):  (before Christ)
Exo 20:10  But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates:
Exo 20:11  For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

Post Merge: August 07, 2010, 01:26:39 AM

Exo 20:11  For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.

for some reason we think that salvation is not a part of the works that God did with in the six days. (the lamb that was slain before the foundation of the world) ( all of the works were finished before the foundation of the world) in the new testament. all through the bible heaven and earth is a figuretive for people of deffernt classes. heaven is over the earth. rules over the commen folk. the sea referse multitudes of people. stars fall from the sky rulers loose their rule over the people. Whatever God needed to do he did just as you got on this forum and began to type. the goats works are what the goat would do because he is a goat. goats eat anything that is given to them. false teacher believe anything that they hear from other false teachers.
Post Merge: August 07, 2010, 02:41:41 AM
Sheep on the other hand, eat only what the sheperd leads them to. green pasters right. grass the same grass that is mown down. so the goats and the sheep need to be sepret. so SHEEP COME OUT of the goats. they can't tell what works are so why even let them think that they know what is being talked about. I was confused the whole time until I walked a way from them than it became clear to me. Sheep hear the call and just come out of the goats.

[justmeinoz]

To me it seems that the important part of the text quoted, is that the goats represent the people who DIDN'T help someone, rather than the need to do good in the hope of a reward.

Doing good in hope of a reward sounds suspiciously like the TV evangelists with the mansions, rather than the aid worker helping AIDS sufferers in an African hospice, with no personal gain.

I don't hear of many millionaire church founders helping the less fortunate, so can only conclude they are a mob of goats.

[tekla]

what i know is but a tiny speck of what is to be known

A well-known Jewish Rabbi (Is there any other kind?) is quoted as saying: "That which is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary."  Which is, not surprisingly considering he was Jewish and all, is exactly what Jesus said when he was trying to concentrate (dumb down) what he was saying to the absolute lowest common denominator, Christianity for Dummys, Heaven 101: Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

That's it.  That's all.  Be excellent to each other.  And only every other belief system teaches that very point, usually in language not much different.  Really, check it out, it's not like Christianity has a corner on this most basic of all ethical/moral precepts.
http://www.thesynthesizer.org/golden.html

And, in that - in all of those, there is not a word, not a breath nor a hint of anything like faith, but it's 100% aimed at behavior (an action - a work if you will).  It's based (thus is our happiness and salvation) on how we act.  Nothing more, nothing less.

And, we're not some B.C.E. tribe out in the middle of a stinking desert.  Nor are we stuck (well most of us) with kosher laws.  So we forget that in that whole whose the sheep and whose the goats is an implicit division on usefulness and total waste.  Sheep are perhaps the most domesticated of all domesticated animals, and along with cows, the most useful.  They do both wool and tasty dinners.  They are so domesticated, so dumb and so easy to lead around that kids can do it.  It's hard to imagine how sheep made it until they got domesticated sometimes.  Anyway, sheep are great, being so pliant is just part of their greatness.

But f-ing goats, not only are they unclean and therefore the Jews can't really eat or wear them, they are about one of the most obnoxious animals around.  Mean, highly territorial, well if you ever been around them you come to quickly understand why no one ever really 'loves' a goat (unlike dogs, cats and horses - all of which are love machines).  Goats are pretty much worthless to the Jews.

But I don't even think you need some sort of high commentary on that either as Jesus preaches as much about the virtue of poverty as any other subject.  It's just that churches, needing money and all, have tried their best to obscure that message since, well since the second year of their existence at least.