|
Forums118
Topics9,250
Posts196,428
Members1,327
| |
Most Online5,850
Feb 29th, 2020
|
|
|
S |
M |
T |
W |
T |
F |
S |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
1
|
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
|
9
|
10
|
11
|
12
|
13
|
14
|
15
|
|
16
|
17
|
18
|
19
|
20
|
21
|
22
|
|
23
|
24
|
25
|
26
|
27
|
28
|
|
|
|
Here is a link to show exactly where the Space Station is over earth right now: Click Here
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11782
12/04/04 08:17 PM
12/04/04 08:17 PM
|
5500+ Member
|
Joined: Nov 2004
Posts: 6,154
Brazil
|
|
quote:
The Old Covenant leads to bondage. Remember that "covenant" means "promise" (see Gal. 3:17, 18). If God initiated the Covenant, then He made promises which led the COI into bondage. God doesn't do that.
Yes, the old covenant leads to bondage if you try to obtain salvation by it. The only means of salvation is under the abrahamic covenant.
If I’m understanding you correctly, what you are saying is that the people initiated a covenant with God and God ratified the covenant that the people initiated. It is here that I diverge. Why anyway would God ratify something that leads to bondage? God doesn't do that. In my view God originated the old covenant; not, however, to be a means of salvation, but to teach them about the sinfulness of their heart and their need of a Savior, and thus lead them to seek salvation through the abrahamic covenant.
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11783
12/05/04 12:00 AM
12/05/04 12:00 AM
|
SDA
Charter Member
Active Member 2019
20000+ Member
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 22,256
Southwest USA
|
|
Yes, because the COI were required to obey the old covenant, to practice the daily and annual ceremonies. Obeying the Abrahamic covenant included, in the case of the COI, complying the conditions of the old covenant. In other words, the old covenant was not optional, as if they could choose between the two.
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11784
12/05/04 02:52 AM
12/05/04 02:52 AM
|
OP
Active Member 2012
14500+ Member
|
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 14,795
Lawrence, Kansas
|
|
quote:
Then did not God Himself lead them into bondage? Not by any means, since He did not induce them to make that covenant at Sinai. Four hundred and thirty years before that time He had made a covenant with Abraham which was sufficient for all purposes.
quote:
So, when the people came to Sinai, God simply referred them to what He had already done and then said, "Now therefore, if ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me above all people: for all the earth is Mine." Exodus 19:5, KJV. To what covenant did He refer? Evidently to the one already in existence, His covenant with Abraham. If they would simply keep God's covenant, keep the faith, and believe God's promise, they would be a "peculiar treasure" unto God. As the possessor of all the earth, He was able to do for them all that He had promised.
The fact that they in their self-sufficiency rashly took the whole responsibility upon themselves does not prove that God had led them into making that covenant.
quote:
God never expected, and does not now expect, that any person can get righteousness by the law proclaimed from Sinai, and everything connected with Sinai shows it. Yet the law is truth and must be kept. God delivered the people from Egypt "that they might observe His statutes, and keep His laws." Psalm 105:45, KJV. We do not get life by keeping the commandments, but God gives us life in order that we may keep them through faith in Him.
quote:
The apostle when speaking of Hagar and Sarah says: "These women are two covenants." These two covenants exist today. The two covenants are not matters of time, but of condition. Let no one flatter himself that he cannot be bound under the old covenant, thinking that its time has passed.
"Why anyway would God ratify something that leads to bondage? God doesn't do that."
This is a very good question, but I disagree with your conclusion. It is true that God never leads us into bondage, but if we choose something that leads to bondage, God, out of respect for our freedom, will often honor that choice. For example, we may choose a marriage partner He would have not led us to choose if we waited for His leading, but He will honor our choice.
We often, often do things which God would not have chosen for us, but if we will not keep step with Him, He will keep step with us. God's whole dealings with Israel illustrate this principle. Polygamy is an example. Allowing Israel to have a king. There are lots of examples of this principle.
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11785
12/05/04 09:57 AM
12/05/04 09:57 AM
|
5500+ Member
|
Joined: Nov 2004
Posts: 6,154
Brazil
|
|
Mike,
I agree with what you said.
Tom,
I don't see how the people might have initiated the old covenant. It embodies a series of laws God prescribed to the COI, so He took the initiative to make the covenant, not the people. This is specially true of the civil laws, which applied specifically to the COI and of course cannot be part of the everlasting covenant. The people only responded to the covenant - in a wrong way, to be sure.
"Therefore not even the first covenant was dedicated without blood. For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, saying, 'This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you'" (Heb. 9:18-20).
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11786
12/06/04 03:25 AM
12/06/04 03:25 AM
|
|
|
Ellen White's narrative in Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 371, shows clearly that God instituted the Old Covenant, not the Israelites. "But if the Abrahamic covenant contained the promise of redemption, why was another covenant formed at Sinai? In their bondage the people had to a great extent lost the knowledge of God and of the principles of the Abrahamic covenant. In delivering them from Egypt, God sought to reveal to them His power and His mercy, that they might be led to love and trust Him. He brought them down to the Red Sea -- where, pursued by the Egyptians, escape seemed impossible -- that they might realize their utter helplessness, their need of divine aid; and then He wrought deliverance for them. Thus they were filled with love and gratitude to God and with confidence in His power to help them. He had bound them to Himself as their deliverer from temporal bondage.
{PP 371.2}
"But there was a still greater truth to be impressed upon their minds. Living in the midst of idolatry and corruption, they had no true conception of the holiness of God, of the exceeding sinfulness of their own hearts, their utter inability, in themselves, to render obedience to God's law, and their need of a Saviour. All this they must be taught.
{PP 371.3}
"God brought them to Sinai; He manifested His glory; He gave them His law, with the promise of great blessings on condition of obedience: 'If ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then . . . ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation.' Exodus 19:5, 6. The people did not realize the sinfulness of their own hearts, and that without Christ it was impossible for them to keep God's law; and they readily entered into covenant with God."
{PP 371.4}
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11787
12/06/04 03:52 AM
12/06/04 03:52 AM
|
OP
Active Member 2012
14500+ Member
|
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 14,795
Lawrence, Kansas
|
|
quote:
"Night before last I was shown that evidences in regard to the covenants were clear and convincing. Yourself, Brother Dan Jones-Brother Porter and others are spending your investigative powers for naught to produce a position on the covenants to vary from the position that Brother Waggoner has presented." (1888 Materials 604)
quote:
"I am much pleased to learn that Professor Prescott is giving the same lessons in his class to the students that Brother Waggoner has been giving. He is presenting the covenants...Since I made the statement last Sabbath that the view of the covenants as it had been taught by Brother Waggoner was truth, it seems that great relief has come to many minds." (1888 Materials 623)
quote:
Then did not God Himself lead them into bondage? Not by any means, since He did not induce them to make that covenant at Sinai.
quote:
So, when the people came to Sinai, God simply referred them to what He had already done and then said, "Now therefore, if ye will obey My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me above all people: for all the earth is Mine." Exodus 19:5, KJV. To what covenant did He refer? Evidently to the one already in existence, His covenant with Abraham. If they would simply keep God's covenant, keep the faith, and believe God's promise, they would be a "peculiar treasure" unto God. As the possessor of all the earth, He was able to do for them all that He had promised.
The fact that they in their self-sufficiency rashly took the whole responsibility upon themselves does not prove that God had led them into making that covenant.
We have:
1) According to EGW, the view of Waggoner is true.
2) Waggoner taught that God did not initiate the Old Covenant.
The unavoidable conclusion, it seems to me, is that you are misunderstanding what EGW wrote. We also have EGW saying
1) Yourself, Brother Dan Jones-Brother Porter and others are spending your investigative powers for naught to produce a position on the covenants to vary from the position that Brother Waggoner has presented.
I don't know how this could be stated any clearer.
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11788
12/05/04 06:29 PM
12/05/04 06:29 PM
|
SDA
Charter Member
Active Member 2019
20000+ Member
|
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 22,256
Southwest USA
|
|
In view of the fact Waggoner's ideas on this specific aspect of the old covenant contradicts what Sister White has plainly written about it, is evidence that Waggoner is wrong. Unless you can prove Sister White endorsed this particular point, then it stands to reason that Waggoner is wrong, which is not to say everything he wrote about the old covenant is wrong. Obviously, much of what he did write about it was correct, otherwise she wouldn't have supported him. What exactly did Brother Jones and Porter disagree with?
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11789
12/05/04 06:45 PM
12/05/04 06:45 PM
|
|
|
EGW endorsed Waggoner's covenant views in 1890. link , {1888 604.2} link , {1888 623.4} But I just found that Waggoner's Glad Tidings wasn't written until 1900. http://www.aplib.org/wop2bib.pdf , page 10 bottom Isn't it possible that Waggoner changed his teaching on this point between 1890 and 1900? Or that he added it in the interim, and didn't teach it at all in 1890? The language in Patriarchs and Prophets is pretty plain. [ December 05, 2004, 04:39 PM: Message edited by: John ]
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11790
12/06/04 04:38 AM
12/06/04 04:38 AM
|
OP
Active Member 2012
14500+ Member
|
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 14,795
Lawrence, Kansas
|
|
quote:
In view of the fact Waggoner's ideas on this specific aspect of the old covenant contradicts what Sister White has plainly written about it, is evidence that Waggoner is wrong.
It can't contradict it! That's my whole point!
If you think they are contradictory, isn't it possible you're misunderstanding something? What does this mean?
quote:
Yourself, Brother Dan Jones-Brother Porter and others are spending your investigative powers for naught to produce a position on the covenants to vary from the position that Brother Waggoner has presented
|
|
|
Re: The Covenants
#11791
12/06/04 04:54 AM
12/06/04 04:54 AM
|
OP
Active Member 2012
14500+ Member
|
Joined: Aug 2004
Posts: 14,795
Lawrence, Kansas
|
|
John, that's an excellent and fair question.
Waggoner's views on the Covenants did not change from 1892 to 1900. She had specific reference to Waggoner's Sabbath Schools lessons. I couldn't find them on line. I've read them (they have them at Andrews) and they are the same as what's in the Glad Tidings. A key point he brought out in the Sabbath School lessons was that the "faulty promises" of Hebrews 8 was the promises of the people.
Waggoner had writing The Glad Tidings in view from at least as early as 1888 when he handed out "The Gospel in Galatians" which references the fact that he would like to write a commentary on Galatians.
The reason Jones, Porter and so on were arguing against Waggoner's view of the Covenants is because it was tied into his view of the law in Galatians (that it was primarily the moral law). They saw if they conceded Waggoner was right about the Covenants, they would have to concede he was right about the law in Galatians as well, and they were not willing to do that.
|
|
|
|
|
Here is the link to this week's Sabbath School Lesson Study and Discussion Material: Click Here
|
|
|
