Today's Excellent Church.

[Benson]

Acts 2 gives the narrative of how the Body of Christ His Church was brought into being by the coming of The Holy Spirit, according to Joel ch. 2 as cited by Apostle Peter.

Today, there are no features within modern Christendom which are a continuation of either Acts ch. 2, Joel ch. 2, The Jerusalem Messianic Church, or the Pauline Gentile Church.

This post remains very short because there is no other information in Scripture to authenticate the state of today's so called "Church." If one thinks the Church does exist today according to the foundation of the Apostles with Christ as the Cornerstone, tell us where on Earth it exists in the hearts of Men before God. No place in Paul's teaching says the Church is some intangibly perceived group of minds set upon faith in Christ.

[tam]

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

I can only say that being in a religious organization is not the same thing as entering through the Gate and being on the road to life (which few find).

There it is. I knew you understood. You finally got what JW and I have been saying. It's just your anti-religion beliefs are clouding good reasoning and want to push your anti-religion views which in the grand scheme doesn't matter to your argument.

I know that is what you claim to be saying. But that is not what the quotes said (from your religion).

You want to say it so bad what you want it to say, that you've cherry picked a line out of context to get it to say what you want it to say. One line out of an 18 paragraph article.

It says what it says. I did not change a single word of the quote you posted (unlike what you did). I do not see how anything has been taken out of context or how you have even shown that it has been taken out of context.

Then you said what you said. I prefaced my thought and then I removed one word of yours to get your words to support my thought. You prefaced a line in the article with what you believe we think of ourselves and then you removed 18 paragraphs.

I simply quoted a line in the article that states faith is needed AND one other thing:

".... survival of individuals today depends on their faith and their loyal association with the earthly part of Jehovah’s universal organization."

But that doesn't make the organization the Ark. This was your point was it not? Haven't we shown you that God's people are not the Ark?

I never claimed you (or the article) said that people are the ark. The people were being compared to Noah and his family, the JW organization/religion was being compared to the ark.

(And if the RCC said they were an organization, instead of a religion, would there really be a difference? Is there a difference between the RCC and the people IN the RCC?)

This is not rocket science or a mysterious riddle. An Ark with no people on it doesn't do anything for anyone. If a person knows where the Ark is and they are not part of the group getting on it, then they drown. It's that simple. Being part of the group IS important. That's the part you hate and I get that. But that doesn't make the people the Ark as you claim. People that just belief the same thing alone is not enough.

To the bold: Though it would depend upon the belief, but if their faith was in Christ, then to your statement, I ask, why not? If their faith leads them to get on the Ark (Christ), how would that not be enough?

Please note that you had to change my actual sentence - the actual quote - to make me sound as if I was saying something I was not.

Please note that the line you quoted doesn't say word for word that God's organization is the Ark.

I know that. I said that in the first comment I made on it:

They also might not be coming out and saying 'the JW organization is the ark', but I don't think there can be much doubt that this is a comparison that they are making

**

I'm just gonna link right back to where all this started (and the quotes that I am supposedly taking out of context):

viewtopic.php?p=1039551#p1039551
viewtopic.php?p=1039553#p1039553


Peace again to you.

[2timothy316]

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

Peace to you,

I can only say that being in a religious organization is not the same thing as entering through the Gate and being on the road to life (which few find).

There it is. I knew you understood. You finally got what JW and I have been saying. It's just your anti-religion beliefs are clouding good reasoning and want to push your anti-religion views which in the grand scheme doesn't matter to your argument.

I know that is what you claim to be saying. But that is not what the quotes said (from your religion).

You want to say it so bad what you want it to say, that you've cherry picked a line out of context to get it to say what you want it to say. One line out of an 18 paragraph article.

It says what it says. I did not change a single word of the quote you posted (unlike what you did). I do not see how anything has been taken out of context or how you have even shown that it has been taken out of context.

Then you said what you said. I prefaced my thought and then I removed one word of yours to get your words to support my thought. You prefaced a line in the article with what you believe we think of ourselves and then you removed 18 paragraphs.

I simply quoted a line in the article that states faith is needed AND one other thing:

".... survival of individuals today depends on their faith and their loyal association with the earthly part of Jehovah’s universal organization."

But that doesn't make the organization the Ark. This was your point was it not? Haven't we shown you that God's people are not the Ark?

I never claimed you (or the article) said that people are the ark. The people were being compared to Noah and his family, the JW organization/religion was being compared to the ark.

Yet it is not. You prefaced/prooftexted the quote saying we did but that is deceitful, as that is not what we believe and I've been trying to explain to you that it makes no sense if we did. The very article you quoted explains all of this but you don't care about that.

The quote "survival of individuals today depends on their faith and their loyal association with the earthly part of Jehovah’s universal organization." is a true statement, but it doesn't make JWs think we are symbolically the Ark as you keep falsely saying. Because if JWs took a 90 degree turn from what the Bible says, the life saving Ark doesn't follow people's beliefs. The Ark's specs are determined by Jehovah and not a religion. If JWs take a 90 degree turn from what the Bible says, they would no longer be on the Ark and they are no longer part of Jehovah's organization because only God's people are on the Ark. If a person follows one or more JWs off course then they are following the creature and not the creator. It is impossible for any religion to be the Ark and anyone who does think a religion is compared to the Ark is setting themselves up for stumbling.

This doesn't mean the Christian congregation isn't important because it is and to deny association with people that are on the Ark is also setting one up for failure.

Here is an appropriate quote of the JW view of the Ark,

"However, it is not sufficient just to get out of false religion. It is necessary to get into the ark of spiritual protection that Jehovah today provides. This is not some material structure, some temple or particular location on earth. As the Son of God, Christ Jesus, stated: “God is a Spirit, and those worshiping him must worship with spirit and truth.” (John 4:24) So true worshipers of God not only separate themselves from all idolatry and superstitious practices; they also study and apply God’s Word in their lives, cultivate Christian personalities and are ‘spirited’ in their service, giving themselves heart and soul in showing love for God and neighbor.​—Mark 12:28-31."
https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/197 ... gion&p=par

We see the 'Ark' as a way of life and not our organization, yet people in our organization do strive to live that life and lead others to that life. Certainly this makes it crystal clear now what Jehovah's Witnesses believe what the 'Ark' for people today is. I didn't need to preface the quote and I left a link to the entire article so as there is no confusion.

This is different from what the RCC does by comparing itself to the Ark. If they take a 90 degree turn from the Bible, well you better follow the RCC because they are the Ark, they establish what the way of life is. Which means all those that think they are on their own and God speaks directly to them, thus carve out their own life, they are making themselves the Ark.