Why did Jesus stop reading?

[Homer]

Paidion,

You wrote:

.....I disagree that your arguments prove that He kills people.....

I can not see how it is possible for anyone to read the bible and deny that God kills anyone. To do so you must have the same mind as Jefferson had with his scissors.

[Candlepower]

Like his father, he never punished people, but corrected them if necessary.

Who do you think drowned almost everyone on earth?
Who do you think burned to death the inhabitants of Sodom & Gommorah?
Who do you think transformed lot's wife into a pillar of salt?
Who do you think killed Er, the Judah's firstborn?
Who do you think killed Onan, Er's brother?
Who do you think killed the firstborn of Egypt?
Who do you think killed the Egyptian army?
Who do you think killed Nadab & Abihu?
Who do you think killed the 10 scouts?
Who do you think killed Korah, Dathan, Abiram and their respective families?
Who do you think killed the followers of Korah?
Who do you think killed (on several occasions) undisclosed numbers of Israelites who complained against God?
Who do you think killed 24,000 Israelites for sexual immorality with Moabite women?
Who do you think killed Undisclosed number of Ammorites with hailstones?
Who do you think killed Nabal?
Who do you think killed Uzzah?
Who do you think killed David and Bathsheba's baby boy?
Who do you think killed Undisclosed number of Ammorites by Joshua's army?
Who do you think killed The 42 youths who mocked Elisha?
Who do you think killed Jeroboam?
Who do you think killed Jehoram?
Who do you think killed Ananias and Sapphira?
Who do you think killed Herod?
And in the future, who do you think will kill Satan's army (Rev. 20:8-9)?

God carried out Capital Punishment on several occasions. These are some of them. I didn't even mention the Assyrian army that surrounded Jerusalem.

[Paidion]

Example #3: Chaff and fruitless trees into unquenchable fire Matt.3:10-12

Admittedly, the words here are those of the Baptizer, not of Jesus. However, Jesus regarded John as “more than a prophet” (Luke 7:26), as the greatest of the prophets (Luke 7:28), and as a “shining lamp” (John 5:35). The words of John, referenced above, are among the very few specimens of his teaching on record, and certainly must have been central to his message. If he was so wrong about the mission of Jesus as Paidion would make him out to be, one must wonder at what point in John’s message he was proving himself to be a great light and a great prophet. If John was wrong, in the sense that Paidion would suggest, then he was not merely a little "off," but diametrically opposed to God's mind. In that case, Jesus should not have referred to him as the greatest of the prophets, but of the false prophets.

John’s warning refers to the immediate crisis facing the apostate in Israel. He is describing a judgment about to fall—the ax is already poised, and the fan is in the hand of the Winnower. There was a faithful remnant, to be sure, who would be gathered into God’s grainery, and preserved from the impending destruction. However, the majority of Israel were apostate and, like fruitless trees and chaff, were about to be consumed in fiery judgment (which occurred in that very generation, as we know). The agent of that terrible judgment of unquenchable fire was to be God Himself. It was He who was wielding the ax (v.10) and the winnowing fan, and who would personally cast the chaff into the fire (v.12). No honest reader can miss this fact.

Since Steve does not view me as “an honest reader,” and I have missed this “fact,” then, of course, nothing I say will make the slightest impact on him.

However, for the sake of other readers, I affirm that I have never suggested that the prophet John the Baptizer “was wrong” nor any of God's other servants as recorded in the New Testament. Here is what the Baptizer said:

Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”(Matthew 3:10-12 ESV)

The Baptizer used figurative language. Otherwise, it would be not only the “chaff” that would be burned up, but also the disciples since they were to be baptized with fire.

Several commentators affirm that it was the gospel of the Kingdom that John the Baptizer proclaimed which would separate the wheat from the chaff. I agree with them on that point. Some would enter the kingdom and others would refuse to do so. John predicted one who was coming after him. That was Jesus, the Anointed One, the Messiah. It is he, Jesus, who would baptize with holy spirit and fire. It is he, who would separate the “wheat” from the “chaff” through the proclamation of the gospel of the Kingdom. Jesus himelf said on one occasion: “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” (Matthew 10:34 ESV). He didn't bring a sword in order to kill people; rather he brought a "sword" of division between those who would enter the Kingdom and those who refused the Kingdom—even people of the same household. Immediately following these words Jesus said, “For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.” (Verses 35,36) It isn't that Jesus delighted in dividing families, but he knew that that's what the good news of the Kingdom would do. Yes, Jesus would “burn the chaff with unquenchable fire.” This is highly figurative language that may simply mean that the “chaff” will be excluded from the Kingdom, or it may mean Jesus will bring severe correction upon the “chaff” though enduring the fire of God's love. I lean toward the second meaning. It will not be pleasant for those who reject God. But God will do whatever it takes to bring them to repentance.

Steve obviously believes that the fire (that Jesus predicted would burn the chaff) is a reference to the defeat of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. when many Jews died at the hands of the Roman invasion. But why not lay the blame where the blame is due? It was the Romans who caused their death, not God. I also know several people who think God caused the holocaust in the early 20th century in order to punish the Jews. But why not lay the blame where the blame is due? It was Adolph Hitler who caused the holocaust, not God.

[steve]

Paidion,

Whatever one may think about the holocaust of the 1940s, Jesus and John the Baptist both ascribed the holocaust of AD 70 to God's direct judgment. John said that it is God's (or Christ's) ax that is laid to the root of the fruitless trees, and whose threshing floor was about to be cleared by His fan (Matt.3:10-12). Even the terminology used by John the Baptist (i.e., fire that is "unquenchable") suggests the AD 70 holocaust, echoing deliberately the terminology of Jeremiah and Ezekiel in their describing the similar holocaust of 586 BC (Jeremiah 7:20; Ezek.20:47-48).

Your statement that the disciples will be baptized with fire is supported by no scripture. The wicked were to be baptized with fire. The disciples would only be baptized with the Holy Spirit (see Acts 1:5).

Similarly, Jesus described the Roman armies burning down the city of Jerusalem and said that this was the action of the same King whose Son's wedding they had snubbed (Matt.22:1-7).

If you have a better exegesis of these passages, please share it with us.

[Paidion]

Your statement that the disciples will be baptized with fire is supported by no scripture. The wicked were to be baptized with fire. The disciples would only be baptized with the Holy Spirit (see Acts 1:5)

.

I formed my understanding from the words of John the Baptizer in Luke 3:16.

John answered them all, saying, “I baptize you with water, but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with (or "in") Holy Spirit and fire.

Was not the "you" to which John referred, his disciples, the group of people that he had baptized with water? That same group of people who afterward became disciples of Jesus? Was not John saying to his disciples that the one who was coming, the Anointed One, would baptize them with both Holy Spirit and with fire?

Or do you think the "you" whom he was addressing consisted of two groups, the wheat and the chaff of which he spoke in the following verse, and that the Anointed One would baptize the wheat with Holy Spirit and the chaff with fire?

"Holy Spirit" and "fire" seem to be linked together. That's one reason they more likely denote the same group.

Commentators John Gill and Matthew Poole understand it as I do, that it is Jesus' disciples who were baptized with both Holy Spirit and Fire:

the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose; neither to bear his shoes after him, as Matthew says, nor to untie his shoe string, or unbuckle his shoe, both which were menial actions with the Jews: he shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire; as he did some of their nation, his own disciples, on the day of pentecost.

baptize them with the Holy Ghost and with fire; with fire as the symbol of the Holy Ghost; so some understand it, expounding it as a prophecy of the descent of the Holy Ghost, #Ac 2:3. Others possibly better expound it of the Holy Ghost working in the souls of believers as fire, purging them, and burning up their lusts and corruptions.

[steve]

John's audience were not a bunch of disciples. John was talking to a mixed crowd, including the brood of serpents (Matt.3:7), whom he assumed were not disciples. The part of his sermon under our consideration was applicable to the whole audience. How could he be speaking to the disciples only, and telling them that they, like fruitless trees and chaff, will be thrown into unquenchable fire?

By reading Matthew 3:10-12 together, you find that each verse ends with "fire."

10 And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.

11 I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.

12 His winnowing fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clean out His threshing floor, and gather His wheat into the barn; but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

The meaning of "fire" in verses 10 and 12 are clearly referring to the judgment about to fall upon fruitless trees and chaff. This is destruction (if anyone thinks it is not, he can learn by experiment what happens to dead trees and chaff when put into fire). As I mentioned before, the mention of "unquenchable fire" (v.12) is specifically alluding to Jeremiah's "fire that is not quenched"—by which the prophet designates the impending Babylonian invasion and destruction of Jerusalem. John's audience were standing on the threshold of the like disaster, at the hands of the Romans.

It would be unnatural for fire to have a different meaning in verse 11 than it has in the verses immediately preceding and following it.

All three verses see the nation of Israel (the "you" in John's statement) as divisible into two groups, having two separate fates. On the one hand, there are those who are fruitful trees and wheat—the faithful remnant. They will be preserved from the destruction coming on fruitless trees and chaff. They will enter the New Covenant Ages, where, as the prophets foretold, they will be baptized (immersed) in the Holy Spirit.

On the other side of the divide are the fruitless tree, the chaff—the apostate in Israel. Their common destiny, mentioned in all three verses is "fire." They will be baptized (immersed) in fire.

Despite John Gill's ideas, even he makes the prediction only applicable to "some of their nation." John doesn't say, "Some of you..."
The whole nation—his entire audience will face the baptism being brought by Christ. Depending upon their status as believers or not, the baptism will either be with the Holy Spirit or with fire. This statement is applicable to the entire crowd, not a small part.

This is also seen, in Acts 1:5, when Jesus quotes the words of John the baptist, this time only to His disciples. He repeats John's promise of their being baptized in the Holy Spirit (since that applies to them), but He omits the reference to being baptized in fire (since that only applies to the unbelievers).

Commentators don't impress me half as much as the actual words of scripture do. Someone has rightly said, "It is amazing how much light the scriptures shed on the commentaries!"

I do not say not to site commentaries against my position. You may look to whatever authorities impress you. However, I have told you in previous disagreements that we have had, that I am far more impressed with what the Bible actually says, and it is clear that commentators can miss it as easily as can any other reader. You should know that one can find commentators to support many conflicting views (most of them support Calvinism in their comments). To face-off different commentators often leads nowhere. In many cases, including the present one, the text alone is clear by itself.

[mattrose]

I'd be interested to hear both Paidion and Steve listen and respond to Greg Boyd's podcast from today (a 7 minute answer to the question of whether God caused the flood). I'm wondering if there is some middle ground in Boyd's position which seems to side with Paidion in large part but retains a substantial doctrine of the inspiration of the Old Testament scriptures.

http://reknew.org/2016/12/podcast-under ... ens-cross/

This would just be one example of Boyd's position which will be further defended in his massive book coming out April 1st, 2017

[Homer]

I'm wondering if there is some middle ground in Boyd's position which seems to side with Paidion in large part but retains a substantial doctrine of the inspiration of the Old Testament scriptures.

So God saved everyone with the flood? And people take him seriously? Sad.

[Singalphile]

I'm wondering if there is some middle ground in Boyd's position which seems to side with Paidion in large part but retains a substantial doctrine of the inspiration of the Old Testament scriptures.

So God saved everyone with the flood? And people take him seriously? Sad.

I don't think Greg Boyd said quite that, Homer, at least not in the clip that Matt posted. Rather, he said that it was God saving humanity and "the human project".

[Paidion]

John's audience were not a bunch of disciples. John was talking to a mixed crowd, including the brood of serpents (Matt.3:7), whom he assumed were not disciples.

It may have been a mixed crowd. But when he said, "I baptize you with water," he was addressing his disciples. He didn't baptize the "brood of serpents" with water. Then, in the same utterance, he continues, "but he who is mightier than I is coming, the strap of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie. He will baptize you with Holy Spirit and fire." It seems unlikely that he switches mid-utterance from a "you" that is restricted to his disciples to a "you" that refers to the brood of serpents as well. Even in the second part of the utterance, he says that the coming One will baptize you with Holy Spirit. Surely Jesus didn't baptize the brood of serpents with Holy Spirit.

The most obvious understanding of the utterance is that John is addressing his disciples throughout, and then speaks of what the coming One will do to the whole Jewish nation in verse 12.

By the way, I quoted the commentators, not to provide some kind of proof, but as an indication that I am not alone in my understanding.

Despite John Gill's ideas, even he makes the prediction only applicable to "some of their nation."

Well, of course he does. So do I. Christ baptized only some of the Jewish nation with Holy Spirit and fire, namely those who became disciples of Christ—those such as John the Baptizer was addressing (as recorded in verse 11).