Post by jetmech on May 8, 2019 18:13:28 GMT -5
I can't help but be concerned sometimes by various perspectives and views in the Bible that are contradictory or at least seem to be.
The Bible does say to prove all things, and I would like to pose some questions herein for reflection and discussion.
I've been thinking first about ACTS 15:38 where it says Paul and Barnabas were planning to go to every city and spread the word and Barnabas
wanted to take along John, who's surname was Mark … it says that Paul didn't want to take him with them and in verse 38 it says
" … Paul thought not good to take him with them, and went not with them to the work …" The only thing I wanted to note about this word
"work" used in this context indeed … it sounds like the same "work" the workers and friends refer to.
My main question in this post though concerns ACTS 16:31 where Paul and Silas could have escaped from prison and when the guard returned
found Paul and Silas praying and singing praises to GOD ( I wonder if they were singing hymns), but it goes on in this book to tell how the
Prison guard wanted to kill himself or at least thought about it and Paul told him " … sir, don't harm yourself …" " … we are still here …"
The guard fell down it says and ask Paul and Silas (ACTS 16:30) " … Sirs what must I do to be saved …?" They replied ( Verse 31) " …. believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved, and thy house …" I'm taken aback by the fact that nothing else was said to be required. They said nothing about them repenting,
they did NOT inflict any guilt trips upon them about their past nor what they did "wrong" as children and/or adolescents.
Why then, are the rest of us subjected to "guilt trips" about our past, told we must truly repent and mean it, and why did Jesus say in Matthew 10:33
" … Whoever denies me before others, I will also deny him …" Why are these requirements placed upon us but obviously not on the guard of the Prison
Paul and Silas were in? Isn't that " … favorable treatment …?" The Bible says "GOD IS NO RESPECTOR OF PERSONS" … well, it looks to me like he, in fact,
is … if he allowed that guard to be full, unequivocally, saved merely "if" he BELIEVE IN THE LORD JESUS CHRIST … as it also says is the only requirement in
John 3:16.
Yet, there are places in the Bible that says if we don't repent and accept Jesus Christ we will be judged, our past, how we spent our lives during our "gifted" lifetime; but, that if we DO, in fact, believe in Christ and accept his blood on the cross as a redemption for us, we are saved and we will not face judgement, because GOD will cast it all into the sea of forgetfulness. Yet, then again, it says to run the race because we do not know, for sure, ever that we are saved, so we should run the race to the end, yet it says in Ecc " … the race is not to the swift, the strong, nor the wise …"
Is the KING JAMES VERSION of the BIBLE missing some facts?