Cyrus:   It isn’t our place to judge others and Scaughdt can believe the way he wants, but like I put it to him before, I think he tries to convince others so he may believe himself.  And you do have a heart of gold, just as you are a child of GOD, Lucy … You pray for those you feel need the love of GOD.  Never change and never give in … You are something special … God bless.

 

Scaughdt:    You know something, Cyrus?   If I were sitting in your shoes – knowing as little about me as you do, I might actually feel the same way.  That is one of the reasons I have to live The Way of Christ so radically, and that is one of the reasons why I back everything up I share with massive amounts of Scripture – a Truth to which this thread alone attests quite well.  I believe the way I do about The Way of Christ because I have radically lived it for the past eleven years of my life (and continue to radically live it to this very day) … This is no mere theological debate for me, Cyrus.  I have lived the Truths I share herein – Truths that I know firsthand to bear the most brilliant Fruit (and Truths that happen to give Jesus by far the greatest honor, which I personally feel he deserves) … It is a privilege for me to share this Way with others, and it is something I intend to do for the rest of my days.
Indeed, the thing about The Way of Christ is this: you really can’t “get it” until you live it, and you certainly can’t live it while remaining tied to the shackles of the Pharisees – neither those found in the Old Testament nor those found in the New (primarily in Paul’s epistles) … So, once you are ready to let go of your dogmatic safety blanket, you too will be able to leap into the terrifying yet brilliantly fulfilling life of the purely selfless, perfect Love of Jesus Christ.  And yet until you do let go, you won’t ever be able to leap with courage into the arms of Christ .. And until you do ultimately make that leap, you will simply not be able to fully understand what I am talking about … Much Peace to you, my Brother!

 

Cyrus:   So what you’re trying to tell me is that everything I read in the Bible is not true, and I shall overcome it, and just let it all go, and step into GLORY? …  I’m sorry, but I don’t understand – How I could do that without the Bible?  It says any man who believes in His Word in the Bible will be saved … I thought that is why GOD had his book – which is the Bible – put out into the world; so that others might believe in Him, and all the things He has done to set us free – to give us a chance to live our lives the way He wants us to.

 

Scaughdt:   No, my Friend, that is not what I am trying to tell you at all … I am actually not trying to tell you anything …  I am simply relaying the simple fact that there are many equally valid ways of reading the Scriptures.   I have tried & tested many of them, and am simply sharing the one I have found that produces by far the best Spiritual Fruit – namely, The Way of Christ as it was described and lived by Jesus himself … Indeed, this is how I myself “stepped into glory”; I took every encouragement & every commandment that Jesus gave us in the Gospels, I combined them in a way where they in no way contradicted one another, and then I put them into practice in my everyday life – literally, completely and without exception.  And especially in those moments when I was tempted to water them down (or make excuses for them — or create exceptions for them), I followed them literally anyway … And what I got was exactly what Jesus promised us we would all attain if we did so:  a state of pure Joy so far beyond mere “happiness” & deep-seated Peace so far beyond mere “contentment” that it can only be properly called “the Kingdom of Heaven”!
My Friend, if you do even a modest amount of research, you will easily find that the Bible might indeed have started as a collection of God-inspired words, but that over time it has become a man-manipulated tool of oppression and misguidance.  And you will also find that the same was true of the Hebrew Bible (what Christians call “the Old Testament”) in Jesus’ day, which is why he clearly came to radically remind folks what God’s Law was truly all about (namely, LOVE) … Jesus literally gave his entire life to this mission, and for several decades after his death, his Followers actually “got it” – and then our friend Paul showed up and turned everything on its head.  The Christian church was born thereafter (founded upon the principles & the teachings of Paul, not those of Jesus), and it is the Christian church that ultimately decided which books made it into the Bible and which didn’t – finally finalizing their canon (and thereby creating the Bible we have today) some 400+ years after Jesus’ death!

 

Now, I think for the most part these men actually did quite a fine job of making the Bible into what it is today (with the exception of removing The Gospel of Thomas & The Apocalypse of Peter, and keeping John’s – in my opinion, blasphemous — book of Revelation) … And I would also note for all those reading along that the scholarly analysis that goes into translating the ancient biblical manuscripts (a process called “textual criticism”) has given us remarkably accurate compiled Hebrew & Greek texts with which to work when we are trying to retranslate &/or rediscover God’s true Word …

 

And it is just as important for us all to remember that the Bible is still a man-manifested collection of merely mostly-Divinely-inspired writings – a collection that thus must be tested to parse out which parts of it are truly “of God” & which are not … Even Paul (ironically) agreed with this contention when he wrote “Test the Scriptures and hold onto only what is Good.” (1 Thessalonians 5:21) …

 

In closing then, please know I am not advocating abandoning the Bible, my Friend … Rather, I am advocating that we all devoutly enliven it; though only in the Way that Jesus would have wanted us to do so … Sending you much Peace today …

 

“You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life, and that it is they that testify on my behalf;  and yet you refuse to follow me and thereby know life.” ~ Jesus Christ (John 5:39-40)

Filed under: Burnishing Bigotry by Scaughdt