His conclusion:
Perhaps we could agree: holiness of life is imperative for Christians; but the one thing we're supposed to be reflecting to the world is not our own moral lives, but Jesus himself, a friend and savior of sinners, who will readily, happily forgive and heal and rebuild and restore anyone, so that sin stops, the desert blooms, and wicked people change, to their own great happiness?
2 comments:
Questions like this always remind me of our "root stock". Where did we start? When I look at myself I see so much of Romans 3 in me and 1 Corinthians 1. In myself I am not righteous. In myself I am foolish and weak. It is because of what God makes and God gives me that I have the ability and faith to become moral.
“For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.”
Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.
For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God. And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, righteousness and sanctification and redemption, so that, as it is written, “Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord.””
(1 Corinthians 1:18–31 ESV)
“What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin, as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” “Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.” “The venom of asps is under their lips.” “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.””
(Romans 3:9–18 ESV)
Of course not! The historical record tells us that such is completely obvious.
Applied Christian politics 101. All of which became inevitable when the early church was coopted by the Roman state, and thus became an integral player in the Western drive for total power and control over every one and every thing.
Such was also inevitable in the entirely bogus Christian claim that Christianity is/was the "one truth faith". A claim which implicitly/explicitly means that ALL other Faith traditions and their various cultural expressions are INHERENTLY false, and thus need to be converted to the "one true way" using whatever means were available in any given time and place.
www.dartmouth.edu/~spanmod/mural/panel13.html
www.jesusneverexisted.com/cruelty.html
www.logosjournal.com/hammer_kellner
Note the dreadful sado-masochistic snuff/splatter film/movie featured in the third reference.
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