Re: [asa] truth with love award

Iain,
I'm glad that you caught on. However, I'm wondering why it took a
roundabout route through Nicodemus. I'm citing Young, for he is the most
"literal" of translators: "for in the day of thine eating of it--dying
thou shalt die" (Genesis 2:17b). "THE DAY" And the old boy lived for over
nine centuries after eating. Good thing, for he and Eve had no children
before the Fall. The human race could have come to a sudden end. Dick
won't allow this, but there would have been a sudden end to the
covenantal race. The death noted can only be spiritual unless the passage
is revised eisegetically.

I know, some idjits will go for a day is a thousand years, so that Adam's
death fell within the "day." They carefully omit the other half of II
Peter 3:8 and don't dealing with Psalm 90:4 at all. I discovered long ago
that some brethren who sign an evangelical or even fundamentalist
statement of faith with an easy conscience can remake scripture to say
whatever they want it to say.
Dave

On Sat, 29 Jul 2006 19:47:13 +0100 "Iain Strachan"
<igd.strachan@gmail.com> writes:

Nicodemus is a scriptural pointer about not taking things too literally.
This is probably a bit tangiential for what you meant, but it was part of
my own journey, so I'd like to share it now.

<snip>
There remained one thorny problem. No death before the Fall. To accept
evolution and long ages, this key bit of doctrine was false & there was a
feeling of a slippery slope where the integrity of my faith was going to
be eroded.

It was about then, when on a long walk by myself, that I fell to thinking
about Nicodemus (did the Holy Spirit remind me gently?). So Nicodemus
goes for the absolute literal interpretation of "born again". "Go back
into your mother's womb and get born again? Eeeeuuch!" (Paraphrased,
but I think it is pretty funny anyway). Nicodemus is told it's not
literal - Christ wasn't referring to physical rebirth, but spiritual
rebirth. So the penny dropped, if it wasn't "that sort of birth" in
being born again, it didn't have to be that sort of death at the Fall.
In fact arguably the state of being "born again" reverses the effect of
the Fall. And then of course later in John 3:16 "Shall not perish but
have everlasting life" clearly doesn't mean we're not going to die
physically.

I can tell you the relief was enormous when this thought came to me! I
at last knew that I didn't have to resort to self-delusion to keep hold
of my faith. It was like being let out of a cage.

<snip>

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Received on Sat Jul 29 18:44:26 2006