Love your article on the King James Version. Disappointed in your home page
Question:
Regarding your article on the King James Version: God bless you! How so many in our movement think that the KJV is the only acceptable Bible, I will never understand!
Wow! Then I went to your home page and was SOOOOO disappointed!
Answer:
Upon what passage in the Bible do you base your disappointment?
"For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ" (Galatians 1:10).
Question:
I don't quite understand your response. Actually, my response was due to the many references you made on your home page to opinions that have little or no basis in Scripture but have divided the churches of Christ for generations and are now, in my opinion, killing her. I was immersed when I was a teenager. From that time up until middle age, I was mired in the mud of legalism (clearly not the message of Jesus Christ). Then my wife and I became members of a congregation that emphasized grace. It was the most liberating thing I ever experienced and is probably the reason I remained in a church that came from the Stone-Campbell movement. It is also, in my opinion, the reason both of my adult children are Christians today. For reasons that I don't want to go into now, I am now in a somewhat more "traditional" church and have had a great deal of trouble adjusting. My present church is far less legalistic than the one in which I grew up; otherwise, I could not have remained there. The church that I believe your web site describes sounds very much like the one into which I was born and that makes me sad because it brings back terrible memories of legalism and guilt. One question I want to ask. Please answer it, unless you would prefer not to do so: where did you receive your training for the ministry and when?
Answer:
So you judge by personal opinion and not by God's teachings. Allow me to recommend the article: "Legalism: The Un-Sin." The problem is you are making up a sin that isn't in the Bible and then charging others of that sin. In this way, you are acting in a manner similar to the Pharisees (Mark 7:1-9). Unlike your own claim, the home page does give brief backing for the statements made from the scriptures. Details are given throughout the web site. The fact that people aren't interested in following God's will does not imply that those who do are divisive. "For first of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and in part I believe it. For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you" (I Corinthians 11:18-19).
I learned to preach as was it done in the early church: I studied with several older preachers and studied the Bible. I have been preaching for over 35 years now. There is nothing like preaching for people who really know their Bibles to spur your own growth. See also, "Where did you learn to give counsel?"
