Featured “The Gospel of John” has an anonymous author

[AgnosticBoy]

With the Revelation the scriptures were complete.

How can we know this? We can theorize what this would look like. For instance, why wasn't this revealed from the start? It took centuries for the canon to be formed and agreed upon. Men deliberated and debated on it which is another thing that I wouldn't expect if revelation was given.

 

[Scooter]

I’m talking about the book of Revelations. It closed the canon of scripture.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

I’m talking about the book of Revelations. It closed the canon of scripture.

What leads you to believe that? Is there a passage in there or something else?

 

[Scooter]

I’m talking about the book of Revelations. It closed the canon of scripture.

What leads you to believe that? Is there a passage in there or something else?

The Revelation of Jesus is the conclusion of the story of God’s redemption of mankind. In Revelation we see Jesus as the King of Kings who finally and forever defeats Satan and all of his evil associates. In Revelations we see perfect justice executed on the ungodly. Believers receive glorified bodies and eternal life free from sin and all the heartache that comes with sin. The book of Revelations is the finale for the whole Bible.

 

[Multicolored Lemur]

In my view, this potentially stunted the progress of Christianity.

But Christianity has more followers than any monotheism faith in the entire world. Islam is a respectful second. And there’s an independent faith in a distant third place, snd relatively few people can answer what it is __________ . In fact, it would be a good quiz show question.

Of course, it goes without saying that the popularity of a set of beliefs is only loosely connected to how well-supported the beliefs are.

Maybe if there were healthier interplay between theory and practice and a quicker feedback cycle, then there’d be more of an overlap between popularity and being well-supported.

 

[Multicolored Lemur]

Richard Lischer: What’s the secret to spiritual memoir? Honesty.

A true story about the life of faith includes the messiness, failures and griefs of human experience. It also offers hope, says the professor emeritus and author of a new book about spiritual memoir.

faithandleadership.com

Faith & Leadership:​

“Are the Gospels in some ways memoir?”

Richard Lischer:​

“Funny you should ask. One of the earliest names for the Gospels comes by way of the church father, Justin Martyr. He called the Gospels the “memoirs of the apostles.” By memoir, he meant, I think, quite literally, the still-living memories of Jesus or of the people who knew Jesus. . . “

————

I’d personally add, memories likely changed from a number of tellings and retellings. And at the end of the day, we just do not know.

 

[Multicolored Lemur]

Richard Lischer: What’s the secret to spiritual memoir? Honesty.

A true story about the life of faith includes the messiness, failures and griefs of human experience. It also offers hope, says the professor emeritus and author of a new book about spiritual memoir.

faithandleadership.com

Richard Lischer:​

“ . . I can't forget what a toddler named Darwin looked like after drowning in a pond in our community, laid out on a hospital bed dressed by the nurses in his pajamas with drums and sticks on them.

“I can't forget what it was like to be in that room with his mother and his grandmother. Oh my God.

“I can't forget what it was like one day after church when the chairman of the board of elders burst into the sacristy and his first words were, ‘You lied to me! You've betrayed me!’ . . ”

———

This is what religion should be about.

With the Mother and Grandmother and the little boy who had drowned, you let yourself say “I’m sorry.” You hug each, unless one or both clearly indicate nonverbally that they do not want a hug.

And you don’t reach for an answer. You don’t know why the boy drowned. And neither does the smartest person in the world. Sometimes tragedies just happen.

————

The guy accusing him of lying is a much less serious situation. But sometimes this kind of criticism can really stick with us. If you feel it, maybe saying “I’m sorry” is not such a bad thing. And let the person talk, without talking over him. Using the reflective sales technique of saying, Okay and repeating the sentence or long phrase the person just said. It’s a pretty good technique because it gives the person confidence that they have been heard.

And 1% of people sometimes have schizophrenia and/or bipolar. I say sometimes because they go through cycles of their issues being less bad or more bad. The person can certainly be a good neighbor, co-worker, parent, etc, etc. With some help along the way, just like all of us. And a doctor who listens and is willing to tinker with the medication.

Or, maybe you really did let the guy down in some way.

————

It’s interesting that I wrote about the tricky situation more than the important situation.

With the family who’s lost someone, bring food to the family in a respectful way.

And show up at the memorial service a respectful amount of time early.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

The Revelation of Jesus is the conclusion of the story of God’s redemption of mankind. In Revelation we see Jesus as the King of Kings who finally and forever defeats Satan and all of his evil associates. In Revelations we see perfect justice executed on the ungodly. Believers receive glorified bodies and eternal life free from sin and all the heartache that comes with sin. The book of Revelations is the finale for the whole Bible.

I don't see that as being enough and I think that can be seen based on some of the reasons why Paul wrote letters to various Churches. As various issues popped up after Jesus's death, Paul often wrote to reassure, correct, and instruct these Churches when issues would pop up. Fast forward to today, we have a bunch of issues that have popped up since Paul's time, like gay marriage, Ai, cloning, etc. We are without real guidance on a lot of these things from a Christian standpoint, that is, unless you overstretch some biblical principle to try to make it apply.

I think it would be easier to have direct access to God to ask him to reveal clear and relevant stance on all of these issues.

 

[Scooter]

As various issues popped up after Jesus's death, Paul often wrote to reassure, correct, and instruct these Churches when issues would pop up. Fast forward to today, we have a bunch of issues that have popped up since Paul's time, like gay marriage, Ai, cloning, etc. We are without real guidance on a lot of these things from a Christian standpoint, that is, unless you overstretch some biblical principle to try to make it apply.

I think it would be easier to have direct access to God to ask him to reveal clear and relevant stance on all of these issues.

Every moral issue we face today is addressed in scripture. Gay marriage…forbidden. AI…if it’s used for good, then good. If it’s used for evil, forbidden. Cloning…God is the giver of all life.

And we do have direct access to God for clear and relevant positions for every issue. That direct access is through Jesus Christ.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Every moral issue we face today is addressed in scripture.

Interestingly, I could not find anywhere in the Bible where it says that the Bible canon and divine revelation ended at the 1st century. That is all tradition and assumption about Scripture. I look at this issue from the perspective of a 1st century Christian. If all of the Scripture that they had contained everything they needed to know about morality or God's view on something, then they wouldn't have needed Paul to add more writings (his letters) to Scripture. The 1st century Christians that were around even before Paul wouldn't have known about CHurch rules from Scripture because the Scripture did not yet exist to them until Paul wrote about it later on. I see the same issue today. There may be plenty of things that we don't know God's stance on, and that's not covered in the Bible, that could be added as Scripture.

Cloning…God is the giver of all life.

. AI…if it’s used for good, then good.

Part of the problem is knowing what good is if it's not addressed in the Bible. To some people, burning too much fossil fuels is a bad thing. You could say if it's used for good, but what is using it for good? Of course, we can know from outcomes, but then a gay marriage that causes no harm can also be seen as a good outcome. I would think religious morality would work like a manual, where you have clear rules and principles. But we don't have that, the canon has been stopped, and revelation is no longer accepted apparently.