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" I have been charged with this before on another forum. The sign with the thumb extended is a universal hand sign for the deaf meaning "I love you".  If you now find it offensive, please say so and I will take it down."

  LAMBSEV:

   Just wondering.

Love is never offensive, it is G-D's sumation of all his commands. You cannot obey G-D's Laws without it.


   "Man learns from history only that he learns nothing from history!"

   RA

As you can see I have changed my avatar. I had some recriminatory thoughts, so am writing a brief explanation. I happened upon this drawing surfing for artistic impressions of our Lord. This one is very unusual. The Nazi soldier is using a screw driver to fasten the boards in the swastika shaped cross. If you are able to enlarge it, you will see the calm and even forbearing expression on the Lord's face. I find the work quite thought provoking. I can imagine it would offend some, and will take it down soon.

I have a personal story to tell relating to the subject. When I was a child, perhaps 7-9 years old, a boy moved into our country neighborhood. I remember three things about him, as we became friends for a time. First was his access to cigarettes and beer. I did not become interested in beer till I was 16, but became mildly addicted to tobacco around this time. Second was the time I was invited to stay over at his house. We ate and played and then went to bed. In his room were two beds, but before the lights were out even one minute, he was in my bed and had begun to molest me. I actually somehow quickly dressed and ran in the dark to my house, telling my mom what had happened. She told me I did the right thing. But the third thing is more relavent here. This boy, as did I somewhat, and many boys our age, had a fascination with things related to WW II. The year would have been 1957 (approx.). We all read comic books about the war. But this boy, and I by his influence, began to draw swastikas on our school notebooks, eventually covering them with the things. Eventually it came to an end, though I can't remember if we were admonished to stop or what.
       In 1960 my family moved to Silver Spring and then to Bethesda in Maryland. I was a child of 13, and quite naive, even gullible. In my 9th grade year we were shown a very powerful and graphic film of the concentration camp liberations in Germany/Europe. It was revelatory to me. Before this I had only a vague and childlike idea of war, of WW II and no real idea at all of what the Jewish people had suffered. To this day I wonder why my "friend" and I were not keelhauled for drawing the swastikas on our notebooks and dragging them through school for all to see. God is very gracious to have educated me in time to understand part of the history of the 20th century.

To Catholic87    

You wrote:  
“there's absolutely nothing special about the Jewish people that makes them better than anyone else, The Bible was written by PEOPLE not God, it's quite convenient …. if God really had "chosen people" than he wouldn't allow the Jews to become some of the weakest people in history. The perfect example is  the Holocaust, if God cares so much than why didn't He stop it?? Why did God let 6 million Jews die..

Dear Brother.
I am a Christian Catholic like your self. It grieves me to see your stance here.
First of all:
In every Holy Mass (the Catholic service) the priest reads from the Holy Bible. He then lifts the Book, kisses It and says: “This IS the Word of God”.
And the assembly answers in the affirmative: “Praised be You, Lord!”
Yet you say plainly: “The Bible was written by people”. And you state that it is coloured by human agendas. You doubt strongly about the Word of God, and thereby your whole belief is built on sand, if I may be so frank as to say so.
You see, even Jesus recognized the Old Covenant and the Holy Scripture in His time. He quoted It.. and He was Himself the fulfilment of the Law.. So how can you doubt the Old Testament without doubting everything that came after it?
You say there is nothing special about the Jewish people. In response to this opinion, our brothers inhere have already shown you some very good Bible passages to prove the obvious to you, and I need not repeat it. My recommendation is that you study the Word of God, while invoking the aid of the Holy Spirit to open the eyes of your heart. Especially the first letters of Paul tells us about the role of the Jewish people.. They were not better than all others but they were a people of belief, the first, in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and therefore the Lord-God blessed their ancestors and the stock of those who were faithful in generation after generation.  
It is written that God is forever faithful. That means He does not forget the Jewish people, the apple of His Eye.
The apostle Paul says that one of the signs of the end times is that the Israeli people will accept the Lamb of God, after the Word has been preached to all the peoples. They will receive Christ as their redeemer and the joy will be full, our joy too, for how can our big brothers of faith (as the Catholic Church calls the Jewish people) be left outside with out the pain of all. How can these prophesies correspond, if you wish to erase the Jewish identity altogether as well as their special role which the whole Bible testifies to?
Actually, it is also written in Sacred Scripture that God did not choose the people of Israel because of its great power and esteem.,. no, on the contrary He loved this people not because of their virtue but for His Own Name’s sake/the covenant and actually because they were the least of all nations (The Lord always had a weakness for the helpless, the small and the poor).
So I think we can all agree that the Jews of today have nothing to boast of, just like the rest of us have nothing to boast of.. we reap what someone else have sown, and “I have trodden the winepress alone”(Is 63.3) says the Lord, so let all pride disappear.
We can look up to the great fathers of faith, such as Abraham. Abraham was first to believe before he could get the great blessing that Our Lord wanted to give and we can bow down to Jesus Christ as sole redeemer.
Your passage about the Holocaust is an abomination to read, and I urge you to reconsider. You speak now like the mockers of Jesus when He was on the cross, which was also foretold in the Book of Wisdom*. These people had not understood that it was the Love of God Who suffered of Love, for love. To be very honest I believe that the sufferings of the Jewish people hold a secret which will be revealed one day everyone (and I think some Catholics in particular already have much knowledge, since there is some very deep teachings on the mystery of suffering in catholic faith) I cannot elaborate on that here.. I plainly admit I do not have the wisdom, but I do see the image of Jesus tortured and exhausted and the image of our fellow brothers in the death camps as something which is in someway linked.. I do not say this to favour the Jewish people but to declare there is no room for chance in God’s world. To state otherwise would only be a sign of lack of faith. Jesus own Passion should give us a hint to the secrets of suffering,..always remembering that He suffered immensely but also with the knowledge of Eternity. How often don’t we forget Eternity when we speak as modern men and woman and judge everything according to our own very narrow perspective.  
Sorry I write too long. I hope this could help you… I wish to get back to the star now * also for the fellow Christians who read this.. It is a most fantastic prophesy about Christ Jesus in the book of Wisdom and will help illustrate my point to you. I wish you all the best.
Yours in Christ,
Katarina <><
*Book of Wisdom 2:“The unjust men speak: “He – the upright man - claims to have knowledge of God… the very sight of him weighs our spirits down…he proclaims the final end of the upright as blessed, and boasts of having God for his father. Let us see if what he says is true, and test him to see what sort of end he will have. For IF THE URIGHT MAN IS GODS SON, GOD WILL HELP HIM…. Let us test him with cruelty and with torture.. put his gentleness and patience to the test. Lets condemn Him to a shameful death since God will rescue him – or so he claims.”
… This is the way they (the unjust) reason, but they are misled, since their malice makes them blind. They do not know the hidden things of God, ..they do not believe in a reward for blameless souls. For God created human beings to be immortal…” (Wisdom 2.2)

( I wonder why Luther wanted this out of the Bible? ... I was dumbfounded and praised the Lord when I discovered it in the "catholic and orthodox Bible"...
Brothers and sisters, you are always welcome to correct me if you find that I am incorrect.. I eg. am not very well versed in the Old Testament yet so I hope you bear with me.)

Dear Katarina,

You write:




I am not Catholic, but I am constrained to remind you that the book you refer to does say:

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. John 1

The Bible is NOT God, nor is it The Word referred to in John Chapter 1. It is the record or history of The Word : Yeshua ha Mashiach

Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. 13 And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account.

His and Him can only refer back to Jesus: the word of God spoken of in verse 12.

The Bible is the record of our "tutor": the law, and Yeshua's Testimony: Older and Newer, and the lessons and instructions of the 1st century church: given to guide us into fellowship with our Living God.

I have been noticing lately how many (denominational and other) statements of faith begin by exalting the Bible and it's infallibility. My statement must begin with God, His Son and His Holy Spirit; the Three in One and One in Three: They in whose mind the law and testimony were written from before the foundations of the world.

Without God the Bible is mute. God and faith in Him unlock the mystery of The Word.

1 Timothy 3:
16 Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness is great:
   He appeared in a body
      was vindicated by the Spirit,
   was seen by angels,
      was preached among the nations,
   was believed on in the world,
      was taken up in glory.

"He" can only be Jesus. God is a Person, not a book, notwithstanding the magnificent and God sent words of Genesis to Revelation.

Dear Dave.
You are absolutely right and I do not dissagree with you.
I admit I took a chance when I used caps and wrote "This IS the Word..." about the Bible.
Thereby I did not mean to equal the Word-Christ with the word-Bible for that would be a mistake and a great underestimation of the Word-Christ. My point was only to speak of the the word-Bible and say to my catholic brother that although catholic faith is not fundamentalist it does teach that the Bible is written by men under the inspiration by the Holy Spirit (it is not taught to be uncreated like the muslims say of the Quran) and it is living - as is experienced by the poeple who read it with faith. It is a book of truth and a tool for God and for men, for our aid. Therefore we must not pass sentence on this word which is highly blessed but we must understand that there are depths and wisdom therein that is unfathomable to the human mind and heart, why we need the Holy Spirit. I dont think we can rightly say that any man or church has yet grasped all that is spoken in this sacred book.
<><
- Katarina.
Thanks for the help, by the way, Dave, with the avatar... I found my own pictures too heavy though.

I disgaree. Jews are still the chosen people, because God's gifts and calling are without repentance:



In other words, bacause of the promises made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Jews will always, and forever will be, the natural elect, the chosen people.



It is so easy to say that Gentile Christians (take note, I am a Gentile Christian myself), the unnatural branches, were grafted in place of the Messianic Jews, the natural branches. Or, to paraphrase the text, "The Jews were rejected as the chosen so that the Church may become the Chosen." But Gentile Christians must always remember that we are only attached by default and not by design. The natural elect, the chosen of God, the natural branches, will always be the Jews.

As a Gentile Christian, I appeal to all other Gentiles not to boast that they are the new "Chosen". In a sense, we are, but only by FAITH and that doesn't change the fact that we are the "unnatural" branches, the "unnatural" elect, the "unnatural" chosen. Gentile Christians cannot afford to be proud and boast against God's chosen people.

The Bible, Old and New Testaments, was written by Torah though adamim- men. The point is this: Torah, Brit Haddash, and any piece of Scripture all comes down to this: The One called Y'shua Ha Nozri, Ha Mashiach, takes Yehudim and goyim from within and beyond Yisrael and saves them. Since nobody can fulfill Torah but Torah (Pesach), why do you we have these barriers? So, Am Yisrael and Am Yehudim were chosen, but should Yehudim and goyim hate each other? Or did we not all have the same Torah written in our hearts and minds somehow? Go back and read Romans or Mattityahu.

The Bible is  God in written form. I suggest you go and look back at Yochanahn and Paul's letters to Timothy.

Indeed, God may not have spared the natural branches, but they REMAIN the natural branches. We Gentiles did not become "naturalized" and they (the Jews who rejected the gospel) "denaturalized". The context of Romans 10-11 implies that the Jews spoken here were those who REJECTED the Gospel. The gentiles who accepted the Gospel are NOT to think of themselves in the same terms as the Jews, for the Gentile stands ONLY by faith. Pride, i.e, boastfulness, is NOT faith.



Indeed, broken off, yes cut off, (karet), but even the Jews who were cut off are STILL called "the natural branches" and Gentiles called "the unnatural branches". Show me where in the book of Romans, or even in the entire NT, or even the whole Bible, where the Jews who were cut off are called "unnatural branches."



I never said that Gentiles grafted in place of the Messianics. What St. Paul said was that believing Gentiles were grafted in the place of UNBELIEVING Jews. That still does not give believing Gentiles a right to boast against the unbelieving Jews.



I did not make the distinction: St. Paul did. Remember, he said, "The Jew FIRST..." Furthermore, St. Paul writes this:



In other words, as far as the election, the state of being CHOSEN, is concerned, they are still beloved because of the promise to the Patriarchs, i.e., Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Notice here that S. Paul is NOT talking about believing Jews but UNBELIEVING Jews as still beloved.



If they quote me, they will do so by misquoting me. They are still chosen, but one's eternal salvation is NOT dependent on being one of the elect. It all depends on faith. What I'm saying is, if a person who is NOT chosen accepts Jesus Christ, s/he will be saved. On the other hand, if a person is one of the elect but has no faith in Jesus Christ, that person will be damned, even if that person is elect. So rather than focus on being one of the "chosen", why not emphasize, or rather, CONFESS our utter unworthiness and accept God's grace through Jesus Christ.



I also remind you that even after your namesake David was anointed to be the new king in place of King Saul, David still called Saul "God's anointed" and refused to have anything to do with actually bringing harm to the king. Was not Saul rejected? Yes he was. Did David still call him the anointed one? Yes he did.

Replace "Saul" with "unbelieving Jew" and David with "Messianic/Christian" and "anointed one" with "chosen". Do you get the picture? Remember that rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and by speaking against God's elect one is in danger of rebelling against God himself.