She might have a little difficulty with the meat of the word too!

Hi Rosangela,

I didn’t quit know how to respond to your statement, but I realized that you thought the post you were commenting on was talking about you. I was talking to Arnold. My point had nothing to do with you other than you quoted Ellen and I quoted Paul where they disagree and Arnold seemed to choose Ellen over Paul.

I think a lot of tension comes from Ellen’s background. Her knowledge of righteousness by faith was limited before 1888 and the very message of 1888 is the gospel. So in a sense everything she wrote before she understood the gospel clearly had a legalist tint to it. After 1888 she wrote her best work. Steps to Christ, Desire of Ages, Mount of Blessings, and Christ Object Lessons all expose a softening on works and a greater dependence on Christ and Him crucified. It takes time for truth to do its work in all of us and Ellen was no exception.

scott

Yeah, the shadowy types were nice in theory but a burden in practice, especially for Jews who lived a long ways from Jerusalem and/or who were very poor. It is so much easier now than it was back then. Eating crackers and drinking juice once every 3 months is a breeze compared to yesteryear. I'm glad Jesus nailed the types to the cross, that He no longer requires us to observe them like the Jews once had to.

That's painting with quite a broad brush. Of course, the animal sacrifices pointed to the true Lamb, and therefore we do not do those anymore. But I can think of a few things that were not shadows.

1) The prohibition against pork. What did that foreshadow? Was that nailed to the cross?

2) Providing for strangers, widows, orphans. What did that foreshadow? Isn't that still a manifestation of the love that Jesus enjoins upon us today?

EGW said these things explained in finer detail how to love as the 10C requires. If they show us how to love, why would Jesus nail them to the cross? He would have as much reason to nail the 10C on the cross, which is what some argue.

Arnold, the two points you outlined above were clearly not types or shadows that were nailed to the cross. I agree with you that they were given to help us keep and obey the 10Cs. Only the ceremonial laws were nailed to the cross.

I think you are missing the whole point of the scripture. Just because the law completed its work doesn't mean that everything it forbade in the OC is now sanctioned in the NC. The fact that prohibition on unclean animals was incorporated into the OC doesn't mean that it started there or that it ends there. Sabbath, unclean, priesthood, feasts, sacrifice, temple, and many other things pre-existed the OC. Unclean meats started as a health issue after the flood, but became a spiritual issue in the OC. Unclean meats are just as bad for your health now as they were from the beginning.

They were forbidden in the OC, but in the NC we find a different reason for staying away from them . . . We are God's temple and we are to take care of our bodies. We don't need the OC to tell us that nor do we need laws for believers when salvation is a personal issue and each believer has been given the Holy Spirit.

Providing for the widows and orphans doesn't need to be commanded by law when the Spirit of Christ is manifest in the NC. He writes the law on our hearts and we become empathetic to the needs of others.

Dissecting the OC and keeping the parts that fit your fancy is one of the main reasons we have so many denominations and so much division in the church. The whole OC including the clean and unclean, tithing, 10C, ceremonial law, feast laws, tabernacle, priesthood, sacrifice, and everything it included represent an obsolete system of law that didn't have the power to change our hearts, but they were proficient in leading us to Christ where we make peace with God and are filled with the Holy Spirit.

Once we have Christ and are filled with His Spirit we will pay much more than just tithe, be much more self controlled, be much more concerned with our health, love Christ's sacrifice much more than the animals, love Christ's priesthood, love the symbols of Christ's body, and much more likely to become like Christ because of the NC.

scott

Scott, I agree with you, but I noticed you left out certain aspects of the law of Moses. Of the 613 laws articulated in the law of Moses which ones will we keep now that the Holy Spirit is dwelling within us, empowering us to be like Jesus? And, which ones will we not keep?

Finally back after a tiresome moving packing/unpacking process and many days without internet connection.


Not obviously if she had written something while in sin, but after she had repented and been forgiven by God, why not? The past is past. If Mary Magdalene had been inspired by God to write something, why wouldn’t any of us accept it?


???? What do you mean? How did people know which messages were inspired by God before Christ came and “showed us what God’s character of love looked like”?
What the Bible says is, “God having spoken in many parts and in many ways formerly to the fathers in the prophets, at the end of these days has spoken to us in the person of the Son” (Heb. 1:1,2).


The prophet in Psalm 137 is not at all making a prayer or expressing a personal wish, but making a prophetic declaration, in figurative language, about Babylon’s fate (see Isa. 13:16).

The prophet is imperfect, the message is perfect – this is simple. If the Lord allowed the prophet to convey a wrong message, someone might be lost because of that – and, of course, the fault would be God’s – for He allowed a flawed message to be conveyed. Some may indeed be lost for twisting, or for understanding incorrectly, the prophet’s message – but then, the fault is theirs, not God’s. “As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things. Therein are some things hard to understand, which those who are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction” (2 Peter 3:16).


There are several conditional prophecies in the Bible. Moses also told the people they would enter immediately in the promised land. This, of course, never happened.

I agree a prophet can mature in his/her understanding of truth. I don't agree he/she can convey a wrong message.