You know, I think it probably IS fair to say I'm more of a "works based" person, though most definitely not in the legalistic sense of the phrase. :love: Do you remember that quote from C.S.Lewis's The Last Battle in which Aslan tells the young Calmorean that "... if any man swear by Tash and keep his oath for the oath's sake, it is by me that he as truly sworn, though he know it not, and it is I who reward him." Basically, as far as I'm concerned, any good deed is done to the glory of God. No man comes to God except through Jesus, but not all men who walk that path realize they're walking it. Having been raised in academia and hearing all the arguments on one side and other, I choose to be practical. I don't like fighting. I don't know if I'm right or wrong. I don't know if YOU are right or wrong. All I know is I'm going to do the best I can, right here and now. See? This is me, hanging with the Virtuous Pagans ----->
Guess it is my turn to nit-pick 2 Corinthians 5 says that we are made righteousness. The new creation isn't the old creation with a declaration of newness, but a brand new creation - "the old has gone and the new has come".
I think I get where you are coming from. I used to have a works-based viewpoint although I was more legalistic in nature I don't believe the path to God is one of works whether legalistic or not. Good deeds are good no matter who you are. There are amazing people who do great deeds in all religions. There are amazing people who do great deeds that don't believe in God at all. To me it comes down to the Christian teaching that there is only One who is good - God. This is why Christianity is unique. It isn't a works-based way to God. It is acceptance by faith and in that you receive a gift of Jesus' righteousness. It isn't about the good I do and what I can achieve, but what He has achieved for me.
Now I face a dilemma: Do I wish to take this thread down another side street by responding to your comment, or should I just shut up and stop distracting from the point of the thread? I'll do the latter - and wait for a more appropriate time/place.
This is interpretation. It's plain and clear if you approach if from a certain perspective. This ties in to Embassy referring me to Romans about men being born sinners. From another perspective the first Genesis story is a liturgy (the days) and the second (the garden) comes from the oral tradition of the ancient Hebrews. For those of us who come from certain backgrounds and traditions that's "plain and clear" from the reading. What's actually in scripture are two stories that DO differ in chronology. What we're discussing now is our respective interpretations of that difference in chronology. The idea that's there's a plain and clear reading possible that would offer one uniform explanation seems to me to be disproved by the very discussion we're having right now. We are not uninformed people who've barely cracked a Bible yet we've all managed to come to different conclusions. The same with the idea of men being born sinners. Embassy referred me to Romans and yet I know of arguments against the idea that we're born sinners that draw heavily on Romans to disprove the idea. Why? Because Embassy and I are discussing interpretation. The words themselves say simply what they say, what you can put between two quotation marks. What we draw from that is up to us and our faith and relationship with God. Judaism is MUCH better at drawing this distinction then Christianity I think. Maybe it's because we're still fairly young?
I say I'm a letter-of-James kind of gal. I find sometimes that poor James gets forgotten in the whole discussion.
But he doesn't suggest that our works are necessary. Our works are the evidence of faith to those watching us. I really am going to sit on my hands now!
Forgive me for not knowing, but is that your blog that you are linking us to? I can't find any information about the author. I was curious what it is I was looking at.
I'm going to reread James...I might end up agreeing with you so don't worry about sitting on your hands.
I hope you didn't think I was being critical. I was just trying to figure out more about it. I'm one of those people who needs to understand the source. (It's a side effect of having a history degree!)
Oh goodness - I didn't think that at all. Actually, until recently, I've been hesitant to post links to my blog because I don't want to come across the wrong way. In some recent examples, though, it saved me a lot of typing.
Which doesn't at all dispute what I said. Hebrew oral stories are not always chronological. I learned that from a rabbi. Matter of fact, I even used the comparison of me recounting events to my husband. It's the same thing. If anything, you're supporting my point: the stories do not discredit each other. They serve two different purposes and therefore share the account two different ways.
Then we're in agreement....I think? I'd say that I mine gather from my reading that they're not literal accounts but I'd also say that not being literal accounts doesn't mean they're discredited; regardless, I think I'm learning that we can have a lot in common regarding scripture. I think it would be really interesting to sit down with people with very different views of the Bible and find out where those commonalities lie. I mean, we often go on about our differences all the time but where could we see similarities? I think it would be helpful, for me at least, in appreciating other views that I might not accept.
Works or faith? Hmmm..... One thing I learned in high school is that this is a lot like a pepperoni pizza. My Youth Leader would buy pizza at a place that would put the pepperoni UNDER the cheese, so when you looked at it, the pepperoni might not be evident. But, as the pepperoni cooked, it would result in a thin layer of grease on top of the cheese, which he claimed made the pizza taste really good. The grease was a RESULT OF the pepperoni. If there wasn't any grease, you better be digging under the cheese to see if any pepperoni was present. In the same way, works doesn't cause our faith, but faith causes works. We are saved by FAITH, not by works (Eph. 2:8). But at the same time, according to James, faith without works is dead. If there are no works, you better be digging deep to see if the faith really is there.
In modern western world when culture is slowly but surely climes down ( well, maybe not as slowly..); there are suppose to be places of sanity and purity, and decency, the columns and support of world true treasures. And libraries are those places to my opinion. I am very tolerable when it comes to gay movement, but I don't believe this suppose to be supported in the local library. So I totally understand your frustration. When it comes to books of all of a kind - a good library must have books about any type of information, JMO
