"5 For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
2 For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven,
3 inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked.
4 For indeed while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life.
5 Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge."
"6 Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord— 7 for we walk by faith, not by sight—
8 we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord.
9 Therefore we also have as our ambition, whether at home or absent, to be pleasing to Him.
10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may be recompensed for his deeds in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad."
Wednesday, July 11, 2018
Luther was not All You May Think He was!
Martin Luther never denied purgatory in his 95 thesis.
He maintained a belief in infant baptism.
Luther never denied papal indulgences, he merely said that they should be preached with caution.
Luther defended the papacy in his 95 thesis. If one would read carefully all the tenets of the 95 thesis they would see that Luther never came against the papacy, he merely criticized certain aspects of the evil priests who were corrupt.
Most of the people who love and quote Luther have disinformation about him, elevating his act of placing the 95 thesis on the door of the Vatican as though it were something unusual.
There was a practice in Luther's day of placing documents to the door to spark debate and make points of doctrine. Luther was not doing anything unusual or heroic in this act of placing the thesis, he was merely using a means that many others had used.
We get into a troubling area when we begin to elevate a man above God. Every man has flaws and every man who is elevated seems to have their flaws dismissed as unimportant or ignored completely merely because we like something good we thought they did.
I say "thought they did" because over time, just like gossip, the story changes so that the truth is obscured by emotional hype. Whenever we look to a man for our truth, pretending they are perfect in order to maintain our idol and good feelings, we are place that person above God.
We can either admit wrong and right about a person, or we must ignore the wrong to move into an area of worship of man. If we can only see the wrong in someone, then we have a prejudice, deliberately ignoring the right in them.
When we can admit openly the wrong and the right of anyone we meet, then we are seeing things truthfully. God wants us to remember, "let God be true and EVERY man a liar."
Those who become angry at criticism about their favorite preacher have developed an idol in their own minds. We must stop elevating people and begin to elevate only Christ.
He maintained a belief in infant baptism.
Luther never denied papal indulgences, he merely said that they should be preached with caution.
Luther defended the papacy in his 95 thesis. If one would read carefully all the tenets of the 95 thesis they would see that Luther never came against the papacy, he merely criticized certain aspects of the evil priests who were corrupt.
Most of the people who love and quote Luther have disinformation about him, elevating his act of placing the 95 thesis on the door of the Vatican as though it were something unusual.
There was a practice in Luther's day of placing documents to the door to spark debate and make points of doctrine. Luther was not doing anything unusual or heroic in this act of placing the thesis, he was merely using a means that many others had used.
We get into a troubling area when we begin to elevate a man above God. Every man has flaws and every man who is elevated seems to have their flaws dismissed as unimportant or ignored completely merely because we like something good we thought they did.
I say "thought they did" because over time, just like gossip, the story changes so that the truth is obscured by emotional hype. Whenever we look to a man for our truth, pretending they are perfect in order to maintain our idol and good feelings, we are place that person above God.
We can either admit wrong and right about a person, or we must ignore the wrong to move into an area of worship of man. If we can only see the wrong in someone, then we have a prejudice, deliberately ignoring the right in them.
When we can admit openly the wrong and the right of anyone we meet, then we are seeing things truthfully. God wants us to remember, "let God be true and EVERY man a liar."
Those who become angry at criticism about their favorite preacher have developed an idol in their own minds. We must stop elevating people and begin to elevate only Christ.
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