They that take the sword shall perish with the sword.

[JohnH]

While I wish Ghandi had become a Christian… I appreciate his teachings of nonviolence and his encouragement for Christians to follow Jesus’ teachings of nonviolence too. He who is not against us is for us.

[Neto]

I wonder if Gandhi believed this verse to be true about Jesus:



The Bible is easier to understand when you pick and choose which verses you want to believe are true. If you believe it is all true and infallible - as Jesus did - then you have to have a framework for understanding it without saying that some parts of it are wrong. "That was for that time and it is a good and true revelation of God, but this is the new/fuller revelation of God for this era, and the future era of reward/triumph/consummation will be a different dispensation as well" is a valid framework, but it needs fleshing out and would need more discussion, and there would certainly be challenges to it. Another way of understanding it is that there is more continuity between the Old and New Testaments, flattening things out so that the Christ of the Old Testament is the same as the Christ of the New Testament (certainly true) and therefore the church of the New Testament is a continuation of the church of the Old Testament...which is a much more questionable conclusion. But anyway, these things need a lot of discussion.

I take an understanding which is much like the "much more questionable conclusion" you mention above. Jesus DID say to the disciples that he has other sheep that are "not of this (Jewish) fold", and that he would bring them, so that there would be a single fold, under one shepherd (He himself). Those who were "looking for the redemption of Israel" (like Simeon and Ana, in the temple the day Jesus was brought there for his redemption as a first born male) do not seem to be zealots. They appear to me to be people with a spiritual vision of the Savior. This is the OT "Congregation of God" coming into the New Testament era and faith. I don't think they left the OT 'church' in order to become a part of the NT 'church'. In my understanding, they are one and the same.

Ephesians 1:20-23 and 4:8 seem to imply that the "church", or New Testament assembly as we know it, began AFTER Jesus ascension.

This doesn't mean that OT saints were saved differently than NT saints. But, it does show a difference in God's plan through history.

I reviewed those passages, and while I realize that the most accepted view regarding the time of the beginning of the Church is Pentecost, I do not find it convincing in terms of the "before the foundation of the world" sacrifice of Christ. In the 4:8 passage, it DOES say 'gifts' (plural), but the main Gift I see in other texts that Jesus brought about is the Good Gift of the Holy Spirit, his presence with us and his working in our lives through comfort and guidance. In Ephesians 1:18-23 Paul references the the great power that comes to us through Christ, the same power by which God brought the Christ back into life, and put him back at his right side, in the place of honor and glory. Was the glory ascribed to Jesus Christ greater after his life on earth than it had been before? I cannot prove it either way, but if he was actually sacrificed 'from before the foundation of the earth', then there is a timelessness there that we ought not ignore.

But as I acknowledged, my understanding of this is not the most accepted view, and I certainly respect the common view as well, and will not "make a big deal about it". Certainly, as you stated, the New Testament assembly as we know it did "begin" after Jesus' ascension, and probably at the time of the coming of the Holy Spirit with fire, what we call Pentecost (as is the common Protestant & Evangelical view). It formed a new era, just as did also the giving of the Law and the presence of God in a visible appearance of glory at the dedication of the tabernacle. That, too, was a new manifestation of the presence of God with his people.

EDIT:
Continuing on in Ephesians, we see how Paul emphasized that his non-Jewish readers were now (after the death and resurrection of the Christ) able to be INCLUDED in the people of God (Eph 2:12, 14, 17-18 especially). This is the new element in this NT Church. Formerly joining Israel required circumcision, and all of the sacrifices.

[Ernie]

Those who were "looking for the redemption of Israel" (like Simeon and Ana, in the temple the day Jesus was brought there for his redemption as a first born male) do not seem to be zealots. They appear to me to be people with a spiritual vision of the Savior. This is the OT "Congregation of God" coming into the New Testament era and faith. I don't think they left the OT 'church' in order to become a part of the NT 'church'. In my understanding, they are one and the same.

So in your view, the Jews who rejected Jesus left the church?

[Neto]

Those who were "looking for the redemption of Israel" (like Simeon and Ana, in the temple the day Jesus was brought there for his redemption as a first born male) do not seem to be zealots. They appear to me to be people with a spiritual vision of the Savior. This is the OT "Congregation of God" coming into the New Testament era and faith. I don't think they left the OT 'church' in order to become a part of the NT 'church'. In my understanding, they are one and the same.

So in your view, the Jews who rejected Jesus left the church?

If they were even in it at that point, then yes. However I'm inclined to say that the congregation of God (the terminology I prefer, because it shows the continuity of 'God's People' throughout history) was and is composed of those who are expectantly "looking for the redemption of 'Israel' ", of which we are also now a part, according to Paul in the letter to the congregation in Galatia. In the OT era, this group were often referred to as the 'Remnant', or sometimes (in some translations), the 'Faithful' (meaning those who are full of faith, in obedience to God). In the early part of the Gospels (that part which records events before the death and resurrection of Jesus, God incarnate, the Anointed One) they are referred to by the name I used above - 'Those who are looking for the redemption of Israel'.

If this is all true, then they didn't LEAVE 'the church'; they were not IN 'the church' to start with, because had they been looking for redemption, they would have recognized Jesus for who he was.