Scooter B
New member
Jeap,
I apologize for the impressions you got from my post but I honeslty don't understand where your impressions are coming from. What you have accused me of and what I have tried to communicate are not anywhere close. I am truly sorry if you have been offended because you thought I looked down on you or whatever.
Communicating with out being able to see facial expressions and tone of voice is very difficult.
It seemed to me that you came in on the attack of Christian music and stated that the Bible was "little more that fairy tales". You of course are welcome to your opinion but you can't expect to come into a thread specifically addressing Christain songwriting and attack everything we believe, attack Christianity and call yourself a Chrisitian without causing some confusion. I am not saying you are or are not a Christian (only you and God know). You have no idea if I am either other than I claim to be. I honestly can't tell from your post if you consider yourself a Christian or not...
Your definition of "Presbyterian" with the prodigal son thing is nothing I have heard before perhaps they teach that in the Catholic Church but that is not the meaning that is assigned to it where I come from. I'm not saying it is right or wrong but it is news to me. I have never been in the Catholic Church so there is a whole world of other terms ther I am not familiar with.
I do not consider myself righteous in any way except by the grace of God He offers a relationship with us as if we were righteous. I have not earned anything so I can be proud of nothing.
Perhaps you could be more specific in your intentions and I will be more specific with mine.
I had hoped to discuss the issues of songwriting and the creative process as a Christain and find fellowship here with other Christians. I did not come here to debate the accuracy of the Bible or how bad churches are. Fed and I have discussed this via private e-mails and I explained to him that I did not want to be resposible for taking the thread too far off the subject. I did not accuse anyone esle of doing so.
That being said I will defend my beliefs and debate passionately and logically when they are challenged. I would expect you to do the same. After a period of time my honest impression was that you were more interested in stirring up a reaction than an honest discussion. What do you mean "you were lucky to get out of there alive"? I don't think you are being literal but I don't understand what you are implying.
It was my impression that the common rules on these boards were to loosely stay within the topic of a thread or start a new one and keep them in their designated places. I am not the moderator here. I simply wanted to check in with the other participants because our personal discussion seemed to have stopped others from participating and from discussing the original purpose of the thread. My impression now is that everyone has been reading along and enjoyed the discussion so far.
If you can specifically explain where you felt I belittled you I will try to restate my comments in a better way.
I do believe 100% in the accuracy of the Bible. It is my reference point for truth, it defines Christianity for me. It defines God and His will for mankind. It defines sound doctrine and tells us to study it to prevent false doctrines from creeping in and decieving us. If you or anyone states something on this thread that to me contradicts the Bible I will call them on it. I want and expect them to correct me if I do the same. If we have a disagreement on the interpretation of the Bible then we can agree to disagree and move on.
God gave all of us free choice and contrary to what you might believe; I have no interest in pushing anyone in any direction against their will or by using guilt. That defeats God's plan and purpose for everyones life.
While I am in no way anywhere close to being without fault; the description you have made of me and the description of me from people that know me are not of the same man.
To judge a man is very different from looking at the Bible and judging wether an activity is consistant with God's Biblically expressed will for our lives. Paul chastised Peter for falling into peer pressure when the converted jews told the gentiles they needed to be circumcised to be saved. What Peter went along with was not what Jesus had taught but was the teaching of men.
Did Paul judge Peter? No.
Did Paul point out that Peters actions were inconsistant with Christ's teaching? Yes.
Did Peter get all offended? I don't know..I don't think the Bible says what Peters first reaction was but he did realize he was wrong and changed.
Jeap,
Please explain to me where I judged you. I only pointed out that you saying "Jesus said it is allright not to be involved in church" is inconsistant with what the Bible says.
If I caught a friend stealing something to feed his family I would advise him that there is a better way to provide for his family and that stealing is against the law and I don't want him to go to prison.
Would you define my intervention as judging him?
My definition of judging someone from the biblical perspective is to devalue their worth, condemn them, appraise them as worthy of condemnation.
My example is the woman caught in adultry that they brought to Jesus to be stoned.
Jesus said to let whoever was without sin cast the first stone. Obviously no one was worthy to judge her to end her life. (I wrote song about that one that is very close to my heart.)
Jesus did not say they were wrong to notice what she did was sin and to define it as such as prescribed in the law of the time.
On the contrary Paul sets out the proper way to approach a brother living in sin within your local church. This is my paraphrased version.
Step One: You go to him in private, out of love, ask him to repent and offer your prayer and support.
Step Two: If they repent - rejoice and embrace them. If they refuse; take another brother with you and again ask them to repent.
Step Three: If they still refuse, bring him before the elders and the church and again discuss their ongoing actions that specifically go against the scripture and if they still will not change their activity you must disfellowship them. I would never want to do that myself. I don't want that job! There may come a time when I will have to but I hope not.
That is not judging the person but judging their actions or words without bias according to the Word of God.
I specifically pointed out some of your words were inconsistant with the Bible.
I did not judge you, your heart, your intentions, your intelligence or your value or belittle you in anyway or falsely accuse you as you have done me.
You implied in a condensending way that I did not really want to go to church but since I had to go I wanted to make everyone else go. I replied to clear up the misunderstanding you seemed to have about my motives - not to define who should or should not go. Infact I said if you don't want to go then I don't want you to go either. I am not intersted in pushing anyone anywhere they don't want to go.
I addressed you as my friend out of respect that regardless of you beliefs and wether or not I agree with you I can still be your friend. I can still respect you and wish the best for you.
I honestly don't see where you found offense in that.
If you are sincere (I am not being sarcastic here) then lets take it down a notch and discuss it more clearly if you like and since everyone else does not seem to mind.
I also welcome George, Fed any any other Christians to help see any "logs or specks" in my eye that I am not seeing.
Did anyone else here interpret my posts the way Jeap has interpreted them?
I apologize for the impressions you got from my post but I honeslty don't understand where your impressions are coming from. What you have accused me of and what I have tried to communicate are not anywhere close. I am truly sorry if you have been offended because you thought I looked down on you or whatever.
Communicating with out being able to see facial expressions and tone of voice is very difficult.
It seemed to me that you came in on the attack of Christian music and stated that the Bible was "little more that fairy tales". You of course are welcome to your opinion but you can't expect to come into a thread specifically addressing Christain songwriting and attack everything we believe, attack Christianity and call yourself a Chrisitian without causing some confusion. I am not saying you are or are not a Christian (only you and God know). You have no idea if I am either other than I claim to be. I honestly can't tell from your post if you consider yourself a Christian or not...
Your definition of "Presbyterian" with the prodigal son thing is nothing I have heard before perhaps they teach that in the Catholic Church but that is not the meaning that is assigned to it where I come from. I'm not saying it is right or wrong but it is news to me. I have never been in the Catholic Church so there is a whole world of other terms ther I am not familiar with.
I do not consider myself righteous in any way except by the grace of God He offers a relationship with us as if we were righteous. I have not earned anything so I can be proud of nothing.
Perhaps you could be more specific in your intentions and I will be more specific with mine.
I had hoped to discuss the issues of songwriting and the creative process as a Christain and find fellowship here with other Christians. I did not come here to debate the accuracy of the Bible or how bad churches are. Fed and I have discussed this via private e-mails and I explained to him that I did not want to be resposible for taking the thread too far off the subject. I did not accuse anyone esle of doing so.
That being said I will defend my beliefs and debate passionately and logically when they are challenged. I would expect you to do the same. After a period of time my honest impression was that you were more interested in stirring up a reaction than an honest discussion. What do you mean "you were lucky to get out of there alive"? I don't think you are being literal but I don't understand what you are implying.
It was my impression that the common rules on these boards were to loosely stay within the topic of a thread or start a new one and keep them in their designated places. I am not the moderator here. I simply wanted to check in with the other participants because our personal discussion seemed to have stopped others from participating and from discussing the original purpose of the thread. My impression now is that everyone has been reading along and enjoyed the discussion so far.
If you can specifically explain where you felt I belittled you I will try to restate my comments in a better way.
I do believe 100% in the accuracy of the Bible. It is my reference point for truth, it defines Christianity for me. It defines God and His will for mankind. It defines sound doctrine and tells us to study it to prevent false doctrines from creeping in and decieving us. If you or anyone states something on this thread that to me contradicts the Bible I will call them on it. I want and expect them to correct me if I do the same. If we have a disagreement on the interpretation of the Bible then we can agree to disagree and move on.
God gave all of us free choice and contrary to what you might believe; I have no interest in pushing anyone in any direction against their will or by using guilt. That defeats God's plan and purpose for everyones life.
While I am in no way anywhere close to being without fault; the description you have made of me and the description of me from people that know me are not of the same man.
To judge a man is very different from looking at the Bible and judging wether an activity is consistant with God's Biblically expressed will for our lives. Paul chastised Peter for falling into peer pressure when the converted jews told the gentiles they needed to be circumcised to be saved. What Peter went along with was not what Jesus had taught but was the teaching of men.
Did Paul judge Peter? No.
Did Paul point out that Peters actions were inconsistant with Christ's teaching? Yes.
Did Peter get all offended? I don't know..I don't think the Bible says what Peters first reaction was but he did realize he was wrong and changed.
Jeap,
Please explain to me where I judged you. I only pointed out that you saying "Jesus said it is allright not to be involved in church" is inconsistant with what the Bible says.
If I caught a friend stealing something to feed his family I would advise him that there is a better way to provide for his family and that stealing is against the law and I don't want him to go to prison.
Would you define my intervention as judging him?
My definition of judging someone from the biblical perspective is to devalue their worth, condemn them, appraise them as worthy of condemnation.
My example is the woman caught in adultry that they brought to Jesus to be stoned.
Jesus said to let whoever was without sin cast the first stone. Obviously no one was worthy to judge her to end her life. (I wrote song about that one that is very close to my heart.)
Jesus did not say they were wrong to notice what she did was sin and to define it as such as prescribed in the law of the time.
On the contrary Paul sets out the proper way to approach a brother living in sin within your local church. This is my paraphrased version.
Step One: You go to him in private, out of love, ask him to repent and offer your prayer and support.
Step Two: If they repent - rejoice and embrace them. If they refuse; take another brother with you and again ask them to repent.
Step Three: If they still refuse, bring him before the elders and the church and again discuss their ongoing actions that specifically go against the scripture and if they still will not change their activity you must disfellowship them. I would never want to do that myself. I don't want that job! There may come a time when I will have to but I hope not.
That is not judging the person but judging their actions or words without bias according to the Word of God.
I specifically pointed out some of your words were inconsistant with the Bible.
I did not judge you, your heart, your intentions, your intelligence or your value or belittle you in anyway or falsely accuse you as you have done me.
You implied in a condensending way that I did not really want to go to church but since I had to go I wanted to make everyone else go. I replied to clear up the misunderstanding you seemed to have about my motives - not to define who should or should not go. Infact I said if you don't want to go then I don't want you to go either. I am not intersted in pushing anyone anywhere they don't want to go.
I addressed you as my friend out of respect that regardless of you beliefs and wether or not I agree with you I can still be your friend. I can still respect you and wish the best for you.
I honestly don't see where you found offense in that.
If you are sincere (I am not being sarcastic here) then lets take it down a notch and discuss it more clearly if you like and since everyone else does not seem to mind.
I also welcome George, Fed any any other Christians to help see any "logs or specks" in my eye that I am not seeing.
Did anyone else here interpret my posts the way Jeap has interpreted them?
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... he meerely addressed your posts and I have to admit that his interpretation of your words was the same as mine... 
) 