tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19802617.post8947330339933963126..comments2024-01-17T04:14:40.892-05:00Comments on A Pastor's Cancer Diary: December 17, 2008 - RevelationCarlhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00540884672406337833noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19802617.post-48020808831213726152008-12-21T22:07:00.000-05:002008-12-21T22:07:00.000-05:00Hi Carl,This is the second time in a few days that...Hi Carl,<BR/>This is the second time in a few days that I read what you wrote. The other is from Fr. Sean Wales, C.Ss.R. in his booklet titled, "What You Should Know About the 'End Times'". He basically says the same thing but puts it in the context of a suffering Christianity at the time of the persecutions and the glory that awaits them in Heaven. Persecution/cancer suffering in different ways.<BR/><BR/>Take care,<BR/>TMAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19802617.post-40570006319685254362008-12-18T10:04:00.000-05:002008-12-18T10:04:00.000-05:00lecoop,It's a question of context. I always belie...lecoop,<BR/><BR/>It's a question of context. I always believe it's more faithful to the biblical text to read it in the larger context, understanding the book of which it's a part, rather than cherry-picking individual scripture verses from vastly different parts of the Bible - which is exactly what John Nelson Darby, who popularized dispensationalism in the 19th century, did. The larger context of 1 Thessalonians 4:17 is clear from verses 13-14a that precede it: "But we do not want you to be informed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others who have no hope." It's also clear in v. 18 that follows it: "Therefore encourage one another with these words."<BR/><BR/>The apostle's goal is not to frighten people with fears of being "left behind," but rather to encourage believers who are seeing their fellow Christians dying all around them, and who are hearing discouraging messages from Greco-Roman culture that there is no life after death. He wants them to know that, by grace, "we will be with the Lord forever."<BR/><BR/>He writes within the worldview of his time: a flat earth, with heaven physically "up there," above the clouds. Of course Paul would envision believers being "caught up to meet the Lord in the air." It's where he thought heaven was! I think we can buy his theology, without buying his scientific worldview.<BR/><BR/>This is good news, not the scary news that forms the heart of much dispensationalist teaching I've seen. Where, in 1 Thessalonians 4, does Paul speak about people being "left behind" after a "rapture"? Paul never mentions people being left behind, and the word "rapture" doesn't occur anywhere in the New Testament. It's based on a Latin, not a Greek word, and it's from the same root as the word for "rape."<BR/><BR/>Is it being faithful to the text to take a message of consolation and comfort about believers who will one day "be with the Lord forever," and to focus instead on others who are "left behind"? It's using the text in a way precisely opposite to what the author intended.<BR/><BR/>Dispensationalism is based on a theory of interpreting scripture that assumes God has scattered little hidden gems of meaning throughout the many biblical books, and that only those who are in the know about which random verses to pick up and analyze will get the hidden meaning. Well, that's not the understanding of scripture I operate from. I believe the Bible is a library of many different books, each having their own distinctive message. The gospel comes from the whole, more than the individual parts. By careful study, taking into account the authors who wrote the individual books and the communities for which they were originally intended, we can discern how the earliest Christians read them. Take all of these together, as a whole, and we can begin to discern what God is continuing to say to us today: a progression of meaning, based on the original understanding - not a radically new understanding that's a complete break with (and sometimes even a contradiction of) the original.<BR/><BR/>Dispensationalism, by contrast, begins with an interpretative grid (that framework of the various "dispensations" throughout history), superimposes it on the Bible, and then pulls individual verses from here, there and everywhere to try to justify it. A book as vast and complex as the Bible (which is really not a book at all, but a library) offers almost endless possibilities for those who are so minded.<BR/><BR/>If God's plan truly was to divide history into a series of dispensations, and this is important for people to know, then why wouldn't God inspire a biblical writer to tell the faithful about it directly, from the beginning? Why hide it as secret knowledge, scattering scavenger-hunt clues all over the Bible, and not revealing it until the 19th century? Did God dislike the Christians of all previous centuries, so as to hide this so-called saving knowledge from them? What kind of God hides such important information, anyway? Isn't the overall message of the New Testament that God sent Jesus to make the good news clear, rather than to obscure it?<BR/><BR/>Those are my thoughts, anyway. You may differ, and that's your privilege. My intention is not to question or undermine anyone's faith, but rather to focus faith on the good news at the heart of the Christian proclamation, not marginal theories.<BR/><BR/>CarlCarlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00540884672406337833noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19802617.post-90367542210095396482008-12-18T07:09:00.000-05:002008-12-18T07:09:00.000-05:00Dear Carl,You are right. We protest!!! But I must ...Dear Carl,<BR/><BR/>You are right. We protest!!! But I must ask: how else can you interpret such clear words: Please read them in every translation you can find - for they all give the same message: we are to be caught up.<BR/><BR/>"For the dead in Christ shall rise first..."<BR/><BR/>"Then we which are alive [and] remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air..."<BR/><BR/>Carl, it matters little what previous generations believed. They did not have the resources we have such as this:<BR/><BR/>http://www.greeknewtestament.com/B52C004.htm#V17<BR/><BR/>Please read these verses in each translation: they all say the same thing! If we believe this is the inspired word of God, then we must believe what this verse is telling us; one day soon we will be caught up!lecoophttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10023999327476642043noreply@blogger.com