HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: NOTJIC@LSUVM.BITNET (Jesse Carnes)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Re: Logic and God
Date: 15 Oct 92 13:09:28 GMT
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              14 Oct 1992 17:38:32 GMT from <nlt@GBORO.GLASSBORO.EDU>

Responding to Nancy's post, God, I assert, DOES speak in propositional
statements.
Did not He who created all things SAY in sentence form :

"Let there be Light"

OR to Pharaoh :

"Thus saith the Lord, 'Let My people Go'."

Looks like sentences to me.
Obviously, He speaks ALL languages and all possible subject-verb variations.
He speaks to us in sentence form in the written Word.
Notice that He did not merely THINK things into existence, but SPOKE them so.
He is a God of communication and is so in propositional form.
It is a part of His inherent nature.
You speak in subject-verb form and your pet cat not so because YOU are made
in God's image and your cat is not.  You get your ability to speak in sentence
form, a priori, from the God of subject-verb communication.


Jesse Carnes
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Date:         Wed, 7 Oct 1992 14:03:11 EDT
From:         Leo W <Leo_W@QM.CIRCA.UFL.EDU>
Subject:      Re>Purgatory, grace, and weeds

Nancy wrote: "I still do eventually want to be made perfect ...  I don't want
to continue to sin throughout eternity.  I want God, at some point, to finish
the work of cleansing within me, to remove from me not only the guilt of sin
but the actual sinful nature itself, so that I will be righteous not only in
name but in fact ... I can only speculate about what the nature of this
cleansing might be."

This reminded me of a verse:

"We were made like the man of earth.  So we will also be made like the man of
heaven ... those who have died will be raised to live forever.  And we will all
be changed ... Death's power to hurt is sin.  The power of sin is the law.  But
we thank God!  He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1
Corinthians 15:49-57).

Reading Paul's doctrines concerning Adam & Christ and resurrection (Romans & 1
Cor.), it seems to me that our inherited sinful nature rots in the grave and
the only nature that is raised from the dead is our new nature in a new
spiritual body, the Spirit of Christ within us.  The purging we would
experience is the burning up of our dead works at our judgment which,
hopefully, would leave behind a big pile of gold and silver works for our Lord
(1 Cor. 3:10-17).

Yours in Christ Jesus,
Leo
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
From: jmrg9881@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Jon Reid)
Subject: Cell Group Churches -- Intro
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 20:35:10 GMT

My church (Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Champaign) is in the process of a
_fundamental_ change from being a church _with_ small groups to being a _small
group church_.  It's a total change to a new paradigm, a new understanding of
what "church" is.  Our goal is to establish 2000 small groups of roughly 10
people each by the year 2000.

Actually, the cell group church is not really a new idea... except in the U.S.
I'm sure most of you know that Dr. Cho's church in Seoul is the largest in the
world... did you know that it is a cell-based church?

The book _Where Do We Go From Here?_ (subtitled "A Guidebook for the Cell
Group Church") by Ralph Neighbor is excellent, life-changing reading.  It's
changed my life, and it's turned our church upside down.  Highly recommended!

-- 
Jon Reid    j-reid@uiuc.edu    GEnie: THE.REIDS
"He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose."
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
From: garrison@eecs.nwu.edu (Renetta Garrison)
Subject: Re:      Political Correctness
Organization: EECS Department, Northwestern University
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 20:28:39 GMT

Hello!

I am new to the network and agree with Ian that Christia expresses the
love and knowledge of Christ.  Disagreements in doctrine are fine as long
as we all KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt that we will be with the Lord
to receive our rewards in heaven.

Peace be unto you!

Renetta  :)
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Date:         Thu, 8 Oct 1992 07:19:01 CDT
From:         Jesse Carnes <NOTJIC@LSUVM.BITNET>
Subject:      Re: Security of salvation?

Dear Stephen ;

Would you indeed LIKE to lose your Salvation?
Is that want you desire??

Look, just do this  ... Tell me in context, what Jesus is saying in John
6:38-40 and from John 10 when He says that they shall NEVER die.

What do His words mean in context?
you are at liberty to exegete these if you wish.




Jesse Carnes
From: FACN34B@SAUPM00.BITNET (zane of dhahran)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Day of Atonement
Date: 8 Oct 92 16:26:22 GMT
Organization: King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, S.A.
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Lon,

    Thanks for the information on the Day of Atonement.  I hope you find the
time to do the same with Succot coming up.  Thanks again,

                                            Peace, zane.
From: GRAHAM%DRCV06.decnet@DRCVAX.AF.MIL (DRCV06::GRAHAM)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Teachings of Jesus.
Date: 15 Oct 92 16:25:00 GMT
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Michael,

Again, you have said something very valuable in your observations that man
made organizations get in the way of the man-God relationship.  Indeed, it
is this very tendancy of humans to form hierarchical organizations that has
caused so much damage to the gospel for the past 2,000 years.

I am very concerned, ho wever about your aversion to the teachings of Jesus
as expressed in the New Testament gospels.  You mention an external source
of these teachings, obviously a book since it has an ISBN number.  Please
give it's title, if not publically, to me pirvately.  My main concern is,
though, what makes it any better than the Bible?  If the first generation
followers of Jesus failed to accurately communicate the gospel, how could
anyone else do this?  The very fact that your source is a book means that
humans have had a hand in its production, how do you know they didn't
corrupt it?

Unfortunately, if you do not accept the Bible as god's word to us, there is
no way to discuss most of your points.  I aver you are wrong in denying the
sacrifical nature of Jesus' death, but we cannot discuss it because you do
not accept the gospel that is taught by the apostles.  Even the Biblical
gospels are written by first generation followers.  If they are not to be
trusted, then I'm sadly misled in my beliefs.

Please discuss more fully your external source of the true teachings of
Jesus.  I must accept the New Testament as exactly what God wants me to
have and learn.  If you reject this, we have a serious communication
problem.

However, let us continue to communicate, for as Jesse points out, we do
serve a God of communication.

Dan Graham
From: gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk (G.J. McCaughan)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Re: Security of Salvation?
Date: 16 Oct 92 17:02:08 GMT
Organization: U of Cambridge, England

In article <CHRISTIA%92101406333937@ASUACAD.BITNET> NOTJIC@LSUVM.BITNET (Jesse Carnes) writes:

>All TRUTH are also facts.  But, all facts are NOT truth.
>
>Truth, as I define it are Biblical propositions.
>Facts are extra-Biblical events and things.
>I never said that facts are inferior to Truth.  But, they are are different.
>There is some overlapping of the two, for a biblical statement like "He was
>raised for our justification" is TRUTH.  It is also a fact that it happened.
>"Today is October 14, 1992" is a fact, but is NOT Truth, for it is not a
>Biblical proposition (i.e., statement involving subject and predicate).

I see.

I'm afraid your definition of "truth" is nothing like any I've ever seen
before; you should use a different word, or else preface every posting
that mentions truth with a warning to the effect that nothing counts as
"truth" unless it's found in the Bible.

The main problem with using terminology like this is that it makes it very
easy to make really serious logical errors. For instance, everyone knows
that a proposition must be either true or false, and cannot be both (this
is subject to some boring and irrelevant qualification concerning things
like "This proposition is false"); but if you define "truth" so that nothing
is "truth" unless it's in the Bible, it is not the case that everything is
either truth or falsehood. (For example: "pi is greater than 3.14159".) And
you have to decide whether you want the adjective "true" to apply to all
statements of fact (in which case it clashes dreadfully with your use of
the word "truth") or only to "truth" (in which case you need to find another
word to mean what everyone else means by "true").

Furthermore, it must be very awkward for you to have to do a mental translation
every time someone else refers to "truth", since they mean something totally
different by it. (I hope you *do* do such a translation; if not, you are sure
to misunderstand everything anyone else says on the subject!)

-- 
Gareth McCaughan     Dept. of Pure Mathematics & Mathematical Statistics,
gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk  Cambridge University, England.    [Research student]
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Fri, 16 Oct 1992 09:51:00 EST
From:         "DRCV06::GRAHAM" <GRAHAM%DRCV06.decnet@DRCVAX.AF.MIL>
Subject:      Cell group churches - my experience.

One day, a couple of gentlemen came to our door and invited us to a
neighborhood Bible study.  We like Bible study, so we accepted.  For about
a year and a half, I went to this group study.  It turned out that it was a
cell group of the Boston Church of Christ.

Now, I have a significant disagreement with nearly everything this church
does and teaches, but I also got a real education in the cell group concept
and idea, and I cannot say I liked what I saw.

First of all, this is the ultimate in hierarchical organizations.  Levels
upon levels and administration upon administration so interfere with the
gospel that it is a wonder the church ever grew at all.  Group leaders,
section leaders, zone pastors, area pastors and finally, some senior
adminstative cadre at the top were all so hung up in maintaining the
organization that the gospel was lost sight of.

I cannot say that what I'm about to mention would be true of other churches
than the BCC, but their control and hold on the individual members was
heinous.

The church insisted that it be the one and only social outlet for its
members through the small groups.  The small group leaders were told to
"inform" on their members, telling the upward levels of administration many
details, often extremely personal ones, about their group members.  Members
were expected to adhere to many rules and regulations that were not related
to the gospel in any way.  My experience was that of a cult of the first
order.

Now, I'm not waying that all cell group churches would deteriorate to this,
but I think it is a dangerous system that encourages much abuse and
demagoguery on the part of the administrators on the various levels.

I fully understand and admire the desire to evangelize and spread the
gospel.  I just think this is not the best way.

Dan Graham
From: CCCAMPER@MIZZOU1.BITNET
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: (no subject given)
Date: 13 Oct 92 19:05:39 GMT
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Comments:     Resent-From: CCCAMPER@MIZZOU1
Comments:     Originally-From: bradk%isdgsm@rtsg.mot.com (Brad Kaiser)

>> This difficulty helped to impede the
>> spread of her message to all mankind. A great war was to begin in the
>> reign of Pius XI. While some maintain that WWII didn't begin until
>> Pius XII, the assasination of the archduke in Yugoslavia that helped
>> trigger WWII did take place during the while Pius XI was pope.

>WWII was not triggered by an assassination of an archduke in
>Yugoslavia; that was WWI (the archduke was Franz Ferdinand, murdered
>by Serbian terrorists in Sarajevo in July [late June?] 1914).

>Most historians point to Hitler's invasion of Poland (1 September
>1939) as the formal beginning of WWII.  I believe that Pius XI died
>the preceding summer or late spring.

>However, the world was in a state of aggressive war almost
>continuously from 1931 (the Japanese invasion of Manchuria) until the
>surrender of Japan in September, 1945.  This includes: the Italian
>invasion of Ethiopia (1935-6), the Spanish Civil War (1935-7,
>approximately), the forced incorporation (or Anschluss) of Austria
>into the German Reich (1938), the rape of Czechoslovakia by Hitler
>1938-9), and the ongoing Japanese war of aggression against China
>1931 onward).

>So, it's fairly debatable when WWII actually began.  Certainly, a
>plausible historical case can be made that WWII (though not the West's
>direct military involvement in it) began during the reign of Pius XI.

Thanks Brad, what a mistake, too many notes and too little time.

In Christ,
Elizabeth
From: NOTJIC@LSUVM.BITNET (Jesse Carnes)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Re: New nature vs. two natures.
Date: 13 Oct 92 14:59:31 GMT
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU
              13 Oct 1992 07:44:58 -0700 from <DRAKE@ASUCHM.LA.ASU.EDU>

Replying to Mark Drake's post, let me say that I am not referring to 2
natures : one of our physical bodies and one of our spirits.
Now, these 2 catagories are what makes a human being HUMAN.
But Paul the Apostle is contrasting 2 natures in the book of Romans ...
especially in chapters 6 and 8.
These 2 natures or STATES of being are

1) The unregenerate sinful SPIRITUAL state of the lost man

AND

2) The regenerate SPIRITUAL state of the saved man


These 2 states of being have to do with the spirit of a man ... not his body.
Now, chapter 7 seems to indicate that it is in the unredeemed body of a person
where the warefare of sin versus Obedience to God is located.

For the Christian, if our bodies were redeemed when we are saved, our bodies
would offer no access to the enemy.  Now, I also admit it seems that it is the
mind where the devil attempts to persuade Christians of his lies, but Paul
refers rather to the human members more expressly.
Our bodies are not evil, but they remain unredeemed nonetheless until which
time the Lord will give us immortality when these bodies will be covered over
with such and will be transformed.



Jesse Carnes
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Organization: Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Tue, 13 Oct 1992 13:38:36 BST
From:         "Jonathan Wheeler" <JFW1@IBM-B.RUTHERFORD.AC.UK>
Subject:      Re: Prayer request

Thanks to all of you for your prayers.

Jesse, I live in a town called Abingdon which is about 5 miles south of Oxford.
RAL (Rutherford Appleton Laboratory) is about 10 miles further south.

Yours sincerely

Jonathan Wheeler
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
From: creps@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Steve Creps)
Subject: Re:      "Christianity that is free from error."
Organization: Indiana University
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 17:41:06 GMT


   Dave Talaga,

   I don't agree with everything you said in this post, but you do
make some good points.  Much of it is the same criticism I've had for
other Catholics who do not take their Faith seriously enough, who are
totally ignorant of what the Catholic Church actually teaches, or just
plain reject her teachings while claiming to be Catholic.

   Sometimes blind obedience can be a problem when people forget _why_
something is done or believed.  But the other extreme in my opinion
can be even worse; that is, the arrogance of believing one is able to
know spiritual truths on one's own, or that one "knows better" than
those whom God has appointed over one.  The latter can lead only to
widespread error, as is evidenced both outside the Catholic Church and
among many of those who claim to be Catholics.

   By the way, my description of Catholicicsm as "Christianity that is
free from error" is correct from the Catholic standpoint, and not
meant to be inflammatory.  That belief is that God has revealed and
entrusted to the Church absolute truths.  As I've mentioned before,
the Catholic Church measures other churches or ecclesial communities
by how close their beliefs are to those of the Catholic Church.  The
closer they are, the less error they contain, since the authentic
teachings of the Catholic Church are considered to contain no error
(so anything that contradicts these teachings must be error).  This is
not arrogant if one accepts that her authority does in fact come from
God, as we believe.

-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Steve Creps, Indiana University
creps@silver.ucs.indiana.edu
From: slingo@CASBAH.ACNS.NWU.EDU ((Carol Slingo))
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: prayer request
Date: 16 Oct 92 16:56:53 GMT
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Please pray for my father who is 89 years old.  He has been having problems
with medicine.  The family feels that he should see another doctor.  He may
be coming to that conclusion himself.  Please pray that he gets the right
help now when he needs it.  He has been healthy most of his life (and busy
too--he has a lifetime award from his church which meant a lot to him) but
most of his friends and almost all of his brothers and cousins are gone.
Since my mother died he has been very lonely.

His name is Erwin Campbell.

Thank you,

In Christ, Carol Slingo
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Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Date:         Tue, 13 Oct 1992 11:29:23 BST
From:         "Jonathan Wheeler" <JFW1@IBM-B.RUTHERFORD.AC.UK>
Subject:      Prayer request

Please can I request prayer for my brother-in-law (Mike) and his wife (Elaine).
Yesterday they lost the baby that they were expecting to be born next month.
I understand that it had died in the womb and the birth had to be induced
last night.  Women who have had children will understand better than I the
anguish that this must have caused Elaine in particular.  They are believers
and already have two children (Hannah and James).

Yours sincerely

Jonathan Wheeler
From: A16905@ITESO.BITNET
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Re: Death of Jesus! Entirely voluntary?
Date: 16 Oct 92 16:40:04 GMT
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Ian,

Jesus didn't want to die ! Sure !  What He wanted is to do God's will, if
that means dieing, so be it, I guess that is the spirit of His prayer at
the Garden.

More even, He said (Jn ?:?) that He will give His Life, His Life was not
to be taken by anyone, well, He decided to do God's will and He gave His
Life.

Before He died, the gospels say, He shouted, A crucified man doesn't shout !
a crucified man is dieing beacuse he can't breath, obviously can't shout,
that shout was a shout of victory and to show that He was giving His Life
and it was not taken form Him.


Shalom,
Memo.
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
From: timk@world.std.com (Tim King)
Subject: Re: Cell group churches - my experience.
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 19:22:01 GMT

"DRCV06::GRAHAM" <GRAHAM%DRCV06.decnet@DRCVAX.AF.MIL> writes:

>One day, a couple of gentlemen came to our door and invited us to a
>neighborhood Bible study.  We like Bible study, so we accepted.  For about
>a year and a half, I went to this group study.  It turned out that it was a
>cell group of the Boston Church of Christ.

[ . . . ]

>First of all, this is the ultimate in hierarchical organizations.  Levels
>upon levels and administration upon administration so interfere with the
>gospel that it is a wonder the church ever grew at all.


I didn't know you were in the Boston area, Dan!  Wow, what a small world!
I live in Dedham.

I think that Jon Reid wrote an excellent post on this subject.  My church
sponsors mid-week home bible studies.  Maybe I'll be able to write an
article on my church (including scriptures!) in the future.

Also, I strongly disagree with the BCC's philosophy and structure.  They are
very authoritarian, and have even been placed in the category of a social
cult by some.  CRI has some good information on them.

I also recommend the following books:

_ Combatting Cult Mind Control _, Steven Hassan.

_ The Discipling Dillemma _, (sorry, I don't remember the editor's name).

_ Churches That Abuse _, Enroth.

These will help to answer the question posed above:  Why do such groups
succeed.  They will also address the problems with their structure, as
well as how to identify abusive and mind-control groups.  Finally, they
suggest alternative methods of relating to people in such groups.

Hope this helps,
-TimK
-- 
Tim King              <>  |  "It is an old maxim of mine that when you have
24 Myrtle Street       |  |  excluded the impossible, whatever remains,
Dedham, MA 02026     < |  |  however improbable, must be the truth."
timk@world.std.com    \|  |           (Sherlock Holmes, The Beryl Coronet)
From: HUTTER@rzmain.rz.uni-ulm.de (Wolfgang Hutter)
Subject: Another baby (was Re: HOWDY)
Organization: University of Ulm, Germany
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 08:04:25 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.24

In <CHRISTIA%92100907443199@ASUACAD.BITNET> PAIGE writes:

> Wouldn't it be nice if it was like that all the time!! Maybe someone else should
> oops! have a baby! NO, I am not volunteering (sp?)

While I was reading all the congratulations and prayer promises to Ian,
I was wondering if... But now that someone asks for it: well, O.K. I
volunteer! And our baby will (hopefully) be born first :-) i.e. by the
beginning of March next year (that's autumm down under, isn't it?).

Wolfgang <><

P.S. Our first BITNET link has not been connected for almost a week, so
I am neither getting BITNET mails in, nor out, nor am I receiving the
CHRISTIA mail the usual way. So I am running behind on NEWS (usenet?).
So if any of you want to reach me privately, please try my internet
address!


<><--------<><---------<><--------<><---------<><--------<><---------<><
 Wolfgang Hutter       I  Internet: hutter@rzmain.rz.uni-ulm.de
 Abt. Chem. Physik     I  Bitnet:   hutter@dulruu51.bitnet
 Universitaet Ulm      I  X.400:    S=hutter;OU=RZ;P=uni-ulm;A=dbp;C=de
 W-7900 Ulm, Germany   I  Tel.:     (49)731-502-2829
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From: iwilliam@AU.ORACLE.COM (Ian Williams)
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.christia
Subject: Re: Security of salvation?
Date: 15 Oct 92 21:51:42 GMT
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              92 3:30 pm

I would like to ask Stephen as to how the Calvanists deal with the
scripture that says that many people who call the Lord 'Lord' are not
part of the elect... Where they 'assured' of their salvation? I am
sure that at least some of them would have 'thought' they were saved?

This is not an attack, just an honest question...


---------------------+-------------+-----------------------------------------
Ian Williams         |    _--_|\   |      Internet: iwilliam@au.oracle.com
Oracle Systems       |   /      \  |	  Phone	  : +61 8 239 3900
Adelaide, Australia  |   \_.--*_/  |
                     |         v   |