Letters From Down the Road

In whatever way God intended when He gave it as one of the gifts of the Spirit, clearly listed in the Bible we ostensibly believe.

And, following your paradigm, if Doug’s preaching agrees with the Word of God, in what sense is it preaching?

The prophecy outlined in 1 Cor does not contain a predictive element, although from other places in the NT you cannot absolutely rule this out.

I see it as a word of edification or consolation for a particular group or person on a particular date. It may also reveal specific sin in the congregation. This accounts for prophecies not being recorded in the bible.

It needs testing, since we are all capable of making mistakes or adding a paragraph of our own ideas.

Unlike teaching it is something women may be gifted with, since all may prophesy!

Some women are gifted teachers…don’t put people into your pathetic box. I feel bad for your spouse…and your mum…and any women in your life.

I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. This is not difficult to understand, and my wife and both daughters are happy with it. And no, I haven’t forced them into accepting this, they have thought about it for themselves. Whenever this instruction is set aside it always leads to the very thing it is designed to prevent, namely deception. I have never been in a such a church that… Read more »

11 Nevertheless neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man, in the Lord.

12 For as the woman is of the man, even so is the man also by the woman; but all things of God. 1 Corinthians 11:11-12

28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:28

I can do it, too.

I have already alluded to the interdepence of man and woman. Did you miss it? Galatians 3 : 28 does not say what egalitarians want it to say. As regards justification all distinctions are removed, creating unity. As far as role is concerned they are not removed. The Jews still have a part in the purposes of God that gentiles never can, the employer/employee distinction is maintained. and an employee with a Christian boss cannot claim equality with that boss, and of course no male or female does not change the bible’s distinctions of role where it defines them. It… Read more »

Ah, I see…more qualifiers to nail down your position…

What is your objection to my take on Gal 3 : 28?

“ It may also reveal specific sin in the congregation. This accounts for prophecies not being recorded in the bible.”

Why is that a reason for prophecy not being recorded? Most prophecy recorded in the Bible specifically DOES call to account specific sins—the Old Testament prophets, and even the ministry of the prophet greater than Moses.

There were prophecies that pointed to Timothy that would have been for him only, and not needed to be recorded as scripture. The need to judge prophecy and our limitations of faith and knowledge indicate its imperfect nature when being exercised in a local church. There is no such limitation on scripture. It is a profound mistake to put 1 Cor 14 prophecy on a par with scripture. If it is a ‘now’ word for a specific congregation of person then it would not be needed as scrpture either. In fact I suspect it was intended to bring immediate consolation… Read more »

All details of scripture can’t be proven as true…is the story of job real? What about Jonah being swallowed by and surviving in a fish? For three days? Seems like some sort of metaphorical component. Was it hyperbole or reality that god had armies destroy all men, women, children and beasts? Read into the Jewish tradition of story telling and get back to me…

Thanks for providing us yet another example of your Bible denialism.

Do you follow Christ yourself, Mr. FP? It would be easy for you just to give an answer yes or no for once. I am completely unclear why you always refuse to answer, unless you feel a denial would cause others to take you even less seriously here. Do you follow Christ and wish to obey his commands or not?

Haven’t got time to reply in detail, but I was recently party to a conversation between two Englishment one of whom said ‘where can I find a woman to have children with who it not crazy’. What he was bemoaning was the deleterious effect of feminism and women thinking they can have rights including dumping the duties of motherhood on their husbands or else as an ‘oppressed minority’ in socialist terms walk away.

Hence I have some sympathy with measures that might push back against this.

But I do think we need to be careful not to politicise the NT.

Sounds like that’s exactly what you’re doing…plus woman-blaming/shaming. You think it’s outlandish that women have rights and thoughts and independence….i argue Jesus saw and treated women differently.

Your claim that I think it is outlandish that women have rights and thoughts and indepence is a figment of your imaginiation! It is a very cultural Marxist way of thinking. Nevertheless, men and women in the NT are interdependent, so lonely independence of either sex is not a good thing. The apostle Paul has a balance on this that modern society couldn’t begin to understand – but then it doesn’t know what a woman is because it has ceased to be able to think! Jesus did not appoint any female apostles, so I think it questionable that he made… Read more »

 I am glad that you and your husband are coming to agree more. But as along as you disagree, you might think about staying home on election day. Save on the gas money. It is SO obvious that he’s referring to both the husband and the wife. The first statement frames the “you” as “you and your husband”. But as long as you (and your husband) disagree, you (and your husband) might think about staying home on election day. Save on the gas money. Not to mention that he’s talked about this multiple times on multiple published platforms, both in… Read more »

But the husband has the final say, so I completely disagree with you. That’s what Doug says. That’s what he believes. I agree he’s talking about both, but he’s telling the wife to stay home so the husbands vote won’t be cancelled out. Nice linguistic gymnastics! Must be tiring…

Oh, he’s very much in favor of conservative women voting conservative, even if their husbands are leftists. I’m curious if you read anything more than Examining Moscow stuff and the comments thread here, and maybe a few Ask Doug letters along with it (the main forum where he doesn’t elaborate on his views, because he’s responding to so many people)?

Yeah, that’s not what he said. He said “you”, meaning the writer, the wife, a woman, not her husband.

You don’t seem to agree with yourself then… cause you make the exact opposite argument. I’m not the one doing backbends.

I maintain the you he refers to is the woman, not the plural form. No backbending here:)

Well, obviously if both stay home, the wife does too. Also, “you” can be plural, unless you’re a diehard stickler for the southern “y’all.” I know for an absolute fact he’s not against women voting now in our current cultural climate—and all the women in the CREC vote regularly. “Save the gas money” would be a meaningless statement if the husband still went, because the husband and wife could go together in the same car…? I get that you’re dead set on him saying what you want him to say, but a little charity might be in order once in… Read more »

I’m a bit confused by both sides of this argument. Pastor Wilson has been very open that he wants the 19th Amendment repealed. He says that he thinks conservative women should still vote now for purely pragmatic reasons, because liberal women exist and he wants to cancel our their votes, but ideologically he doesn’t think that women should have the right to vote.

Thanks for the response. That’s mostly right, except that he’s not against women voting per se, but against those who are not heads of households voting—so, for instance, unmarried widows could vote even in a more ideal society. I was just pointing out that, in the present situation, he was not advising the woman to stay home and the husband vote. He was just saying that, if they’re gonna cancel each other out, both should stay home. (We’re talking about the phrase “you might think about staying home” in his letter to Diane.)

No, he’s against women voting. That’s what he said, and I take words at face value.

That position seems nonsensical. If unmarried singles could vote, but not married women, then a couple getting married would cut their voting power in half. So you’d be incentivizing people not to marry, and penalizing those who do. You’d also be penalizing college students who chose to stay at home for college rather than move away, and adult children who chose to take in and support their elderly parents. Is there a real benefit to this somewhere, or is it just one of those trollbait sort of suggestions that would be neither useful nor practical but lets Doug make some… Read more »

I don’t expect you to see this because the discussion was a week ago, but assuming your question was asked in good faith (unlike those of some commenters on this thread), the basic answer would be along these lines (again, it can be developed/defended in much more detail): The household voting framework takes for granted a society that a) broadly agrees politically, so that one’s vote becomes much less important because the parties are not nearly so polarized, and b) a society where everyone (men and women) both accept a household vote from a Christian framework, and c) that places… Read more »

Maybe you should read the Bible with the same charity you request…it’s what Christ would advocate.

Wait, so the (alleged) fact that I don’t read the Bible charitably (which obviously just begs the question) entails that you don’t need to read pastor Doug charitably? Your liberal humor simply breaks all the conventional bounds of wit!

Tax exemptions are never a govt handout; rather they are the govt allowing churches (or individuals) to keep more of their own money.

We are not wards of the state who decides graciously how much of the money we earn we are allowed to keep, as though govt has first call on it.

Then why do billionaires get to keep so much of theirs? Being exempted is a form of governmental handout…grace…or an exception…made by the government.

Billionaires may not deservce or have earned the wealth that they have, but it is still not the job of government to appropriate their wealth to fund tax and spend programmes.

These injustices will one day be put right. Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. You have laid up treasure for the last days.

Tax exemptions are never a govt handout; rather they are the govt allowing churches (or individuals) to keep more of their own money. ^ that is one perspective. Not a Christian one, obviously, but a very common worldly perspective often found in prosperity churches that do not preach the gospel, in which we find the opposite: “he said to them: “Whose image and inscription is this?” They said to him: “Caesar’s.” Jesus then said: “Pay back Caesar’s things to Caesar, but God’s things to God.” It’s not your money and never was. That’s what Jesus says, and that is why he… Read more »

But a man named Anani’as with his wife Sapphi’ra sold a piece of property, and with his wife’s knowledge he kept back some of the proceeds, and brought only a part and laid it at the apostles’ feet. But Peter said, “Anani’as, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit and to keep back part of the proceeds of the land? While it remained unsold, did it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not at your disposal?  It seems to me Peter here confirms the voluntary nature of giving, and that… Read more »

Of course the big dollar amounts given away by the super rich is fairly well publicized. However, apart from that I wonder, how is it known how much people give to charity, and to who or what they give? I wouldn’t doubt poor people give a relatively higher percentage of their income, when they give anything. Anything is big chunk of what you have when you don’t have much.

It seems to me to be the opposite – it should be EASY for the rich to give a relatively higher percentage of their income, when the poor are forced to spend so much of their income on basic needs. Even 10% giving as an average would outpace the poor and 10% is a small portion of their expendable wealth. But they don’t even give that 10%, because when you become wealthy you serve money, as Jesus pointed out.

Easier to give a higher percentage and still be well off, yes, if that’s what you mean. I agree most people can afford to give more than they do before their own wellbeing, or even their general comfort and convenience, is in jeopardy. What I meant was, when one has very little and they reach into their pocket as the plate is passed – figuratively or literally – there is a greater likelihood that they will have ended up giving a relatively higher percentage of what they had. Not that true charity is just a matter of percentages. When we’re… Read more »

To whom more is given, more is required. I agree that it is more difficult for a rich person to fulfill their obligations for giving up wealth than it is for a poor person to. That does not mean they will be judged by God on an easier scale though, to the contrary we are told that they rarely if ever attain the Kingdom of Heaven. Another reason why it’s better to divest wealth than to hoard it. In my mind, “poor” means that you struggle to attain the resources necessary to meet your family’s food, shelter, medical, educational, or… Read more »

Then poor (including those who could work but wouldn’t) people would be richer than everyone else, but not for long. If the poor gave their money away too, or just let it sit, when they had more than they needed, it would be a dead end, and if they just bought a lot of things, laziness (in some cases) would be rewarded. Most likely , if everyone simply gave all their surplus money to the poor, especially those who couldn’t handle money well or didn’t want to, and chose to live an ultra-minimalist life, the economy would implode, and most… Read more »

So the form of your argument, which has been used by many to reject Jesus’s words for generations now, is: “If everyone acted like Jesus suggests, it would crash our modern economy, which relies on rampant consumerism to survive. Of course, such large-scale obedience will never happen, but just the thought experiment is enough to argue that those minority of us who are trying to pursue obedience must not act that way. If it doesn’t align with modern consumer capitalism, it must not be Scriptural ” “For Koinonia to suggest following the plain words of Scripture, he must be mentally… Read more »

“What would happen if all the most secularized members of society suddenly repented and began dramatic obedience?” This is an odd thought experiment because it bears no relation to anything that has or will happen in our society. It’s like asking what would happen if everyone in Moscow spontaneously converted to CREC and started attending Doug’s church. Parking would be an unsolvable nightmare, the bathrooms would be untenable, could be fights over pews between the rough and newly converted, many Moscow businesses would collapse and religious institutions would go under with unknown consequences. It would lead to logistical issues galore.… Read more »

“You and the church group you’re in sounds good. How fast would you want to add foreigners? Project that to the whole US, if you think we can handle the percentage you can at the speed you can.” At times the services have had 1/3 to 1/2 migrants. That has never been the slightest problem. So we’re good up through 160 to 320 million migrants in the USA by your projection? I think your “project that” suggestion backfired on you, which suggests you have not seen much capacity for love in your own church. The gish gallop of excuses that… Read more »

No one ever asks, “What would happen if all abortions stopped tomorrow?*. Obviously there would be a million or more children now being born into difficult, unwanted circumstances, deeper strains on hospitals and schools, many more children growing up without a father around, far more welfare payments…there are even those studies suggesting the crime rate would go way up. No one says this because we all feel strongly that obeying God and ending the abortion of babies is objectively good, even if we can’t predict all the consequences. Once you see someone resort to secular hypotheticals instead of making a… Read more »

Let me give a real life example of failed generosity/hospitality Several years ago, my parents, who are none too wealthy themselves and are relatively simple livers (there were times when we never ate out) took in a black woman who I will call Malia (name changed to protect privacy), a single Mom with five children who had been evicted. Malia would not allow her teenage son to seek a job, and lived off the state, and her younger children were rather wasteful with food, I think it was partly their mother’s fault. Mom and Dad had agreed to host Malia… Read more »

Jesus also said, “If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. For it is better that you lose one of your members than that your whole body go into hell.” – Matt. 5:29-30

These are the plain words of Scripture. So then, we should be able to recognize Koinonia by the stump and the eye patch.

Purposely and obviously misinterpreting Scripture is not an argument against correctly interpreting Scripture. I have invited you, over and over again, to discuss actual interpretation of the passages in question. You refuse to discuss the actual passages and your own interpretation, every time, and instead retreat to distractions and personal attack.

Let’s start with Luke 12:33. How would you interpret its meaning, and how do you practice it?

James 1:19-20 is a great Scripture. You should try it.

fp – sadly the phrase the anger of man does not work the righteousness of God has almost become my life’s verse!

Sometimes you feel like exploding with anger at what is going on in the world, and even worse the church, but it doesn’t do any good whatsoeever.

Are you a biblical “realist”/“literalist”?

This from the Bible denier. Priceless.

I never said I deny the Bible…just those who misrepresented it:) you can’t pick and choose when to be literal or figurative…what is it, descriptive or prescriptive? Blah blah blah…

You don’t have to say it. You demonstrate it repeatedly.

Just because you fell off the turnip truck yesterday doesn’t mean everyone else has :)

Nice anecdote…

The moral lesson was goofy. So his parents were nice once for one day, it didn’t immediately solve obviously deep problems, so this we shouldn’t obey Jesus? It’s like saying, “Once I went to church and my life didn’t immediately get better, so I decided to stop going to church.” What does he think a one-day action shows about any Biblical principal?

And shoehorning race into it, twice in fact, was bizarre. I wonder why he thought that was relevant.

I will defend myself no more, because it doesn’t seem that you want to listen, and I said it would be my last. But I will defend my parents. I already said that they were willing to let Malia stay for several days, and I will say that they hoped she would. But she just wanted a hotel room, so she splurged when she got her check, and I don’t remember hearing from her again. My Dad really does care about helping the poor, and I think my Mom does too. But they are not socialists, and they believe in… Read more »

How did this become about your parents? I did not criticize your parents, I criticized your Biblical interpretation being based on that single one-day action not fixing the world.

You keep taking the Bible personally rather than looking at Scripture on its own terms. The Bible’s job is not to validate your life. The Bible’s job is to shape your life. You want to judge people, to determine whether one is better than another. I want to find the best actions.

They REALLY seemed to go out of their way…and then the grudge coming from a poor person wanting some comforts lasts into the next generation…quite twisted, really. Here’s an anecdote:

I once passed an unhoused person on the street asking for change, and I gave him a $5 bill. I walked on my way. I couldn’t care less what he used it for…somewhere, if I remember correctly, it was said that god loves a cheerful giver. Maybe you should look in the mirror and see if you have a smile or a scowl:)

To clear things up, this is not something my parents told me about, but something that happened while I was home–and I still am home, working to save for a time when, Lord willing, I will have a wife and children to support, and paying some to my parents, who are still simple liberals and still, espe.cially in my Dad’s case, go out of the way to help the poor and strangers. I was not trying to say they should not have taken her in, but that Malia’s difficult life was partly of her own making, and that there is… Read more »

I meant simple livers, not liberals. My parents are, generally speaking, socially and fiscally conservative.

As opposed to simple kidneys?

As I pointed out before, you seem more interested in judging and ranking people than in exploring obedience to Christ. That, combined with your fixation on race, make me wonder whether Jesus is who you’re looking for or whether you want something else. If they are anything like you depict, then it would seem that Wulf and Malia both needed Jesus, and both needed a community to better show Jesus to them. Whatever you are trying to argue for in this comment section, it doesn’t seem to be getting you closer to God, just getting you angry at people that… Read more »

 Jesus tempered his condemnation of the rich by saying God, with whom all things are possible, can get them into the Kingdom of Heaven; The reasonable interpretation, unless Jesus was purposely misleading everyone in all the interaction up until that moment as well as directly after, was that God can help them to give up their wealth. Not one word suggested “they should keep it”, he instead told him to give it up, lamented that he did not give it up, stated that all things were possible with God, and then praised those who had indeed given everything up. The… Read more »

And just to be clear, I do think it possible that God is willing to accept even the rich into the Kingdom of Heaven, despite what Jesus says there as well as all the other times they’re condemned in the NT. Just as he accepts the condemned brigand. But it is obvious from that text and many others that, “Keep your wealth and maybe by chance you can get in anyway” is not the goal. Giving up that wealth because you’ve seen something of the Kingdom of Heaven is the direct goal he gives.