Post by gloryintruth on Jul 26, 2007 7:36:23 GMT -5
I had to suppress a chuckle when someone recently tried to question Brad on a biblical basis, asking whether he felt he was promoting peace – that is to say, whether he was following the injunction of Christ to be a peacemaker. The reason I felt a flash of humour was that when I was active on the TMB several months ago, I tried to get Brad to answer a question too. I asked him, “Do you feel that your writings on the TMB reflect the Spirit, doctrine and teachings of the scriptures?” I asked this repeatedly over many weeks and was always unsuccessful in getting any response.
At one stage Brad challenged people on the forum to prove him in error using only the scripture. I responded by saying that the Apostle Peter clearly taught that we should always be ready to give an answer (Greek “apologia” – defence) for the hope that is within us. Despite repeated questions regarding the practical outworking of his faith, Brad refuses to give a coherent answer about the alignment of his practice to his professed beliefs. (On the other hand, Brad believes that I am possessed by demons and actively worship Satan, so it is possible he feels he does not need to respond to an individual he would count as one of the anti-Christs, however, this still stands in contrast to the commandment of Holy Scripture.)
How does one justify a functional hatred for a group of people, whilst concurrently proclaiming a belief in a Being that is the very definition of love? How can one in good conscience celebrate the tender mercy of Christ to a completely undeserving humanity, and yet labour night and day to create as much angst, ill-feeling, alienation and discord between two sectarian groups? How can a man do this and live with the cognitive dissonance? The answer is to make hatred a holy thing, just as communist regimes made persecuting “enemies of the people” a virtue of virtues.
Hence Brad resorts to claiming that he is merely telling the “truth” to those who are lost, and that sometimes the truth can be hurtful. Sometimes telling the truth involves being harsh, involves pointing out uncomfortable facts, indeed, even being bellicose in order for the poor soul to receive life. Using this logic, Brad justifies his “humour” (“Telling the truth through humour! I love it!” – a more or less verbatim quote), justifies calling the friends Nazis and devil worshippers, spawn of Beelzebub etc, and refusing to concede that any of the friends could be genuine Christians.
Seeing how we can twist the truth to justify our own dark motives reminds me why the Bible commands us to always “tell the truth in love” and “do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good”.
However, a pattern of behaviour and belief such as that demonstrated by Brad cannot sustain itself forever. “A house divided cannot stand” we are taught in the Gospel. And likewise, a faith that manifests itself in schizophrenic practices – for example, holding palms to the sky in praise of God on Sunday, and belittling the friends (and some of the exes) through distasteful words and behaviours – will eventually implode. We see this happening even now. A couple of months ago Brad was constantly citing from the Bible (often out of context, but still citing from the Holy Book nonetheless), and making references to Jesus (often as a beating stick for the friends, but still referring to Jesus nonetheless), yet of late it seems these habits have faded, leaving only the murk of hatred and a mechanistic loathing for the institution of the fellowship and the friends.
At one stage Brad challenged people on the forum to prove him in error using only the scripture. I responded by saying that the Apostle Peter clearly taught that we should always be ready to give an answer (Greek “apologia” – defence) for the hope that is within us. Despite repeated questions regarding the practical outworking of his faith, Brad refuses to give a coherent answer about the alignment of his practice to his professed beliefs. (On the other hand, Brad believes that I am possessed by demons and actively worship Satan, so it is possible he feels he does not need to respond to an individual he would count as one of the anti-Christs, however, this still stands in contrast to the commandment of Holy Scripture.)
How does one justify a functional hatred for a group of people, whilst concurrently proclaiming a belief in a Being that is the very definition of love? How can one in good conscience celebrate the tender mercy of Christ to a completely undeserving humanity, and yet labour night and day to create as much angst, ill-feeling, alienation and discord between two sectarian groups? How can a man do this and live with the cognitive dissonance? The answer is to make hatred a holy thing, just as communist regimes made persecuting “enemies of the people” a virtue of virtues.
Hence Brad resorts to claiming that he is merely telling the “truth” to those who are lost, and that sometimes the truth can be hurtful. Sometimes telling the truth involves being harsh, involves pointing out uncomfortable facts, indeed, even being bellicose in order for the poor soul to receive life. Using this logic, Brad justifies his “humour” (“Telling the truth through humour! I love it!” – a more or less verbatim quote), justifies calling the friends Nazis and devil worshippers, spawn of Beelzebub etc, and refusing to concede that any of the friends could be genuine Christians.
Seeing how we can twist the truth to justify our own dark motives reminds me why the Bible commands us to always “tell the truth in love” and “do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good”.
However, a pattern of behaviour and belief such as that demonstrated by Brad cannot sustain itself forever. “A house divided cannot stand” we are taught in the Gospel. And likewise, a faith that manifests itself in schizophrenic practices – for example, holding palms to the sky in praise of God on Sunday, and belittling the friends (and some of the exes) through distasteful words and behaviours – will eventually implode. We see this happening even now. A couple of months ago Brad was constantly citing from the Bible (often out of context, but still citing from the Holy Book nonetheless), and making references to Jesus (often as a beating stick for the friends, but still referring to Jesus nonetheless), yet of late it seems these habits have faded, leaving only the murk of hatred and a mechanistic loathing for the institution of the fellowship and the friends.