HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: pauley@tai.jkj.sii.co.jp (Martin Pauley(student))
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Christmas on the 25th.  Why?
Date: 15 Dec 92 08:51:59 GMT

William E Hamilton pointed out that many Messianic Jews take a dim view
of celebrating Christmas due to its Pagan origins.  I can understand
their feelings on this.  I do not like mixing Pagan symbols with
Christianity _BUT_ I can't change the fact that Christmas is celebrated
so I will _USE_ that fact to tell people about Christ.

The commercialisation is as bad as the Pagan origins but Christians
should use the opportunity to share the Truth.  Here in Japan the
Christmas "festival" is basically a big sales promotion _BUT_ it is
still called Christmas (albeit with only the Pagan symbols left).
While the "Christ" is still there Christians have "an opening"  (In a
perfect situation we shouldn't NEED an opening, but use it!)

One little point.  Please don't use "Xmas" or "Xian".  X implies an
unknown quantity (x=y-2z) or someone anonymous (Mr X).  Just a personal
'niggle'

Well, if anyone is interested in the origins of the Christmas festival
(probably the oldest festival known to man!) or the Pagan symbols still
there (have you decorated your Asherah pole yet?), email me.

in Christ,
.Marty.!
<pauley@tai.jkj.sii.co.jp>

[X seems to have different implications to different people.  I'm
known several ministers who use X (chi) for Christ because it's the
first letter of Christ in Greek.  See e.g. the well-known chi rho
symbol.  Perhaps this is more meaningful to people who are used to
reading the Gospel in Greek.  It also reminds some people of the
cross, something that should always be closely associated with Christ.
--clh]
From: julian@sfu.ca (Julian Shillcock)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: There will be a collision?
Date: 17 Dec 92 04:38:42 GMT
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada

baseball@catch-the-fever.scd.ucar.edu (Gregg Walters) writes:

>In Article: 17266 of soc.religion.christian,
>julian@sfu.ca (Julian Shillcock) wrote >>

>>> u presumably know abou tcomet Smith-Tuttle that is scheduled to be in the
>>> same place at the same time as the earth in 2126?

>NO ONE IS SAYING THAT THE COMET IS "SCHEDULED" TO HIT THE EARTH.  To

>Gregg            \\                                    //

I did not say it would hit, I said it would be in the same place meaning
approximately. But we can know orbits of comets pretty accurately, look
at Halleys. The point is that the collision is distinctly more probable than
any other that I have heard of, not that is definitely going to happen.

julian
>		  \\                                  //
From: rpitts@emperor.gatech.edu (Richard Pitts)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Dating
Date: 13 Dec 92 05:01:08 GMT
Organization: CERL-EE, Georgia Institue of Technology

rpitts@emperor.gatech.edu (Richard Pitts) writes:
>One of our pastors, who works with the youth, told us that he often runs
>into the question "what is wrong with dating non-christians?"  His response
>is that we are to live above this "walking a fine line deal" and should do 
>the wisest thing.  Specifically, if you are going to get married, you will 
>most likely marry someone you dated - not someone you didn't date.

mmrwlm@sn535.uca writes:
>I respect that stance, and see the wisdom in it.  But I am not a teenager,
>and I am engaged to be married.  So how do you get that message across to
>a teen who is single and not even *thinking* about marriage?  That response
>may work for someone who has been a Christian a long time, but what about
>a lonely single person who is new in Christ?  Should they continue to sit
>at home alone and turn down dates from non-Christian co-workers or peers?

This pastor was the full-time youth pastor - he now is the preaching
pastor at our temporary building, where the rest of us will be moving
to in God's time.  

I think this goes over well with teenagers, for that is a lot of what
this pastor would do.  He brought ideas to the whole church that he
had been teaching to the youth.  The youth (jr. and sr. high school)
loved/loves him and he is still actively involved with them.

For Christ and His Kingdom,
Richard Pitts
-- 
rpitts@cerl.gatech.edu      |  Love and Worship God, the Creator of the Earth. 
                          --|--   
Pro-Life!              -|-  |  -|-    Come bow down in worship, let us kneel
Pro-Responsibility!     |   |   |     before the Lord Our Maker.  Psalm 95:6
From: ljh655@cscgpo.anu.edu.au (Lubosh)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Kingdom of God #2
Date: 13 Dec 92 06:51:43 GMT
Organization: ANU

Zaire
-----
As I said before many of the mission stations were very distant for any
other kind of help, so the most usual thing was to send what they needed
by mail. Many times just a letter with a nice postcard brought a lot of
joy. To understand why Fr Stefan sends that little message with his
letter - the postage in Czecho-Slovakia raised  quite significantly
(especially the Parcel Post to overseas destinations) in the beginning of
1992 when a lot of state subsidy was removed from the postal services. Of
course, the number of packages dropped, and there were attempts to
organize a container for delivery of goods to all stations in Africa - it
would come cheaper, but from the point of view of the little black kids
it's probably much better to get twenty postcard and five parcels a week
than one big container a year... Here are the letters:
---------------------------------------------------------
+!																																								15-7-92
Dear sister Helen,
heartly greetings for you, and wishes of many more blessed years. Let the
God's blessing accompany you for the rest of your life. 8-7-92 I was
delivered 62 letters from 26 senders, and 437 postcards. And that's all
thanks to you. Now you be also responsible to reply to all those good
people in my name and in the name of the black children express all
thanks. I can't write to everybody. And do write Kolwezi instead of
Kalwezi.
Dear Helen, read also these little message below, and maybe send
photocopies to all those who sent the postcards. I'm leaving for a
retreat tomorrow, 350 km from Kolwezi, and I'll be back in August. The
letters from here are delivered to Belgium, and from there to the rest of
Europe by train. I'll tell you more when I'll come to Slovakia.
God be with you! I'll write more in August.
Yours in Christ,
Stefan Gazdik, SDB
-----------------------------
Dear friends,
	warm greetings to all of you who sent us those beautiful postcards. I'll
leave it to you if you can send some again. Well, the postage went up...
Last year we were able to buy bread for 1,600 zairs. A week ago it was
120,000 zairs for half a kilogram. And while I'm writing this message,
half a kilo of bread is sold for 200,000 zairs. But - what are we going
to do? Not to eat bread anymore ?
	For these black children your postcards are so dear! And please, put a
strip of tape on the back of the envelopes, as it often happens that the
envelopes come open. And be sure of my prayers for you every day. I also
want to ask you for prayers, to support us in our work here.
Mother Mary, pray for us!
Your sincerely,

Fr. Stefan GAZDIK, SDB
Mariapolis B.P. 1121
KOLWEZI
ZAIRE
Africa
---------------------------------------------------
"...you did it for one of the least important of these brothers of mine,
you did it for me!" (Jesus Christ)
PS: Have you got a postcard, have you got a stamp? I'm just going to look
for one... ;-)
From: harling@miki.pictel.com (Dan Harling)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Is Christianity really the ONLY way?
Date: 15 Dec 92 09:08:02 GMT
Organization: PictureTel Corporation

In article <Dec.14.00.09.12.1992.2971@geneva.rutgers.edu> st14@cornell.edu (Stephen Tseng) writes:
>I've been having difficulty trying to understand something. Doesn't
>Jesus say that belief in Him is the only way for salvation, and that we
>cannot be saved through our own efforts? However, this would seem to
>cut off millions of people who have never heard of Jesus, and millions
>more who died before Jesus even walked the face of the earth. One
>argument I heard was that God will have mercy on whomever he decides,
>and that belief in Jesus was the only SURE way. This however, leaves an
>opening in logic. If God saves even one person who didn't accept
>Christ, then Jesus really is not the one and only way.
>
>There seems to be four ways out of this logical trap.
>
>1)Jesus encompasses much more than just the Man who died on the Cross...
>2)...proclaim
>everyone else who is not Christian, even if s/he never heard of Christ, to
>hell...
>3)...God doesn't play by mankind's logic. In this
>case Jesus is the only way to salvation for some, but not to others...
>4)Of course the final way out is to be an atheist so the whole point is
>moot.

Another view might be that, while Jesus did pay the penalty for one's
sins, one need not have *intellectual* knowledge of Jesus in order to
be saved.  In other words, if you are indeed saved, it was Jesus'
sacrifice on your behalf that made it possible, not your own works or
beliefs or knowledge.

It is possible that those who are saved inevitably end up hearing the
Gospel and learning about Jesus (like the Chinese student in another
post who heard the Gospel for the first time and immediately recognized
it as true), but that is not necessarily the case.  Thus, even if
people who have never heard the Gospel *are* saved, it is still through
Jesus, despite the fact that they do not "know" it in a historical or
theological sense.
____________________________________________________________________________
Daniel A. Harling                        (harling@pictel.com)
PictureTel Corp.             Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of
Peabody, MA  01960                   PictureTel Corp. (so there!)
From: belville@athena.mit.edu (Sharon Belville)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Dating
Date: 13 Dec 92 04:52:08 GMT
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology

In article <Dec.11.01.42.25.1992.12622@athos.rutgers.edu> mmrwlm@sn535.uca writes:
>When I was a teen, I felt it was easy for my mother to tell me, "Someday
>a nice, Christian young man will ask you out," when she was married and
>didn't have to deal with sitting at home on the weekend when all of your
>friends had dates.  There has got to be a more down-to-earth way of
>getting the message across to teenagers.  Any ideas?

You can't just tell kids "don't do this", "don't do that"...they need
positive activities to replace it.  It goes without saying that there is
a tremendous amount of peer pressure among teens, so even though they
may not be thinking of marriage, the potential for worldly teens to
challenge their convictions is still great.

The church I'm part of has a large, active teen group, but the church I
grew up in didn't.  I was the teen group.  (There were kids a few years
older than me and a few years younger, but no one my age.)  We did find
out about youth rallies at area churches, I went to Christian camp a
couple years, etc.  The teen ministry in the church here is awesome --
they're spiritual, evangelistic, and have strong convictions about
purity.  They date within the ministry -- often double dating with adult
teen leaders.  They have devotionals, camping trips, retreats, banquets,
parties, missions fund-raisers, etc, so they're not sitting home every
Saturday night -- I daresay they're having more fun than a lot of their
non-Christian friends, and drawing close to God at the same time.

It's the same with all of us -- we can't survive by making Christianity
a list of "don'ts".  I believe God has designed the church to help meet
our spiritual and emotional needs.  Then we won't have to turn to the
world or be tempted to date non-Christians.

I hope this helps :-)


--
Sharon Belville
From: jfc@nic.cerf.net (Co Ho)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Sin and worship.
Date: 21 Dec 92 00:16:37 GMT
Organization: CERFnet


	Ah!  What 's a refreshing post!  Finally somebody speaks my mind!
	You are right when define sin as disobeying God's will.
	You are right again when stressing the personal relationship with
	Christ as the pivotal point.

	I pray that our life would reflect His Glory in both word and deed
	and we would not fooling ourselves into 'talk and not walk' syndrome.

-------
"Jesus today has many who love his heavenly kingdom, but few who carry his
cross; many who yearn for comfort, few who long for distress.  Plenty of
people he finds to share his banquet, few to share his fast.  Every one
desires to take part in his rejoicing, but few are willing to suffer
anything for his sake..."
				Thomas A Kempis
				(The imitation of Christ)

-------

-- 
Co Ho  - FJC Software Development | "..is there a vision that I can call my
321 E. Chapman Fullerton CA 92632 | own? Feel like I'm looking for a reason
(714) 992-7274 BBS:(714) 992-7754 | -roaming through the night-  to find my
Alt.Addr=xcho@ccvax.fullerton.edu | place in this world.."   MichaelW.Smith
From: cctr114@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz (Bill Rea)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Mary and the Moderns
Date: 20 Dec 92 22:45:51 GMT
Organization: University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand.


 (mls@cbnewsm.att.com) wrote:

>One conclusion of biblical scholarship that I find *very* hard to get
>around is that Isaiah's prophecy in 7:14 --
>
>	"Look, the young woman is with child and about to give birth
>	to a son.  Let her name him Immanuel."  [_Tanakh_, JPS]
>
>was *misread* by the community represented in Matthew's gospel.  Whether
>that has to do with the Greek-speaking community taking the Septuagint
>rendering of _almah_ as _parthenos_, and then pushing *that* in a manner
>not required by Isaiah's text I don't know, for sure.

One of the problems facing all translators of Biblical texts is 
theological bias. All translations have theological bias, but some
are noticably worse than others. The quotation above is from a
Jewish translation of a verse that must be nearly universally regarded
as Messianic by Christians, there is a natural tendency to play down
the Messianic aspects of the verse by Jewish people. We should take
that into account when reading their translation, just as they would
when reading a Christian translation of the same verse. While the above
translation is certainly an admissible one, it is not the definitive
one, if such a thing exists. There are other possible ways of translating
this verse, see just about any Christian translation for an alternative. 
The way the JPS version has done it has made it seem that the
pregnant young woman was standing close by the prophet and the king
and was close to full term, or at least the young woman in question was
sufficiently well known to both of them that no further identification was
nesessary. While this is possible, we cannot be sure that this was the
case. The standard Christian rendering of verse, which puts events into the
future is certainly admissible by the Hebrew text. 

While I don't know what the Septuagint says at this point, it was done 
during a period of time when there were rising Messianic expectations
among the Jews, so it is quite possible that the translators amplified
the apparent Messianic implications of the verse. But that's pure 
speculation on my part.


P.S. If anyone want to flame me about anything I wrote here, they will
have to e-mail as I will be away from work for the next two and half
weeks. Bye.

--
                                                                     ___
Bill Rea                                                            (o o)
-------------------------------------------------------------------w--U--w---
| Bill Rea, Computer Services Centre, | E-Mail   b.rea@csc.canterbury.ac.nz |
| University of Canterbury,           | or     cctr114@csc.canterbury.ac.nz |
| Christchurch, New Zealand           | Phone (03)-642-331 Fax (03)-642-999 |
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: hovingh@ucsu.Colorado.EDU (William Hovingh)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: God the Father
Date: 20 Dec 92 21:59:45 GMT
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder

With regard to the use of the pronoun "he" to refer to God, I'd like to share a
Fun Fact (tm) that I learned in my Hebrew Exegesis course this fall.


First a little review (which the moderator may omit if he sees fit):

The text of the Hebrew Bible that is the basis for most modern translations
is called the Masoretic text. It includes the consonants that were fixed as the
canonical text in the last couple of centuries BCE; vowel markings that were
added by some very careful scribes and scholars called the Masoretes (who 
worked during the Middle Ages), and side-notes that were also made by the
Masoretes, making note of mistakes that they thought they saw in the consonantal
and of word frequency and location (kind of an early Strong's Concordance).  On
the most part, the vowel markings are based on the traditional pronunciation of
the words, but in a few cases the vowels from another word are attached to the
consonants in the text.  A well-known example is that whenever the Name of God
appears (the consonants are YHWH), the vowels used are either those of Adonai
(the word "lord") or Elohim ("God").  This marking was to alert the reader that
he or she should pronounce the word as Lord or God rather than pronouncing the
Sacred Name.

Now to my point:  In several books of the Hebrew Bible, the pronoun that refers
to God is written with the consonants for "he", but has the vowel pointings for
"she".  This means that either the Masoretes made a mistake (*extremely*
unlikely!), or (as most scholars seem to think) the writers and transmitters of
the text KNEW that it was absurd to assign a sex to God, and so reflected the
ambiguity in the way they wrote the text.

In my view, this makes it improper to claim that it is in any way "unbiblical"
to reflect that ambiguity in our own language about God.  If Louie Crew wants
to refer to God with the feminine singular pronoun, he should not be accused of
being unfaithful to the Biblical text.  My own strategy for getting around the
problem (which more than anything else is a failure of most human languages to
have a neuter-gender pronoun that refers to a person) is to avoid using
pronouns for God at all.  It gets a little rocky when I want to refer to
"God God's-self" (traditionally "God Himself"), but it's worth it for me to
maintain my understanding of the nature of God.
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Straight, but     |         Bill Hovingh         |Stay out of my bedroom unless
not narrow-minded |wjhovi01@ulkyvx.louisville.edu|you plan to sleep with me.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: fall266@cse.unl.edu
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Preaching to the Moderns
Date: 20 Dec 92 22:40:08 GMT
Organization: University of Nebraska--Lincoln

harling@miki.pictel.com (Dan Harling) writes:

>>Is not our faith based on the life of Jesus after his baptism?  And is
>>it not possible that the birth narratives of Matthew and Luke ARE
>>attempts to prove to the Jewish Christians and the Roman Christians
>>that Jesus really is the Messiah?

>My faith is based on the *resurrection* of Jesus.  It was not what he
>did or taught while on Earth that matters most, but who he *is*.

>The Virgin Birth and other events surrounding Jesus pointed to the fact
>that he was the Messiah, God's Anointed, as prophesied in the Old
>Testament.  They were not central to his purpose, but they were signs

I have one question.  How christian will recive the 2nd comming of
Jessus while jews are waiting for the promised massiha.  Are both same
if not who will be the masiah of Jews. and whow is Anti christ fit in
the christian belife?

These question come because Jesus will come to save his people.  But I
dont see any denger to the christian but some churches are claiming
that Jesus(P) are come as soon as year 2000.

When the State of Israel is already stablished then why jusus will
come?  If this is not the Kingdom that jesus is going to stablish then
why there is in consistancy in the scripture and the current era?

And will the kingdome of Jesus will be like the Israel then I will
prefare to be dead before his comming.
 I used (P) for the phrase for Peace be upon him as we use for all the
prophets as we belive. I reguest others too to use some kind of phrase
to distiguish Jesus(P) from other peolple.
From: dsegard@nyx.cs.du.edu (Daniel Segard)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: America's Godly Heritage
Date: 15 Dec 92 09:00:24 GMT
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix at U. of Denver Math/CS dept.


       I have heard that Bo Gritz has trouble deciding whether he is
Mormon, Baptist or part of the Christian Identity movement.  Any positive
word on what he is actually following these days?
From: nlt@gboro.glassboro.edu (N. L. Tinkham)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Cooperative Baptist Fellowship
Date: 20 Dec 92 23:37:00 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Department, Rowan College of New Jersey

Rick Granberry asks:

> I am looking for connections to the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship, and any 
> churches in the local area with sympathies.  Can someone give me an address?

One source of information about the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship is the
periodical _Baptists_Today_ (subscription $15, published 22 times per year).
While _Baptists_Today_ is independent of the CBF, it regularly reports news
on CBF events and writes from a "moderate" viewpoint.

The address for _Baptists_Today_ is

	Baptists Today
	222 East Lake Drive
	Decatur, GA 30030

	FAX:  (404) 377-0288
	Phone: (404) 377-6822

I couldn't find an address for the CBF in the latest issue, but there was
a phone number for the CBF:  1-800-352-8741.

(Standard disclaimer:  I'm not connected with the paper except as a
 subscriber.  I'm just a semi-liberal former Southern Baptist who likes to
 stay caught up on "news of home".)
_____________________________________________________________________________

                                              Nancy Tinkham
                                              nlt@gboro.glassboro.edu
From: phoenix@cwis.unomaha.edu (Shannon Chris Saltzman)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: Why do you thank God?
Date: 21 Dec 92 00:15:17 GMT
Organization: University of Nebraska at Omaha


 It has been my experience that Christians have a nasty habit of
placing all of destiny on either God or Satans shoulders.
Good=Gods divine hand,and Bad(or just undesirable)=Devils work.
I do not think there is a divine reason for everything. If I sneeze
and it blows all my printouts off the desk I dont think it was because
God wanted me not to read them so he put the spirit of sneeze in my
left nostril!
It is Good to give God credit when it is due(and it IS due a lot), and
it IS Good to be wise to Satans schemes also,but too much is ...well,
too much!
I do not thank God for food because he wnent out and got it with
his credit card( I am the one who payed for it after all!),but I
thank God for his mercies to me. Even air and food are mercies to
a planet that would see him die(and indeed has put him to death)
if it had the chance!! Even I am not above the human weakness for
which he gave his son to die for us. For that,God deserves all the
thanks for any mercy he grants me.

-- 
 MR Shannon Saltzman
 "Is doggie heaven kitty hell?" Stephanie phoenix(age 6)
 "How does teflon stick to a skillet when nothing sticks to teflon?"
 The words of Mike Warnke.